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Poilu: The World War I Notebooks of Corporal Louis Barthas, Barrelmaker, 1914-1918, by Louis Barthas Edward M. Strauss
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Review
“This translation of the diaries and letters of a French corporal on the Western front in World War I brings the gritty reality of trench warfare to an English-speaking audience in a manner unparalleled even in the best soldier writings from that war. The reader feels and smells and hears the mud, the blood, the fear, the deafening noise of exploding shells, the clatter of machine guns, the cries of the wounded and dying. Here is the war as the men in the trenches experienced it.”—James McPherson, author of Battle Cry of Freedom“This book shows clearly and viscerally what were the origins of French soldiers’ pacifism. . . . Barthas’s voice is unlike any other I know in the vast literature on the First World War. The translation is excellent; the grittiness of the text is captured beautifully, and so is the humanity of the man who wrote it.”—Jay Winter, Yale University"A revelatory book that brings the French experience of the Great War to life as you read. However much we may think the British and Americans suffered, their agony was shorter and less intense than the tragedy that overwhelmed the French nation in 1914-1918."—Peter Hart, author of The Great War: A Combat History of the First World War“Ah, the notebooks of Louis Barthas! This book has profound historic value. It is also a genuine work of literature.”—François Mitterrand, former president of France“Louis Barthas’ stunningly honest, graphic and gripping narrative has rightly made Poilu a classic trench memoir.”—Douglas Porch, author of The French Foreign Legion: A Complete History of the Legendary Fighting Force“In Barthas’ telling, the fighting men on both sides of No Man’s Land shared a more natural bond with their fellows than with those career officers who pitted them against each other. Barthas’ detailed real-time reportage captures instances of informal truces and slowdowns between combatants, as they tacitly aid one another in their shared struggle to survive the madness.” —David Wright, The Seattle Times“Among World War I books being published in this centennial year of that conflict's start, none likely can connect readers more directly or vividly to the experience of those who fought it.”—Alan Wallace, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
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About the Author
Louis Barthas (1879–1952) was a cooper in a small town in southern France. Edward M. Strauss is a fundraising director in higher education and former publisher of MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History. He lives in New York City.
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Product details
Paperback: 480 pages
Publisher: Yale University Press (March 31, 2015)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0300212488
ISBN-13: 978-0300212488
Product Dimensions:
5.7 x 1 x 9.5 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:
4.7 out of 5 stars
149 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#99,939 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The lion's share of Great War accounts I've read seem to be from the English or the German side. Occasionally there are some French accounts thrown in (i.e. Barbusse's "Under Fire") but for the most part (I don't know why) the French soldiers are usually treated as distant, somehow at a remove from a lot of the actions and campaigns that took place between Tom and Jerry.Barthas's account of the life of a "poilu" (I believe it literally translates as something like "hairy one" but means "grunt") is the firsthand account of a cooper-turned corporal, who reluctantly but steadfastly fought for several years straight in the charnel house that was Europe in the First World War. Like Herbert Sulzbach ("With the German Guns") it's a miracle that Barthes even lived long enough to write the diary entries that comprise this book. And like Ernst Junger ("Copse 125," "Storms of Steel" et. al.) Barthas' descriptions of battle are at once of an unquestionable veracity (to paraphrase Gide on Junger) and yet somehow achieve the tenor of ghastly, surrealistic poetry. Some of the entries are truly breathtaking to read.That said, I would be lying if I said I didn't find some of the book to be a slog. Because the French (unlike the Germans) didn't fight primarily with units comprised of men they knew from their towns and villages, and because they were constantly shifted, it is hard to get a bead on any of the other characters in Barthas' orbit. Yes, this is a series of diary entries, which makes it more an interior rumination rather than a traditional narrative, but the men with whom Barthas shares the trenches congeal into one mass of undifferentiated ciphers. The old saying is that war is long stretches of boredom punctuated by short bursts of sheer terror, and it's certainly true in this book as Barthas marches, camps, prepares for a fight that doesn't occur, and then marches off again. Also, I don't fault any man for having strong political convictions (especially when they've been born out by such a mountain of empirical evidence in the form of what essentially was state-sanctioned genocide), but the relentless didactic tone (Barthas was a socialist) sometimes becomes a bit wearing. It is, in its own way, as rigid, reflexive, and blinkered as unbridled and unthinking patriotism.All that said, there's no disputing that this is an important book, a candid and harrowing piece of history from an enlisted Frenchman, a species from whom we who are curious about the Great War haven't heard nearly enough.
