On Remembrance

A personal response to “Testament of Youth” and “Letters From a Lost Generation”.

The impulse that led so many young men to volunteer to fight in the First World War is difficult to understand. What drove their desire to pour “…out the red sweet wine of youth…” so freely on foreign soil? Why did the brightest and the best feel that with the coming of conflict their generation, in its prime and brimming over with youthful vigour, had suddenly found its purpose? I sit a century removed from that time and read the words of Rupert Brooke’s “1914”, trying to fathom why a young man might strive with all his heart to make “…some corner of a foreign field…for ever England.” Moreover, I try to imagine what it must have been like to read Brooke’s words just after their publication, as Vera Brittain did in her tutor’s room at Somerville College, knowing that frontline fighting was a looming reality for so many who were close to her.

The tragic circumstances of war recounted in Brittain’s “Testament of Youth” are at times almost unbearable to read. The gore and the mud, the leave-takings and losses, would be stirringly emotive when read as part of a straightforward account of the conflict. What makes them particularly striking, though, is how they are seen through young eyes. Whilst the war was thundering onward, so was youth. The same young people who were answering their country’s call with zeal were also pouring their energies into loving, learning and simply living. They were embarking on their lives with fresh, eager minds, seeing and experiencing things for the first time. Already heightened emotions were intensified still further by the shadows of trenches, bombs and bullets. For anyone just about young enough to remember their own youth, this opens up a strong and moving connection across the years.

I can recall with clarity the sense of freedom that going to university imparted. The feeling that we were all brilliant young minds who could take on the world — a natural consequence, perhaps, of frequent late night discussions and intense reading. That sense of right and proper separation from your parents, those whose time has passed and who, indeed, were only holding you back. When Vera writes of throwing herself into university life, her place at Oxford being so hard won and meaning so much to her, I recall the strong bonds that I formed as I made my own first academic steps and note that none of my peers were compelled to pursue duties to their country, to serve, perhaps fight and make the ultimate sacrifice. Later on, when writing of her time spent nursing in Malta, Vera’s descriptions of the climate particularly resonate. The sensation of uncommon, radiant heat and light that so often assaults the pale, frail English body upon travelling abroad for the first time, along with the newness of outlook and the sheer foreignness of everything and the excitement and exhilaration of fresh experiences. The change in the self that a new environment so often brings about, however surprised you might be by that and the attendant realisation that you are pushing yourself onward to do more than you ever thought possible, are such vital parts of the maturation process. Vera eloquently describes this in a way that can be instantly identified with.

In Malta, Vera marks the first anniversary of a truly pivotal moment of her youth and her war — the death of her fiancé Roland Leighton. She tells of a shooting star lighting up the sky, though tries not to read too much romantic mysticism into the event. She writes from time to time throughout the book of feeling the presence of those she has lost, yet is certain that there is no afterlife. She half remembers moments in time, unsure whether to trust the feeling that she has walked through a certain place with Roland. She finds comfort in churches, yet does not really believe in God. Most of all she must know details, however harrowing, to prevent her creative mind from dwelling too long on the deaths of those she loves. The facts about their passing are of vital importance as she works through her own grief. Her gradual working out of a belief system is echoed by that of the young friends with whom she corresponds regularly. Her brother visits Roland’s grave and leaves determined to become a soldier worthy of the great companion he has lost, but he is equally certain that the Roland he knew is not there in the ground. His essence has long departed. Finding answers to the biggest questions posed by human existence and finding ways of making peace with loss are things that we all have to do, whether at war or not.

So what of this Roland Leighton, whose poetry and prose Vera Brittain reproduces alongside her own? Bringing to mind that first, intense rush of real love that binds you irrevocably to one person makes the sadness of Vera’s story so raw. The strong, prize-winning youth in all his glory, so keen to get to the frontline and play his part in the war — she knew him only briefly, but their connection ran deep. It was a meeting of minds who committed to paper more over a few short months than most couples do over years of closer physical proximity. The conventions of the time kept their relationship chaste, with chaperones and a coyness that seems almost cruel, given the ultimate tragic ending. The void left by the loss of Roland is filled in part by the support and friendship of others who were close to him. Reading the collected volume of correspondence “Letters From a Lost Generation” reveals the importance of the bond between Vera and her brother Edward. Somehow in his worrying about trifles — the loss of his valise, the persistent trench mud, his inability to talk to women — Edward affirms through his missives that life must go on. Roland was his friend and he shares with Vera the deep, aching grief that underlies everything they now do, however mundane. Their shared upbringing and love of music also provide some comfort. Perhaps even more poignant is the way in which a young man whom Edward met during his officer training steps up and reaches out to Vera in her hour of need. Geoffrey Robert Youngman Thurlow, known as “Gryt”, is shy and awkward. It takes great courage for him to start writing to Vera and eventually take her out to tea and to a concert, but she is impressed by his straightforwardness and honesty. He is completely and utterly himself and can be no one else. There is no ounce of pretension. Out of all the letters sent by Vera, her friends and family, his voice is the most distinctive. His love of cats and constant use of the word “topping” to describe things that please him, along with a tendency to write “Well!” as a means of collecting his thoughts, seem to make his character jump out off the page. The little things he mentions, such as providing hot water bottles for his men coming back from the trenches, and his constant worry that he is not a good soldier, endear him to the reader. He seems very real, his story that of an ordinary man, not brilliant and outstanding among his peers like Roland Leighton or conspicuously brave and leading from the front like Edward Brittain, but fundamentally an unassuming good man, like those we quietly encounter every day.

So we will never truly know what drove those young men to the trenches. The circumstances of the time are lost to us and the mindset of the hour is difficult to grasp, but we can reach back across the years and realise that people then were very much like we are now in many ways. Human beings have not really changed much. We still love. We still live our everyday lives. We make friendships just as Vera Brittain and her peers did. We grow and we go out into the world, take up causes, strive to make our mark. We make mistakes. We learn. We can find tiny mirror images of ourselves in a chance few words written a century before. Much as Vera wanted so desperately to be near to the front, to experience what those men closest to her had to face amongst the myriad dangers, so we can seek a closeness to the past in that we share so many of the basic traits of those who were there. Despite the passing of the years and the great shift from all-out brutal trench warfare to comparative peace, there are aspects of life that are eternal. Reading “1914”, “Testament of Youth” and “Letters from a Lost Generation” is not simply an act of remembrance for a war long gone. It is an affirmation that our own lives and the connections we make have great value in them, a truth as relevant today as when war brought that simple fact into stark relief for so many.

Further Reading:

1914 by Rupert Brooke
Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain
Letters from a Lost Generation — First World War Letters of Vera Brittain and Four Friends, Edited by Alan Bishop and Mark Bostridge