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Captain Oates: Soldier and Explorer
This is the biography of Captain Oates who w ill always be remembered as a hero, as the man who walked wi llingly to death so that his comrades might have a better ch ance of survival on the expedition to the South Pole led by Captain Scott. '
256 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1982
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
June 5, 2014
Not quite sure what I think about this book. Its certainly not as well-written as the bio of Apsley Cherry-GarrardCherry: A Life of Apsley Cherry-Garrard but it has a quaint sense of the writer's adoration for Oates.
It doesn't help that the print is very small and the quality of the paper poor. This is not one of those books you hold with pleasure. The illustrations are not particularly well presented either.
But, if you are looking to find out more about Oates this provides a tantalising glimpse of his life.
Three stars. I would have given it four, but for the quality of the actual book. It will not be one I pick up and read often - in fact I may well look for a better quality edition.
It doesn't help that the print is very small and the quality of the paper poor. This is not one of those books you hold with pleasure. The illustrations are not particularly well presented either.
But, if you are looking to find out more about Oates this provides a tantalising glimpse of his life.
Three stars. I would have given it four, but for the quality of the actual book. It will not be one I pick up and read often - in fact I may well look for a better quality edition.
September 15, 2025
Of the cast of supporting characters that surround Robert Scott in the great drama of his Terra Nova expedition, one that looms large is Laurence 'Titus' Oates. Sue Limb and Patrick Cordingley have written a solid and enjoyable biography of Oates, and one which provides some useful insights into Scott's last expedition generally, as well as greatly increasing my understanding of "The Soldier".
The overwhelming impression that remains with me is that Oates was an ordinary man, following a standard army career, and would most likely be completely unknown if it were not for his participation in the Terra Nova expedition. It was only in Antarctica that he emerged as a prominent personality and stood out as someone noteworthy. While this would in any case have ensured his fame thanks to the mass of subsequent writing about the expedition, the manner and timing of his death granted him immortality: "his heroic step out of the tent gives his last moments on earth an ambiguity and a tantalising privacy, and as well as the bravery and self-sacrifice of his act, there is an almost jaunty and rebellious edge to his farewell. The cool, dry understatement of his reported last words has become one of the most often quoted sentences of the twentieth century, frequently appearing in the most avant-garde comedy. He has become a legend...The paradox of an ordinary man becoming extraordinary and world famous because of his enigmatic exit has attracted many writers...One thing is certain, a story of such compelling appeal to the imagination can only continue to be revisited, and the curious, mysterious containment of Captain Oates's life - now almost a hundred years distant - may still reveal some secrets, like a dusty old desk with a hidden drawer. His unique and unmistakable personality, encapsulated in those final words, will certainly captivate generations yet unborn. And of course because death is the last wilderness we are all obliged to explore, his nonchalant stepping out into that embrace will remain a hypnotising icon for us, probably for centuries to come... Oates had lived in obscurity. When he died, he became the world's property: a dead hero, his name a touchstone for certain values, his death an example which thrills the imagination." The authors also note powerful draw of travel to remote wildernesses, and the specific "British psyche and its fascination with extremes, the sublime, and the struggle between man's impertinent energy and the majestic challenges of Nature's wilderness - psychological territory familiar to anyone who has read the English Romantic poets...Perhaps this literary and philosophical tradition is the reason why Scott's Expedition in particular remains so hauntingly iconic: it is the existential struggle in which Nature, not man, triumphs. Like the last scene of a Shakespearean tragedy, the final tableau of Scott, Wilson and Bowers dead in their tent has an awe-inspiring grandeur: we feel pity, terror and perhaps also exhilaration, as if some ultimate debt has been paid."
