Strange Meeting by Wilfred Owen | Summary in English

Summary in English of the poem Strange Meeting by Wilfred Owen

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Is it possible that you can be enemy of someone you have never met, who did no wrong to you? Apparently, you can be. All you need is a uniform, an ideology, an oversimplified story, the lack of ability to think critically to question your own actions, and following something or someone blindly.

The poem Strange Meeting by Wilfred Owen opens with the speaker describing how he seemed to have escaped from a battle down into a deep, dark tunnel that had been carved by previous wars, emphasising that war has always been a part of humanity. This poem is imaginary.

In the tunnel, the speaker finds people suffering, moaning, and sleeping at the same time. They could also be dead. As the speaker stares at them, one of them jumps up and stares back at him with a look of pity and as if he has recognised the speaker. The woken soldier lifts his hands sadly, as if to bless the speaker. From the soldier's lifeless smile, the speaker realises they are standing in Hell.

The soldier's face is etched with a thousand fears, but there is no blood. Also, there is no sound of battle that could reach them there. The speaker tells the soldier in order to comfort him, that there is no need to mourn in this place. The soldier replies that he mourns for the years of life he had lost and for the loss of hope. He says that whatever hopes and dreams the speaker had from life, he had them too. The soldier, when alive, had desperately ran after the wildest beauty in the world, a beauty not found in physical appearance and could last forever.

The man is upset that if he had lived, his laughter could have made many happy, and his tears over his experiences of war would have shown some truth about how meaningless war is - but now that he is dead, the truth that he could share with the world can also not be told. He predicts that other men will either accept the death and damage of war quietly, or will get very angry and keep spilling more blood.

The soldier says he had courage, mystery, wisdom and mastery in life. He wished he could have revealed truths to the people about war. The soldier lamens that he had to pour out his spirit through violence instead of through peaceful acts.

The soldier then reveals that he was the enemy the speaker had killed in the battle the other day. He had stabbed the soldier with his bayonet. The soldier had tried to defend himself at that time, but could not and he was killed. Now that they recognised each other, the two agrees to rest together in Hell.

Though the soldier was killed by the speaker, he still called him "my friend." The poem suggests war turns people who could have been friends into enemies. Even in death, the soldier tried to convey to the speaker and the reader the reality he learned - the pity and meaninglessness of war.

The poem explores the shared humanity of two enemy soldiers, showing war's cruelty and uselessness through their meeting in Hell. Though divided in life, both grieve the waste of life and lost hopes caused by war. The poem gives a sad and critical view of war's destruction.

Through the poem, the poet is asking the readers to turn from violence to solidarity.

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