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Goodbye to All That

4.07 of 5 stars 4.07 · rating details · 3,192 ratings · 206 reviews

The quintessential memoir of the generation of Englishmen who suffered in World War I is among the bitterest autobiographies ever written. Robert Graves's stripped-to-the-bone prose seethes with contempt for his class, his country, his military superiors, and the civilians who mindlessly cheered the carnage from the safety of home. His portrait of the stupidity & petty...more

Paperback, Modern Classics, 281 pages

Published September 28th 2000 by Penguin Books, Limited (UK) (first published 1929)

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Mar 28, 2013 ·Karen· rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: biography-memoir

In 1929 Robert Graves (aged 33) went abroad, "resolved never to make England my home again;" which explains the title. However this autobiography does little to illuminate that decision: in an epilogue he says that "a conditioning in the Protestant morality of the English governing classes, though qualified by mixed blood, a rebellious nature, and an overriding poetic obsession, is not easily outgrown." Nor is it easily escaped when writing about your own life: one thing that does not feature is...more

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Mar 02, 2010 Tyler rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Anyone

Recommended to Tyler by: WWI Bibliography

Herbert Marcuse describes in One-dimensional Man a world where clashing ideas are held together in a way that makes them impossible to evaluate. We see this with the current PBS ads which, in service to some obscene aesthetic, combine classical opera with film of a napalm attack on Vietnam. A kindred juxtaposition makes the technique of Goodbye to All That recognizably modern. Graves relates his life in a succession of caricatures that shift between the comic and the horrific. Young Graves faces...more Herbert Marcuse describes in One-dimensional Man a world where clashing ideas are held together in a way that makes them impossible to evaluate. We see this with the current PBS ads which, in service to some obscene aesthetic, combine classical opera with film of a napalm attack on Vietnam. A kindred juxtaposition makes the technique of Goodbye to All That recognizably modern. Graves relates his life in a succession of caricatures that shift between the comic and the horrific. Young Graves faces two hurdles: British boarding school and World War I. It’s his accounts of both that bring this book fame. But is it really all that?

In upper class schools for boys we find, as the story begins, bastions of intramural sex that administrators ignore. Graves takes a partner, Dick, as a matter of inveterate custom; his tone tells us it would be in bad form to register much more than a raised eyebrow over this. True, it’s not as graphic as Céline’s frank account of British boarding school in Death on the Installment Plan. But later comes a kind of punch line. Dick gets arrested for coming on to an officer. Graves denounces him, realizing, apparently for the first time, that Dick really is “like that.” I’m not gay, Graves tells us, but my boyfriend is. Having torn the mask off British boarding school, Graves, we find, has adapted to its carnal secrets quite nicely, thank you. Wickedly funny, sir. Take a bow but please, no encore.

Adapting to anything is the link that gets us from sex to war. One moment finds Graves killing Krauts and tripping into rotting corpses; next thing you know he and Siegfried Sassoon are sitting in the grass reciting poetry. Graves plays on this contrast between Britain’s home front dream of war and France’s reality. These absurd transitions take events in stride without regard to their moral status. Graves chronicles them. Conclusions are left to the reader.

A light touch helps sidestep the in any case inexplicable enormity of the Great War. But at this point we run up against the circularity of the author’s worldview. Implicit in the book is a concession that the system that causes war is its own raison d’etre. This undertone weakens the farce we might otherwise notice. The memoir is in part a comedy of evil; but Graves’s comical approach, because of his dry class humor, often turns a fuming crime into a desiccated absurdity. It’s hard to read the theatricality the way the author may have meant it.

A puritanical upper class conformist, Graves is content to be part of the state of affairs he excoriates. The book's light moments rely on a satire of manners that plays to his immense vanity; the rich details of a catered life flesh out various sketches – every faux pas made, the style of the place settings, his illustrious friends and family, the weave of the many strings he pulls. He drops names with astonishing recall, and I certainly can’t deny his entitlements. Yet it’s hard to effectively attack this system from within. The sheer scale of the evil doesn’t yield easily to jaunty farce. Readers in our day can only too well see World War II just dying to climb out from these pages.

Fans of satire might disagree with me as to how effectively it works here. But I can safely say that this is not the scorching declamation of injustice one might be led to expect. Even so, this important war memoir received special attention in the elegantly conceived The Great War and Modern Memory. Graves’s book is in fact well structured and well written, containing all the effects that make for good storytelling. It’s a precise read that doesn’t tarry too long on any one point and an unexpected page turner.

The particular attraction of Goodbye to All That is for students of World War I, fans of memoirs, people who like poetry (although the book contains none) and poets, and anyone curious about the scandal endemic to boarding schools. On the other hand, readers outside these categories may find in this autobiography an insufferable litany of manners, titles, class, ego and conformity. Proceed, but with realistic expectations.
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Aug 30, 2010 Teresa rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The lines that have stayed with me after finishing this book are those Graves wrote about his time in Oxford after the war, when he was experiencing vivid 'daydreams' of trench warfare. It's obvious now that those 'dreams' were flashbacks -- I'm guessing the term hadn't been invented yet -- and Graves says they were always of his first four months in the trenches, that his 'feeling-apparatus' (his words) had shut down after that time.

