Regeneration extract

Regeneration- Chapter 13 Pg 134

'Yesterday, I felt like I was from a different Planet'

'You can talk to people here.'

'It's the last thing that this lot want to talk about.'

In this extract Prior highlights an emotion common among those who returned from war. The war, as it was for many, a 'different Planet' due to it's alien nature and completely different experience. Many involved tried to keep them separate from each other so that when they returned it would be like starting from where they left off. Jack Firebrace in Birdsong is a good example of this. His immediate responses from the letters from his wife are very limited. Despite news that his son is unwell he moves to eat 'quickly' before any emotion can be registered.

The extract also reveals an inability to associate with those who did not fight in WW1. Prior goes on to describe it as 'the club to end all clubs'. This is a sarcastic view of the war and also the term 'the war to end all wars' which became associated with WW1. Prior has a very hostile view towards the 'lot' that don't want to talk about the view. Prior becomes very hostile towards civilians that can be echoed in some of Sassoon's poetry where he describes them as 'smug-faced crowds' in his poem 'They' and in 'Glory of Women' he complains of how they 'worship decorations' or 'wounded in a mentionable place'. 

Sergent-Major Money by Robert Graves

Sergeant-Major Money

It wasn't our battalion, but we lay alongside it,

  So the story is as true as the telling is frank.

They hadn't one Line-officer left, after Arras,

  Except a batty major and the Colonel, who drank.

 

'B' Company Commander was fresh from the Depot,

  An expert on gas drill, otherwise a dud;

So Sergeant-Major Money carried on, as instructed,

  And that's where the swaddies began to sweat blood.

 

His Old Army humour was so well-spiced and hearty

  That one poor sod shot himself, and one lost his wits;

But discipline's maintained, and back in rest-billets

  The Colonel congratulates 'B' Company on their kits.

 

The subalterns went easy, as was only natural

  With a terror like Money driving the machine,

Till finally two Welshmen, butties from the Rhondda,

  Bayoneted their bugbear in a field-canteen.

 

Well, we couldn't blame the officers, they relied on Money;

  We couldn't blame the pitboys, their courage was grand;

Or, least of all, blame Money, an old stiff surviving

  In a New (bloody) Army he couldn't understand.

By Robert Graves

This poem is a narrative and tells a story of incompetence among soldiers as well as the physiological problems caused by war and what it can lead men to do. A simple break down of the poem shows this.

After a period at the front line, 'B' company is left with not one officer that fought with them (they have all been killed) except for a major who has been driven mad and a colonel who drinks to escape the horror (sound like any other characters we know). When the replacement officers arrive, they haven't had sufficient training or experience to effectively lead the company, so they leave it with a Sergeant Major who is a veteran of the pre-war army and the harsh discipline enforced before the horrific casualties of WW1. In this case it is the battle of Arras in 1917. While this is just over a year and a half from the end of the War, those involved would have no idea so morale and discipline is low. His 'humour' (discipline, ways of punishment, humour= dark, cruel, humiliating punishments for those who disobey his orders) leads to the men in the company to become angry/ suicidal. The officers, with no idea how they should run things without him, go easy on the men but are reliant on Money. In the end, two welsh soldiers kill him under the stress. The last Stanza is perhaps the most important. The morale of the story. No one is at fault except for the war and those prolonging it. The officers needed Money, the soldiers were pushed past the breaking point, and Money is unable to comprehend the huge changes to the army and so applies the only thing he knows to keep himself together. The 'New (bloody) army' is a brilliant play on words. The large scale recruitment through the war meant many people began to refer to the army as the New army. The members of the Pre-war army often found it hard to deal with the volunteers who had most their lives been clerks etc. However, the play on words hear is that is the use of the inclusion of the word 'Bloody'. This might be what Money referred to it as, but also it could mean the difference between the new and the old army is that the new one has been bloodied. People have died and fought in a scale uncomprehending to the old army members and so Money can't cope with it. This evokes pity but also shows the physiological effect of war. 

Use of the name Money-

I think that Graves deliberately chose to call his character money. It alludes to the War having capitalist motivations. He blames 'a terror like Money driving the machine'. Machine being war but also the manufacture of weapons etc. Many producers of arms made a fortune from the war. The line 'we couldn't blame the officers, they relied on Money'  also shows that for many people the war  provided them with a job and income , especially in the upper/middle classes, but this doesn't mean that they wanted the war to continue. But perhaps most importantly is Moneys death. Graves alludes to a sought of revolution where the working class (the pit boys) becomes fed up with the war profiteers etc and kills them. In this sense the poem is very much a subtle threat.

The Last Meeting by Siegfried Sassoon

I

Because the night was falling warm and still 
Upon a golden day at April’s end, 
I thought; I will go up the hill once more 
To find the face of him that I have lost, 
And speak with him before his ghost has flown
Far from the earth that might not keep him long. 

