Siegfried Sassoon Books

Continuing tale of the Cambridge-educated English Officer living the hell of warfare on the Western Front: replete with adoring batman, blustering colonel Blimps, out of control colonials (Australians and Canadians), journeys to England on home leave to meet misinformed civilians. Sasson has a style that waxes between light and lyrical, cynical and dark and starkly realistic. It is reminiscent of Graves but less dark than Blunden.

This is a tale of the human mind (an upper crust mind) that makes the journey from old world to that of the lost generation -- but Sassoon never loses himself. It shows that the mind-set was already there capable of dissecting and throwing away the old world view tradition. With capable honesty Sassoon relates the contradictions in life, army and mind set of the pre-war generation. He still takes advantage of the liesure of the educated class; his batman pours his tea, he still sees the colonials as slightly quaint and backwards (especially the Australians), still finds refuge among his educated Cambridge intellectuals -- this is no tale of class struggle.

This book can read as part of his trilogy lifestyle or on its own. It has many haunting vignettes and is perhaps one of the top 5 WWI memoirs. Highly recommended.

Siegfreid Sassoon's wonderful war memoir is thinly disguised as the story of George Sherston. Based solely on Sassoon's life in the trenches of WWI, it recounts the horror and scale of carnage that occurred. More importantly it shows the emotionally scars that the survivors carried with them as a result of exposure.

Sherston (Sassoon) was a rather spoiled and pampered young upper class Englishman. The war changed all that. Confronted with death, destruction and idiotic leadership from the High Command you sense the inner turmoil of Sherston.

Relieved when he is not involved with the fighting he is driven by guilt over the loss of the soldiers in his battalion. Consequently when his platoon is on the line he takes great risks in reconaissance of the German positions.

The effects of non-stop total war, stupid leadership and the complete contrast between England and the trenches (only a few hundred miles apart) is staggering to Sassoon. Sassoon becomes anti-war and considers becoming an objector, but his obvious connection to his comrades and loyalty to them wins out in the end. He hates the war but won't abandon his comrades in the field.

This is a great war memoir written by a poet who survived and was changed for life by his experiences in it.

While perhaps best known for his poetry written during WWI, Siegfried Sassoon was a very talented wordsmith in general, a trait that is demonstrated in his second semi-fictionalized autobiography, "Memoirs of an Infantry Officer". Sassoon chose to fictionalize his accounts of his life, an odd technique that allows him to distance himself from these experiences as he intimately describes the raw emotion and response behind them. In his three memoirs he is George Sherston, a thinly veiled version of himself, who thinnly veils the real-life characters he encountered during these times.

Readers are automatically flung into Sassoon's war experience, from the disjointed and fantastical training, to the brutal reality of life in the trenches. Sassoon describes these experiences in vivid detail, the sheer misery of trench warfare, the almost callous attitude toward the dead on both sides, and the surreal life led by those back home. Sassoon, nicknamed "Mad Jack" for his stubborness and seemingly sheer lunacy at times, was awfully lucky during his battle campaigns. He was wounded a few times, always sent back home to England to recuperate, and almost happy to return to the war.

However, after one session as an invalid, Sassoon begins to recognize that the war may not be all it's cracked up to be, that those in power are not telling the truth about their war aims, and that he may just be a lowly pawn in a game he doesn't want to play. Towards the end of his narrative, Sassoon tells of his decision to speak out against the war, even if it meant being court martialed. This act, filtered with courage and fear, is achingly portrayed as an act both necessary and questionable: as Sassoon places himself in danger, he questions his true beliefs in the matter. This account ends just as Sassoon enters the hospital in Scotland, avoiding court martial with a diagnosis of shell shock, 'lucky' as usual.

"Memoirs of an Infantry Officer" is a vividly descriptive account of life in the trenches during WWI. Sassoon is a gifted storyteller, who can make even the direst settings come to life. He offers a unique insight into the soldier poets who first questioned whether or not war was such a noble and glorious pursuit and if the sacrifice of lives was worth the price in the end. While a little slow at times, the last quarter of the narrative which details Sassoon's questioning of the war, is a brilliantly written firsthand look at how a too little celebrated writer finally found his voice.

