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Testament of Youth: An Autobiographical Study of the Years 1900-1925 (Virago classic non-fiction) | 
| Author: Vera Brittain
Creators: Shirley Williams, Mark Bostridge
Publisher: Virago Press Ltd
Category: Book
List Price: £12.99
Buy New: £9.09
You Save: £3.90 (30%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  22 reviews
Sales Rank: 399
Media: Paperback
Edition: New Edition with new cover
Pages: 640
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 5 x 1.7
ISBN: 0860680355
EAN: 9780860680352
ASIN: 0860680355
Publication Date: January 1, 1933
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually dispatched within 9 to 14 days
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Amazon.co.uk Review
In 1914 Vera Brittain was 21 years old, and an undergraduate student at Somerville College, Oxford. When war broke out in August of that year, Brittain "temporarily" disrupted her studies to enrol as a volunteer nurse, nursing casualties both in England and on the Western Front. The next four years were to cause a deep rupture in Brittain's life, as she witnessed not only the horrors of war first hand, but also experienced the quadruple loss of her fiancé, her brother, and two close friends. Testament of Youth is a powerfully written, unsentimental memoir which has continued to move and enthral readers since its first publication in 1933. Brittain, a pacifist since her First World War experiences, prefaces the book with a fairy tale, in which Catherine, the heroine, encounters a fairy godmother and is given the choice of having either a happy youth or a happy old age. She selects the latter and so her fate is determined: "Now this woman," warns the tale, "was the destiny of poor Catherine." And we find as we delve deeper into the book that she was the destiny of poor Vera too.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 17 more reviews...
 utterly heartbreaking; one woman's war June 15, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
My mother having pressed me to read this book, I finally got round to it early this year. Thank God I did.
I cannot begin to put into words how much this book touched me. Vera Brittan must be an inspiration to all women; a strong and determined character who, despite losing almost everything to the War, did not give up. Vera Brittan was a young, ambitious girl growing up pre-war with aspirations to go to University (something uncommon for the day.) She succeeded in getting into Oxford to study English. Then the War came crashing into her life, and Vera's brother and friends get called up to fight. She herself finds her place, working as a nurse first in London, then abroad. Vera Brittan lost so much to this horrific War and yet still found the strength to write about her experiences. This is no fiction, but a true, heartbreaking story of one woman's war.
A most poignant and haunting read, Vera Brittan's tragic story of love, family, duty and growing up will stay with you long after you finish the last page.
 An important memoir of the Great War and its aftermath January 3, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
In 1929 Vera Brittain ( 1893- 1970) began using her extensive diaries and correspondence to start writing her auto-biographical epic from 1913-1925, which was published in 1933. At the time Brittain was a part time lecturer for supporters of the League of Nations, a journalist, and had written two novels which had not been particularly well received. Ambitious and a feminist, Brittain seemed determined to succeed at something, and her greatest achievement has been in autobiography.
The book is well written : Brittain depicts her own life, frustrations, personal losses , near breakdown and subsequent attempts at building new life and friendships after the Great War in an endearing manner. Her humanitarianism, her social observations, the fact that she reminded the world how those people away from direct military action, (especially women and men to old to fight) suffered along with the men who were maimed, traumatised, or killed . Brittain also nurses enemy soldiers and also visited Germany after the War, and her compassion extended to the German people. The book also clearly documents how women's lives changed during this time period.
`Testament of Youth' is not great literary fiction, compared with Siegfried Sassoon' Memoirs of an Infantry Officer'. The book has its opponents, one unkind critic referred to Brittain as the `princess of self-pity'. The book is centred around her own suffering and personal losses ( of fiancé, friends, brother), though millions of other people experienced great levels of bereavement at this time. Whether she has the right to be heralded as the `voice' of a generation in this respect is open to question. Certainly Brittain's supporters will point out that the book's success was due to a large number of her contemporaries feeling at least some affinity with her suffering.
Further research has suggested that her brother Edward killed in 1918, may have taken his own life or deliberately exposed himself to enemy fire so as to avoid the disgrace of a court martial ( see `Vera Brittain A life' , Paul Berry and Mark Bostridge 1995). In `Testament of Youth' this is not disclosed to the reader, and one wonders if other amendments have been made though it also to fair say that the book's detractors have found few factual errors in the work.
