Reading as “the salt of … life” During the First World War

THE NOTION that soldiers have time to read during war is staggering; how, amidst constant assaults on both body and spirit, do they maintain the focus needed to lose themselves in textual worlds? As Reading and the First World War demonstrates, a vast number of those involved in World War I—not only soldiers but also civilians—read avidly. They read many genres—novels, letters, newspapers, poetry, and Bibles—for many reasons. Soldiers in the trenches read “soldier newspapers” bursting with stories about women to distract themselves; convalescent soldiers and prisoners of war read to while away boredom and anxiety; and conscientious objectors read when they had sufficient light in their gloomy prison cells to do so. As Shafquat Towheed and Edmund King, editors of this collection, tell us, “soldiers who fought the war have been described as the most ‘vigorously literary’ fighting force in history.” Accordingly, Reading and the First World War comprises a range of essays addressing topics as varied as the reading practices of war artists behind the line; of conscientious objectors; and of Australian prisoners of war. The essays take us to Italy, the U.S., Australia, and, of course, the Western Front, exploring issues from German censorship of newspapers in Belgium to the reading practices of American soldiers. Emphasizing archival research, the collection illuminates the material practices of readers more than considers theoretical or literary critical questions about reading during World War One. Although it thus risks being more descriptive than analytical overall, some essays nevertheless offer valuable theoretical insights. Ultimately, scholars interested in discovering who read what, where, and when during the First World War will find a trove from which to begin their own explorations.

For instance, scholars of Edith Wharton will find Towheed’s “Reading the Great War: An Examination of Edith Wharton’s Reading and Responses, 1914–1918” evocative. Here they will peruse the list of books Wharton acquired during the war, learn that she subscribed to a press clipping service, and discover the titles of the nine newspapers she read during April 1916. These are the kinds of facts that permeate Reading and the First World War, conjuring a lost time and place. In fact, as I read through the essays in the volume, I saw delightful possibilities for more than a handful of new PBS series focusing on the lives of some of the early twentieth century characters to which we are introduced. Meet the amazing Australian officer William Albert Amiet of Jim Cleary’s “William Albert Amiet, Barrister-at-Law, M.A., Reads His Way through the Great War.” Amiet’s focus was so honed that he memorized bits of Tennyson’s “In Memoriam” and “Locksley Hall” the day before he knew he would “go over” in an attack near Polygon Woods in Belgium in 1917 (he survived the war). And then there’s Mary Elizabeth Chomley (1872–1960), the secretary of the Prisoner of War Department of the Australian Red Cross in London. According to Edmund King’s essay, “The Reading Lives of Australian Prisoners of War,” Chomley corresponded with Australian POWs about which books they wished to be sent in captivity. She seems to have been particularly good at eliciting reports from the POWs about their mental states; thus the letters in the Chomley archive promise to reveal much about the emotional vicissitudes of being a POW. King suggests that many POWs’ letters to Chomley “implicit[ly] link . . . reading and mental health.” Indeed, these quoted letters are among the most poignant bits of archival testimony in the volume: “‘I don’t think I would be over stating the fact if I said that in civil life reading was “the salt of my life,”’” writes one POW. Although King’s essay makes some solid points about how Australian prisoners of war represent a “lacuna . . . within the traditional ANZAC [Australia and New Zealand Army Corps.] narrative,” and how their soliciting Australian titles to read in...