Regeneration

Regeneration by Pat Barker


My rating: 4 of 5 stars

One of the nice things about serving afternoon tea to newly arrived patients was that it made so many neurological tests redundant. (10)

Regeneration is a beautifully sensitive examination of the psychology of shell shock in the First World War, framed around the real-life figures of poets Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen. Sassoon's conscientious objection to the continuance of the war starts the book. The consequences -- he is bundled off to a mental hospital to be treated for a 'breakdown' -- follow, in thoughtful, elegant prose.

Army psychiatrist Dr Rivers is in many ways the 'main' character, as we see him interacting with patients and developing his understanding of what has happened to the minds and hearts of these broken men.

Rivers struggles with his own conscience while treating the men in his care, who are placed in the hospital to be 'cured' only to be sent back to the front when they are well enough. Sassoon's public declaration against the war, coupled with his extremely heroic service at the front, shakes Rivers deeply.

Themes that enthralled me while reading this short but extremely rich novel:

• nightmares and dreams
• father figures
• love between men
• loss of speech, silence
• paralysis
• memory and suppression
• passivity, helplessness
• manhood
• willpower

This was the dawning of our cultural understanding of post-traumatic stress; psychology evolved as Rivers and his colleagues experimented with different therapies.

This would have been easier if he could have believed... that men who broke down were degenerates whose weakness would have caused them to break down, eventually, even in civilian life... As soon as you accepted that the man's breakdown was a consequence of his war experience rather than of his own innate weakness, then inevitably the war became the issue. (115)

The dynamics between the men -- doctor and patient, between patients, friends and comrades -- are exquisite and heart-wrenching.

Barker dramatises the small moments so well, such as when Owen and Sassoon meet for the first time. She lovingly infuses with life moments and conversations that happened nearly a century ago, but that are still so present now.

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