The first several chapters chart Oates' early life and army career. This latter took him to South Africa during the Boer War, where he briefly saw action before being badly wounded in the thigh (something that would, gruesomely, come back to haunt him in Antarctica. Following his recovery, his service took him to some staples of British colonial soldiering: Ireland, Egypt and India. While in India, he volunteered and was accepted for inclusion in the upcoming British Antarctic Expedition. Several incidents are recounted that give insight into Oates' character and motivations: "Sophisticated medical techniques were an insult to his manhood. Growing professionalism and the importance of technical and scientific education offended his sense of the individual vigour of the amateur and the sportsman. And it is this notion of the sportsman which lies at the heart of Oates's nature. Luckily, his own age cultivated the idea of sport, more earnestly than previous eras, which had found enough justification in the enjoyment and excitement of it. All Oates's instincts were sporting ones which means that his senses and appetites were sharply tuned towards experiences which were physically taxing, combative, fun, and held some element of risk. All this is very much in keeping with the old England. The new England with its stifling social conformity, trivial bourgeois rituals and leaden religiosity, must have become unendurable at times to such a free and sporting spirit. He belonged to an England deeper and older than that. So when strangers called him the perfect example of an English gentleman they spoke a more complex and complete truth than they knew...His energies drove him towards several fields of action. The first was exciting sports: riding hard, sailing in the teeth of a gale, defying 120 Boers (for that, surely, was a sporting experience for him, too). They all show his taste for danger. He sought thrills, and that sense of enhanced life which comes from being a breath away from death. But there was always a cut-off point to his recklessness, later than most men's which, up until the Antarctic, had enabled him to survive." The authors also point to Oates' restlessness, and the refreshment he found in travel; his reckless and bloody-minded stubbornness; and his impatience with the constraints of his society. The other well-known recent biography of Oates (by Michael Smith) included the revelation that Oates supposedly fathered a child with an underage girl in Scotland: Limb and Cordingley dismiss this in their preface as little better than gossip, or a family story, for which there is no evidence one way or the other. From what else we know of Oates, it does seem like an implausible allegation, and I am still puzzled as to why Michael Smith chose to include it in his otherwise excellent biography.
The importance of considering the time and society that the late Victorian and Edwardian explorers came from cannot be overstated. Placing these men in the proper context is vital if we are to understand either their motivations or their actions. Commenting on an incident in Egypt during Oates service there, when the improbably named Major Pine-Coffin was confronted by a hostile crowd and gave up his gun, Limb and Cordingley could have been writing about Scott: "His innocence, which borders on naïveté, convinces him that a chivalrous gesture will be universally understood and appreciated; generosity will breed generosity, that a soft word will turn away wrath. A truly mediaeval idealism. Within the grips of this code, the English Gentleman was capable of reckless acts of courage. The society he lived in may have been sophisticated and industrialized, and have produced a materialistic and bourgeois culture and a hidebound and earthbound system of mores, but it still expected of him, and he provided, sudden flashes of extraordinarily primitive self-sacrifice." Later, they provide some striking insight into Scott, and some of what lay at the heart of Oates' frustration with him, not least a tender-heartedness towards the animals that clouded his judgement: "He attributes moral qualities to the ponies: pluck, cheerfulness, and so on, and when they suffer, he suffers with them. His sentimental attachment to animals is quintessentially English, part of his emotional nature and indeed his charm, but still, not necessarily a help to him in organizing Antarctic travel...Scott's scientific interests, and his sentimentality towards animals show the modern man. But fundamentally he seemed to be in touch with an ancient world: his sensitivity to weather, which could plunge him into deepest gloom or the most infectious glee; his instinctive soul (Scott trusted his instincts and listened to his heart - not necessarily desirable characteristics in an Antarctic explorer, though undoubtedly lovably human); his impulse to prove his strength and manhood; and above all his sense of powerlessness of human struggles in the face of an implacable fate - in all these ways he seems in a curious sense to be more like an ancient Greek than a mod- ern naval captain." Oates motivations for coming to the Antarctic, however, reveals a very different character: "Many elements combined to bring him to Antarctica: a desire to escape from social constrictions, the promise of great trials of strength, the excitement of being on the frontiers of discovery, and the sportsman's aim to be first if possible but if not, to have a thundering good time anyway. He came to this great adventure, as he had come to everything else in his life, with a striking degree of personal strength, albeit veiled by his habitual quietness. He had grown up wealthy and loved, into a man whose joy lay in the active exploration of the physical world, undisturbed by philosophical uncertainties. No wonder he was a powerful figure. He never had to struggle to assert his personality - it was simply there, as many of his companions describe - massive, unobtrusive, impossible to ignore, irresistibly attractive. Oates was his own man. He could never, in any circumstance, have been anyone else's victim."
