The Winter of the World: The Poems of the First World War

by Dominic Hibberd (Author), JohnOnions (Author), Dominic Hibberd (Author), John Onions (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  2007

  $5.09

  The poetry that came out of the First World War exposed, for the first time in history, the real horror of war. This terrible honesty and truth found their perfect expression in poetry as in no other form. The result is an extraordinary record of passionate feelings and appalling experiences, written by men and women from widely different backgrounds, of unique and enduring importance. Hibberd and Onions are acknowledged experts in the field of Great War literature. Their book demolishes numerous myths and misconceptions, demonstrating, for example, that the first poems of protest and frontline realism were written by civilians, not by soldiers; that many soldier-poets continued to believe the fighting had to go on; and that many of the war poets who are famous today were unknown and far from typical at the time. All the major poets are generously represented, but here too are many unfamiliar yet remarkable poems, often not conforming to the usual modern assumptions about 1914-18 verse. Accompanying notes to the poems, historical events and the poets give precise, relevant information and suggest links to other poems, so the book as a whole forms a fascinating, moving narrative as individual writers struggle to respond to catastrophic events and scarcely imaginable horrors. Breakfast - We ate our breakfast lying on our backs, because the shells were screeching overhead. I bet a rasher to a loaf of bread that Hull United would beat Halifax when Jimmy Stainthorpe played full-back instead Of Billy Bradford. Ginger raised his head and cursed, and took the bet; and dropt back dead. We ate our breakfast lying on our backs Because the shells were screeching overhead. Wilfred Wilson Gibson, October 1914, whose poems were the first of their kind, preparing the way for Sassoon, Owen and others.

• Used

  Paperback
  2008

  $3.27

  This new anthology brings together 270 poems and is the most complete and authoritative ever compiled. Arranged by year rather than by poet, it is the first to reveal how poetry developed between 1914 and 1918, and afterwards from 1919 - 1930.

  The poetry that came out of the First World War exposed, for the first time in history, the real horror of war. The result is an extraordinary record of passionate feelings and appalling experiences, written by men and women from widely different backgrounds, of unique and enduring importance.

  All the major poets are generously represented, Owen, Brooke, Sassoon, Blunden, Gurney, Graves and Rosenberg, but here too are many unfamiliar yet remarkable poems from the less familiar, Joseph Leftwich, F S Flint, 'Touchstone'; female poets: Edith Sitwell; Vera Brittain, Eleanor Farjeon; and writers not always associated with WWI poetry, Thomas Hardy, Rudyard Kipling and Ezra Pound.

  Accompanying notes to the poems, historical events and the poets give precise, relevant information and suggest links to other poems, so the book as a whole forms a fascinating, moving narrative.

  Praise for Poetry of the Great War: An Anthology:

  'This splendid anthology...immaculately crafted...wide and authorative...[is] recommended unhesitatingly to both a popular and academic readership. Choice, USA

  Praise for Wilfred Owen: A New Biography:

  'Rich, compelling, formidably researched.' John Carey, Sunday Times