So down the road I went, pausing to see 
How slow the dusk drew on, and how the folk 
Loitered about their doorways, well-content 
With the fine weather and the waxing year.
The miller’s house, that glimmered with grey walls, 
Turned me aside; and for a while I leaned 
Along the tottering rail beside the bridge 
To watch the dripping mill-wheel green with damp. 
The miller peered at me with shadowed eyes
And pallid face: I could not hear his voice 
For sound of the weir’s plunging. He was old. 
His days went round with the unhurrying wheel. 

Moving along the street, each side I saw 
The humble, kindly folk in lamp-lit rooms;
Children at table; simple, homely wives; 
Strong, grizzled men; and soldiers back from war, 
Scaring the gaping elders with loud talk. 

Soon all the jumbled roofs were down the hill, 
And I was turning up the grassy lane
That goes to the big, empty house that stands 
Above the town, half-hid by towering trees. 
I looked below and saw the glinting lights: 
I heard the treble cries of bustling life, 
And mirth, and scolding; and the grind of wheels.
An engine whistled, piercing-shrill, and called 
High echoes from the sombre slopes afar; 
Then a long line of trucks began to move. 

It was quite still; the columned chestnuts stood 
Dark in their noble canopies of leaves.
I thought: ‘A little longer I’ll delay, 
And then he’ll be more glad to hear my feet, 
And with low laughter ask me why I’m late. 
The place will be too dim to show his eyes, 
But he will loom above me like a tree,
With lifted arms and body tall and strong.’ 

There stood the empty house; a ghostly hulk 
Becalmed and huge, massed in the mantling dark, 
As builders left it when quick-shattering war 
Leapt upon France and called her men to fight. 
Lightly along the terraces I trod, 
Crunching the rubble till I found the door 
That gaped in twilight, framing inward gloom. 
An owl flew out from under the high eaves 
To vanish secretly among the firs,
Where lofty boughs netted the gleam of stars. 
I stumbled in; the dusty floors were strewn 
With cumbering piles of planks and props and beams; 
Tall windows gapped the walls; the place was free 
To every searching gust and jousting gale;
But now they slept; I was afraid to speak, 
And heavily the shadows crowded in. 

I called him, once; then listened: nothing moved: 
Only my thumping heart beat out the time. 
Whispering his name, I groped from room to room. 

Quite empty was that house; it could not hold 
His human ghost, remembered in the love 
That strove in vain to be companioned still. 

II

Blindly I sought the woods that I had known 
So beautiful with morning when I came 
Amazed with spring that wove the hazel twigs 
With misty raiment of awakening green. 
I found a holy dimness, and the peace 
Of sanctuary, austerely built of trees, 
And wonder stooping from the tranquil sky. 

Ah! but there was no need to call his name. 
He was beside me now, as swift as light. 
I knew him crushed to earth in scentless flowers, 
And lifted in the rapture of dark pines. 
‘For now,’ he said, ‘my spirit has more eyes
Than heaven has stars; and they are lit by love. 
My body is the magic of the world, 
And dawn and sunset flame with my spilt blood. 
My breath is the great wind, and I am filled 
With molten power and surge of the bright waves 
That chant my doom along the ocean’s edge. 

‘Look in the faces of the flowers and find 
The innocence that shrives me; stoop to the stream 
That you may share the wisdom of my peace. 
For talking water travels undismayed. 
The luminous willows lean to it with tales 
Of the young earth; and swallows dip their wings 
Where showering hawthorn strews the lanes of light. 

‘I can remember summer in one thought 
Of wind-swept green, and deeps of melting blue, 
And scent of limes in bloom; and I can hear 
Distinct the early mower in the grass, 
Whetting his blade along some morn of June. 

‘For I was born to the round world’s delight, 
And knowledge of enfolding motherhood,
Whose tenderness, that shines through constant toil, 
Gathers the naked children to her knees. 
In death I can remember how she came 
To kiss me while I slept; still I can share 
The glee of childhood; and the fleeting gloom 
When all my flowers were washed with rain of tears. 

‘I triumph in the choruses of birds, 
Bursting like April buds in gyres of song. 
My meditations are the blaze of noon 
On silent woods, where glory burns the leaves.
I have shared breathless vigils; I have slaked 
The thirst of my desires in bounteous rain 
Pouring and splashing downward through the dark. 
Loud storm has roused me with its winking glare, 
And voice of doom that crackles overhead. 
I have been tired and watchful, craving rest, 
Till the slow-footed hours have touched my brows 
And laid me on the breast of sundering sleep.’ 

III

I know that he is lost among the stars, 
And may return no more but in their light. 
Though his hushed voice may call me in the stir 
Of whispering trees, I shall not understand. 
Men may not speak with stillness; and the joy 
Of brooks that leap and tumble down green hills 
Is faster than their feet; and all their thoughts 
Can win no meaning from the talk of birds. 

My heart is fooled with fancies, being wise; 
For fancy is the gleaming of wet flowers 
When the hid sun looks forth with golden stare. 
Thus, when I find new loveliness to praise,
And things long-known shine out in sudden grace, 
Then will I think: ‘He moves before me now.’ 
So he will never come but in delight, 
And, as it was in life, his name shall be 
Wonder awaking in a summer dawn,
And youth, that dying, touched my lips to song. 


