{"id":1388,"date":"2014-06-03T13:17:53","date_gmt":"2014-06-03T13:17:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/warpoets.org.uk\/splashpage\/?page_id=1388"},"modified":"2014-06-03T13:17:53","modified_gmt":"2014-06-03T13:17:53","slug":"wilfred-owen-and-henri-barbusse","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/warpoets.org.uk\/splashpage\/resources\/for-teachers\/wilfred-owen-and-henri-barbusse\/","title":{"rendered":"Wilfred Owen and Henri Barbusse"},"content":{"rendered":"

It appears that Owen first came across Henri Barbusse\u2019s account of life in the war, Under Fire<\/em> (Le Feu<\/em>) whilst he was at Scarborough in December 1917 and in Jon Stallworthy\u2019s biography of Owen he suggests that the English poet\u2019s reading of this French account of Northern France in 1915 made a deep and lasting impression. Under Fire<\/em> is available in Penguin Classics.<\/p>\n

Two useful exercises in comparative criticism might be the following:<\/p>\n

Wilfred Owen\u2019s poem \u2018The Show\u2019 and the following extract from Chapter I of Under Fire:<\/h3>\n

The man at the end of the rank cries, \u201cI can see crawling things down there\u201d\u2014\u201cYes, as though they were alive\u201d\u2014\u201cSome sort of plant, perhaps\u201d\u2014\u201cSome kind of men\u201d\u2014
\nAnd there amid the baleful glimmers of the storm, below the dark disorder of the clouds that extend and unfurl over the earth like evil spirits, they seem to see a great livid plain unrolled, which to their seeing is made of mud and water, while figures appear and fast fix themselves to the surface of it, all blinded and borne down with filth, like the dreadful castaways of shipwreck. And it seems to them that these are soldiers.<\/p>\n

This scene in Barbusse\u2019s novel is placed in a sanatorium which is situated high in the mountains before the outbreak of war. The chapter is titled \u2018The Vision\u2019 and it offers an eerie prophecy of the horror about to engulf Europe.<\/p>\n

The Show by Wilfred Owen<\/h4>\n

We have fallen in the dreams the ever-living<\/em>
\n Breathe on the tarnished mirror of the world,<\/em>
\n And then smooth out with ivory hands and sigh.<\/em>
\nW.B. Yeats<\/p>\n

My soul looked down from a vague height, with Death,
\nAs unremembering how I rose of why,
\nAnd saw a sad land, weak with sweats of death,
\nGrey, createred like the moon with hollow woe,
\nAnd pitted with great pocks and scabs of plagues.
\nShow whole text + <\/a>


\nAcross its beard, that horror of harsh wire,
\nThere moved thin caterpillars, slowly uncoiled.
\nIt seemed they pushed themselves to be as plugs
\nOf ditches, where they writhed and shrivelled, killed.<\/p>\n

By them had slimy paths been trailed and scraped
\nRound myriad warts that might be little hills.<\/p>\n

From gloom’s last dregs these long-strung creatures crept,
\nAnd vanished out of dawn down hidden holes.<\/p>\n

(And smell came up from those foul openings
\nAs out of mouths, or deep wounds deepening.)<\/p>\n

On dithering feet upgathered, more and more,
\nBrown strings, towards strings of grey, with bristling spines,
\nAll migrants from green fields, intent on mire.<\/p>\n

Those that were grey, of more abundant spawns,
\nRamped on the rest and ate them and were eaten.<\/p>\n

I saw their bitten backs curve, loop, and straighten.
\nI watched those agonies curl, lift, and flatten.<\/p>\n

Whereat, in terror what that sight might mean,
\nI reeled and shivered earthward like a feather.<\/p>\n

And Death fell with me, like a deepening moan.
\nAnd He, picking a manner of worm, which half had hid
\nIts bruises in the earth, but crawled no further,
\nShowed me its feet, the feet of many men,
\nAnd the fresh-severed head of it, my head.
\nThis item is from The First World War Poetry Digital Archive, University of Oxford (www.oucs.ox.ac.uk\/ww1lit<\/a>); \u00a9 The Estate of Wilfred Owen. The Complete Poems and Fragments of Wilfred Owen<\/em> edited by Jon Stallworthy first published by Chatto Windus, 1983. Preliminaries, introductory, editorial matter, manuscripts and fragments omitted. <\/div><\/p>\n