Terrific book that sounded a bit autobiographical. Sassoon, of course, was a war hero on the battle of the Somme, decorated twice for bravery.

The book reads lyrically and is convey's nicely the daily life of soldiers moving back and forth from the front fighting trenches to the rear area of the battle field. He also does a great job portraying the strangeness and inner conflict of being back in British society (while recovering from illness) with people who know nothing of the war or its cost to the participants.

A Brit's version of "All Quiet ..."

Siegfried Sassons' "Memoirs of an Infantry Officer" is a first-hand account of life at the front line during World War 1. This is not a just a historical document or diary however. Sassoon writes via an alter-ego called George. In real life, Sassoon was an infantry officer who fought at the front, but eventually grew suspicious of the reasons for the continuation of World War 1, and as such became a dissenter. This book may be fiction, but it is based on fact and it gives an impressive account of what life must have been like in those trenches, nearly a hundred years ago. Sassoon's incredible ability with words paints a much more vivid picture than any war movie will ever provide.

George was a middle-class officer who had the luxury of a university education and was an avid reader of classic English literature. He juxtaposes the themes and ideas in this romantic poetry with the realities of life at the front to great effect. Although a tad repetitive in it's ideas (perhaps to get the point across clearly), this book is rewarding and still relevant this whole century later. As one character in the book says, "In war-time the word patriotism means suppression of truth" .

If you haven't read Regeneration, you are making a big mistake if you read The Eye in the Door before Regeneration. Regeneration sets the stage for The Eye in the Door and provides much background information that you need to appreciate this book.

Those who liked the first book in the Regeneration trilogy, Regeneration, will absolutely adore The Eye in the Door. The characters from Regeneration return, and you have a chance to find out the consequences of the treatments they received from Dr. William Rivers in Regeneration. Pat Barker builds on the tensions, damage, doubts, and despair of mid-World War I to show how much more desperate matters were for the British by the spring of 1918.

In developing these themes, Pat Barker does a masterful job of explaining how a soldier has to operate both by emotion and by objective distance in order to function. From there, she helps us use the crucible of war to see how that duality is important to everyday functioning for all people.

As the title indicates, the book builds on a central metaphor of everyone being under observation as doubts build about Britain's ability to win the war. Those on the margins are most under pressure and at greatest risk.

I thought that the portrayal of Lieutenant Billy Prior was brilliant. He comes across as the kind of complex, interesting character that can help us learn a lot about Ms. Barker's messages for us. The eye metaphor is nicely developed in the context of Billy's life.

Brava, Ms. Barker!

THE EYE IN THE DOOR is the second installment in Pat Barker's marvelous Regeneration trilogy. In this volume the principle characters of Dr. Rivers and Prior have left Criaglockhart War Hospital and are now living in London. Although Dr. Rivers has taken a new position treating shell-shock soldiers who have returned from the front in France, he continues to keep in touch and treat his former patients from Criaglockhart, especially Prior. Amidst the bombing and blackouts of wartime London, Prior continues to suffer from war neurosis as he embarks on solving a mystery that involves his childhood friends and acquaintances. He is confronted by England's societal fixation with fear and scapegoating of those who are believed to deter from the war effort (mainly war deserters and homosexuals). Individuals are often forced to hide their true attributes from society during this time of societal finger pointing and blaming. As in the previous volume of this trilogy, the characters of Prior and Dr. Rivers are well developed and nuanced. I continually enjoy reading about their trials and tribulations, and look forward to reading the third and final volume in this trilogy.

THE EYE IN THE DOOR (spoilers)

Ms Barker's epigraph, a quote from Stevenson, sets the tone: "It was on the moral side, and in my own person, that I learned to recognize the thorough and primitive duality of man. I saw that, of the two natures that contended in the field of my consciousness, even if I could rightly be said to be either, it was only because I was radically both."