Flixécourt. May 1916. 
Summary of what I think that the poem is about...

Analysis

• The Last Meeting was written in memory of David Thomas, a friend of Sassoon who had just been killed while fixing wire above the trenches. Its possible that the two had a homosexual relationship.
• ' I will go up the hill once more'- Sassoon will make his own assault on the hill in order to die alongside his body?
• 'To find the face of him that I have lost'- Sassoon is referring to his death,  but maybe he has forgotten his face. Like in Firebrace says in Birdsong, 'he let their white faces slip from memory'. Seeing so much death can affect you like that.
• 'Far from the earth that might not keep him long'- His body will compose and disappear or , as probable in the war, be eaten by rats or blown a way by a shell.
• Stanza second and third appear to be the same place but with one in war and the other in peace respectively. Or maybe it's Sassoon first impressions of the town and how it's just so different from the trenches several miles away.
• 'Strong, grizzled men; and soldiers back from war,'- A first read through this and you might not see it, but the use of the semicolon seems to say that there are strong, grizzled men and then there are soldiers. He could be implying that the soldiers have not become stronger; but weaker due to exhaustion and bad conditions.
• 'Scaring the gaping elders with loud talk.' Like the the quote 'in peace, sons bury their fathers. In war, fathers bury their sons', there seems to be roll reversal here. Older people generally scare youngsters but here war has made them the people with the stories.
•   ‘A little longer I’ll delay, And then he’ll be more glad to hear my feet' I think here Sassoon is considering dying. He seems to be saying that he will stop fighting and just let himself be killed. Leaving it longer will also please David. It's a very personal line, and Sassoon includes his friends feelings to show this. 

Suicide in the trenches by Siegfried Sassoon

Suicide in the Trenches 
by Siegfried Sassoon (1917) 

I knew a simple soldier boy 
Who grinned at life in empty joy, 
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark, 
And whistled early with the lark.

In winter trenches, cowed and glum, 
With crumps and lice and lack of rum, 
He put a bullet through his brain. 
No one spoke of him again.

You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye 
Who cheer when soldier lads march by, 
Sneak home and pray you'll never know 
The hell where youth and laughter go. 


First impressions of the poem-
When reading, I was struck by it's simplicity. The simple AA,BB rhyme pattern has been used many times before but I found that this example
was particularly powerful. The content of the poem is it's self simple- Suicide. While the reasons behind are complicated, the act itself is straight forward. This is echoed throughout the poem.

AO4- Common themes
The disdain that the poet feels towards the 'smug faced crowds' is also in other literature. Sassoon in regeneration is prescribed to have a 'hatred' towards the people at home. In many letters, this view comes across.

As part of my further reading, I have begun to read Erich Maria Remarque's All quiet on the Western front. First published in 1928 it was , like many WW1 texts, written by a war veteran. But unlike the novels that we have begun in class this text is written for the German perspective. For many who know very little about the war it may seem as if this would make a large difference. But from the first chapter of the book its clear that it makes no difference as you are immersed in an image that could originate from any of the many nations of the war.

The text is obviously a novel, written as a first person narrative by the protagonist Paul Baumer. It focuses on his and his group of friends experience as they go through the war. What is immediately obvious is the way that all the characters treat death in such a blase way. The cook is only 'staggered' because hes cooked for double the number of people that are still alive. This is not surprising. With so many people getting killed soldiers would appear immune to the horrors they experienced. This doesn't mean that it didn't affect them; far from it. But to survive something as dreadful as WW1 without losing your sanity (as many people did- shell shock) you would have to exist in some sort of dream state. The soldiers take full advantage of the extra quantity of food, happily taking the rations of those 'pushing up daisies'. Language like that gives it a surreal feel. The way war changes people is, in my view, perfectly surmised in the first chapter. Remarque, through Paul, describes the way vocabulary changes due to what you go through and how 'it is impossible to express oneself in any other way so clearly' without revealing how bad the war was. It wasn't until the 1960's (at least in Britain) that the Blackadder view of the war became a popular view on how the war was conducted. Both my Great Grandfathers were in the war but they never spoke about the experiences their children . I know that one was wounded seven times and I have a letter detailing a brief engagement where men were killed. But, as in the book, its done in a casual way. Its was not uncommon for people to not want to talk about the war for reasons that we all know. 

With the family history out the way, the first chapter of the book describes the reason the 'boys' joined up. Following the brilliant description of the school teacher, Remarque, in a fashion that was mirrored across Europe, explains why young men joined up in the early years. 'Under his shepherding' the whole of his class joined up because they 'had to fall into line'. People 'loved their country' but that's only part of the reason they would join up. The threat of being 'ostracized' by the ones that you love would force even the strongest of willed people to join. If a similar situation existed today, sadly,it would not surprise me if the same thing happened.

I'm not sure if this is the kind of work you asking for Miss Prosser, so I just wrote whatever.