The embattled self: French soldiers' testimony of the Great War
How did the soldiers in the trenches of the Great War understand and explain battlefield experience, and themselves through that experience? Situated at the intersection of military history and cultural history, The embattled self draws on the testimony of French combatants to explore how combatants...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Book |
| Language: | English |
| Subito Delivery Service: | Order now. |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| WorldCat: | WorldCat |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
Ithaca, New York
Cornell University Press
2007
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| In: | Year: 2007 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
France
/ Soldier
/ World War
B French language / War stories / World War (Motif) B Girard, René 1923-2015 |
| Further subjects: | B
HISTORY ; Europe ; France
B World War, 1914-1918 Personal narratives, French B World War, 1914-1918 Literature and the war B HISTORY ; Europe ; Western B World War, 1914-1918 Personal narratives, French B Electronic books Personal narratives B War and literature B Experience account B Electronic books B Personal Narratives |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Parallel Edition: | Non-electronic
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| Summary: | How did the soldiers in the trenches of the Great War understand and explain battlefield experience, and themselves through that experience? Situated at the intersection of military history and cultural history, The embattled self draws on the testimony of French combatants to explore how combatants came to terms with the war. In order to do so, they used a variety of narrative tools at hand-- rites of passage, mastery, a character of the soldier as a consenting citizen of the Republic. None of the resulting versions of the story provided a completely consistent narrative, and all raised more questions about the "truth" of experience than they answered. In thematic chapters, Smith explains why the novel structured by a specific notion of trauma prevailed by the 1930s and undermines the conventional understanding of the war as tragedy and its soldiers as victims, a view that has dominated both scholarly and popular opinion since the interwar period Rites of passage and the initiation to combat -- The mastery of survival : death, mutilation, and killing -- The genre of consent -- The novel and the search for closure. |
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| Item Description: | Includes bibliographical references and index. - Print version record |
| Physical Description: | Online Ressource (229 pages) |
| ISBN: | 978-0-8014-7121-6 0-8014-7121-4 |
