Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    Regeneration
    Unavailable
    Regeneration
    Unavailable
    Regeneration
    Audiobook (abridged)2 hours

    Regeneration

    Written by Pat Barker

    Narrated by Paul Mcgann

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    The first in a stunning trilogy about the First World War, the novel takes a real life encounter between a doctor running a hospital for the wounded, and Siegfried Sassoon.Craiglockhart, a hospital for officers ravaged by their experiences in trench warfare, is the setting for Pat Barker's 'Regeneration'. Here the poet Siegfried Sassoon, author of an article condemning the war, came under the care of psychiatrist W.H.R Rivers whose duty, as he saw it, was to return Sassoon to all the horrors of the Front, because Sassoon was sane, was healthy – and he had made a commitment. But while the encounter of Sassoon and Rivers is central to 'Regeneration', it is the exploration of the character of Rivers himself, the agony of the other patients and the insights into their minds, that makes this a tour-de-force. A superb novel related with chilling clarity and vivid compassion.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins UK Audio
    Release dateJan 16, 2006
    ISBN9780007229109
    Unavailable
    Regeneration
    Author

    Pat Barker

    Pat Barker's novels include Another World, Border Crossing and Noonday. She is also the author of the highly acclaimed Regeneration Trilogy, comprising Regeneration, which has been made into a film starring Jonathan Pryce and James Wilby, The Eye in the Door, winner of the 1993 Guardian Fiction Prize, and The Ghost Road, winner of the 1996 Booker Prize. She lives in England.

    More audiobooks from Pat Barker

    Related to Regeneration

    Related audiobooks

    War & Military Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      The Lighter Side of Dan Chaon

      Apr 11, 2022

      I had a dystopian idea in the beginning, and in the end the dystopia caught up with me. The post The Lighter Side of Dan Chaon appeared first on The Millions.

      4 min read

    • Article

      A Year in Reading: Casey Gerald

      Dec 14, 2018

      There’s a line in my book that reads, “I have been so many things along my curious journey: a poor boy, a nigger, a Yale man, a Harvard man, a faggot, a Christian, a crack baby (alleged), the Spawn of Satan, the Second Coming, Casey.” My reading tend

      2 min read

    • Article

      50 Quid Craptic Crossword

      Mar 10, 2022

      50 Quid Craptic Crossword
      1 min read

    • Article

      Unlikely Auteur Of Mercy

      Nov 24, 2022

      Unlikely Auteur Of Mercy
      7 min read

    • Article

      Kate Atkinson On Writing: A Good Day Is When You’ve Written A Good Sentence

      Aug 5, 2019

      Kate Atkinson’s new mystery is “Big Sky,” the fifth featuring Jackson Brodie. She talks about WWII, her life before she was a writer, and more.

      4 min read

    • Article

      Lech

      Feb 8, 2022

      Lech
      4 min read

    • Article

      Window On Hotere

      Oct 18, 2020

      Window On Hotere
      6 min read

    • Article

      Bard In The Woods

      Nov 30, 2020

      Bard In The Woods
      4 min read

    • Article

      Evidence Of Evil

      Oct 1, 2020

      Evidence Of Evil
      4 min read

    • Article

      Books

      Sep 5, 2022

      Books
      6 min read

    • Article

      Celebrity Shelfie

      Mar 2, 2020

      Natalie Portman is reading Normal People by Sally Rooney. The award-winning novel is a portrait of Connell and Marianne’s relationship, from their life as teenagers in a small Irish town to when they move to Dublin for uni. ■

      1 min read

    • Article

      Le Carré's Dirty Linen

      Oct 18, 2023

      The Secret Life of John le Carré By Adam Sisman Profile Books £16.99 Halfway through Adam Sisman's 2015 biography of John le Carré, something odd occurs. The book simply shuts up shop. You can all but hear the rattle of the roller shutter as if it's