As a schoolboy, Graves suffered under the herd mentality at bo...more

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Nov 25, 2012 Don Incognito rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed, owned

The strength of Robert Graves' autobiography is that it provides sharp and illuminating observations on: the culture of the British school system and students in the early twentieth century; the behavior and attitudes of British regular military officers (as opposed to both enlistees and reservists) near the frontline during World War I; and, especially, trench warfare. The book is an excellent resource for understanding what life in the trenches--during battle attacks and between attacks--was l...more The strength of Robert Graves' autobiography is that it provides sharp and illuminating observations on: the culture of the British school system and students in the early twentieth century; the behavior and attitudes of British regular military officers (as opposed to both enlistees and reservists) near the frontline during World War I; and, especially, trench warfare. The book is an excellent resource for understanding what life in the trenches--during battle attacks and between attacks--was like. Trench warfare is fascinating, if miserable.

The weakness: Graves's writing is very, very emotionally restrained. At no time does he let the reader have a glimpse of his soul. It's hard not to conclude that Graves was simply a cool, distant intellectual.

The reader can figure out early on that Graves had no special sympathy for either England or Germany in the war, and the most likely reason is obvious. Graves had one German parent and many German relatives, and spent substantial time in Germany in his youth. This, in addition to his joining the British Army for self-interested reasons, prevented strong nationalistic feelings in him toward either country.

Except for its extensive descriptions of trench warfare life, I consider this book ultimately a failure, due to two problems. One is Graves's emotional restraint. He eventually makes it clear that he has been psychologically damaged by the trench warfare, using the word "neurasthenia" frequently to describe his mental condition during leave and relating that he suffered from shell shock for years after the war. Therefore, the restraint must be excused, I guess; Graves did what he could do. Nevertheless, the reader can't see much of Graves's soul at any time.

The other problem is inexcusable. If you read reviews of this book or read other biographical information on Graves, you will know he left England circa 1929 and moved to Spain permanently, feeling very bitter toward England. We can figure out that the bitterness must have been due to the stupidity of the entire war, the stupidity and arrogance of the English military leaders, and the naivete and ignorance of patriotic English civilians; but apparently there was something else that made Graves angry and bitter. Unfortunately, Graves does not explain what that was, does not even give enough clues for us to guess. The only reason at all that we know his angry departure was due to anything other than World War I is the first paragraph of the prologue (written in 1957), which says:

I partly wrote, partly dictated, this book twenty-eight years ago during a complicated domestic crisis, and with very little time for revision. It was my bitter leave-taking of England where I had recently broke a good many conventions; quarreled with, or been disowned by, most of my friends; been grilled by the police on suspicion of attempted murder; and ceased to care what anyone thought of me.

That's honestly all he says about whatever drove him out of England, as though it couldn't be important or interesting. He says absolutely nothing about his later career as an important classicist writer, either. I suppose he wanted to relate only the history of his youth and his career as a soldier during World War I. This book should be called a "memoir," because it's much too incomplete to be an "autobiography."(less)

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Nov 26, 2007 Nat rated it 5 of 5 stars

What follows is my favorite passage from Goodbye to All That. It begins with Graves's delivery of absurdity in deadpan style:

"Many of the patients at Osborne were neurasthenic and should have been in a special neurasthenic hospital. A.A. Milne was there, as a subaltern in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, and in his least humorous vein. One Vernon Bartlett, of the Hampshire Regiment, decided with me that something new must be started. So we founded the 'Royal Albert Society', its pretended aim b...more What follows is my favorite passage from Goodbye to All That. It begins with Graves's delivery of absurdity in deadpan style:

"Many of the patients at Osborne were neurasthenic and should have been in a special neurasthenic hospital. A.A. Milne was there, as a subaltern in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, and in his least humorous vein. One Vernon Bartlett, of the Hampshire Regiment, decided with me that something new must be started. So we founded the 'Royal Albert Society', its pretended aim being to revive interest in the life and times of the Prince Consort. My regalia as president consisted of a Scottish dirk, Hessian boots, and and pair of side-whiskers. Official business might not proceed until the announcement had been duly made that 'The whiskers are on the table'. Membership was open only to officers who professed themselves students of the life and works of the Prince Consort; those who had been born in the province of Alberta in Canada; those who had resided for six months or longer by the banks of the Albert Nyanza; those who held the Albert Medal for saving life; or those who were linked with the Prince Consort's memory in any other signal way. This must have been the first of the now popular burlesques of Victorianism. The members were instructed to report at each meeting reminiscences collected from old palace-servants and Osborne cottagers, throwing light on the human side of the Consort's life. We had fifteen members and ate quantities of strawberries".