The depot journey in early 1911 brought some of these matters to a head, as Oates was frustrated both with the poor quality of the ponies and with Scott's sentimental refusal to drive the weaker animals as far South as possible before shooting them and caching the meat for the following season's Polar attempt. On their return to base after laying the depots, "Oates was a soldier and a gentleman through and through. He believed in simple and straightforward solutions to problems, and in a regular, decent life devoid of much intellectual engagement. He spoke his mind - when he felt free to do so. Scott was a man of considerable intellect and, above all, delicate sensibility. Literary, emotional, unpredictable, given to melancholy moods and bouts of fussing, his sensibility was his enemy. Conscious of the need to prove his manhood, in an age when manhood welcomed physical exertion, he punished himself by arduous marches and by enduring pain in a spirit of gladness...Oates was free from such masochistic episodes. He did not need to prove his manhood to himself, to a wife, or anyone else. He probably never gave it a thought. When Oates said that Scott was not 'straight' this is surely what he must have meant - that he could never get Scott to see the issues so clearly as he, Oates, experienced them. Scott's reactions were veiled by a complex web of intellectual assumptions, moralistic fervour and paralyzing self-consciousness. Scott clearly liked Oates a great deal, valued him and appreciated him. But Scott got on Oates's nerves."
As far as we can tell, Scott and Oates' relationship calmed over the Antarctic winter, and Oates once again took charge of the ponies at the beginning of the Polar journey in late 1911. Following the demise of the last of the ponies, he began man hauling and was ultimately chosen to accompany the final party to the Pole. From there, the story is very familiar to everyone who has heard of Captain Oates:
"On the way back from the Pole, he found himself suddenly, and much earlier than he might reasonably have expected (his brother and sisters all lived into their eighties) at the end of his road. To some extent, other people's blunders and misconceptions had brought him there. He certainly realized that for survival in Antarctica, Amundsen's techniques were far superior to his own expedition's methods. But there were other facts, too: the bad weather, the gradual erosion of health and spirits by the unseen enemy, scurvy: his own war-wound, which was in some ways a death blow whose final dispatch had merely been delayed some eleven years. And apart from all these causes which contributed towards his end, there was his own stubborn refusal to turn back, his own sportsman's gamble to chance his luck...He probably still wanted to get to the Pole. He probably still felt his luck would hold and enough sheer grit would get him there and back. His courage was Titanic but so, alas, was his destiny. When the Norwegians' flag appeared in the snows and they knew they had lost, it was a struggle even for the overt Christians of the British party to be entirely graceful in defeat. But for Oates the sportsman it was easy. He was a good loser. And a few weeks later, when he reached the end of his time and his energies, he raised the art of losing well to sublime heights. He knew what to do, although not, for a moment, exactly how to do it. There was no revolver. Hence his question to Scott - the moment when Oates appeared to falter. 'Poor fellow, he practically asked for advice', wrote Scott. 'Nothing could be said but to urge him to march as long as he could.' In fact, Oates was probably not asking about his chances of life, but how to achieve the obviously necessary death...He knew his time was up; he knew that, for the others, it was not, and they might have a chance if he disappeared and stopped holding them up. In some ways, his walking out might seem the logical last step for a man who had felt frustrated by his society and wanted, all his life, to be out in the cold. But that is too simple a view. It is clear from his last recorded thoughts and words, from his nostalgic last letter and his ceaseless talk, on New Year's Eve, of his regiment, his home, his horses, that he very much wanted a future. He had come as far away as possible, to a world of nothingness. And he had half-turned from its bleak embrace, longing to see again the England which, despite everything, he loved, and which he embodied...So it must have been terribly hard to leave the tent, that last vestige of civilization; hard to leave the dreams of a future, the open fire in the manor house, the major's exams. All the same, he had gambled and lost. With a shrug, and with an offhand phrase he went - a sportsman who knew how to lose. He faced the most difficult act of all, a truly horrifying death, and he made it look easy. And because it took him two hours of painful struggling to put his footgear on, he went out to die in his socks. What more can we ask of our heroes?"
