“Strange Meeting” Introduction

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“Strange Meeting” Summary

“Strange Meeting” Themes

• 

  The Horrors of War

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• 

  Reconciliation and Solidarity

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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Strange Meeting”

• Lines 1-3

  It seemed that out of battle I escaped
  Down some profound dull tunnel, long since scooped
  Through granites which titanic wars had groined.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 4-8

  Yet also there encumbered sleepers groaned,
  Too fast in thought or death to be bestirred.
  Then, as I probed them, one sprang up, and stared
  With piteous recognition in fixed eyes,
  Lifting distressful hands, as if to bless.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 9-10

  And by his smile, I knew that sullen hall,—
  By his dead smile I knew we stood in Hell.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 11-13

  With a thousand fears that vision's face was grained;
  Yet no blood reached there from the upper ground,
  And no guns thumped, or down the flues made moan.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 14-17

  “Strange friend,” I said, “here is no cause to mourn.”
  “None,” said that other, “save the undone years,
  The hopelessness.
  Whatever hope is yours,
  Was my life also;

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 17-21

  I went hunting wild
  After the wildest beauty in the world,
  Which lies not calm in eyes, or braided hair,
  But mocks the steady running of the hour,
  And if it grieves, grieves richlier than here.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 22-25

  For by my glee might many men have laughed,
  And of my weeping something had been left,
  Which must die now. I mean the truth untold,
  The pity of war, the pity war distilled.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 26-29

  Now men will go content with what we spoiled.
  Or, discontent, boil bloody, and be spilled.
  They will be swift with swiftness of the tigress.
  None will break ranks, though nations trek from progress.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 30-33

  Courage was mine, and I had mystery;
  Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery:
  To miss the march of this retreating world
  Into vain citadels that are not walled.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 34-36

  Then, when much blood had clogged their chariot-wheels,
  I would go up and wash them from sweet wells,
  Even with truths that lie too deep for taint.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 37-39

  I would have poured my spirit without stint
  But not through wounds; not on the cess of war.
  Foreheads of men have bled where no wounds were.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 40-44

  “I am the enemy you killed, my friend.
  I knew you in this dark: for so you frowned
  Yesterday through me as you jabbed and killed.
  I parried; but my hands were loath and cold.
  Let us sleep now. . . .”

  

  

  

  

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“Strange Meeting” Symbols

• 

  The Tunnel

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• 

  Blood

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• 

  Citadels

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• 

  Chariot-Wheels

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• 

  Sweet Wells/Water

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“Strange Meeting” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• End-Stopped Line

  

  

  

  

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• Enjambment

  

  

  

  

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• Caesura

  

  

  

  

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• Simile

  

  

  

  

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• Parallelism

  

  

  

  

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• Diacope

  

  

  

  

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• Apostrophe

  

  

  

  

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• Personification

  

  

  

  

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• Synecdoche

  

  

  

  

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• Alliteration

  

  

  

  

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• Assonance

  

  

  

  

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• Consonance

  

  

  

  

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• Allusion

  

  

  

  

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• Metaphor

  

  

  

  

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“Strange Meeting” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• Profound
• Dull
• Granites
• Groined
• Encumbered
• Fast
• Bestirred
• Probed
• Piteous
• Distressful
• Sullen
• Vision
• Grained
• Upper ground
• Flues
• Running
• Richlier
• Distilled
• Spoiled
• Tigress
• Progress
• Citadels
• Cess
• Parried
• Loath

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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Strange Meeting”

• Form

• Meter

• Rhyme Scheme

“Strange Meeting” Speaker

“Strange Meeting” Setting

Literary and Historical Context of “Strange Meeting”

More “Strange Meeting” Resources

• External Resources

  • The Poetry of World War I — A list of poems written about and during World War I, broken down by year, from the Poetry Foundation.

  • World War I — A detailed timeline for the First World War, put together by the BBC.

  • "Strange Meeting" Read Aloud — Alex Jennings reads Owen's poem in its entirety.

  • Benjamin Britten's "Strange Meeting" — A performance of the British composer Benjamin Britten's "War Requiem," which includes a musical adaptation of Owen's "Strange Meeting."

  • The Life of Wilfred Owen — A detailed biography of Owen from the Poetry Foundation.

  • The Rear Guard — Siegfreid Sasoon's poem, "The Rear Guard," which influenced Owen's "Strange Meeting."

• LitCharts on Other Poems by Wilfred Owen

  • 1914

  • Anthem for Doomed Youth

  • Disabled

  • Dulce et Decorum Est

  • Exposure

  • Futility

  • Mental Cases

  • Spring Offensive

  • The Next War