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Regeneration by: Pat Barker

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Rating: - An excellent storyline, with superb writing from Barker

I do not often read that much but I had to read Regeneration as part of my a-level english lit course. I really enjoyed this book because it did not follow the ordinary form of war books as Barker chose to present the effects of war on peoples lives rather than to glorify it. The book excellently presents the relationships between people and how their experiences affect these relationships. Another excellent novel by Barker!!

Rating: - A very entertaining but somewhat limited novel

If you are considering reading this book primarily for the purpose of pleasure I would whole-heartedly recommend it. Pat Barker's characters are beautifully rounded and psychologically developed thus the novel has great potential for intense cathartic involvement. It is highly engaging and a very easy read. As a basic introduction WWI literature I would say that it has a certain educational value, as Barker very sympathetically incorporates and discusses the concerns and issues which typify the genre. Having said this, I believe that its value is significantly limited. Rather than writing the experiences of those who did not have a voice during the War, (as is often the case with Barker's work), she has chosen to embellish and fictionalise the lives of several of the great war writers such as Owen, Sassoon and Graves. My concern with this novel therefore is that it will be read as a substitute for the biographies and autobiographies of the aforementioned persons, and thus that it will undermine those works of literature from which Barker has taken inspiration.

Rating: - yay

being on my A-level reading list i assumed, like most books your forced to read, the story would be lost to monotomus analysis but instead i was suprised at how much i enjoed it.

Unlike with earlier war lit, which although good tends to bore slightly by the end, it was completey enjoyable from start to finish.

The most compelling part of the story for me was by far the relationship between Sassoon and Owen, very realistic and touching especially Owens nervousness when meeting his hero.

It's definatly worth a read especially for fans of war poetry.

Rating: - Regeneration

great story well worth a read, especially if you love the ww1 war poets. Its a good read for A level students for war lit as is pretty quick to read and easy going.

Rating: - No-man's mind

Though often mentioned alongside the likes of Faulks's Birdsong and Susan Hill's Strange Meeting, Regeneration does not exactly come up to the 'regular' qualification of a war novel. Instead, what novelist Pat Barker sets out to attain is to trace the mental paralysis the war leaves in man's mind as well as exploring the courageous, though mostly inept, ways for all those involved, to cope.

As a psychiatrist at Craiglockhart Hospital, psychiatrist W.H. Rivers, a historically authentic character and a kind-hearted, get-at-able, even noble person, faces up to the impossible task to try and free his inmates-patients from the war demons that do not cease to haunt their minds.
In this process he gets involved in their regeneration process at a personal level as they grow able to express the horrors that have incapacitated them psychologically.

Barker follows the treatment undergone by war poet Siegfried Sassoon (aka Mad Jack) upon his arrival at Craiglockhart after throwing his brave conduct medal into the river Mersey and publishing his notorious anti-war statement in the Times.
Another riveting feature of the book is when Sassoon meets young Wilfred Owen and encourages the young poet in his writing aspirations.

In Regeneration, admittedly, the war merely serves as an undercurrent; but Barker succeeds admirably in turning it into a dramatic device to explore the complex issues she sets forth to clarify.
Being a doctor, Rivers' job is to preserve life. However, in just doing this, he ends up getting the men back on their feet again so they are ready to go back to the front (to get killed there just the same).

For Sassoon, Owen and the other soldier-patients, an important crux is the guilt complex which, given the emotional closeness between the fellow-soldiers in the trenches, almost forces the chaps to return to the front; to them it is the only way by which to avert the threat of mental destruction by guilt.

This dilemma is just what makes novels like these so worth one's while: even while physically on the safe side, the soldiers remain damned and doomed. What, indeed, are their chances of survival if and when they go back to the trenches?
A worthy testimony and a valuable read.

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