Under Fire: the story of a squad [eBook]

Henri Barbusse

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Descriere

'Under Fire: The Story of a Squad' by Henri Barbusse, was one of the first novels about World War I to be published. Although it is fiction, the novel was based on Barbusse's experiences as a French soldier on the Western Front. The novel takes the form of journal-like anecdotes which the unnamed narrator claims to be writing to record his time in the war.

It follows a squad of French volunteer soldiers on the Western front in France after the German invasion. The book opens and ends with broad visions shared by multiple characters but beyond these the action of the novel takes place in occupied France. 'Under Fire' describes war in gritty and brutal realism. It is noted for its realistic descriptions of death in war and the squalid trench conditions.

 

About the Authors
 
Henri Barbusse (May 17, 1873 – August 30, 1935) was a French novelist and a member of the French Communist Party.
 
The son of a French father and an English mother, Barbusse was born in Asnières-sur-Seine, France in 1873.[1] Although he grew up in a small town, he left for Paris in 1889, at age 16. In 1914, at age 41, he enlisted in the French Army and served against Germany in World War I. Invalided out of the army three times, Barbusse would serve in the war for 17 months, until the end of 1915, when he was permanently moved into a clerical position due to pulmonary damage, exhaustion, and dysentery.[citation needed]

Barbusse first came to fame with the publication of his novel Le Feu (translated by William Fitzwater Wray as Under Fire) in 1916, which was based on his experiences during World War I. By this time, Barbusse had become a pacifist, and his writing demonstrated his growing hatred of militarism. Le Feu drew criticism at the time for its harsh naturalism, but won the Prix Goncourt.

In January 1918, he left France and moved to Moscow, where he married a Russian woman and joined the Bolshevik Party. His novel, Clarté, is about an office worker who, while serving in the army, begins to realize that the imperialist war is a crime.[citation needed]

The Russian Revolution had significant influence on Barbusse's life and work. He joined the French Communist Party in 1923 and later traveled back to the Soviet Union. His later works, Manifeste aux Intellectuels (Elevations) (1930) and others, show a more revolutionary standpoint. Of these, the 1921 Le Couteau entre les dents (The Knife Between My Teeth) marks Barbusse's siding with Bolshevism and the October Revolution. Barbusse characterized the birth of Soviet Russia as "the greatest and most beautiful phenomenon in world history."[citation needed] The book Light from the Abyss (1919)[citation needed] and the collection of articles Words of a Fighting Man (1920)[citation needed] contain calls for the overthrow of capitalism.
 
In 1925, Barbusse published Chains, showing history as the unbroken chain of suffering of people and their struggle for freedom and justice.[citation needed] In the publicistic book The Butchers, he exposes the White Terror in the Balkan countries.

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Limba: Engleză
Compatibil cu: iPhone, iPad, Android, Kindle
Dimensiunea Fișierului: 1-2 MB
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