Then it gets even more absurd:

"On one occasion, a dozen officers came in to join the society, professing to have the necessary qualifications. One claimed to be the grandson of the man who had built the Albert Memorial; one had worked at the Albert Docks; and one actually did possess the Albert Medal for saving life; the others were all interested students. They submitted quietly at first to the ceremonies and business, but it was soon apparent that they had come to break up the society; they were, in fact, most of them drunk. They began giving indecent accounts of the Prince Consort's private life, alleging that they could substantiate them with photographic evidence. Bartlett and I got worried; it was not that sort of society. Therefore, as president, I rose and told in an improved version the story which had won the 1914 Aldershot for the filthiest story of the year. I linked it up with the Prince Consort by saying that he had heard it from the lips of John Brown, the famous Balmoral ghillie, in whose pawky humor Queen Victoria used to find such delight; and that, having prevented him from sleeping for three days and nights, it had been a contributory cause of his premature death. The interrupters threw up their hands, in shocked surrender, and walked out" (pp.253-254). (less)

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Dec 14, 2011 Tamora Pierce rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult, nonfiction

This is the autobiography by poet, novelist, essayist, you name it Robert Graves, author of I, CLAUDIUS and CLAUDIUS THE GOD, THE WHITE GODDESS, translations of the Greek myths and legends (which I found *very* educational and read before Bulfinch and Edith Hamilton), and large numbers of other things I cannot detail. It begins with his childhood, his ancestry--assorted illustrious writers and ministers on the British side and minor German nobility--and his school history, up until the outbreak...more This is the autobiography by poet, novelist, essayist, you name it Robert Graves, author of I, CLAUDIUS and CLAUDIUS THE GOD, THE WHITE GODDESS, translations of the Greek myths and legends (which I found *very* educational and read before Bulfinch and Edith Hamilton), and large numbers of other things I cannot detail. It begins with his childhood, his ancestry--assorted illustrious writers and ministers on the British side and minor German nobility--and his school history, up until the outbreak of WWI.

The bulk of the book details his war experience as a young officer sent into the trenches in the region of the Somme, describing minutely life as an officer among the men, billeted among the French when not living in trenches themselves, dealing with the development of gas warfare, the curious relationships the troops had with their German counterparts, friendships, leaves, sickness and injuries, and deaths. Death is the principal factor in Graves' service in the war, with one in three men wounded or killed and a battalion virtually wiped out and replaced every 4-6 months in a war that killed most of a generation of Europe's young men. It's the most vivid account of a war on the ground I've ever read. He also details his wounds following *the* Battle of the Somme and his post-war PTSD (and that of his fellow soldiers), describing the effect his "nerves" has on his day-to-day life, family, marriage, and career. He also talks about the notable men he meets during and after the war, men like Siegfried Sassoon, Wilfred Owen, and T.E. Lawrence, among others.

The book is ironic, bitter, funny, horrifying, and undeniably real. Graves doesn't try to make himself pretty, either in his physical descriptions of himself or in his descriptions of his thinking and his behavior. He makes it clear he is fumbling--through school, through the ranks of officers, through the war and after it. The one thing he is certain of is his writing. He needs to do it and he hangs onto it when the world around him really is going crazy.(less)

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Aug 23, 2007 Eric rated it 5 of 5 stars

All the chickenhawks who think war is wonderful and glorious should read this book. Then go enlist.

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May 25, 2011 Jeanette rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: audio, biography-memoir, four-star-nonfiction, nonfiction

I probably would have liked this better if I'd been able to read it in print. Alas, most libraries don't have it these days, so I was lucky enough to get the abridged audio edition from my library. It's only four disks, and the fourth disk is far and away the most interesting. The earlier disks are filled with the repetitive miseries of World War I from the soldier's perspective, and also his strange upbringing as an English schoolboy.

The fourth disk provides a lot more variety. He discusses th...more

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Mar 12, 2008 Mike Schneider rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

What strikes me about this book -- after the descriptions of WW I trench warfare, which give me a sensual feel for this war as does nothing else I've read, including All Quiet on the Western Front . . .

What strikes me is Graves' tone toward his material -- it's an epic, amazing tale, I think. Greatly tragic. And yet his British stiff upper lip, in a way, never quivers. He delivers all of it -- the whole story of young men dying horribly, and for nothing much beyond empty nationalist pride &...more

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Feb 12, 2012 Lindz rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Anyone who loves good writing.

Shelves: british, 20th-century, memoir

I wish I had not read this book when I had a nasty case of the flu, other wise this book may have got 5 stars.
"Good Bye to all that" is a no holds bar, beautifully written, smug, contentious, colourful at times ludicrous (only because I still find the descriptions of the trenches hard to believe, yet I have seen photos and read other accounts - too much Black Adder I think), autobiography.

