Background
Siegfried Sassoon was born to a Jewish father, Alfred Ezra Sassoon, who was a descendant of a wealthy merchant family from Baghdad and Theresa, an Anglo-Catholic.
(The first volume in Siegfried Sassoons beloved trilogy, ...)
The first volume in Siegfried Sassoons beloved trilogy, The Complete Memoirs of George Sherston, with a new introduction by celebrated historian Paul Fussell 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. Never out of print since its original publication in 1928, when it won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, Sassoon's reminiscences about childhood and the beginning of World War I are channeled through young George Sherston, whose life of local cricket tournaments and fox-hunts falls apart as war approaches and he joins up to fight. Sassoon's first novel, though rife with comic characters and a jaunty sense of storytelling, presents his own loss of innocence and the destruction of the country he knew and loved. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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(Leopold is delighted to publish this classic book as part...)
Leopold is delighted to publish this classic book as part of our extensive Classic Library collection. Many of the books in our collection have been out of print for decades, and therefore have not been accessible to the general public. The aim of our publishing program is to facilitate rapid access to this vast reservoir of literature, and our view is that this is a significant literary work, which deserves to be brought back into print after many decades. The contents of the vast majority of titles in the Classic Library have been scanned from the original works. To ensure a high quality product, each title has been meticulously hand curated by our staff. This means that we have checked every single page in every title, making it highly unlikely that any material imperfections such as poor picture quality, blurred or missing text - remain. When our staff observed such imperfections in the original work, these have either been repaired, or the title has been excluded from the Leopold Classic Library catalogue. As part of our on-going commitment to delivering value to the reader, within the book we have also provided you with a link to a website, where you may download a digital version of this work for free. Our philosophy has been guided by a desire to provide the reader with a book that is as close as possible to ownership of the original work. We hope that you will enjoy this wonderful classic work, and that for you it becomes an enriching experience. If you would like to learn more about the Leopold Classic Library collection please visit our website at www.leopoldclassiclibrary.com
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B018S4410E/?tag=2022091-20
(The second volume in Siegfried Sassoons beloved trilogy,...)
The second volume in Siegfried Sassoons beloved trilogy, The Complete Memoirs of George Sherston, with a new introduction by celebrated historian Paul Fussell 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. The second volume of Siegfried Sassoon's semiautobiographical George Sherston trilogy picks up shortly after Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man: in 1916, with the young Sherston deep in the trenches of WWI. For his decorated bravery, and also his harmful recklessness, he is soon sent to the Fourth Army School for officer training, then dispatched to Morlancourt, a raid, and on through the Somme. After being wounded by a bullet through the lung, he returns home to convalesce, where his questioning of the war and the British Military establishment leads him to write a public anti-war letter (verbatim the letter Sassoon wrote in 1917, entitled "Finished with the War: A Soldiers Declaration", which was eventually read in the British House of Commons). Through the help of close friend David Cromlech (based on Sassoon's friend Robert Graves) a medical board decides not to prosecute, but instead deem him to be mentally ill, suffering from shell-shock, and sends him to a hospital for treatment. Sassoon's stunning portrayal of a mind coming to terms with the brutal truths he has encountered in waras well as his unsentimental, though often poetic, portrayal of class-defined life in England at wartimeis amongst the greatest books ever written about World War I, or war itself. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/014310716X/?tag=2022091-20
("The War Poems of Siegfried Sassoon" is a collection of B...)
"The War Poems of Siegfried Sassoon" is a collection of British war poems that doesn't mince words about the horror of infantry combat. Sassoon's poems drip with bite, sarcasm, and some bitterness, but at the same time they are elegantly rhymed and the images are powerful. The World Wars marked the end of innocence for many, 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 note Sassoon wrote on one of his poems is particularly enlightening: "I haven't shown this to any clergyman. But soldiers say they feel like that sometimes." The writing in "The War Poems of Siegfried Sassoon" is poetry that grabs and moves the reader, letting them see some of life's darker experiences. For those who wish to understand what war really was, as well as be motivated to avoid it when at all possible, this collection is well worth reading.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1449588832/?tag=2022091-20
diarist journalist military Soldier memoirist poet
Siegfried Sassoon was born to a Jewish father, Alfred Ezra Sassoon, who was a descendant of a wealthy merchant family from Baghdad and Theresa, an Anglo-Catholic.
