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Old Soldiers
This is a portrait not only of old soldiers, but of old age in general. Other work by the author includes "A Distant Likeness", "Peter Smart's Confessions", "Gabriel's Lament", "Sugar Cane", and "An Immaculate Mistake".
1 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1994
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
July 6, 2024
It took me a little while to find my way in this novella. Two old soldiers from the Great War meet in London. Both of them in their long life dealt with their trauma’s a different way. Both of them are still haunted. Moving. Disturbing.
July 7, 2024
"Victor Harker's first impression as he shakes hands with Captain Harold Standish in St. Paul's Cathedral is that he would never have allowed the man an overdraft. Victor has not been in London for fifty years, but now that his beloved wife Stella is dead, he cannot face the memories that linger in their Newcastle home. He brings his recent bereavement and sixty-year-old nightmares of the Somme with him to the capital. He even has time to pass with this dubious old soldier, Standish.
"Victor's new acquaintance is not entirely Captain Hal Standish, however. He also sports the name of Tommy...a toothless but rather prim tramp. He sleeps at a mission, where he is looked after by a dooting Canadian Sergeant Marybeth...(he is also) a poet called Julian Borrow...swathed in food stained corduroy...(and) holds forth at Speakers' Corner and finds ladies quite willing to take part in the creative process of a poet.
"It is yet to be discovered by Victor that this unholy trinity is lodged within the single odd fellow he meets at St. Paul's - or that the reasons for his disguises, like Victor's own nightmares, hark back to the Somme..." From the cover of the 180 hardback edition of the novel from Jonathan Cape.
A Beautiful, perfect little novel (by that I mean short) about a bewilderingly rich number of themes, memory, love, family, getting old, deceit and fraud and what they are and mean. It is also a novel about war and what it does to people. That it was written by an author who was barely into middle age is a testimony to his enormous talent and ability to disappear into his characters.
A real gem of a novel by a really great writer.
"Victor's new acquaintance is not entirely Captain Hal Standish, however. He also sports the name of Tommy...a toothless but rather prim tramp. He sleeps at a mission, where he is looked after by a dooting Canadian Sergeant Marybeth...(he is also) a poet called Julian Borrow...swathed in food stained corduroy...(and) holds forth at Speakers' Corner and finds ladies quite willing to take part in the creative process of a poet.
"It is yet to be discovered by Victor that this unholy trinity is lodged within the single odd fellow he meets at St. Paul's - or that the reasons for his disguises, like Victor's own nightmares, hark back to the Somme..." From the cover of the 180 hardback edition of the novel from Jonathan Cape.
A Beautiful, perfect little novel (by that I mean short) about a bewilderingly rich number of themes, memory, love, family, getting old, deceit and fraud and what they are and mean. It is also a novel about war and what it does to people. That it was written by an author who was barely into middle age is a testimony to his enormous talent and ability to disappear into his characters.
A real gem of a novel by a really great writer.
October 19, 2022
A detailed study of old age. Memorable!!
October 12, 2020
This is a wonderful study of old age and a truly enjoyable short read. I felt remnants of Dickens in this author's writing. Just wonderful.
April 6, 2023
SUMMARY - A quick, mud-flecked march alongside two old survivors trying whatever it takes just to keep going.
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Bailey specialises in the tawdry melancholy of those living on the margins. 'Old Soldiers' returns to the geriatric focus of his 1967 debut. Other themes it revisits include the subject of grief after a wife's death, which Bailey covered in 'Trespasses', blended with the libidinous compulsiveness he brought to 'Peter Smart's Confessions', and the fragile will-to-survive of the storm-tossed characters of both.
Its style is again in short untitled sections. There are no chapters to divide scenes, but rather a continuous flow of thought and interaction. The dialogue is littered with lies and questionable memories, which returns us to the untrustworthy narratives of 'A Distant Likeness'. As readers we are are mercifully admitted into the dramatic irony, rather than left to drift between fragments of context-free dialogue. We know whose speaking, we know how characters feel about each other and relate one to another, and can feel the pathos, pity and antipathy to 'Old Soldiers' whose wars to survive civilian life are shorn of glory.
It was a reasonably satisfying view on two coping strategies to survival after trauma. The dynamic between the quasi-confidence trickster and the obligated politeness of his interlocutor worked. That said, the nature of the charade felt under-explained, and over-produced. I enjoy Bailey most when he steers clear of a certain hamminess, which might read camp, were it not for the diluting qualities it brings to the seriousness of his subject matter.
Overall, middle-of-the road for me. War trauma is a well-covered soft target for fiction, and I thought this was good but not exceptional. As an aside, I would be intrigued to read the autobiography of whatever oversexed septugenarian he modelled one of his old soldiers on...
__________
Bailey specialises in the tawdry melancholy of those living on the margins. 'Old Soldiers' returns to the geriatric focus of his 1967 debut. Other themes it revisits include the subject of grief after a wife's death, which Bailey covered in 'Trespasses', blended with the libidinous compulsiveness he brought to 'Peter Smart's Confessions', and the fragile will-to-survive of the storm-tossed characters of both.