Above all `Testament of Youth' has undergone a revival , after its transatlantic success in the 1930's, with a new generation of readers as from the late 1970's, because its' vision of the Great War-as a senseless carnage- is now popular. The book was re-published by Virago, the feminist publishing house, whose mission was to showcase work by women authors. It's revival coincided with a new wave of feminist anti-militarism. It is easily the most cited Great War memoir written by a woman. Moreover, the tale of a survivor such as Vera Brittain who witnesses great tragedy but by the end of the book in 1925 has found love again, has great contemporary appeal. Ultimately Vera Brittain has ensured that her perception of the Great War was known to millions of people and the names of those who close to her who perished or also suffered great loss, have been remembered,which must make it a success
The book that changed my life February 8, 2007
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I first read this book when I was about 15 and it had such a remarkable effect on my life that 25 years later I still return to it again and again. It encapsulates so much of the period; the desperate need to get into higher education, the horror of war and its aftermath, how to make sense of it all and finally the joy of love and of friendship. Try Chronicles of Youth as well, the diaries on which she based the book.
A classic: shattering at times, always enlightening May 23, 2004
19 out of 21 found this review helpful
Vera Brittain's account was written in the early 1930s, as she tried to make sense of the extraordinary bereavement that affected those of her generation who survived the First World War.
Growing up in provincial Edwardian England, a fascinating piece of writing in itself, she falls in love with one of her brothers's friends in 1914. The romance is going well, until the outbreak of war sweeps in to disrupt her life. Suddenly the love of her life, as well as her brother and some other close friends, are all in the trenches, trying to live out the noble heroic dream on behalf of King and Country.
Unable to support directly, she joins the nursing corps as a volunteer but there is no consolation for her as first her fiance, then her friends and finally her brother die.
Her account of desolation when she receives the news each time is traumatising and shows a side of life you don't get from the war poems: the horror of war not from the front line, but from the perspective of almost continuous bereavement, among people who feel helpless and increasingly angry with the world. Her perspectives on daily life in London in the war years are as insightful as the descriptions of nursing in Malta and France, where she spent the bulk of her time. Certain details, such as the atmosphere behind the lines as the British wilt before the Ludendorff offensive, but are rallied by a missive from Field Marshall Haig will interest even those who know a lot about the history of it.
Yet it is the human story which is most powerful.
This is a brutally honest book, and she does not paint herself without warts: she is obsessive about academic study, has a mental breakdown after the war and doesn't make it easy on anyone courting her thereafter. Yet Brittain's problems outside the war, of a woman trying to combine a career with marriage, anticipate the great feminist struggles of the 20th and 21st centuries. Indeed, her honesty gives the book a raw truth.
Yet this is not just her story. As she herself writes, this is the story of a generation whose men were wiped out in battle and whose women were shattered by bereavement.
The book continues after the war following her work with the League of Nations until 1925 and this has only limited interest today: the really timeless passages come from earlier on. Profoundly affecting and profoundly insightful, in beautiful prose, this deserves its classic status.
An amazing story of love October 28, 2003
15 out of 17 found this review helpful
I read this book for my A Levels, last year, as we were studying Worl War One Literature. Such a hefty tome looked completely imtimidating, but I decided to start anyway. I soon became completely engrossed in this book. Vera Brittains simple style is so poignant, and the heartrending events are described sensitively and with candour Vera tells of her feelings at the demands of her family, the war and her studies, culminating in the deaths of her brother, and her fiance Roland. The love between Roland and Vera is a pivotal part of this story, and to my mind is the epitome of true, optimistic, young love. The tragic event of his death and the sorrow Vera experiences throughout the war permeates the book. This is an amazing, inspiring book and should by read by anyone who beileves that world war one has no relevance to our lives now, or anyone interested in a woman's perspective on important historical events. Vera Brittain rules!!!! Seriously read this book, buy it now! :) The excellent poetry that preceeds each chapter is so deeply touching. Especially "Perhaps" written after Roland's death by Vera, which tells of her sadness, that she doesn't even notice the shining sun, or appreciate the beauty of nature which was so heightened previous to his death. Really excellent book; perhaps my all time favourite, and I have read a lot of books!
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