I cannot imagine Robert Graves being an easy person too like, but this is what made this autobiography brill...more

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Apr 03, 2013 Greg Deane rated it 5 of 5 stars

Robert Graves’ Goodbye to All That is a fine piece of WWI literature, where the humdrum brutality and incessant misery of war concludes with the different type of tedium that Graves and his wife find in a grocery shop they open in rural England. Graves writes his memoirs that are strikingly frank, not only with respect to others, including fellow writers like Siegfried Sassoon and Rupert Brooke. But while he captures the ruthless bloodthirst that infects even proclaimed pacifists like Sassoon, h...more Robert Graves’ Goodbye to All That is a fine piece of WWI literature, where the humdrum brutality and incessant misery of war concludes with the different type of tedium that Graves and his wife find in a grocery shop they open in rural England. Graves writes his memoirs that are strikingly frank, not only with respect to others, including fellow writers like Siegfried Sassoon and Rupert Brooke. But while he captures the ruthless bloodthirst that infects even proclaimed pacifists like Sassoon, he recalls Ford Maddox Ford who conveys the maddening routine of war, including the artillery barrages and the constant rebuilding of trench defences.

Graves is all the more credible because he is apolitical, without blaming according to any ideology. He even admits to the thrill of running amok. He accepts his part in the war without casting blame, or preaching or even regret.

At the same time, Graves is hardly unthinking, together with his fellow writers at the front. He talks of pacifism and how it is warranted by the futility of a war without any clear justification. The immediacy of his observations suggests he wrote the book from a journal, but with a perspective that enables him to be dispassionate and lucid.

Graves provides an objectivity that does not engage with the mythology and sentimentality that pervades the works of Rupert Brooke or Wilfred Owen. He is not wracked by guilt; nor does he glory in triumphalism. He lets the reader know that he was an acting lieutenant-colonel, or an officer commanding a regiment, before he was 23,but without any implication that he is proud of the abilities he must have demonstrated to hold this rank, no matter how briefly. But clearly, he was a conscientious leader who strove for the survival of his men.

Highlights of the book include his sketches of the lieutenant colonel in the officers’ mess enraged because Graves wore insignia on his epaulettes instead of his cuffs. He wittily describes the behaviour of soldiers when off active duty, temporarily billeted in French towns before being drafted to the front, or enjoying a short, precious leave. The reader shares in the relief of the soldiers on leave, briefly released from the trenches to recover their spirits in the drawing room of a French chateau. These small pleasures were all the more precious for the soldiers who accepted that could die any time. Ironically, those who feared death the most were the ones most likely to die. Graves’ memoir gives insights into a new normal, that including compatriots ‘going over the top’ only to be mown down by German machine guns, to collapse and die writhing on barbed wire. But Graves still recalls that the German barbed wire, and the German cutters, and other military equipment, was superior to that issued to the British Tommy.

Graves’ frankness and objectivity combined with a sense that the war was a dreadful phenomenon that had a life of its own makes Goodbye to all that a valuable historic document for anyone interested in the psychology of the soldier at war, and of the way that events can subsume not only individuals, but whole armies and nations. (less)

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Oct 20, 2012 Jessica Tocque rated it 3 of 5 stars

I had to read Grave's memoir for my English university course. I was expecting a severely emotional account of the First World War. It was everything but that.

I took an instant dislike to Graves' with his bourgeois tact, I found his completely discriminating views regarding class and sexuality to heart, and this shows throughout the book, so I never could get my head around him, and disliked him more at the end than I did at the start.

He is a very impassive character, describing the deaths of hi...more

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Feb 22, 2012 Al rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I started “Good-bye to All That” with both interest and trepidation: interest, because the book came highly recommended by Paul Fussell in “The Great War and Modern Memory” which I had just read; trepidation, because I had never previously read a soldier’s war memoir, so I expected it to be a pretty dry affair. I needn’t have worried. It’s easy to understand why Robert Graves’ 1929 autobiography remains in print today; it provides an accessible, almost shockingly realistic portrayal of being an...more

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Jan 29, 2011 Tony rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: biography