      3 min read

    • Article

      The Deadly Wave

      Apr 27, 2020

      The Deadly Wave
      5 min read

    • Article

      Grief Is Another Word For Love

      Jun 21, 2021

      I am trapped in Australia. The borders are shut, which has worked well for keeping COVID-19 out, but it has also kept me in. Over the last fifteen months in sunny Perth, where I live, there have only been two cases of COVID-19 in the community. We ha

      8 min read

    • Article

      Benny vs Deon

      Dec 23, 2021

      Benny vs Deon
      4 min read

    • Article

      James Baldwin, Restored

      Feb 15, 2019

      James Baldwin, Restored
      9 min read

    • Article

      Portrait Of An Artist

      Jan 6, 2022

      Portrait Of An Artist
      6 min read

    • Article

      Top 10 Books About Family Secrets | Jyoti Patel

      Jan 18, 2023

      Where there are families there are stories and where there are stories there are always secrets. It’s ripe crop for a writer. In literature, these are a staple of the coming-of-age novel. Family secrets seem to rise to the surface when a protagonist

      4 min read

    Reviews for Regeneration

    4/5

    1,038 ratings66 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 5/5
      This little book has been a long time waiting for me. I am so glad I have finally read it! It follows the story of Sigfried Sassoon who was admitted to a WWI mental hospital for examination, and for his anti-war feelings to be eliminated/mended/erased so that he could be sent back to the front and continue doing his duty. The medical officer in charge of this feat is William Rivers. He is a middle aged man schooled in the ways of the mind, he is a kind man and a skilled manipulator of others, in a way that helps them see that their afflictions (shell-shock, anxiety and the like) can be overcome that they can carry on.The book is so much more than its plot though. It is about war and politics, it is about mental health and the effects of what continued anxiety can do to the mind and body, and it is about right and wrong. It is beautifully written, and coupled with a great story is everything I like about books.
    • 3/5
      Certainly not your typical book about war, the narrative centers around a British officer in World War I who declares his opposition to the war and is subjected to psychological treatment to bring his thinking back to "normal". This really should be a companion piece to Joseph Heller's Catch-22, even if written in a much more "serious" manner. While fictional, the story is very much based on true events and actual characters. Despite that solid foundation, I found the writing too often out of focus and less than clear as to the writer's intent. This book is the first of a highly regarded trilogy, the later books getting stronger praise, so I'm unclear at this point if this is really the lesser of the three books, and should continue with the series, or if writer's style will always be a step behind the power of her subject. Ultimately, it's a thought-provoking read, if not always satisfying.
    • 5/5
      Stunning, stark, unsettling. We meet in this book a number of people whose lives are fundamentally changed by the events of WWI. This tales are full of despair and hope, and on occasion happiness and possibility. There are people hollowed out by their experience, and many whose lives have gone further and rank in society increased in ways they could not have in England before the war. sometimes these were the same people. Barker helps us to understand so much about a time, but also about the impact of war on our soldiers today and guides us to empathize with people just trying to live right and often failing. I can't wait to start the second book.
    • 4/5
      When Siegfried Sassoon, an English soldier and poet, writes a letter protesting the war in 1917, a friend of his manages to get him sent to Craiglockhart hospital instead of getting court martialed. I expected this historical fiction to be more about the war and the fighting, but instead it shows the many men whose experience of war was psychologically damaging. Dr. Rivers, a psychologist and anthropologist, and his patients show us the horror of war through each of their stories, experiences, and wrestling with conscience. Sassoon, for his part, claims not to be a pacifist and is known for his heroism, but articulately maintains that the war has gone on long enough, while Rivers sees it as his duty to convince him to go back. The tone is melancholy, and makes for difficult reading at times, but it is a well-done portrait of a time and characters who were real people: poets and soldiers who experienced the war.
    • 3/5
