Owen Begins as Lay Assistant to the Vicar of Dunsden
Poet involved
What happened
Unable to afford university after failing to win a scholarship, Owen accepts an unpaid position as lay assistant to the Reverend Herbert Wigan at All Saints' Church in Dunsden, Oxfordshire. In return for free lodging and tuition, he teaches Bible classes, leads prayer meetings, and visits the parish poor.
Literary impact
Owen's eighteen months in Dunsden exposed him to rural poverty and human suffering on a personal scale, deepening his empathy and his critical view of institutional religion. His disillusionment with the Church's failure to alleviate suffering would later inform the angry, pitying tone of his war poetry and his rejection of easy religious consolation.
Source: Wikipedia
