Tim O'Brien quotes the line in the book If I Die in a Combat Zone, Box Me Up and Ship Me Home.In his book And No Birds Sang, chronicling his service in Italy with the Canadian army during the Second World War, Farley Mowat quotes Wilfred Owen's poem on the opening pages and addresses 'the Old Lie' in the final section of the book.In the film ' All Quiet on the Western Front' a teacher quotes this early on while talking to his class.The film Johnny Got His Gun ends with this saying, along with casualty statistics since World War I.The title of Damon Knight's 1955 short story ' Dulcie and Decorum' is an ironic play on the first three words of the phrase the story is about computers that induce humans to kill themselves.In a school essay German playwright Bertolt Brecht referred to the phrase as 'Zweckpropaganda' (cheap propaganda for a specific cause) and pointed out, that 'It is sweet er and more fitting to live for one's country.'.'Died some, pro patria, non 'dulce' non 'et decor'.' from part IV of Ezra Pound's ' Hugh Selwyn Mauberley', a damning indictment of World War I 'Daring as never before, wastage as never before.'.In the final lines of the poem, the Horatian phrase is described as 'the old lie.' It is believed and illustrated by the original copy of the poem, that Owen intended to dedicate the poem ironically to Jessie Pope, a popular writer who glorified the war and recruited 'laddies' who 'longed to charge and shoot' in simplistically patriotic poems like 'The Call.' Owen's poem describes a gas attack during World War I and is one of his many anti-war poems that were not published until after the war ended. Perhaps the most famous modern use of the phrase is as the title of a poem, ' Dulce Et Decorum Est', by British poet Wilfred Owen during World War I.

So, let us drink to the health of the homeland.' Ergo, bibamus pro salute patriae.' A reasonable English translation would be: 'It is sweet and fitting to die for the homeland, but sweeter still to live for the homeland, and sweetest yet to drink for the homeland. Ī humorous elaboration of the original line was used as a toast in the 19th century: 'Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, sed dulcius pro patria vivere, et dulcissimum pro patria bibere. Our youth should learn let steed and spearĪ back that cowers, or loins that quake. In John Conington's translation, the relevant passage reads: The poem from which the line comes exhorts Roman citizens to develop martial prowess such that the enemies of Rome, in particular the Parthians, will be too terrified to resist them.

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