| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Letters From A Lost Generation: First World War Letters of Vera Brittain and Four Friends for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
Letters from a Lost Generation, a collection of previously unpublished correspondence between Brittain and these young men--all public schoolboys at the start of the war--chronicles her relationship with them, and reveals "the old lie"--the idealised glory of patriotic duty which was soon overtaken by the grim reality of the Flanders trenches. The letters are lively, dramatic, immediate and, despite the awfulness of war, curiously optimistic: "..somehow I feel the end is not destined to be here and now. We have not fulfilled ourselves--and someday we shall live our roseate poem through" wrote Vera to in one of her last letters to Roland in December 1915, just days before he was killed by a sniper's bullet. Following his death, and later those of their mutual friends Victor and Geoffrey, Vera's letters take on a new, raw intensity as she concentrates all her emotions on her brother--a hero awarded the Military Cross--until his death on the Italian Front in June 1918.
These letters formed the basis of Vera Brittain's remarkable autobiography, Testament of Youth and vividly bring to life the voices of the "lost generation" whose words threaten to be lost forever as the First World War recedes even further from living memory. --Catherine Taylor --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
Immensely moving...As the first world war slips out of living memory, this is a timely reminder of what was lost - and how we lost it (SUNDAY TIMES )
Touching, angry, bewildered...they demand to be read (MAIL ON SUNDAY )
Beautifully edited and with excellent notes. (TLS )
Browse and search another edition of this book.
In December 1911, shortly before her eighteenth birthday, Vera Brittain completed her final term at St Monica's School in Kingswood, Surrey, and returned to her parents' home in Buxton, Derbyshire. Read the first page
Concordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
"Nothing in the papers, not the most vivid and heart rending descriptions, have made me realise the war like your letters."
This passage, written by Vera Brittain to Roland Leighton as he acted as an officer in the trenches, is just one of many containing so much truth. Nothing has made me realise the war like these letters - so much is contained within them. More striking than the visible horrors of war is the raw emotion and pain of such perfect relationships as they are torn apart in such hideous circumstances. Through this intrusion into five people's lives via these breathtaking letters, we witness them growing together simply to be blown apart suddenly, unjustly, by shellfire and sniper bullets.
The five people featured are all academics at Oxford. None of them have completed their time their when the war begins, and Vera Brittain has not even started. All of them, then, are people of 'words rather than action', and had not formally considered military life. Vera becomes a V.A.D nurse after her first year at Oxford because she cannot stand being useless any longer whilst those that she loved were suffering on the country's behalf. All of the men act with the highest nobility by heading to the front as soon as they can, and becoming respected and courageous leaders. All of the characters are so incredibly brave and admirable as the situation, making the outcome more tragic and the enhancing the feeling that the men deserve to live, and that Vera deserves them to live for her. As Edward puts it, the loss of friends means that "whatever was the value in life has all tumbled down like a house of cards."
If the same plot had been used in fiction, I would have hated the book. It would have come across as over the top in its sentiment. The honesty, emotion and pain contained in it would have come across as almost unrealistic, and the tragedy would have been just too tragic - to the point of trivialising the true horror. However, because the letters, the emotion and the pain were all real as this was written, the book does the direct opposite. In this case, it seems that truth is far, far sadder than fiction.
Following an intelligent youthful fivesome in their tracks, the trade or art, let alone, ecstasy image of the war is quickly left behind as its gruesome realities cause the inevitable questions on the glorification of warfare to crop up. Centre-stage is Vera, a brave and empathic VAD nurse, who sets out to acquire her own place inside, not out of, the war. As she loses one by one of her nearest and dearest, she turns her personal involvement in the war into an attitude of uncompromising sacrifice for life.
In so doing, the book, which is ultimately an intimate war memoir, reaches greater emotional intensity and richness as one turns the pages and notices how desperately Vera is trying to come to terms with the impossible. Just that very feminine line of approach makes this book an all the more worthwhile read. There can be no doubt that this is an indispensable work and one for everyone to cherish.
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