The overwhelming impression that remains with me is that Oates was an ordinary man, following a standard army career, and would most likely be completely unknown if it were not for his participation in the Terra Nova expedition. It was only in Antarctica that he emerged as a prominent personality and stood out as someone noteworthy. While this would in any case have ensured his fame thanks to the mass of subsequent writing about the expedition, the manner and timing of his death granted him immortality: "his heroic step out of the tent gives his last moments on earth an ambiguity and a tantalising privacy, and as well as the bravery and self-sacrifice of his act, there is an almost jaunty and rebellious edge to his farewell. The cool, dry understatement of his reported last words has become one of the most often quoted sentences of the twentieth century, frequently appearing in the most avant-garde comedy. He has become a legend...The paradox of an ordinary man becoming extraordinary and world famous because of his enigmatic exit has attracted many writers...One thing is certain, a story of such compelling appeal to the imagination can only continue to be revisited, and the curious, mysterious containment of Captain Oates's life - now almost a hundred years distant - may still reveal some secrets, like a dusty old desk with a hidden drawer. His unique and unmistakable personality, encapsulated in those final words, will certainly captivate generations yet unborn. And of course because death is the last wilderness we are all obliged to explore, his nonchalant stepping out into that embrace will remain a hypnotising icon for us, probably for centuries to come... Oates had lived in obscurity. When he died, he became the world's property: a dead hero, his name a touchstone for certain values, his death an example which thrills the imagination." The authors also note powerful draw of travel to remote wildernesses, and the specific "British psyche and its fascination with extremes, the sublime, and the struggle between man's impertinent energy and the majestic challenges of Nature's wilderness - psychological territory familiar to anyone who has read the English Romantic poets...Perhaps this literary and philosophical tradition is the reason why Scott's Expedition in particular remains so hauntingly iconic: it is the existential struggle in which Nature, not man, triumphs. Like the last scene of a Shakespearean tragedy, the final tableau of Scott, Wilson and Bowers dead in their tent has an awe-inspiring grandeur: we feel pity, terror and perhaps also exhilaration, as if some ultimate debt has been paid."
The first several chapters chart Oates' early life and army career. This latter took him to South Africa during the Boer War, where he briefly saw action before being badly wounded in the thigh (something that would, gruesomely, come back to haunt him in Antarctica. Following his recovery, his service took him to some staples of British colonial soldiering: Ireland, Egypt and India. While in India, he volunteered and was accepted for inclusion in the upcoming British Antarctic Expedition. Several incidents are recounted that give insight into Oates' character and motivations: "Sophisticated medical techniques were an insult to his manhood. Growing professionalism and the importance of technical and scientific education offended his sense of the individual vigour of the amateur and the sportsman. And it is this notion of the sportsman which lies at the heart of Oates's nature. Luckily, his own age cultivated the idea of sport, more earnestly than previous eras, which had found enough justification in the enjoyment and excitement of it. All Oates's instincts were sporting ones which means that his senses and appetites were sharply tuned towards experiences which were physically taxing, combative, fun, and held some element of risk. All this is very much in keeping with the old England. The new England with its stifling social conformity, trivial bourgeois rituals and leaden religiosity, must have become unendurable at times to such a free and sporting spirit. He belonged to an England deeper and older than that. So when strangers called him the perfect example of an English gentleman they spoke a more complex and complete truth than they knew...His energies drove him towards several fields of action. The first was exciting sports: riding hard, sailing in the teeth of a gale, defying 120 Boers (for that, surely, was a sporting experience for him, too). They all show his taste for danger. He sought thrills, and that sense of enhanced life which comes from being a breath away from death. But there was always a cut-off point to his recklessness, later than most men's which, up until the Antarctic, had enabled him to survive." The authors also point to Oates' restlessness, and the refreshment he found in travel; his reckless and bloody-minded stubbornness; and his impatience with the constraints of his society. The other well-known recent biography of Oates (by Michael Smith) included the revelation that Oates supposedly fathered a child with an underage girl in Scotland: Limb and Cordingley dismiss this in their preface as little better than gossip, or a family story, for which there is no evidence one way or the other. From what else we know of Oates, it does seem like an implausible allegation, and I am still puzzled as to why Michael Smith chose to include it in his otherwise excellent biography.