I am hampered in critiquing the trilogy, since I've read only the first two works, REGENERATION and THE EYE IN THE DOOR. The first of these concentrates on the relation between the enlightened, humane Dr Rivers and the war hero/war protester Siegfried Sassoon, who has been labeled a war neurotic ("shell-shocked") in order to avoid confronting his rational case against the war. Both Rivers and Sassoon are historical characters who the author effectively fictionalizes (their dialogues, etc).

The second novel focuses on the relation between Rivers and Billy Prior, a relatively minor character in the first. The book is set on a wider stage than REGENERATION, which was confined to the (real) mental hospital of Craiglockhart in Scotland. Here we are in London, during the crisis produced by the initial success of the Germans' spring offensive in 1918. As happens during defeats, the search is on for scapegoats seen as undermining the war effort, groups like pacifists and ... who are seen as destroying the nation's "moral fiber." Ludicrously, the leading anti-... crusader, lays the blame on the Germans, who are said to have sent homosexual agents over before the war to corrupt English youth.

Billy Prior, on medical leave from the front, works for a counter-intelligence agency, but his loyalties are divided, since his earliest friends are pacifists and "conchies" (conscientious objectors). The result of these divided loyalties is a split consciousness, where the fugue state ("Hyde") takes over at times, doing things that the "daytime" Billy is not aware of, but whose consequences nevertheless he must face. It is this split consciousness that Rivers must deal with-and on one occasion, he deals directly with "Hyde," who speaks of Billy in the third person.

At the crisis of the novel, Billy's alter ego betrays his closest friend, something that the daytime Billy at first denies doing, but which he finally comes to suspect he has actually done. Rivers treats the psychological phenomenon by making Billy see that it is basically Oedipal, that he actually wished to kill his father, who had, in Billy's sight and hearing, beat and abused his mother. One manifestation of this hatred is "Hyde's": punching the agent provocateur Spragge, who looks like Billy's father. To complicate the issue, his father is a socialist/pacifist, a fact which may contribute to Billy's ambivalent attitude to his pacifist friends, one of whom he helps, as he betrays the other.

Sassoon make another appearance here, having gone back to France (partly at Rivers' suggestion), and once again been wounded (by friendly fire). But Sassoon's appearance doesn't seem to contribute to the plot of this novel, tho it may have a role to play in the trilogy as a whole. (Maybe his divided consciousness is relevant, since he was very effective at killing Germans, but at home becomes a "dove") Another seemingly extraneous thread is Manning, one of Billy's sex partners.

But basically a rich novel, recalling a key point in Western history. In many ways, WWI was more traumatic than WWII, since it occurred after almost a century or relative peace in Europe. And, as Barker makes clear, WWI was harder on soldiers than was WWII.

Trivia: Why were French troops show on the covers of the paper editions of the first two novels? They play no role in the novels themselves (tho they played the major role on the Western Front).

People existing against a war background-normal people doing normal things whilst shouldering the burden of their experiences, their fears and societies norms and expectations.

A lovely book that always has the lightest of touches in the darkest of moments. Nothing is simple and nothing is complicated, but everything is ambiguous and dwarfed by "the front" and what is expected.

The writing is always simple, but the ideas, concepts and dilemmas dealt with are complex and impossible to resolve. Class and duty are themes; the most interesting theme in my opinion is that of being a pacifist, a father figure to your men and a violent war hero simultaneously. (By the nature of things, war heroes are violent.)

My one regret is that I have only just realised that this book is part of a trilogy and that I have read it out of sequence... although on the positive side it means I have two more books to explore. I would strongly recommend this book; I have just gone and bought one of Sassoon's books as a direct result of it awakening school hood poems by him and Wilfred Owens.

After reading "Regeneration", the second novel of the trilogy "Eye in the Door" expands in terms of characterization and plot complexity. Whereas Regeneration is superb in its exploration of the consciousness of Siegfreid Sassoon and his psychiatrist, Dr. River; Eye in the Door expands the character of Billy Prior to become one of the most psychologically well developed and complex characters in English fiction.