Graves, Robert. GOODBYE TO ALL THAT: An Autobiography. (1929; revised 2nd ed. 1957). ****. From the back cover: “Robert Graves left his native England for Majorca shortly after World War I and, except for infrequent visits, has never returned since. But in this autobiography written at the age of thirty-three – youth, the war, and Oxford behind him – Graves says goodbye to more than simply England and his English family and friends. For the war ended a way of life. It ended the 19th century and...more Graves, Robert. GOODBYE TO ALL THAT: An Autobiography. (1929; revised 2nd ed. 1957). ****. From the back cover: “Robert Graves left his native England for Majorca shortly after World War I and, except for infrequent visits, has never returned since. But in this autobiography written at the age of thirty-three – youth, the war, and Oxford behind him – Graves says goodbye to more than simply England and his English family and friends. For the war ended a way of life. It ended the 19th century and in this book – a classic of its kind – Graves gives us in parallel accounts the end of his own innocence and that of his world.” Graves starts out his story telling of his youth and the various schools that he attended. He moved from school to school because of either academic reasons or social ones. When he finally did manage to get his certificate, he wound up getting a scholarship to Oxford. At Oxford, he was a loner. He didn’t mingle and was not very good at sports. He did take up boxing – not a popular sport for students – in an attempt to learn self defense against the ragging of the other students. Early homosexual encounters are hinted at, but not gone into in detail. His lover was a younger student named David. When war broke out, he entered the Royal Welsh Fusiliers, and was sent to the French theater, where he spent his time in the forward trenches. While in France, he met Siegrfried Sassoon, and two became life-long friends. Graves was later wounded by shell fragments and was reported dead. He was sent back to England for recuperation and used that opportunity to let family and friends know that he was alive. After his recovery, he was sent back to France – again to the front. On this tour, he contracted severe bronchitis and was returned to England once again for recovery. He chose to go to Oxford. While recuperating, he took on a staff teaching job, and met the current Oxford crowd, including: Aldous Huxley, Philip and Lady Ottoline Morrell, Clive Bell, Lytton Strachey, and Bertrand Russell. Later he also met Arnold Bennett and John Galsworthy. About that time, Sassoon published his letter affirming his conscientious objector beliefs, and Graves had to organize his defense in order to keep Sassoon out of jail or worse. He meets and marries Nancy and they have a little girl, Jennie. He catches influenza – like so many around the world – but manages to survive. By this time, he is fit only for home service, but he is posted to Ireland. When he ultimately demobs from Ireland – under questionable circumstances – he goes with his family back to Oxford. He meets T. E. Lawrence, with whom he develops a life-long friendship, and Thomas Hardy. He and his family can barely survive on his Oxford pay, even augmented by income from his poetry, and he seeks and obtains a teaching post in Cairo, Egypt. He ultimately can’t stand it and moves with his family first to Gibralter. Later, he moves to Majorca, and that’s where his chronicle stops. In this second revised edition, Graves provides a new introduction and an afterwords in addition to adding and/or deleting several chapters from his original version. Recommended.(less)

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Jan 28, 2011 Tony rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: das-nach-fruct-book-club, nonfiction

I generally hate memoirs, and avoid the genre as much as possible -- so when my bookgroup picked this as the next selection, I was pretty crestfallen. But I held my nose and started reading it, and lo and behold, found myself drawn in right away. I certainly knew of the book's reputation as a classic account of World War I and kind of epitaph for a generation, but had no inkling that Graves would be able to write about his childhood and school years in such a compelling manner. Granted, it's onl...more I generally hate memoirs, and avoid the genre as much as possible -- so when my bookgroup picked this as the next selection, I was pretty crestfallen. But I held my nose and started reading it, and lo and behold, found myself drawn in right away. I certainly knew of the book's reputation as a classic account of World War I and kind of epitaph for a generation, but had no inkling that Graves would be able to write about his childhood and school years in such a compelling manner. Granted, it's only compelling to those who have an interest in how prewar English society operated, especially in the upper classes, but as a portrait of that particular time and place, it's certainly a fine example.

The book really picks up, however, when Graves enlists in the Army and heads off to war (interestingly, he enlists to postpone his higher education). I gather that what made his account so groundbreaking was his scathing honesty and apparent lack of embellishment in recounting the horrors and idiocy he witnessed (particularly memorable is his description of a bungled early attempt at using poison gas). Although the mind still reels at the carnage, it reels even further at the prospect that teenage academics such as Graves were suddenly thrust into positions where they commanded other men in a war zone. There's a lot of very interesting detail about daily life in the trenches, meals, equipment, and so forth. But plenty of drama too -- notably an episode in which Graves is left to die (and indeed his family is notified), only to eventually recover. I would assume that pretty much any contemporary reader of the book would be well aware of the catastrophic prosecution of WWI, but Graves's book provides a direct view into what that meant on a day-to-day basis.

The post-war years, on the other hand, feel very perfunctory and tacked on. They unspool as a series of episodes with very little connective tissue, and without the drama of youth or the larger import of the war, they largely fail to engage. As a series of name-dropping encounters with various eminent literary figures of the day, they work fine, but there's clearly much more drama to his failing marriage than he cares to disclose here. I gather from further reading that the memoir has been substantially revised since its initial publication, and that Graves may have embellished certain aspects in order to appeal to a broader readership. Whatever the case may be, it is a fairly interesting peek into a bygone era, with special appeal to those interested in World War I. I can't say I loved it, but I certainly enjoyed it much more than I expected to.(less)