He was educated at The New Beacon Preparatory School, Sevenoaks, Kent and majored in history at Clare College, Cambridge from 1905-1907.
He dropped out of college and spent the next few years hunting, playing cricket, reading and writing poetry.
Siegfried Sassoon expressed his opinions on the pre-World War I political scenario in his 1913 work, ‘The Daffodil Murderer’. It was a parody of John Masefield's, ‘The Everlasting Mercy’.
He joined the British Army just before the onset of World War I and joined the ‘Sussex Yeomanry’, a regiment of the British Army, on August 4, 1914. It also happened to be the day the United Kingdom declared war.
He injured his right arm in a riding accident, after which he spent the spring of 1915 recovering from his injury. During this time, his younger brother, Hamo was killed at war, which affected Sassoon mentally.
In May 1915, he was appointed as the second lieutenant in the ‘Royal Welsh Fusiliers’, an infantry regiment of the British Army. He was posted to the Western Front in France.
While he was on duty in the Western Front he discovered a German trench with 60 odd German soldiers in it; armed with only grenades he captured the trench. He was highly appreciated for his bravery.
Stuck by the grief of the sudden death of a close friend at war, he wanted to campaign against the war and in 1917, he finally decided to take a stand against the conduct of the war.
In 1918, he was wounded while on duty, when a fellow soldier accidentally mistook him to be a German and shot him in the head.
After being discharged from the military services he assumed the position of literary editor at the Daily Herald, a British daily newspaper, in 1919.
In 1928, he authored the first semi-autobiographical novel ‘Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man’, which is regarded a classic in English literature. In 1930, his second semi-autobiographical novel titled, ‘Memoirs of an Infantry Officer’ was published which narrates a semi-fictional account of his life during and post-World War.
In 1936, the final book of his semi-autobiographical trilogy, ‘Sherston's Progress’ was published.
He later died of stomach cancer and is interred at St Andrew's Church, Mells, Somerset.
(The second volume in Siegfried Sassoons beloved trilogy,...)
(The first volume in Siegfried Sassoons beloved trilogy, ...)
("The War Poems of Siegfried Sassoon" is a collection of B...)
(Leopold is delighted to publish this classic book as part...)
( The Complete Memoirs of George Sherston includes Sherst...)
(Personal narratives of a British officer on the Western f...)
Towards the end of his life, Sassoon converted to Roman Catholicism. He had hoped that Ronald Knox, a Roman Catholic priest and writer whom he admired, would instruct him in the faith, but Knox was too ill to do so. The priest Sebastian Moore was chosen to instruct him instead, and Sassoon was admitted to the faith at Downside Abbey in Somerset. He also paid regular visits to the nuns at Stanbrook Abbey, and the Abbey press printed commemorative editions of some of his poems. During this time he also became interested in the supernatural, and joined the Ghost Club.
Quotations:
"The fact is that five years ago I was, as near as possible, a different person to what I am tonight. I, as I am now, didn't exist at all. Will the same thing happen in the next five years? I hope so. "
"I have seen and endured the sufferings of the troops, and I can no longer be a party to prolong these sufferings for ends which I believe to be evil and unjust. "
"For it is humanly certain that most of us remember very little of what we have read. To open almost any book a second time is to be reminded that we had forgotten well-nigh everything that the writer told us. Parting from the narrator and his narrative, we retain only a fading impression; and he, as it were, takes the book away from us and tucks it under his arm. "
"I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the political errors and insincerities for which the fighting men are being sacrificed. "
"Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin they think of firelit homes, clean beds, and wives. "
"I am making this statement as an act of wilful defiance of military authority, because I believe that the War is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it. I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. I believe that this War, on which I entered as a war of defence and liberation, has now become a war of aggression and conquest. "
He was romantically involved with men including, William Park, ‘Gabriel’ Atkin, actor Ivor Novello; Novello's former lover, Glen Byam Shaw; German aristocrat, Prince Philipp of Hesse; the writer Beverley Nichols; an effete aristocrat, the Hon. Stephen Tennant.
In 1933, he married Hester Gatty, with whom he had a child named George.