Billy Prior , a bisexual, has both male and female lovers in this novel. These relationships are embedded in the homophobic atmosphere of war torn London. Prior, suffering from "shell shock" struggles with his identify of war hero and pacifism. He struggles with childhood trauma in a society where repressesions are let lose in a war charged atmospher.

The book is beautifully written. Whereas Regeneration explores Sassoon's struggles to brng meaning into a meaningless situation, Eye in the Door explores more of the societal struggles with the war and individual reactions to the pressures of a war time society.

I loved this book and would give it 10 stars if I could.

I had heard of this book many years before I was tempted to read it, and now I truly regret my lack of interest in Sassoon up to this point. He is a great poet, but as a memoirist he absolutely sparkles. Robert Graves' book, "Goodbye to all that", often described as a classic, is a mere string of unrelated anecdotes compared with Sassoon's modest, humorous, poignant account of his own youth, which takes us from his childhood in Kent to the end of his military career after the First World War. Don't hesitate to read this book, especially if you enjoy seeing the English language used at its very best.

World War I had a far greater impact on Britain than the US for the obvious reasons that they were in the war for over four years and suffered horrific casualties. The literature produced by that war made a sharp break from what came before, which reflected the feeling in the country that the war had irrevocably changed life in Britain. This is well illustrated in Siegfreid Sassoon's "The Complete Memoirs of George Sherston," a fictional version of his own experiences. The first part covers Sherston's pre-war life, with his obsession with fox-hunting. This is so well written that you will enjoy it even if you don't have the least interest in the subject.

The next section, "Memoirs of an Infantry Officer" covers his experiences in World War I, during he is highly decorated. The horrors of the war, which many of Sassoon's class thought would be a great adventure, are accurately portrayed. Eventually he becomes disillusioned with the war, and writes a letter denouncing it that could have led to his court-martial. A close friend (Robert Graves in real life) gets him classified as having a mental disorder and he is sent off to a hospital to recuperate.

This book is deeply moving and is one of a handful of books that changed the way that the English-speaking world views war. Sassoon's writing style is plain on the surface, but its plainness makes the emotional impact all the greater.

I find this book completely compelling, particularly volume 2 (Memoirs of and Infantry Officer). The descriptions of degradation experienced by those who fought in the trenches and their ability to create a sub-culture of derring-do is powerful in its modesty.Sassoon's mounting frustration is skilfully portrayed, especially in his allusion to details about provision for and management of warfare. His ennui is almost palpable on those train journies across France.

The first volume (Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man) is possibly of more interest to those of us born and raised in the parish where Sasson himself lived. I enjoyed playing 'spot-the-location', but must declare that I am in possession of a comprehensive list, produced by Brenchley History Society,of pseudonyms/real names.

The writing in this volume has some of the lyrical quality of his autobiography (The Old Century and Seven More Years - out of print)on which it is based. Rather than a treaties on Hunting, I consider this to be a gentle study of the awakening of Sassoon's poetic sensibilities; the Hunt and the relationships he formed with particular characters was, for him, an early catharsis. They also augur the events and characters in the following volume.

The final volume (Sherston's Progress)is probably most poignant if one is aware that this is, indeed, a thinly veiled autobiography. Sassoon's heroism is, for me, as great beyond the era of World War I as it is within it. This volume should certainly be read within the context of the previous two, but stands alone as a testament to the debt future generations owe to the perseverance of men such as Sassoon.

A rhetorical question. I've looked for these memoirs off and on in used book shops for years, chiefly because I remembered the first, foxhunting volume so fondly. I don't agree at all with the other reviewers that this section of the "memoirs" is dull. If you like animals or learning about lost sports and conventions--alpine climbing when it was a club activity, say, or round-the-world sailing--you'll enjoy Sassoon's description of hunts and hunters, especially those of the equine sort.

Sassoon's three volumes wrapped up into one take the reader into another world. First volume describes life in the English country, where a young George Sherston becomes completely immersed in fox hunting. To say he becomes consumed by this is an understatement. Sassoon's intimate depictions of the countryside, to include the life of a country gentleman are so detailed you can clearly "see" and feel how young George felt.