The importance of considering the time and society that the late Victorian and Edwardian explorers came from cannot be overstated. Placing these men in the proper context is vital if we are to understand either their motivations or their actions. Commenting on an incident in Egypt during Oates service there, when the improbably named Major Pine-Coffin was confronted by a hostile crowd and gave up his gun, Limb and Cordingley could have been writing about Scott: "His innocence, which borders on naïveté, convinces him that a chivalrous gesture will be universally understood and appreciated; generosity will breed generosity, that a soft word will turn away wrath. A truly mediaeval idealism. Within the grips of this code, the English Gentleman was capable of reckless acts of courage. The society he lived in may have been sophisticated and industrialized, and have produced a materialistic and bourgeois culture and a hidebound and earthbound system of mores, but it still expected of him, and he provided, sudden flashes of extraordinarily primitive self-sacrifice." Later, they provide some striking insight into Scott, and some of what lay at the heart of Oates' frustration with him, not least a tender-heartedness towards the animals that clouded his judgement: "He attributes moral qualities to the ponies: pluck, cheerfulness, and so on, and when they suffer, he suffers with them. His sentimental attachment to animals is quintessentially English, part of his emotional nature and indeed his charm, but still, not necessarily a help to him in organizing Antarctic travel...Scott's scientific interests, and his sentimentality towards animals show the modern man. But fundamentally he seemed to be in touch with an ancient world: his sensitivity to weather, which could plunge him into deepest gloom or the most infectious glee; his instinctive soul (Scott trusted his instincts and listened to his heart - not necessarily desirable characteristics in an Antarctic explorer, though undoubtedly lovably human); his impulse to prove his strength and manhood; and above all his sense of powerlessness of human struggles in the face of an implacable fate - in all these ways he seems in a curious sense to be more like an ancient Greek than a mod- ern naval captain." Oates motivations for coming to the Antarctic, however, reveals a very different character: "Many elements combined to bring him to Antarctica: a desire to escape from social constrictions, the promise of great trials of strength, the excitement of being on the frontiers of discovery, and the sportsman's aim to be first if possible but if not, to have a thundering good time anyway. He came to this great adventure, as he had come to everything else in his life, with a striking degree of personal strength, albeit veiled by his habitual quietness. He had grown up wealthy and loved, into a man whose joy lay in the active exploration of the physical world, undisturbed by philosophical uncertainties. No wonder he was a powerful figure. He never had to struggle to assert his personality - it was simply there, as many of his companions describe - massive, unobtrusive, impossible to ignore, irresistibly attractive. Oates was his own man. He could never, in any circumstance, have been anyone else's victim."
The depot journey in early 1911 brought some of these matters to a head, as Oates was frustrated both with the poor quality of the ponies and with Scott's sentimental refusal to drive the weaker animals as far South as possible before shooting them and caching the meat for the following season's Polar attempt. On their return to base after laying the depots, "Oates was a soldier and a gentleman through and through. He believed in simple and straightforward solutions to problems, and in a regular, decent life devoid of much intellectual engagement. He spoke his mind - when he felt free to do so. Scott was a man of considerable intellect and, above all, delicate sensibility. Literary, emotional, unpredictable, given to melancholy moods and bouts of fussing, his sensibility was his enemy. Conscious of the need to prove his manhood, in an age when manhood welcomed physical exertion, he punished himself by arduous marches and by enduring pain in a spirit of gladness...Oates was free from such masochistic episodes. He did not need to prove his manhood to himself, to a wife, or anyone else. He probably never gave it a thought. When Oates said that Scott was not 'straight' this is surely what he must have meant - that he could never get Scott to see the issues so clearly as he, Oates, experienced them. Scott's reactions were veiled by a complex web of intellectual assumptions, moralistic fervour and paralyzing self-consciousness. Scott clearly liked Oates a great deal, valued him and appreciated him. But Scott got on Oates's nerves."
As far as we can tell, Scott and Oates' relationship calmed over the Antarctic winter, and Oates once again took charge of the ponies at the beginning of the Polar journey in late 1911. Following the demise of the last of the ponies, he began man hauling and was ultimately chosen to accompany the final party to the Pole. From there, the story is very familiar to everyone who has heard of Captain Oates:
"On the way back from the Pole, he found himself suddenly, and much earlier than he might reasonably have expected (his brother and sisters all lived into their eighties) at the end of his road. To some extent, other people's blunders and misconceptions had brought him there. He certainly realized that for survival in Antarctica, Amundsen's techniques were far superior to his own expedition's methods. But there were other facts, too: the bad weather, the gradual erosion of health and spirits by the unseen enemy, scurvy: his own war-wound, which was in some ways a death blow whose final dispatch had merely been delayed some eleven years. And apart from all these causes which contributed towards his end, there was his own stubborn refusal to turn back, his own sportsman's gamble to chance his luck...He probably still wanted to get to the Pole. He probably still felt his luck would hold and enough sheer grit would get him there and back. His courage was Titanic but so, alas, was his destiny. When the Norwegians' flag appeared in the snows and they knew they had lost, it was a struggle even for the overt Christians of the British party to be entirely graceful in defeat. But for Oates the sportsman it was easy. He was a good loser. And a few weeks later, when he reached the end of his time and his energies, he raised the art of losing well to sublime heights. He knew what to do, although not, for a moment, exactly how to do it. There was no revolver. Hence his question to Scott - the moment when Oates appeared to falter. 'Poor fellow, he practically asked for advice', wrote Scott. 'Nothing could be said but to urge him to march as long as he could.' In fact, Oates was probably not asking about his chances of life, but how to achieve the obviously necessary death...He knew his time was up; he knew that, for the others, it was not, and they might have a chance if he disappeared and stopped holding them up. In some ways, his walking out might seem the logical last step for a man who had felt frustrated by his society and wanted, all his life, to be out in the cold. But that is too simple a view. It is clear from his last recorded thoughts and words, from his nostalgic last letter and his ceaseless talk, on New Year's Eve, of his regiment, his home, his horses, that he very much wanted a future. He had come as far away as possible, to a world of nothingness. And he had half-turned from its bleak embrace, longing to see again the England which, despite everything, he loved, and which he embodied...So it must have been terribly hard to leave the tent, that last vestige of civilization; hard to leave the dreams of a future, the open fire in the manor house, the major's exams. All the same, he had gambled and lost. With a shrug, and with an offhand phrase he went - a sportsman who knew how to lose. He faced the most difficult act of all, a truly horrifying death, and he made it look easy. And because it took him two hours of painful struggling to put his footgear on, he went out to die in his socks. What more can we ask of our heroes?"