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Feb 10, 2012 Dougie Morgan rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is the autobiography of the famous war poet Robert Graves, and is absolutely brilliant. Following Graves from his school days at Charterhouse to the trenches, even charting his post-war experiences, there is definitely something in here for everyone in terms of content; fans of the lives of the war poets, for example, will be interested to read of Graves' relationship with fellow poet Siegfried Sassoon, whilst some of the tales from Charterhouse are worthy of inclusion in a Molesworth book....more

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Mar 31, 2011 Keith Michael rated it 4 of 5 stars

i wish that i had read this before Hemingway's a moveable feast. i feel like the two complement each other very well as examples of cultural change during the WWI era. Graves bitterly details the trauma of WWI and the soldier's task of readjustment to society. Hemingway's characters are readjusted, but act strangely etherized and always emotionally wounded from the war. Graves's harrowing descriptions of trench warfare and his concomitant dissociative disorder help to explain the origins of Hemi...more

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Jul 31, 2011 Stuart rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: biography

This is Robert Graves' autobiographical story of his experiences of World War 1. Perhaps strangely, I didn't realize that this is the Robert Graves who wrote "I, Claudius". I had thought of him as a poet along with Wilfrid Owen. I read the book because he was mentioned in the bio I read of Lawrence of Arabia. And Lawrence gets a chapter to himself in this book. Written in 1929, WW1 was fresh in Graves' mind when he wrote it. It has a different tone from Siegfried Sasson and E M Remarque's books,...more

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Feb 04, 2009 John rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: history

The book is the autobiography of Robert Graves, an author probably best known for the novel, "I Claudius." The book deals with only the first thirty or so years of his life, and focuses primarily on his participation in the trenches in France in WWI.
The man lived in quite a different world from ours: patriotism was not taken lightly. For example, the book was apparently considered nearly treasonous for its antiwar stance when it appeared in the late 1920's, though it seems quite mild and bland...more

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Dec 02, 2012 J. rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Good-Bye To All That is usually referred to as the best WW1 memoir, so I was somewhat disappointed upon finishing it. I think that was because I was expecting the detail and excitement of one of the great war novels. Also, as others have noted, Graves writes in a detached and distant manner about the war and its aftermath. This distance is probably the result of his family, class and public school education. Still, he is very honest and that is the value of his memoir. The section of his public...more

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Dec 22, 2010 Alex rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: war, biography

In this book, the author of "I, Claudius" recounts the story of his early life in a frank & engaging narrative. His boyhood experiences in the English public school system make fascinating reading (one of his tutors was George Mallory of Everest fame) but the heart of the book is his account of his service as a young officer in the Royal Welch Regiment during the First World War. He survived the early bloody debacles of 1915 only to be flung, in the following year, into the hell of the Somme...more

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Sep 23, 2011 Miss GP rated it 3 of 5 stars

I found this book somewhat disappointing. I've been reading a lot of war books lately, including some really fine autobiographies, and I can't say that I've enjoyed this one as much as several others. It is similar to All Quiet on the Western Front, but it lacks the heart of that book. Graves really sticks to what happened. There's very little sense of how it made him feel at the time, and also very little description. I wasn't able to paint much of a mental picture of his situation, and didn't...more

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May 03, 2012 Eva rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: classic, memoir, read-in-2012

First, I have to say that this is much more than a Great War (or WWI if you prefer it that way) memoir. It's really divided in to three sections: Graves' childhood and before the war, the war itself, and the post-war period. All of these parts combined together really paint a picture of how the war ruptured English society and left deep and lasting marks on the soldiers who fought in it.

Graves is concise in his writings and a lot of the book is made out of simple statements (especially when noti...more

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Jul 25, 2012 travelgirlut rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: wwi

This book was depressing, and that had nothing to do with the subject of the book. I find Graves to be a bit hopeless and pessimistic, and that was the feel of this whole book. Granted, WWI was pretty hopeless and pointless, but this book also covered the author's life from his childhood up to the war and then for some years afterwards.

He tells of the ridiculousness that went on in the boarding schools, and that probably still goes on in boarding schools today. He talks of the class system and...more

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Dec 26, 2011 Michael rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

It's often hard to keep your appraisal of a book separate from your prior expectations. "Goodbye to All That," for much of its length, is an amazing document of a junior officer's experience of World War I. Since junior officers didn't tend to survive that war, a lucid, frank, and articulate account of life in the trenches -- literally -- is a valuable document.

Unfortunately, I was pointed towards the book by its reputation as a bitingly funny attack on and rejection of the entire British, or Eu...more It's often hard to keep your appraisal of a book separate from your prior expectations. "Goodbye to All That," for much of its length, is an amazing document of a junior officer's experience of World War I. Since junior officers didn't tend to survive that war, a lucid, frank, and articulate account of life in the trenches -- literally -- is a valuable document.

