“GOOD-BYE TO ALL”

Northern Advocate, 19 November 1929, Page 5

“GOOD-BYE TO ALL”

CONTROVERSIAL WAR BOOK,

GRIM REALISM

MALEDICTION ON DEAD MEN,

(Received 3.30 p.m.)

LONDON, November 17

Robert Graves, the well-known poet, has published a war book, entitled “Good-bye to All,” that is likely to arouse a controversy akin to “All Quiet on the Western Front” in its stark, grim realism. There arc many anecdotes unquotable in a newspaper, emphasising the slow, horrible, physical and mental deterioration of men of all ranks. The book deals with many unfortunate officers, who with two or more years of continuous trench service .became, dipsomaniacs.

Mr Graves says that he know three or four officers who worked up to two bottles of whisky a day before they were lucky enough to got wounded. The first and last bodies that Mr Graves saw in France were of men who had preferred suicide to continued fighting.

The author tells the grim story of a?) officer who mistook dead men for cowards. He whistled his platoon to advance but nobody appeared to heed him. “You 1 cowards, are you going to leave me alone?" cried the officer. A wounded sergeant cried out: “They are not cowards, sir, they are willing enough, but all "are dead." Machine-guns had caught them as they rose to the officer's whistle.