      Een boek over de eerste wereldoorlog, dat moet wel een anti-oorlogsboek zijn, ook al is het uitgebracht lang voor de hype van de eeuwviering (2014-18). En Regeneration/Niemandsland is dat zeker: her en der verspreid komen de getuigenissen van de gruwel in de loopgraven aan bod, maar de nadruk ligt op de schokkende gevolgen voor de overlevenden. Barker gebruikt een aantal historische personages (onder meer de dichters Sassoon en Owen) en een aantal fictieve figuren om verschillende aspecten van wat een oorlog met mensen doet, in de verf te zetten. We kijken vooral door de bril van dr Rivers, een psychiater in een instelling in Edinburgh, Schotland, waar getraumatiseerde soldaten (officieren eigenlijk) opgelapt worden. Rivers past er de techniek toe om de militairen op zachte wijze te confronteren met wat ze precies hebben meegemaakt, ze dat een plaats te laten geven, en zo te verwerken, zodat ze na een paar maanden weer naar het front kunnen.Maar doorheen het boek zien we Rivers aan het twijfelen gaan. Hij worstelt onder meer met zijn methode (een collega van hem in Londen past gewoon elektroshocks toe, en forceert op gruwelijke wijze een doorbraak). Het is vooral de confrontatie met een aantal markante patiënten die hem dwingt tot zelfonderzoek. Dan gaat het in de eerste plaats om de keuze tussen militarisme en pacifisme: Barker brengt die vooral aan via de figuur van Sassoon, en doet dat met opvallend veel nuance, want de dichter – een gedecoreerd loopgravenstrijder – brengt in 1917 wel een heel gedurfd en controversieel standpunt tégen de oorlog uit, maar keert ook terug naar het front, uit solidariteit met zijn makkers. Ook de gevolgen van de oorlog voor het sociale en het gender-zelfbeeld worden uitgediept: homoseksualiteit, mannelijke identiteit, het aristocratische karakter van het officierenkorps, worden vooral via de fictieve figuur van Billy Prior aangekaart.Kortom, Barker levert hier geen goedkoop pacifistisch manifest, maar een doorwrochte en subtiele studie in de psychologische gevolgen van mensen na traumasituaties. “Nothing justifies this, nothing, nothing, nothing”, bedenkt de Rivers naar het einde van het boek, meteen een kernachtige samenvatting ervan.
    • 5/5
      "Nothing can justify this", April 22, 2014This review is from: Regeneration (Regeneration Trilogy (Plume Books)) (Paperback)This review is from: Regeneration (Regeneration Trilogy) (Paperback)Absolutely superb novel that brings the utter horrors of the First World War to life without going near a battleground.Set in a Scottish hospital, and based on the true life character of psychiatrist William Rivers who sees the terrible mental trauma inflicted by the war on men who are terrified to return yet conditioned to feel it their duty to get back to their comrades... And the doctors whose role - undertaken by some more enthusiastically than others - is to 'fit young men back into the role of warrior, a role they had - however unconsciously - rejected.'As he treats various patients, including poet Siegfried Sassoon, who is vehemently opposed to the continuance of the War, Rivers is only too aware that 'normally a cure implies that the patient will no longer engage in behaviour that is clearly self-destructive. But in present circumstances, recovery meant the resumption of activities that were not merely self-destructive but positively suicidal.'A powerful and affecting read.
    • 4/5
      An attention grabbing story that follows the work of a British doctor and his interactions with patients suffering psychiatric ailments as a result of their experiences of war. Hard to put down.
    • 5/5
      The story is based on real historical facts/persons. The real life encounter of W.H.R. Rivers (anthropologist, psychiatrist) and Siegried Sassoon at Craiglockhart in 1917. When I started to read this book, I assumed Pat Barker was a man because I knew that the trilogy was a war story. I also assumed it was fiction and then discovered that these some of the characters in the story were real persons. Sassoon was a poet and also a brave army officer who came to the conclusion that the war should be ended. I knew about shell shock, now called PTSD and have seen documentaries of WWI victims. I knew about the gas, I had an great uncle who suffered from exposure to gas in WWI. I know quite a bit about psychiatry as it is my field. I found this book to be well written, the protagonist is Rivers and he changes as the story unfolds. I would be able to recommend this book though I am not certain the remaining two books are as good as I have not heard as good reports on those.
    • 4/5
