Siegfried Sassoon
Siegfried Sassoon
Siegfried Loraine Sassoon, CBE, MCwas an English poet, writer, and soldier. Decorated for bravery on the Western Front, he became one of the leading poets of the First World War. His poetry both described the horrors of the trenches, and satirised the patriotic pretensions of those who, in Sassoon's view, were responsible for a jingoism-fuelled war. Sassoon became a focal point for dissent within the armed forces when he made a lone protest against the continuation of the war in...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth8 September 1886
His most rational response to my attempts at drawing him out about literature and art was 'I adore italics, don't you?'
The visionless officialized fatuityThat once kept Europe safe for Perpetuity.
Who's this—alone with stone and sky? It's only my old dog and I— It's only him; it's only me; Alone with stone and grass and tree. What share we most—we two together? Smells, and awareness of the weather. What is it makes us more than dust? My trust in him; in me his trust.
Soldiers are citizens of death's grey land, drawing no dividend from time's tomorrows.
His wet white face and miserable eyesBrought nurses to him more than groans and sighs:But hoarse and low and rapid rose and fellHis troubled voice: he did the business well.(First verse of Died of Wounds)