Volume 2, Memoirs of an infantry officer take George into the trenches of France, where again with graphic details, the horror and calamity of the fighting in WWI are brought to our attention. Of note is the latter part of the volume where Sherston's morals are challenged, and how he deals with this mental dilemma.

Volume 3 takes Sherston from the trenches of France, to a stint in Ireland and Palestine, but ultimately back to France where the novel is brilliantly wrapped up.

Sassoon's experiences in the war have given us perhaps one of the greatest novels from the era. The writing is absolutely outstanding and will give you pause to put the book down.

Like his poems, this book is short, to the point, and well worth reading. Highly recommended

There's no question that Siegfried Sassoons's is the finest of the World War I poetry. How the poems are presented to the reader is A PROBLEM. Publishers employ "lick and a polish" guys who excell at slight touch-ups to a graphic design that enables the corporation to double the book price. THIS BOOK."THE WAR POEMS OF SIEGFRIED SASSOON",COSTS TOO MUCH. If Sassoons poems were the value for the money, hooray. But we're not paying the money to Sassoon. Sassoon has been dead for half a century. Sassoon does not, therefore, benefit from the high cost of the publication. Poems: GREAT. book: OVER-PRICED.

I admit I am not one much for poetry, but ever since I read Martin Gilbert's THE FIRST WORLD WAR, which was replete with poetry written in the heat of battle, I've learned that verse is one of the most effective ways for a combat veteran to communicate the experiences of war. Siegfried Sassoon's aptly-titled WAR POEMS, compiled by Rupert Hart-Davis, is less a book of poetry than a guided tour through the muck, duckboards and barbed wire of No Man's Land.

Sassoon was a paradox as a human being. A sensitive and cultivated man and a world-famous poet when still in his twenties, he was also a ferocious fighter on the battlefield, dubbed "Mad Jack" by his men and a holder of the prestigious Military Cross. Disenchanted by the wastage and slaughter he had experienced, in 1917 he wrote a denunciation of the war and was promptly shut up in an asylum in Craiglockhart, Britain, where he composed many of the poems that appear in this book. Later he returned to the front and was shot in the head, but survived and enjoyed a prolific and diverse writing career, somewhat annoyed (as Hart-Davis tells us) that he had gone down in history as a "war poet." Reading this book, however, it is easy to see why.

Hart-Davis has arranged the 111 poems in chronological order, so that the reader can follow Sassoon's emotional journey from a naive young subaltern filled with a quasi-religious sense of mission (in 1915) to an embittered, half-delirious veteran driven to the edge of his sanity by relentless horror. And truly his poems run the range of emotions, from the mundanities of trench life ("A Working Party"; "In An Underground Dressing Station") to the moments before the ball went up ("Before the Batlle") to fury of combat itself ("Counter Attack") and its aftermath ("Died of Wounds"). Every aspect of the war is discussed, from war-fever to cowardice, from the bungling and incompetence of generals to the bluster of civilians back in England. Sometimes he's filled with rage and grief; other times with admiration and pathos (as with "Remorse", his paen to German prisoners run through with bayonets after an attack). But always there's the keen intelligence, the gift for words, the startling ability to convey image in just a few syllables, that mark the true genius-writer. See "The General:"

"Good morning, good morning" the general said
When we met him last week on our way to the line
Now the soldiers he smiled at are most of 'em dead
And we're cursing his staff for incompetent swine
"He's a cheery old card," grunted Harry to Jack
As they slogged up to Arras with rifle and pack.

But he did for them both with his plan of attack.

Of course quoting from the best of the WAR POEMS would fill 30 pages, so I'll leave you with the words of "Base Details."

If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath,
I'd live with scarlet Majors at the Base,
and speed young heroes up the line to death.

You'd see my puffy petulant face,
Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel,
Reading the Roll of Honor, "Poor young chap."
I'd say -- "I used to know his father well;
Yes, we lost heavily in this last scrap."
And when the war is done and youth stone dead,
I'd toddle safely home and die -- in bed.

