Showing results by author "Siegfried Sassoon" in All Categories

A highly decorated English soldier and an acclaimed poet and novelist, Siegfried Sassoon won fame for his trilogy of fictionalized autobiographies that wonderfully capture the vanishing idylls of Edwardian England and the brutal realities of war. In this first novel of the semiautobiographical George Sherston trilogy, Sassoon wonderfully captures the vanishing idylls of the Edwardian English countryside.

Here are the extraordinary writings of a generation who fought through a war of unprecedented destructive power, and who had to find new voices to express the horror of what they discovered. The great names - Owen, Sassoon - are fully represented, but there are also many poems by lesser-known or unexpected figures, ranging from serving soldiers like Isaac Rosenberg and Richard Aldington to women such as Edith Nesbit and Vera Brittain.

In the midst of bombs and bullets, trenches and trauma, the soldiers of World War I, and those observing the horrors taking place from home, took pen to paper to record their experiences in verse. These poems - considered the greatest written during WWI and some of the greatest poetry of the twentieth century - show the horror of war but also shine a light on the strength of human courage, bravery, and virtue.

A collection of the greatest war poetry ever written, read by some of the 20th century’s most renowned actors. Tragedy, war and humanity are played out in these timeless readings of poetry written about, or on, the battlefield.

Siegfried Sassoon is one of the best-known of the plethora of First World War poets. His poem, Counter-Attack, was published in 1918 in Counter-Attack and other poems and describes the horror of life in the trenches of the Western Front.

George Sherston – the “I” of the book - is a shy, sensitive, and rather lonely boy living on the Kent/Sussex border in the early years of the 20th century. His great loves are sports, horses, and hunting, and the story is told through his gentle and comic adventures at point-to-point races or village cricket matches in a privileged pre-War England. The picture he paints of the Garden of England in the age of pony carts, bicycles, and very slow trains is enchanting. But this is also a poignant coming-of-age tale; with innocence and naivety abruptly crushed by the outbreak of War.