Its style is again in short untitled sections. There are no chapters to divide scenes, but rather a continuous flow of thought and interaction. The dialogue is littered with lies and questionable memories, which returns us to the untrustworthy narratives of 'A Distant Likeness'. As readers we are are mercifully admitted into the dramatic irony, rather than left to drift between fragments of context-free dialogue. We know whose speaking, we know how characters feel about each other and relate one to another, and can feel the pathos, pity and antipathy to 'Old Soldiers' whose wars to survive civilian life are shorn of glory.
It was a reasonably satisfying view on two coping strategies to survival after trauma. The dynamic between the quasi-confidence trickster and the obligated politeness of his interlocutor worked. That said, the nature of the charade felt under-explained, and over-produced. I enjoy Bailey most when he steers clear of a certain hamminess, which might read camp, were it not for the diluting qualities it brings to the seriousness of his subject matter.
Overall, middle-of-the road for me. War trauma is a well-covered soft target for fiction, and I thought this was good but not exceptional. As an aside, I would be intrigued to read the autobiography of whatever oversexed septugenarian he modelled one of his old soldiers on...
February 21, 2011
Short but perfectly formed. Sparce but evocative with the great character of Standish/Tommy/Julian. Wont take you long to read but will stay with you.
June 17, 2022
“Hour after hour, the blessings he most craved - death, or its substitute, a dreamless sleep - eluded him. In old age, it seemed, he had at last become the son of his father. Now he, too, was seeking oblivion.
‘Your father is dead, Eric. I’ve made cucumber sandwiches. He did away with himself; he did himself in. And your favourite chocolate cake. In Hull, of all places. There’s jelly, too. You and I will have to make a go of things. Sit straight, dear - sit straight. Between us, we’ll make a life for you. I bought cream as a special treat. In Hull, my dear, in a common lodgings. He left a note. There was no mention of me. Or you. It was addressed to Shelly. What a coward, Eric. What a perfectly disgusting coward.’”
‘Your father is dead, Eric. I’ve made cucumber sandwiches. He did away with himself; he did himself in. And your favourite chocolate cake. In Hull, of all places. There’s jelly, too. You and I will have to make a go of things. Sit straight, dear - sit straight. Between us, we’ll make a life for you. I bought cream as a special treat. In Hull, my dear, in a common lodgings. He left a note. There was no mention of me. Or you. It was addressed to Shelly. What a coward, Eric. What a perfectly disgusting coward.’”
March 8, 2015
They fade away, fade away, don't they, old soldiers, just like everyone else. But not young soldiers. Young soldiers die. Young soldiers die young.
Two old soldiers from the Great War meet in St. Paul's Cathedral - one (Harkey) is looking at old memorials of young soldiers, and one (Standish) is impersonating an old captain. Both are consumed by the young soldiers they were and seem to have never lived an authentic life afterwards.
"Old Soldiers" follows them around London as Harkey reminisces about the London he lived in as a kid, meeting his wife and the horrors of the battlefield. While Harkey is doing this, Standish (his stand-in name for his "captain" impersonation) doffs his costume and becomes a beggar (Tommy - the WWI word for British soldiers) and a failed poet (Julian "Borrows"). It doesn't seem Standish does this for fraudulent reasons - it is just that he can't be himself.
Near the end we find out why Standish can't be himself, and this epiphany lets Harkey know that his life was not wasted, that the young soldier he was can fade away.
This novel packed a lot into its 120 pages - more than some I've read three times the size. It is very reminiscent of Muriel Spark in that way, though with a lot more sympathy for the characters!
Two old soldiers from the Great War meet in St. Paul's Cathedral - one (Harkey) is looking at old memorials of young soldiers, and one (Standish) is impersonating an old captain. Both are consumed by the young soldiers they were and seem to have never lived an authentic life afterwards.
"Old Soldiers" follows them around London as Harkey reminisces about the London he lived in as a kid, meeting his wife and the horrors of the battlefield. While Harkey is doing this, Standish (his stand-in name for his "captain" impersonation) doffs his costume and becomes a beggar (Tommy - the WWI word for British soldiers) and a failed poet (Julian "Borrows"). It doesn't seem Standish does this for fraudulent reasons - it is just that he can't be himself.
Near the end we find out why Standish can't be himself, and this epiphany lets Harkey know that his life was not wasted, that the young soldier he was can fade away.
This novel packed a lot into its 120 pages - more than some I've read three times the size. It is very reminiscent of Muriel Spark in that way, though with a lot more sympathy for the characters!
October 23, 2014
Книгата е едновременно откровена, забавна и тъжна. В началото не ме грабна. Имаше момент, в който определено се чудех защо я чета. Но след средата нещата се оправиха. А накрая дори ми хареса. Изпълнена е с типично английски черен хумор. Чете се бързо, но интересното е, че след като я оставиш, още мислиш за нея.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews