Changing Englishness in First World War Poetry

Abstract

This thesis examines how the first-hand experience of the First World War changed the prominent war poets? collective vision of England. The England of the pre-war poetic consciousness was transformed by the unique experience of fighting in the biggest and most destructive war at that point. Two key aspects of this new vision are examined ? `Place? and `People?. England as a place is depicted as vividly as the war poets? immediate environment of trenches and battlefields. Yet the war poets also came to conceive of a new, more egalitarian England overseas, defined primarily in terms of their fellow soldiers. Traditional divisions of nationality and class were attenuated, replaced by the soldier-civilian divide. Nevertheless, the war poets? vision was still fundamentally conservative as it remained rooted in tradition, most apparent in their treatments of class and language. Their vision of England is distinctive but limited, despite the war?s shaping influence.