January 27, 2016
An incredible book. Oates' story is told from diary entries, letters and conversations with people who knew him so everything is guided by facts. This isn't simply a book about his final journey either. His early life and experiences as a soldier are given as detailed research and space as his famous end.
This was always going to be an emotional read and I was impressed that the author's managed to leave me with a smile at the end.
This was always going to be an emotional read and I was impressed that the author's managed to leave me with a smile at the end.
February 25, 2020
Capt. Lawrence 'Titus' Oates is best known for his last words, but in order to understand how he got to the point of uttering them, one needs to know about the rest of his life. This book does a good job of laying that out, with a large amount of necessary background information on Victorian culture, the political situations which affected him, and life in the army and specifically the 6th Inniskilling Dragoons at that time. The real asset of this book is the access to people who knew Oates personally – most especially Frank Debenham and Violet Oates – which no later biography could supply.
Unfortunately there are a few factual errors (many of which only appeared in print after this book's initial publication) and some details of the Terra Nova Expedition are told out of order. The authors also apparently swallow some of Huntford's interpretation of the story whole, though they are critical of his work in the final chapter.
All in all, though, it's a good portrayal of a character who's often rather aloof. Though his own writing is scant, understanding where Oates was coming from and the forces which shaped him help us get to know the man in a way perhaps even his closest colleagues didn't, which makes the book worth reading.
Unfortunately there are a few factual errors (many of which only appeared in print after this book's initial publication) and some details of the Terra Nova Expedition are told out of order. The authors also apparently swallow some of Huntford's interpretation of the story whole, though they are critical of his work in the final chapter.
All in all, though, it's a good portrayal of a character who's often rather aloof. Though his own writing is scant, understanding where Oates was coming from and the forces which shaped him help us get to know the man in a way perhaps even his closest colleagues didn't, which makes the book worth reading.
October 5, 2021
A beautifully sympathetic biography that pieces together Oates's character from his army life and letters, but also, of course, from his fateful experiences on the trip with Captain Scott's party to the South Pole.
Although Limb is a great admirer of Oates, she is for the most part pointedly neutral in her assessment of his faults and virtues, and always backs up her conclusions with ample evidence.
Slowly but surely, at a pace that allows for a full appreciation of how Oates saw and reacted to the world, the author brings in pertinent information about the times in which he lived, gradually constructing a deeply nuanced portrait of a man who, she argues, was in many ways the embodiment of long-held English virtues.
A fascinating book, put together with great care and attention, and with admirable insight.
Although Limb is a great admirer of Oates, she is for the most part pointedly neutral in her assessment of his faults and virtues, and always backs up her conclusions with ample evidence.
Slowly but surely, at a pace that allows for a full appreciation of how Oates saw and reacted to the world, the author brings in pertinent information about the times in which he lived, gradually constructing a deeply nuanced portrait of a man who, she argues, was in many ways the embodiment of long-held English virtues.
A fascinating book, put together with great care and attention, and with admirable insight.
October 22, 2025
Written very dryly. The presentation is plain and academic and I didn't get a lot of feeling for Captain Oates. He became a national hero but I came away feeling he was a rather simple and average English officer put in a hopeless position by an absurdly selfish and unprepared superior. It's more of a tragedy than anything.
February 25, 2026
Wow = Brutal, beautiful, poignant, inspiring.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews