"Love" in 1915, but "mud" by 1917: The words that most frequently pop up in World War One poetry.

The title says it all.

Reddit user u/est-1913 used The Poetry Foundation's information to create a visual representation of the most common words used in World War One poetry.

Knowing what we know of The Great War, its brutality, its outcome, etc., what's striking is the emotional progression of how the war finds itself represented in language, which u/est-1913 displays in the following graph.

"Love" leads the way in the hopeful beginning stages of the war in 1915. Two years of trench warfare later, and "mud" dominates poems by 1917.

In the decade following the war, "dead," "died," and "time" become most commonly used.

Love. Mud. Dead. Time.

The history of World War One in four words.

It doesn't take much to wonder why.