BOOK OF THE WEEK

Taranaki Daily News, 23 November 1929, Page 17 (Supplement)

BOOK OF THE WEEK

A SOLDIER’S RECORD

(By

G.E.)

“Combed Out,” by F. A. Voigt: Jonathan Cape, Ltd., London, through Avery and Sons, Ltd,. New Plymouth. Though the eleventh anniversary of the armistice was celebrated a fortnight ago, the war continues to be a prominent news topic. This week we have had several references to the subject —the reminiscences of a German U-boat commander and one of his British victims, who have been fraternising in England: an. announcement that “Tell Enghand," the famous Gallipoli novel, is to be filmed by,, the talkies, and a quite lengthy message regarding the publication of a new war book. We are told that the stark, grim realism of this story, which is, strangely enough, by a well known poet, Mr. Robert Graves, is likely to aro'use a controversy akin to that about “All Quiet on the Western Front." It happens this week, rather aptly indeed, that I have had another war‘book to read. “Combed Out" is probably a far less pretentious volume than the one Mr. Graves has written, though it is also exceedingly frank. It is not, the author declares, a piece of imaginative writing, but a mere, record of the war as seen by a private soldier in the British Army. The author was called up early in 1510, was' drafted into the Royal Garrison Artillery, and then became a signaller. Later. .<a. he .served with engineers, with a labour company, and with the Royal Army Medical Corps. His whole period of active service was passed in Flanders. He describes “Combed Out" as no more than a re-arrange-ment of his diary and of his letters home, written chiefly under the immediate impression of. the events, recorded. One may say at once that in this note' to his book the author is less than fair to himself. It is anything but a diary that he has served up, for he probably knows as well as his publishers do that at this late date a diary record of a soldier’s life on active service would be lamentably wearisome. What he has done has been to. make an obviously careful and certainly shrewd selection of the events and incidents that impressed themselves upon his memory', and then to describe them in language that is simple, direct and expressive. The result is that one can visualise £he complete life of tho soldier under service conditions, but one-is-spared the laborious task of wading through unessential details. The construction of the book is adniirablc, its 220 pages being divided into ten chapters, tho shortest Of which fills ten pages and the longest barely fifty. In tho first chapter of ten pages all that is worth while is told about the recruit’s experience. The writer evidently is u man of education, who thoroughly' under-stands-the language he uses and has the happy faculty of condensing his ideas. He is fond of short sentences, and he packs them remarkably full of meaning, never a word being superfluous. Clarity and emphasis are the natural result of ■his method. |

As the longest in the book the second chapter will bear mention. It is the story of a fatigue party, detailed :o shift 5800 railway sleepers from one bath of mud to another, rain' and snow falling the while. One has to read the chapter to' realise how much incident was crowded into a hard-working soldier's day and also how much humanity was often hidden under a khaki uniform. Because it comes in this chapter one may well quote here the closing paragraph as giving an insight into the author’s mind. Having a free afternoon, he has gone for a lonely stroll and has permitted himself to soloquise: “I gazed in an eastward direction. All the snow had melted, the fields, the bare trees and hedges were steeped in warm sunlight. In the distance there was a gentle slope crowned by a long line of poplars. Beyond the poplars, about eight miles away, there was something I did not sec, although I knew it was there —a stupid, terrible, and uncouth monster that stretched in a zigzag winding course from the North Sea-to the Alps. It was strangely silent at that hour, but I was fascinated by it and thought about it harder and harder, in spite of myself. I became increasingly conscious of it, and it grew upon me until it seemed to crush and darken everything beneath its intolerable weight.” That “in spite of myself - ’ takes us very completely into the confidence of this very interesting writer. He does not grumble in his book, and it is plain that he did his job in the war, and did it conscientiously, because it was his job. But he has no love, for war. Therein, no doubt, lies the source of his inspiration. He Ims written his plain, unvarnished tale,. perhaps not altogether as a protest against war, but at any rate in the hope that it may help the cause of international peace. Mr. Voigt has exercised some restraint in the pursuit of his purpose. He gives a very frank account of a day's work at a casualty clearing station, mentioning incidents that are horrible enough, but handling them so capably as to convince the onlooker that there are two sides to the picture. His references to the despoliation of bodies on the battlefields bespeak the awfulness of the degradation induced by the conditions ho sketches, and the words which he puts into the mouth of his fellow-privates are those of the camp and the trenches.) He is true alike to his knowledge and to ! his purpose in everything he writes, and yet he avoids deliberate repulsiveness. In the chapter entitled “Home on Leave” he makes some incisive comments on the conditions existing among those who did not go to the war, and a little bitterness escapes him when .he discusses the armistice. These are touches which serve to emphasise the genuineness of an excellent book.

“Combed Out” is No. 122 of Jonathan Capo’s “Travellers’ Library,” a series that is very attractively produced. The volumes are of handy size and the price is very modest. , . •