Comment: The ANZAC Legacy

Interesting point that I wasn't aware of. I would have thought however that the use of "condemn" is more appropriate to the sense of the poem than "contemn", given that the subject of the sentence that the verb refers to is "the years." "Condemn" is also the passing of sentence and I believe that this is the sense that is being used here. ie, they are being condemned to old age.

Laurence Binyon, a 45 year old Quaker in 1914, read Classics at Oxford where he won a prize for poetry.The poem " For the Fallen " was published in 1914 after 2,500,00 soldiers fought the Battle of the Marne, where the casualties on both sides were nearly 500,000. I am sure he deliberated on his choice of words, and I would not attempt to second guess the meaning of any words he chose to use.

This is a complete fabrication. The word contemn HAS NEVER formed part of this wonderful poem. The poem was first published in The Times in in 1914 with the word condemn. It was subsequently published in the same form over and over, before this spelling emerged in recent decades.

Every year this little furphy gets a run somewhere and creates a completely unnecessary distraction away from the central theme both of this poem, and of Anzac Day itself, which is to remember and pay our respects for those who did not return from battlefields all around the world. For those of us who never served in our armed services, it's also an opportunity to thank those who did our dirty work for us.

I would refer people to the official Anzac Day website, which addresses this very point: http://www.anzacday.org.au/education/tff/rememwords.html