Unfortunately, I was pointed towards the book by its reputation as a bitingly funny attack on and rejection of the entire British, or European, class system as it existed before The Great War. And that it isn't. Graves is, first of all, not bitingly funny. He gets an occasional good line off, but he is on the whole a workmanlike and rather spare prose craftsman. His wit is dry, but not abundant. And although he is perhaps a bit Bohemian, fancies himself blunt-spoken, and reports himself as able to get on well with the lower classes, Graves is through and through a member of the "ruling class" from start to finish. He doesn't even really try to tell us otherwise; his decision to say "good-bye to all that" and exile himself in Malta is by his own account mostly about his failed marriage. In a forward written decades later, Graves frankly admits that he wrote his memoirs to a formula he thought would sell, in order that he could make some money. That is charmingly cynical, perhaps, but it's not a very convincing rejection of the social order.

Readers hoping for a broadside against The Establishment will be disappointed to find that the post-War chapters of the book are downright cluttered with name-dropping, alternating between unremarkable stories of family life and detailed reports of everything Thomas Hardy, T.E. Lawrence, Ezra Pound, and other literary notables said on the occasions that he rubbed elbows with them. They didn't say much of interest, really.

Highly recommended for those interested in the First World War. Skim the pre-War and post-War chapters unless you are related to Robert Graves and are interested in family history.(less)

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Jul 06, 2012 Carey rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: owned, ww1

Is it wrong for a favorite book to be about war?
But this book is so much more than that. With the title a reference to how much the world changed after WW1, the loss of so much during the war - innocence, morality, friends, mental peace - and a desire by everyone to get past it and move on, this novel gets to the bare bones of war. Britain post war sunk into a gloom. A generation of youth was missing, most families had lost someone or at least knew families directly affected. Graves captures it...more

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Dec 11, 2008 Katy rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

Can I just say how shocked I am that NO one has reviewed this one?

I will admit, orginally written in 1928(ish) and then updated in the 1950s, its not exactly a page turner by today's standers. For the time though, I can only imagine what it must have been like to be glued to its pages.

I picked this up for two reasons. 1)I'm a sucker for British History and 2) you can't read anything about Robert Graves (who is famous for his poetry) without seeing a mention of the book that first coined the phra...more Can I just say how shocked I am that NO one has reviewed this one?

I will admit, orginally written in 1928(ish) and then updated in the 1950s, its not exactly a page turner by today's standers. For the time though, I can only imagine what it must have been like to be glued to its pages.

I picked this up for two reasons. 1)I'm a sucker for British History and 2) you can't read anything about Robert Graves (who is famous for his poetry) without seeing a mention of the book that first coined the phrase, "Goodbye to All That."

That said, I admit that in the middle of this one I found myself wondering why I had picked it up at all. Its a WWI autobiography, the non-fictional Hemingway. Graves, isn't falling in love with nurses or driving ambulances, he's steping over headless bodies on his way into the trench and wonder why the guy next to him hasn't moved for 5 hours.

Still, he offers a unique persective. Graves was raised in the British boarding schools and groomed to be the perfect Bristish gentalmen, but his mother was German. He spent many holidays on the conteniante as a child. The most interesting part of his whole tail is his ability to like his childhood memories to the battle field. He is very aware of the fact that his uncle is a German General and his cousines were killed by British soilders.

I think that since of familuarity explodes the general consenus that WWI was the biggest waist of a war ever fought on British Soil. As a child of the 1980s, it is almost impossible to read the first chapter of the World War stories without being tainted by the second. This book allows you to do that though. It is written through the eyes of young man who has never seen a war like this before, and is sure he never will again.

The other really revealing thing is the death toll of this. The true since of how an entire generation was whole effected by the conflict. 1 and 4 of Grave's Prep school classmates were killed on the battlefield and of the 3 left standing, 2 of them were injured at least once, often more. That is staggering. It isn't something that we can relate to at all really.

At yet, with all the carnage going on. All the death. The gas attacks. Graves doesn't sent on his high horse and preach to the chior. He mearly tells his story. He introduces us to the characters, lays out the tales of time they spent to gether, then almost as an after thought adds..."He was killed at..." or "He was later blinded by...".

Anyway. It is worth it to trudge through this one because it gives such a unique perspective. You can't help but come out different on the other side. You do have to be in the mood though. (less)

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Jun 23, 2012 Reds_reads rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012, autobio-memoir, history, wwi

Robert Graves' autobiography, written in 1929, and so covering the first 34 years of his life. This was a very enjoyable read, the style is easy to read and there is humour throughout. Other reviews have mentioned that this book should not be relied upon as a historical record and have judged it critically as a result, although few have offered proof of inaccuracies. Nor have they concluded whether inaccuracies are pure fabrication or are because hearsay has been included without checking its tr...more

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Jun 01, 2010 Gary Land rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is another book that has been on my to read list for a long time. Although it is a memoir of the famous British author's life up to about age thirty, the bulk of the book concentrates on his World War I experience. In graphic detail he describes life in the trenches, with its water, mud, rats, cold, and putrifying bodies, among other things. He also recounts the often meaningless attacks or "shows" that resulted in equally meaningless deaths. He was wounded at least twice and it seems that...more

