First World War From Above

[RosieH]

I'm rather failing to say anything, don't really know what to say, except that it was beautiful and harrowing documentary making, and if you didn't see it, I'd heartily recommend you catch up on iplayer.

[Alec John Moore]

I wasn't able to watch all of it but I generally like Fergal Keane's take on things. Aerial photography is fascinating and I liked the way he linked the two technological developments that makes it possible. It is also fascinating how WWI continues to hold us in its thrall. There was also an item on BH this morning on war poetry and how we always remember the poems of Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon but who can name a poet from WWII or from more recent conflicts?

[expat]

>can name a poet from WWII or from more recent conflicts?

'I have a rendezvous with death' A. Seeger

[Ted Max]

There is plenty of poetry about and influenced by WWII but I think there's lots of reasons why WWI has become, in the UK public's mind, the poets' war.

First, there was the deliberate effort by the WWI poets (most of them) to deal with the conditions, scale, scope and pointlessness of much of the war - both for themselves but also to cry out on a public basis.

(Similarly, in terms of highlighting the cause, see the Spanish Civil War)

There's a view that WWII, as a just cause, did not require such conciousness raising (it was also a civilian war in the UK in the way WWI was not). Also, if you were a poet in WWII, how did you respond in an artistic sense to what were already known as the War Poets, and to the Spanish war poets?

Then there's the effect of the mass media. Although there was a rabidly patriotic print press in the UK, WW1 was fought without mass radio, film, TV and the internet to tell the story. This means the written word is much more dominant in the artistic response to the war, and also meant an alternative commentary to the official story was lacking.

Finally there's perhaps something in the scale of its impact on British consciousness - twice as many deaths as the Second World War and the first time the country had experience such scale of loss - that impacted on the artistic response. Quite simply there was a need to understand what had happened through an alternative telling of the war.

It was the poets that provided this narrative of brave lads undermined by idiotic commanders, and that is the story of the war that has become the truth for most of the public, which in turn has reinforced the poetry as the primary artistic response to the war.

[Alec John Moore]

That's a compelling analysis, most of which I am familiar with. I wonder what role class and education have had in establishing and keeping the WWI poets in the public consciousness down the decades. But, I didn't mean to redirect the thread from its focus on the TV programme.

[RosieH]

Oh no, direct away. This is the lounge after all.

I do think there's a horrible sort of romance to the "war to end all wars" and I think Ted's hit the nail on the head as to why. There's something about our fine lads going off to the slaughter that feels like the end of a beautiful era in a way that WWII didn't (is that just too much literature and costume drama I wonder).

I also think there's an element of being considerably more removed from it - as Ted rightly points out, WWI wasn't (for the UK) a civilian war, so people at home were spared the grisly reality. Some of the detail from last night will stay with me for a long time - I had no idea about the tunnels and mines, and when they said that the biggest part of a German soldier they found after a series of mine detonations was a foot in a boot, it really brought home the visceral, sticky, gory reality. And to know that a lot of those remains are still located at the bottom of ponds on a golf course, my god, that's haunting, but I think, not commonly known at the time.

There was a lovely moment in the programme though, when the daughter of the pilot who captured the scene from the air saw her dad smiling on camera. I may have sobbed at that point. In fact, I'm welling up just thinking about it now.

[Alec John Moore]

Sebastian Faulks's Birdsong is very moving in relation to WWI. Some of the main characters are tunnellers as I recall. I did see the part in the TV documentary where the daughter saw the footage of her dad, very moving. I thought the images were remarkably clear and detailed and it takes a thoughtful commentator like Fergal Keane to make the connections that show we are less removed from it than we might think.

[mockney piers]

All is quiet on the western front is still one of the most quietly moving books I've read. If you're interested in the period it's a must.

[DJKillaQueen]

I just watched it on iplayer. The aerial photography really hits home the scale of it. And how moving for the daughter at the end to see her father on film.

I personally think that WWl stands out because it was an arrogant war, both in it's causes and the attitudes of those that so enthusiastically took europe into it. The tragedy is the human suffering and cost and poetry seems to be the idea medium for comunicating that. There also wasn't yet the mass media, that would follow WWll.

[Emerson Crane]

There was also a programme on recently regrding the last day of WW1. It highlighted the refusal by some generals to stand their troops down and sent them into action despite the fact that they knew the armistice had been signed. Senseless. It was very moving to watch, especially when the futility of it all hit you.

[waynetta]

I saw this programme and it made me cry

[daizie]

aw waynetta you great big softie