Delphi Collected Works of Siegfried Sassoon

by Siegfried Sassoon, Delphi Classics (editor)

One of the leading poets of the First World War, Siegfried Sassoon is best remembered for his angry and compassionate poems, winning him public and critical acclaim. His vivid depictions of the trenches helped expose the stark realities of the front lines, challenging the romanticised notions of heroism that were prevalent at the time. Sassoon was also an accomplished writer of fictionalised autobiographies, which were celebrated for their evocation of English country life and modernist technique. Today, Sassoon’s work remains relevant due to its unflinching portrayal of the psychological and physical demands of war, offering a timeless portrait of the enduring cost of the Great War on both individuals and society at large. The Delphi Poets Series offers readers the works of literature’s finest poets, with superior formatting. This eBook presents Sassoon’s collected works, with rare texts, illustrations and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1)

* Beautifully illustrated with images relating to Sassoon’s life and works
* Concise introduction to his life and poetry
* Images of how the poetry books and novels were first printed, giving your eReader a taste of the original texts
* The complete war poetry
* Many rare poems digitised here for the first time
* Excellent formatting of the poems
* Special chronological and alphabetical contents tables for the poetry
* Easily locate the poems you want to read
* Includes the first novel of the Sherston Trilogy — a celebrated classic of English prose literature
* Ordering of texts into chronological order and literary genres

Please due to US copyright restrictions, Sassoon’s five remining novels cannot appear in this edition. When new works enter the public domain, they will be added to the collection as a free update.



The Life and Poetry of Siegfried Sassoon
Brief Siegfried Sassoon
The Daffodil Murderer (1913)
The Old Huntsman and Other Poems (1917)
Counter-Attack and Other Poems (1918)
Picture-Show (1919)
War Poems (1919)
Satirical Poems (1926)
The Heart’s Journey (1928)

The Poems
List of Poems in Chronological Order
List of Poems in Alphabetical Order

The Sherston Trilogy
Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man (1928)

855 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 10, 2024

About the author

Siegfried Loraine Sassoon, CBE was born into a wealthy banking family, the middle of 3 brothers. His Anglican mother and Jewish father separated when he was five. He had little subsequent contact with ‘Pappy’, who died of TB 4 years later. He presented his mother with his first ‘volume’ at 11. Sassoon spent his youth hunting, cricketing, reading, and writing. He was home-schooled until the age of 14 because of ill health. At school he was academically mediocre and teased for being un-athletic, unusually old, and Jewish. He attended Clare College, Cambridge, but left without taking his degree. In 1911, Sassoon read ‘The Intermediate Sex’ by Edward Carpenter, a book about homosexuality which was a revelation for Sassoon. In 1913 he wrote ‘The Daffodil Murderer,’ a parody of a John Masefield poem and his only pre-war success. A patriotic man, he enlisted on 3rd August, the day before Britain entered the war, as a trooper in the Sussex Yeomanry. After a riding accident which put him out of action, in May 1915 he joined the Royal Welch Fusiliers as a second lieutenant. At the training depot he met David Thomas, with whom he fell in love.
In November Sassoon received word that his brother Hamo had died at Gallipoli. On 17th Nov he was shipped to France with David Thomas. He was assigned to C Company, First Battalion. It was here that he met Robert Graves, described in his diary as ‘a young poet in Third Battalion and very much disliked.’ He took part in working parties, but no combat. He later became transport officer and so managed to stay out of the front lines. After time on leave, on the 18th of May, 1916 he received word that David Thomas had died of a bullet to the throat. Both Graves and Sassoon were distraught, and in Siegfried’s case it inspired ‘the lust to kill.’ He abandoned transport duties and went out on patrols whenever possible, desperate to kill as many Germans as he could, earning him the nickname ‘Mad Jack.’ In April he was recommended for the Military Cross for his action in bringing in the dead and wounded after a raid. He received his medal on the day before the Somme. For the first days of the Somme, he was in reserve opposite Fricourt, watching the slaughter from a ridge. Fricourt was successfully taken, and on the 4th July the First Battalion moved up to the front line to attack Mametz Wood. It was here that he famously took a trench single handed. Unfortunately, Siegfried did nothing to consolidate the trench; he simply sat down and read a book, later returning to a berating from Graves. It was in 1917, convalescing in 'Blighty' from a wound, that he decided to make a stand against the war. Encouraged by pacifist friends, he ignored his orders to return to duty and issued a declaration against the war. The army refused to court martial him, sending him instead to Craiglockhart, an institution for soldiers driven mad by the war. Here he met and influenced Wilfred Owen. In 1918 he briefly returned to active service, in Palestine and then France again, but after being wounded by friendly fire he ended the war convalescing. He reached the rank of captain. After the war he made a predictably unhappy marriage and had a son, George. He continued to write, but will be remembered as a war poet.