Anthem for Doomed Youth

by Jon Stallworthy

Very good/ Shipped from the U.K. All orders received before 3pm sent that weekday.

Genres: Poetry, History, Nonfiction, War, Biography, World War I, Military Fiction

Hardcover

First published October 24, 2002

About the author

Jon (Howie) Stallworthy (18 January 1935 – 19 November 2014) FBA FRSL was Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Oxford. He was also a Fellow (and was twice Acting President) of Wolfson College, a poet, and a literary critic. From 1977 to 1986, he was the John Wendell Anderson Professor of English at Cornell.

Stallworthy was born in London. His parents, Sir John Stallworthy and Margaret Stallworthy, were from New Zealand and moved to England in 1934. Stallworthy started writing poems when he was only seven years old. He was educated at the Dragon School, Rugby School and at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he won the Newdigate prize. His works include seven volumes of poetry, and biographies of Wilfred Owen and Louis MacNeice. He has edited several anthologies and is particularly known for his work on war poetry.

While researching the local history of New Zealand Stallworthy discovered an obscure volume entitled Early Northern Wairoa written by his great-grandfather, John Stallworthy (1854–1923), in 1916. From this book he learned that his great-great-grandfather, George Stallworthy (1809–1859), had left his birthplace of Preston Bissett in Buckinghamshire, England, for the Marquesas as a missionary. This discovery led in turn to him finding family-related letters in the archives of the London Missionary Society. Stallworthy's book A Familiar Tree (Oxford University Press, 1978) is a collection of poetry inspired by events depicted in these documents. Singing School is an autobiography which emphasises Stallworthy's development as a poet.

Stallworthy wrote a short summary of war poetry in the introductory chapter to the Oxford Book of War Poetry (Edited by Jon Stallworthy, Oxford University Press, 1984), as well as editing several anthologies of war poetry and writing a biography of Wilfred Owen. In 2010 he received the Wilfred Owen Poetry Award from the Wilfred Owen Association. In the course of his literary career, he became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and the British Academy.

Reviews

[Lyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this a very moving book about some of the soldier poets of WW1. For each poet there is a brief biography, a selection of poems (and some analyses of these) and photos and drawings. It would perhaps have been nice if the biographies had been more detailed.

[Anna Gibson · Rating 3 out of 5]

An analysis of twelve soldier poets of WWI. The book typically only produces a handful of their poems, and is more focused on providing a biography and contextual analysis of their writing and prose. Which is fine--but I'd been assuming the book was more of a poetry anthology so I was a bit disappointed that we didn't get more of their work. The author's personal opinion on their poems also takes precedence, and is sometimes a little frustrating.

Not a bad place to start, though, as the author does provide an extensive list of further reading.

[Sadie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I got this book from my grandfather a while ago and it did have some really good poetry included. Obviously, this isn't my usual read but it was good!


(I also needed to increase my reads to achieve my reading goal so, I needed to finish this lol 😅)

[Tim O'Riordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovely volume with photographs and short biography of the poets. The poems themselves give an interesting insider's take on WWI and the verse form makes it all the more poignant.