Poetry is one of my literary loves: but in this slim volume it is put to the task of exposing the soul of a young man who fights his nation's war because his honor demands that he do so while he simultaneously deplores and decries both the necessity of doing so and the method forced on him of carrying out his honorable charge.

A good friend once asked me what to read to properly understand the history of World War I and while I recommended several critical histories (Churchill's, Keegan's and B.H. Liddell-Hart) I also emphasized the necessity of reading All Quiet on the Western Front, Goodbye to All That, and the combined war poetry of Graves, Owen and, of necessity, Sassoon.

The poetry of WWI brings to life the soul of the experience in a way no history, no matter how talented the historian, can do. It translates you into Sassoon's body and mind as he experiences the horror and shock of absolute and directionless (to his view-point, not necessarily in reality) war. These poems bring the sounds and smells of violent death and horrendous suffering - massive destruction and heroic effort - into your ears and nostrils. Indispensible.

Kelly Whiting

I do not read much poetry, but for various reasons I wanted to read some of the British WWI poets because I knew they didn't mince words about the horror of infantry combat. Sassoon does not disappoint. His poems drip with bite, sarcasm, and some bitterness, but at the same time they are elegantly rhymed and the images are powerful. War is nasty business, not glorious, and it is also stupid. WWI was the end of innocence and the poets who wrote of their war experiences brought home the irony of that innocence in the face of the devastation that was wrought. A sample will help.

Stand-to: Good Friday Morning

I'd been on duty from two till four. I went and stared at the dug-out door. Down in the frowst I heard them snore. "Stand to!" Somebody grunted and swore. Dawn was misty; the skies were still' Larks were singing, discordant, shrill; They seemed happy; but I felt ill. Deep in water I splashed my way Up the trench to our bogged front line. Rain had fallen the whole damned night. O Jesus, send me a wound to-day, And I'll believe in Your bread and wine, And get my bloody old sins washed white!

This collection includes the notes that Sassoon added as commentary on some of his poems. On the above poem Sassoon notes: "I haven't shown this to any clergyman. But soldiers say they feel like that sometimes."

This is poetry that grabs you and moves you, but it is a particular genre, not for everyone's taste. If one purpose of poetry is to allow us to see through some of life's darker experiences, then this collection is well worth your reading and reflection.

I have loved Wilfred Owen's poetry since school days.His exquisite use of language vividly conjures up the horrors of war where young men had no choice in their fate and highlighted the social context in which WWW1 took place. Very moving.

Indeed, this is a book not to be missed by those who love poetry. Owen's verses are mostly gut-wrenching lines that will burn images in your brain, but that is good, particularly next to other poems that we may have been familiar with, where the idea of war is an "ideal" and soldiers are knights who know no fear, who are immune to death and pain. Owen's war is different: the men die like rats in the trenches, in their own vomit, and glory and honor are not enough to protect agaist mustard gas. That the poet perished in that war is only a final irony in the short life of a sensitive man who saw too much in too short a time. Excellent.

This touching collection of poetry stems from the horrors of Owen's own experiences at the front. From his grim, visual and detailed description of a man dying of poison gas, to his conspiracy theories of the real reasons behind the war, Owen uncovers the old lie and disproves it right before our eyes: Dulce et Decorum est Pro Patria Mori...

I recommend reading this along with some other biography of Sassoon. The concordances and the differences are stunning. The factual revelations of his life which he does not reveal in these paired biographies/novels are remarkable. Sassoon writes well. The fox hunting classes of England, what must have been going on in their hearts in pre WW1 years unfolds before you. These novels are description of a class of people as well a an insight into Sassoon and the question of where his poetry "came from". A fascinating man with a life whose real events were compressed into a short time. A great study for those interested in Georgian England, in WW1 and in Sassoon himself or other WW1 poets.

Dr. Hipp's tome wrestles with a great period of British Literature--World War I. The WWI literary field is as ripe as any, and Dr. Hipp takes on three of its giants. While Dr. Hipp is also known for his Nabokov scholarhip, he clearly is more than dabbling in this subject area. His book will soon be heavily referenced among students and scholars working in WWI literary history.

