Discussion Post
• What do you think is the meaning of Robert Graves' title Goodbye to All That? What is the 'all that' that he is referring to?
• How do RH Tawney and Robert Graves' accounts of the Battle of the Somme compare? Can you find any passages about actual combat in Graves's classic memoir as vivid as Tawney's account of his experience in the Battle of the Somme? What makes Tawney's account so powerful?
• Reflect on the following passage from "The Attack." How do you interpret RH Tawney's account of his emotions during his participation in the Battle of the Somme?
"Now I knew it was all right. I shouldn't be frightened and I shouldn't lose my head. Imagine the joy of that discovery! I felt quite happy and self-possessed. It wasn't courage. That, I imagine, is the quality of facing danger which one knows to be danger, of making one's spirit triumph over the bestial desire to live in this body. But I knew that I was in no danger. I knew I shouldn't be hurt; knew it positively, much more positively than I know most things I'm paid for knowing."