The Shield of Achilles I believe Auden's poem, The Shield of Achilles, is meant to show the stark reality of life. He points out that people sometimes like to ignore the severity of situations and look at the happier sides of them. Auden appears to have adapted Achilles' shield to real-life situations such as war, sacrifice, rape, and murder. Instead of "Marble well-governed cities and ships upon untamed seas, there was "an artificial wilderness and …showed first 75 words of 382 total…

…showed last 75 words of 382 total…disintegrating we will all turn out like "iron-hearted man-slaying Achilles." I believe that Auden wrote this poem trying to relate the fact that there is no glory in rape, killing, and fighting. He also is trying to convey the message that we need to take a look at where the world is headed. As a society we need to stop becoming so complacent and start to re-evaluate the way we think and live. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ **Bibliography**