It is a commonplace observation that the Great War changed Western culture fundamentally and ineradicably, lending to formerly respectable sentiments like Horace's "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" an indelible bitterness.
Sassoon, one of the most prominent figures among Great War writers, produced a influential body of poetry and memoirs which are accessible and worthwhile today, yet the man himself is largely unknown, partly due to his own reticence. Moeyes, a Sassoon expert, in this admirably readable work traces the elusive writer's life and career with examples of his poetry and prose, examines his relationships with contemporary literary figures, and places his work in the context of Georgian poetry.
Highly recommended for students of English literature in general, and Great War writing in particular.

(The numerical rating above is an ineradicable default setting within the format of the site. This reviewer does not employ numerical ratings.)

What makes some poets great and leaves others to become forgotten by history? To be fair, you can't call Siegfried Sassoon forgotten, since Jean Moorcroft Wilson has spent twelve years or more researching every known fact of his life. And because he lived into the era of VietNam and the "summer of love," an astonishing number of people who are still alive remember him. She has done a wonderful job combing through his papers and coming up with real, solid evidence about the facts of his life, the emotional, sexual and aesthetic complexities of the man.

And yet at the same time, one thinks that she is making slightly a mountain out of a molehill when it comes to her failed attempt to build him up as a writer of permanent interest. Sassoon interested the generation of Georgians who followed the dictates of taste that Edward Marsh laid down, yet at the very moment of his ascension, a counter-revolution in taste, fomented by the American poets Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot, and their Irish colleague W. B. Yeats, were spreading modernism all over the critical map. And even though modernism has lost its iron grip over the popular imagination, the tide has not turned back to the days when a versifier like Sassoon is once again on top of the heap. He was talented, he was tormented, he went to bed with the handsomest men in the world, but his writing isn't all that. Too bad. Still, the book is a fine one and will give you a wonderful sense of period detail--of several periods--in British history since World War I.

I read this book because of my early love of the War Poets, Sassoon, Wilfred Owen and Robert Graves.
What I had not expected was to find myself transported into a nearly forgotten time where Summer was glorious and England was feeling safe, secure and on top of the world.
Yes, they knew that things were a "bit iffy" in Europe. Yes they could see that the USA and Germany could challenge them economically - if not on the seas.
I had read Robert Massie's book Dreadnought which had a solid military-political perspective of the time following Bismarck and his unification of Germany.
This book filled in the missing pieces in my mind to show just why the English and Europeans were so unprepared to fight a total war. And why the aristocracy was so casually careless of the lives of ordinary soldiers.
I wept for the innocence of young men suddenly thrown into the teeth of machine gun fire and massive explosive shells. I smiled and felt comfortable at the descriptions of park cricket at a time that this was the noblest conflict that a young man might pursue.

I read this book because I entered Sassoon first by reading his "Memoirs of an Infantry Officer." Since Sassoon has always been one of my favourite poets I thought this would allow me to see into the mind of one raised in the English Countryside at the turn of the 20th Century.

There is a lot of fox hunting here and if I was encouraged to be more sympathetic to a bunch of upper-class twits running in their finest allowing hounds to do most the work, then this book, for all its description did not engender such feelings. (Being born in Canada, real men and women hunt their animals on foot, are forbidden from using dogs in any form of hunting and a real man shoots one's game over open sights... preferably after that person has hiked over a few mountains on foot. The game is then carried out of the bush, by yourself. There are no manservants, no shared drinking of spirits or chance to rest). But the descriptions of rural life and Sassoon's existence between some limited previledge yet not quite a member of the upper classes was an interesting perspective on this time.

Sassoon writes well and economical. There is little real adventure here and the book would be one that I could recommend to someone who is thinking of touring the quite country lanes of Kent in the summer time, or open whilst on top of Downs on a sunny day. It is a reflection of rural (but not country) life in the soft cotton covered English existence while the world heads for collective insanity.

