Teaching WW1 Literature: Vivien Noakes

Lecture at the event 'Wilfred Owen: From Doomed Youth to the Battle of the Sambre'. Imperial War Museum, 10th November 2012. In this talk, Jean Moorcroft Wilson, presents Owen's full flowering as a late one. Fertilized by his meeting with Sassoon at Craiglockhart War Hospital for Neurasthenic Officers in August 1917 and nurtured by his own experiences of the 'pity of war', it died with Owen himself in one of the last Allied engagements in November 1917, the Battle of the Sambre.

Lecture on Siegfried Sassoon given at the Imperial War Museum, London, 12th November 2011. How did Siegfried Sassoon, whose first patriotic outpourings are almost more Brooke-like than those of Rupert Brooke himself, come to write the bitter war-satires for which he has become famous? Many factors went into the making of 'Mad Jack' - the death of his younger brother at Gallipoli in November 1915, the loss of his great love, David Thomas, and his 'dear' bombing sergeant, Mick O'Brian, in early 1916, and the first day of the Somme, which he witnessed on 1 July that same year. But it was the gruesome aftermath of the battle of Mametz Wood which finally brought home to him the grim realities of war. Presented by the Siegfried Sassoon Fellowship with support from The Wilfred Owen Association.

A discussion on the last phase of the First World War. A talk given at 'Wilfred Owen: From Doomed Youth to Battle of the Sambre', Imperial War Museum, 10th November 2012. Max Egremont, writer and lecturer asks: How bad was the Allies' position in the last months of 1917, after Ypres and Passchendaele? Was it possible to imagine defeat? Why was this transformed during 1918, after the huge German advances of the spring? Was there any truth in the Germans' 'stab in the back' claim that politicians had betrayed a still defiant military? The roots of the catastrophe of the 1930s are already apparent in the last year of the First World War. But can they be traced further back, even to 1914?

Alisa Miller takes a look at the 'Rupert Brooke cult', examining why this particular poet was so popular during the First World War, both with the general public and the soldier, at home and abroad. This podcast has eminated from Alisa's dissertation at the Faculty of History, Oxford University on the poet Rupert Brooke and popular literary culture in Britain during the First World War.

Professor Tim Kendall considers what composer and poet Ivor Gurney understood by the phrase 'war poet' and how he saw his own work as belonging to (and eminent amidst) a tradition of writing about war. Tim Kendall examines the ways in which Gurney represents poetry, and the figure of the poet, in his own work; and assesses Gurney's hopes for the efficacy of such poetry - whether as acts of witness, of escapism, or of political intervention. Tim Kendall is Professor of English Literature at the University of Exeter and editor of The Oxford Handbook of British and Irish War Poetry (Oxford Handbooks of Literature) and author of Modern English War Poetry. The paper was presented at the First World War Literature, Music and Memory Conference held at King's College, Cambridge on the 11th and 12th July, 2009. Recording courtesy of Silvia Perucchetti.

Colin Hughes, author of David Jones: the man who was on the field (1979), discusses his friendship with poet and artist David Jones and his research on the Battle of Mametz Wood.

In a podcast recorded earlier this year, Kate Lindsay, Project Manager for the First World War Poetry Digital Archive discusses the exciting development of the First World War Poetry Digital Archive and The Great War Archive. In a podcast recorded earlier this year, Kate Lindsay, Project Manager for the First World War Poetry Digital Archive discusses the exciting development of the archive and it's initiative "The Great War Archive". Kate outlines some of the features that will be available to researchers, teachers, students and the general public when the archive is launched on the 11th November 2008. This podcast was recorded by the Joint Information Systems Committee as part of it's Digitisation Programme.

A second enhanced podcast tour of some of the exhibits in the Imperial War Museum. The tour takes you through the Trench Experience and the end of the war, linking to some of the poets and poetry of the period. This podcast is designed to be used at the Imperial War Museum. It is the second in a series of 2 podcasts, produced by Oxford University's First World War Poetry Digital Archive project.

Andrea Peterson 'Children's Literature'. Andrea Peterson 'Children's Literature' part of the Teaching World War One literature conference, Oxford University, 12/11/07.

Vivien Noakes 'Blasting the Canon'. Vivien Noakes 'Blasting the Canon' part of the Teaching World War One Literature conference, Oxford University, 12/11/07.