I have waited many years for this work to be published in English. I served in the Verdun region for the years 1955-1956 at the Etain-Rouvres AB as part of the NATO buildup across Europe. My literary French is very weak and Edward M. Strauss has done a splendid job of French/English conversion.I knew many of the veterans of the battle and they helped us young military guys with the maps and the terrible feeling of being under fire while suffering from fever, hunger, thirst and terror.Armies are not all the same. This is the French Army of 1914-1918. Military folks! Do not miss out on this epoch work of an intelligent Poilu, Cpl. Louis Barthas who carefully recorded life in the garrison and trenches during those years.
Poilu is best understood not as a war book, but as a narrative explaining how and why people willingly march to their own slaughter at the bidding of sadistic, power-mad commanders who obviously care nothing whatever for them. In that sense, the book is about human psychology, and has universal import. It is one of the very few narratives written by an ordinary soldier, whose plight, as the author says, is simply unknowable to their officers. Barthas, a self-professed socialist, internationalist, and pacifist, willingly obeys orders he fully understands are insane and murderous, issued by people he views with incandescent hatred and contempt. Almost all his friends die senselessly, even assuming the justness of the war itself [which the author does not]. Not only are soldiers sent in heaps to almost certain death; they also suffer constant torture and abuse by haughty officers who appropriate the best food and most comfortable quarters for themselves while forcing their men to freeze and starve. Death and mutilation seem also the least of the common soldiers' worries. At every lull in the carnage, brutal officers force their charges to endure meaningless, degrading, and unending drudgery; shivering, starving, manure-covered and lice-infected poilu suffer humiliating marches, parades, and drills to fulfill the sadistic pleasures of their superiors, who sacrifice legions for their own glory and promotion. How do they get away with this? Why do the victims obey? Why do commoners march into certain mutilation or death rather than shoot those who sacrifice them? This question is one of the most important faced by our species; answering it explains, if not everything, than almost everything. Theoretical discussions of this issue abound; this narrative puts us in the place of one who survived and let's us comprehend his thoughts and emotions. Laid bare are the mechanisms of totalitarian control not only over the bodies, but the hearts, minds, and souls of the victims--which is almost all of us who are asked or allowed to serve. Coincidentally, I read this just after finishing *Seductive Poison*, a survivor's account of life [and death] with Peoples Temple, culminating in the mass murder/suicide of over 900 devoted followers in Jonestown. Jim Jones is widely considered a pathological cult leader; yet Deborah Layton and hundreds of other sane and idealistic persons voluntarily adjusted themselves to his rule, and suffered humiliation, privation, and death in fulfilling his commands. The methods of social control, the myriads of ways in which followers accustom themselves in participating in great atrocities [including those inflicted on themselves], even as they extenuate, justify, and deny to the grave, are the same in murder/suicide cults public and private--in national armies as well as Jonestown in Guinea or the Brach Davidian compound at Waco. Understanding the armed forces of nations as officially-sanctioned murder/suicide cults is essential for us to recognize their true natures.
The book REALLY describes war as seen through the eyes of a French soldier. Very detailed and moving. I'm about halfway through and wanted to review it as soon as possible. It described events as if you were there. There are some surprising aspects, such as fraternization with the enemy troops, that was more common than previously known. I did not realize how close the front lines were to the areas that the troops used to rest (if you can call it that). A matter of meters. The poilu (slang for the French ground troops or infantry from the rural areas of southern France) were sacrificed in a war that was horrific at best. A reluctant corporal, Louis Berthas was diligent in his writings and left us a treasure. He was well read, even though he was only a barrelmaker, and his compatriots wanted to make sure he told their tale. It is amazing his notebooks survived. The photos of the notebooks are amazing. I highly recommend this book.
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