Wilfred Owen\u2019s poem \u2018Exposure\u2019 and two extracts from the second chapter of Under Fire, titled \u2018In the Earth\u2019. The extracts from Barbusse are printed below:<\/h3>\n

Our company occupies, in reserve, a second line parallel. No night watchman works here. At night we are ready for making earthworks in front, but as long as the day lasts we have nothing to do. Huddled up together and linked arm in arm, it only remains to await the evening as best we can.<\/p>\n

\u00a0We are waiting. Weary of sitting, we get up, our joints creaking like warping wood or old hinges. Damp rusts men as it rusts rifles; more slowly, but deeper. And we begin again, but not in the same way, to wait. In a state of war, one is always waiting. We have become waiting-machines. For the moment it is food we are waiting for. Then it will be the post. But each in its turn. When we have done with dinner we will think about the letters. After that, we shall set ourselves to wait for something else.<\/p>\n

Exposure by Wilfred Owen<\/h4>\n

Our brains ache, in the merciless iced cast winds that knive us…
\nWearied we keep awake because the night is silent…
\nLow, drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient…
\nWorried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,
\nBut nothing happens.<\/p>\n

Watching, we hear the mad gusts tugging on the wire,
\nLike twitching agonies of men among its brambles.
\nNorthward, incessantly, the flickering gunnery rumbles,
\nFar off, like a dull rumour of some other war.
\nWhat are we doing here?<\/p>\n

The poignant misery of dawn begins to grow…
\nWe only know war lasts, rain soaks, and clouds sag stormy.
\nDawn massing in the east her melancholy army
\nAttacks once more in ranks on shivering ranks of grey,
\nBut nothing happens.<\/p>\n

Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence.
\nLess deathly than the air that shudders black with snow,
\nWith sidelong flowing flakes that flock, pause, and renew;
\nWe watch them wandering up and down the wind’s nonchalance,
\nBut nothing happens.<\/p>\n

Pale flakes with fingering stealth come feeling for our faces—
\nWe cringe in holes, back on forgotten dreams, and stare, snow-dazed,
\nDeep into grassier ditches. So we drowse, sun-dozed,
\nLittered with blossoms trickling where the blackbird fusses,
\n—Is it that we are dying?<\/p>\n

Slowly our ghosts drag home: glimpsing the sunk fires, glozed
\nWith crusted dark-red jewels; crickets jingle there;
\nFor hours the innocent mice rejoice: the house is theirs;
\nShutters and doors, all closed: on us the doors are closed,—
\nWe turn back to our dying.<\/p>\n

Since we believe not otherwise can kind fires burn;
\nNor ever suns smile true on child, or field, or fruit.
\nFor God’s invincible spring our love is made afraid;
\nTherefore, not loath, we lie out here; therefore were born,
\nFor love of God seems dying.<\/p>\n

Tonight, this frost will fasten on this mud and us,
\nShrivelling many hands, puckering foreheads crisp.
\nThe burying-party, picks and shovels in shaking grasp,
\nPause over half-known faces. All their eyes are ice,
\nBut nothing happens.<\/p>\n

This item is from The First World War Poetry Digital Archive, University of Oxford (www.oucs.ox.ac.uk\/ww1lit<\/a>); \u00a9 The Estate of Wilfred Owen. The Complete Poems and Fragments of Wilfred Owen<\/em> edited by Jon Stallworthy first published by Chatto Windus, 1983. Preliminaries, introductory, editorial matter, manuscripts and fragments omitted.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Ian Brinton<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It appears that Owen first came across Henri Barbusse\u2019s account of life in the war, Under Fire (Le Feu) whilst he was at Scarborough in December 1917 and in Jon Stallworthy\u2019s biography of Owen he suggests that the English poet\u2019s reading of this French account of Northern France in 1915 made a deep and lasting  Continue Reading »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"parent":817,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n