The unwritten rule of WWI art and literature

 

With the 100th anniversary of the end of World War One fast approaching, I have been reflecting on the art and literature associated with this particularly tragic conflict. My paternal Grandfather was a Corporal in The Royal Engineers and fought at Battle of the Somme. As a teenager, I read his letters home from the trenches and his experiences had a profound affect on how I viewed the History of the period. I went on to study History at university and then taught it for over a decade in Secondary schools.

As part of my teaching career, I have addressed the facts of the 1914-18 conflict many times, but it is in the art and literature associated with the era that I have always felt the nearest approximation of the horrors of that war are truly conveyed. My favourite novels dealing with the war are Pat Barker’s Regeneration trilogy, which neither glorifies nor shies away from the darkness experienced by the men who fought on the Western Front. They are also wonderfully written novels that explore the complexities of the emotional and physical effects of the war on both soldiers and civilians.

Whether it is through the poetry of Sassoon and Owen or the paintings of Paul Nash and Stanley Spencer, or even the satire of Blackadder and Horrible Histories, the horrors, banality and, at times, comic realities of the war have been extremely well chronicled. So what is the unwritten rule that governs all the truly great art of World War One?

It is simply that there should be no glorification of conflict and violence. This is because the war of 1914-18 squandered young lives in their hundreds of thousands. There is no glory in dying for your country in this manner. That is what Wilfred Owen taught us in his poem Dulce et Decorum est and I, for one, have never forgotten the lesson.

So it does concern me to witness a new type of writing emerge, one which uses gratuitous violence to explore the impact of World War One. The BBC drama Peaky Blinders I feel falls into this trap. The 1920s gangsters who populate this series have been inured to violence because of their experiences in the trenches, we are led to believe. Yet this violence does not remain an unseen menace within the series, but is played out with unflinching detail in pretty much every episode. To me, this breaches the unspoken understanding amongst writers and artists that WWI should not be used to celebrate man’s inhumanity to man. Instead, it should be used only to guard against other such futile wars happening in the future.

Dramas like Peaky Blinders make me worry that 100 years is too long; that we have forgotten the message  those wonderful artists worked so hard to convey. I sincerely hope not. Sometimes, rule breaking just isn’t appropriate or clever.

War has traditionally generated great art, but the great stuff doesn’t set out to glorify, celebrate or use violence for entertainment. If the 100th anniversary of this war to end all wars teaches us writers anything, it should teach us that.

 

 

Reading suggestions for Remembrance Sunday

On Remembrance Sunday, it is an appropriate time to pause and think about the conflicts that are being commemorated in services and parades across the UK. A very good way to approach this task is through an exploration of the poetry and literature of the 20th Century, which has invoked the reality of war for the soldiers and personnel who participated. There are many titles to choose from, and in order to narrow the choices down a little, I have focussed on books dealing with the First World War of 1914-18.

If you are considering some reading materials to help you to understand this conflict better and the impact it had on the lives of contemporaries, these are my suggestions:

‘The Regeneration Trilogy’ by Pat Barker is, in my opinion, the definitive collection of novels set during WWI. The first of the books, Regeneration, won the Booker Prize in 1995 but don’t let that put you off!
Famously, it deals with the relationship between an army psychologist, W.H.R Rivers and the poet Siegfried Sassoon. It chronicles the psychological impact of the war as well as its futility. It is a good book, but stick with the trilogy as the next two parts I absolutely loved.
‘The Eye in the Door’, her second instalment, continues with the story of Billy Prior, another damaged young man who has to return to the front after his treatment by Rivers. The next two books deal with the effects of the war on ordinary people’s lives. It also depicts women’s war work and the realities of the ‘Home Front’.
The whole trilogy is beautifully written and the psychological impact of the conflict is masterfully dealt with. To my mind, these books give a far more wide-ranging perspective on the war than Sebastian Faulks’ ‘Birdsong’ which I have always found to be overrated.

There are also several excellent works exploring the war from the German perspective, which I detail in the list below, alongside the powerful poetry of the period.

Other titles to try:

‘The Penguin Book of First World War Poetry’, ed by Matthew George Walter.

‘Strange Meeting’ by Susan Hill.
‘Journey’s End’ by R.C Sherriff.
For the German perspective:
‘Storm of Steel’ by Ernst Junger.
‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ by Erich Maria Remarque.

And biographical works:

Testament of Youth, by Vera Brittain

Goodbye To All That, by Robert Graves

‘Lest We Forget’