J. B. Priestley

[michaeldr]

quote: "The public will be able to read almost 50 unpublished letters from the first world war trenches by the writer JB Priestley, one of the last great literary voices of the conflict, from next month.

The archive of 47 letters and postcards to his father, sister and stepmother have been given to Bradford University by the writer's son Tom, an author and film-maker who is publishing the full correspondence as a book next year."

for the full text of the article see http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,,2211967,00.html

[MelPack]

He told friends after the slaughter, in which he was wounded three times after volunteering in 1914, that he just wanted to live again after four years simply trying to stop himself and others being pointlessly killed....... "The army ought to have turned on [the commander-in-chief] Haig and his friends and sent them home."

Obviously Priestley had no appreciation of the 'learning curve'. His comments cannot be trusted.

[michaeldr]

"The army ought to have turned on [the commander-in-chief] Haig and his friends and sent them home."

Note that there was no animosity or the slightest hint of any harm to be done

Just thought that they should have been sent back from whence they came

[MelPack]

Michael

Leaving aside my flippancy, I am a little surprised that Priestley has never really been discussed on the Board before - apart from a brief thread on his military service some three years past:

http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/i...mp;hl=Priestley

Given his previous literary prominence, it is a measure of how far he has fallen out of 'fashion'.

Regards

Mel

[michaeldr]

Fashion; ah yes....

By my interest I may be betraying my age

nevertheless, I shall keep an eye open for the book

best regards

Michael

[DaveBrigg]

." All his life, when he thought the playing fields of his schooldays, he saw instead "a crowd of ghosts".

I'm not sure that he is out of fashion. I know that the Grocer's Daughter was not a big fan, but 'An inspector Calls' is still studied by at least half the 15/16 yr olds in the country. There is a reference to the Great War in it - 'fire and blood and anguish'; the fate of man if we cannot learn to live as one body.