Critics had mixed reviews for Wilfred Owens poetry. What were some of these contrasting opinions about Owen's poetry?

Owen's poetry often meets with mixed reviews, so to speak. One of the main reasons is that Owens writes about war in all of its ugliness and reality. In his poem, The Old Lie, for example, he talks about how when they go to war initially young men believe that it is a sweet gift to die for their country, but in the end, when they lie wounded on the battlefield, the only thing they are thinking is how much pain they are in and that they are "frightened men in pain, dying grusomely". In the end, he argues that they aren't fighting for a cause so much as they are fighting for their own lives.

This, of course, is not a popular sentiment.

Secondly, many suggest that he merely copied his mentor, Sassoon and that if it weren't for Sassoon editing the work and then promoting him, we might not even know Owens' poetry at all. Lastly, many suggest that he overly romanticizes and overly dramatizes situations where a more subtle hand would have been preferable .