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Aug 16, 2012 Sam Reaves rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Robert Graves is best known as a poet and author of the historical novel I, Claudius, but he also served in the British Army in the First World War and wrote this no-punches-pulled memoir about it. More than a simple war memoir (it is a comprehensive autobiography written when Graves was in his early thirties), it is a record of how the war made him a skeptic regarding the entire edifice of privilege and hypocrisy he was born into. Far from a pacifist screed (Graves served with distinction until...more

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About Robert Graves

Robert Ranke Graves, born in Wimbledon, received his early education at King's College School and Copthorne Prep School, Wimbledon & Charterhouse School and won a scholarship to St John's College, Oxford. While at Charterhouse in 1912, he fell in love with G. H. Johnstone, a boy of fourteen ("Dick" in Goodbye to All That) When challenged by the headmaster he defended himself by citing Plato, G...more Robert Ranke Graves, born in Wimbledon, received his early education at King's College School and Copthorne Prep School, Wimbledon & Charterhouse School and won a scholarship to St John's College, Oxford. While at Charterhouse in 1912, he fell in love with G. H. Johnstone, a boy of fourteen ("Dick" in Goodbye to All That) When challenged by the headmaster he defended himself by citing Plato, Greek poets, Michelangelo & Shakespeare, "who had felt as I did".
At the outbreak of WWI, Graves enlisted almost immediately, taking a commission in the Royal Welch Fusiliers. He published his first volume of poems, Over the Brazier, in 1916. He developed an early reputation as a war poet and was one of the first to write realistic poems about his experience of front line conflict. In later years he omitted war poems from his collections, on the grounds that they were too obviously "part of the war poetry boom". At the Battle of the Somme he was so badly wounded by a shell-fragment through the lung that he was expected to die, and indeed was officially reported as 'died of wounds'. He gradually recovered. Apart from a brief spell back in France, he spent the rest of the war in England.
One of Graves's closest friends at this time was the poet Siegfried Sassoon, who was also an officer in the RWF. In 1917 Sassoon tried to rebel against the war by making a public anti-war statement. Graves, who feared Sassoon could face a court martial, intervened with the military authorities and persuaded them that he was suffering from shell shock, and to treat him accordingly. Graves also suffered from shell shock, or neurasthenia as it is sometimes called, although he was never hospitalised for it.
Biographers document the story well. It is fictionalised in Pat Barker's novel Regeneration. The intensity of their early relationship is nowhere demonstrated more clearly than in Graves's collection Fairies & Fusiliers (1917), which contains a plethora of poems celebrating their friendship. Through Sassoon, he also became friends with Wilfred Owen, whose talent he recognised. Owen attended Graves's wedding to Nancy Nicholson in 1918, presenting him with, as Graves recalled, "a set of 12 Apostle spoons".
Following his marriage and the end of the war, Graves belatedly took up his place at St John's College, Oxford. He later attempted to make a living by running a small shop, but the business failed. In 1926 he took up a post at Cairo University, accompanied by his wife, their children and the poet Laura Riding. He returned to London briefly, where he split with his wife under highly emotional circumstances before leaving to live with Riding in Deià, Majorca. There they continued to publish letterpress books under the rubric of the Seizin Press, founded and edited the literary journal Epilogue, and wrote two successful academic books together: A Survey of Modernist Poetry (1927) and A Pamphlet Against Anthologies (1928).
In 1927, he published Lawrence and the Arabs, a commercially successful biography of T.E. Lawrence. Good-bye to All That (1929, revised and republished in 1957) proved a success but cost him many of his friends, notably Sassoon. In 1934 he published his most commercially successful work, I, Claudius. Using classical sources he constructed a complexly compelling tale of the life of the Roman emperor Claudius, a tale extended in Claudius the God (1935). Another historical novel by Graves, Count Belisarius (1938), recounts the career of the Byzantine general Belisarius.
During the early 1970s Graves began to suffer from increasingly severe memory loss, and by his eightieth birthday in 1975 he had come to the end of his working life. By 1975 he had published more than 140 works. He survived for ten more years in an increasingly dependent condition until he died from heart failure.(less)

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“Nor had I any illusions about Algernon Charles Swinburne, who often used to stop my perambulator when he met it on Nurses’ Walk, at the edge of Wimbledon Common, and pat me on the head and kiss me: he was an inveterate pram-stopper and patter and kisser.” — 1 person liked it

“Swinburne, by the way, when a very young man, had gone to Walter Savage Landor, then a very old man, and been given the poet’s blessing he asked for; and Landor when a child had been patted on the head by Dr Samuel Johnson; and Johnson when a child had been taken to London to be touched by Queen Anne for scrofula, the King’s evil; and Queen Anne when a child...” — 1 person liked it

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