Sassoon and book eventually drift to war and the last third of the book is about him forsaking Cambridge, taking a commission and eventually heading to the front. While around him his mates, his footmen and other collegues are blown to pieces or otherwise changed unalterably by the war. Sigfried ends the book after the disasterous battles of Loos (where Kipling's son was killed) and the writing style starts to take on a melancholy and more stark tone continued in his "Memoirs of an Infantry Officer".

A good book and one worth the read for the country vignettes.

This is a very good place to commence the life of Sassoon, better known in my country as a great poet of the First World War. Having only the briefest of equestrian experience in rural Dorset and the slightest of brushes with the class structure existing even in a small village, most of Sassoon's marvellously recounted youth falls well beyond this Aussie's radar. I found the quaint rituals of horseriding and foxing fascinating; the fact of a life so given to the pursuit of pleasure, utterly bemusing. Sassoon's everpresent sense of how protected all this was, and how he could place such significance, say, on the purchase of a riding cap, saves this work from charges of class pretension. Though an acute observer, he is amazingly free, in his writing, from the sense of superiority exuding from many of the class he aspires to join.The idyll comes crashing down with the outbreak of War, and the loss of his closest friends are sobering moments, never milked for any self-pity. His writing is exquisite,full of easy phrasings that scroll as readily on his page as the gentle topography of those pleasant pastures green. As eloquent as the succeeding volumes of this series are, I believe this is the most satisfying. Is that, perhaps, because the catostrophe of the trenches was so brilliantly trapped on silent film? iMAGES OF The Great War jittered across our tele screens in the mid 1960s, possibly with the hidden message of consolidating youthful support for our conscription to the Vietnam conflict. I was almost paralysed with fear each Sunday as I sat hypnotised before the unspooling of those oancient black and white atrocities. The effect induced a wholesome loathing of nationalism and all futile expressions on foreign soils.

Perhaps the best way to classify "Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man" is as an autobiographical novel; the details and events described are Sassoon's personal experiences in disguise. This book serves as the first of a trilogy, covering the author's early days up through his initial military service during WWI. Even though it is written as a novel, the truth of the author's life shines through.

The narrator of "Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man" is George Sherston, a young orphan left to live with his aunt in the remote English countryside. He is a shy, reticent and awkward boy who learns gradually to flourish under the tutelage of his aunt's stablehand, Tom Dixon. Dixon teaches young George to ride and play cricket, and as he grows he eventually makes a name for himself among the fox hunting circuit and among horse racers. George drops out of Cambridge to pursue a life of leisure (one that he cannot afford) and finds himself entering the military just before war is declared.

The narrative is surprisingly fast-paced and evocative to begin with. Sassoon has a manner of drawing readers into the story through the quaint and idyllic reminisences of a spoiled young man. Yet readers may soon become distracted with George Sherston's snobbery, his diffidence towards those who care about him and have his best interests at heart, and his pretentious attitude towards his station in life. There are also times when readers can see the author shining through his characters, in scattered asides he drops the mask he holds before him and tells it as it is. "Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man" may not be for everyone, but is a definite must-read for any fan of Sassoon's poetry; it is a window into the world of a man who helped to shape the course of literature after WWI.

This beautifully written account of a well-to-do youth growing up in sleepy rural England in the years leading upto and including the Great War. Siegfried Sasson was one of the finest poets of the Great War, which he experienced first hand (he famously threw his medal into the sea in disgust at the war), however he only touches on the war in this book -- the incredible restraint just adds pogniancy though. I was deeply moved by this book (and Siefrieds war poetry). The book, perhaps somewhat autobiographical(?) describes in some detail the growth of a young rider into an accomplished hunter. There is also some interesting insight into early golf and cricket. While Fox-hunting may not interest some (indeed it is now scorned my many) -- do not let that deter you from reading this excellent book. The book captures, accurately I think, the flavor of rural Britain -- and the relationships that grow up regardless of class in many English villages (the English country village was in many ways the ideal community -- perhaps a model for the world to adopt). This is a wonderful book intended for anybody and everybody -- not just fox hunters.