      Based on some truth. Craiglockhart War Hospital is a place for people broken by the war to go and to hopefully be cured, Dr William Rivers (a real man) features in his humane treatment (particularly when compared to the treatments later in the book involving electricity which basically is torture); of men who have to be put together again after being broken by this war. He deals with his conflict between fixing these men and knowing that by fixing them he's dooming them to a return to what broke them in the first place.Siegfried Sassoon; Wilfrid Owen and a fictional character Billy Prior, the three are pivotal in the story. There are others but most of the story is Rivers, Sassoon and Prior and their interactions and paths. I found it very interesting and it opened up more about the war than I had known. Several books I've read have touched on the aftermath of the war (see Lord Peter Whimsey's nightmares) but this one delves deep and looks at how it was treated, sometimes quite inhumanely. It looks at masculinity and it's perception and asks questions about how it's seen.
    • 4/5
      An oddly subdued and emotionally controlled book. Highly readable, and strangely interesting even from the start when the whole thing seems to be a sequence of interview texts. The torture scene later on was particularly well done; I had to stop reading afterwards to think about it. I think my enjoyment would have been enhanced if I knew the details of the events from history in more detail and as this is just part of a trilogy I suppose I've essentially just read a third of a novel. If I have a criticism (and I feel I have to offer one) it's that it occasionally falls back on the trappings of women's fiction.
    • 5/5
      Normally a cure implies that the patient will no longer engage in behaviour that is clearly self-destructive. But in present circumstances, recovery meant the resumption of activities that were not merely self-destructive but positively suicidal.Such are the conclusions of Dr. Rivers, a psychiatrist working with shell-shocked soldiers in 1917 England. His most recent patient is Siegfried Sassoon, a poet and decorated soldier, who has written a declaration calling the war a senseless slaughter without a clear objective. This is enough to land Sassoon in Craiglockhart War Hospital as a patient until he can be cured and returned to the front. Dr. Rivers is treating many patients: a man so traumatized by a gruesome accident that he will never recover, a doctor now unable to stand the sight of blood, a young man unable to remember what happened that caused his breakdown. But there is something about Sassoon and his articulate condemnation of the war that causes a crisis of conscience for Dr. Rivers. Bits. The scold's bridle used to silence recalcitrant women in the Middle Ages. More recently, on American slaves. And yet on the ward, listening to the list of Callan's battles, he'd felt that nothing Callan could say could have been more powerful than his silence. Later, {after treatment by Dr. Yealland forces Callan to begin speaking again}, Rivers had felt that he was witnessing the silencing of a human being. Indeed, Yealland had come very close to saying just that. 'You must speak, but I shall not listen to anything you have to say.'...Just as Yealland silenced the unconscious protest of his patients by removing the paralysis, the deafness, the blindness, the muteness that stood between them and the war, so, in an infinitely more gentle way, he silenced his patients; for the stammerings, the nightmares, the tremors, the memory lapses, of officers were just as much unwitting protest as the grosser maladies of the men.This novel fascinated me on so many levels. There is the philosophical, but very real arguments about the morality of the war; the psychiatric effects of war trauma on soldiers; the medical ethics of experimenting on oneself or using brutal methods; the use of mythology in the treatment of trauma; and the social effects as homosexuality begins to be acknowledged in British society.He distrusted the implication that nurturing, even when done by a man, remains female, as if the ability were in some way borrowed, or even stolen, from women-a sort of moral equivalent of couvade. If that were true, then there was really very little hope....Rivers had been touched by the way in which young men, some of them not yet twenty, spoke about feeling like fathers to their men. Though when you looked at what they did. Worrying about socks, boots, blisters, food, hot drinks. And that perpetually harried expression of theirs... It was the look of people who are totally responsible for lives they have no power to save.But what really struck me about this novel is that it is based on actual people, declarations, and treatments. In a brief Author's Note at the end of the book, which I found helpful to read first, the reader is told which characters were real people and cites the sources for the various methods of treatment which Drs. Rivers and Yealland used. On the spectrum between fact and fiction, the author skews to the actual, and I was amazed at how deftly she brought the historical to life. [Regeneration] is the first in a trilogy that I look forward to continuing. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in the psychology of war.
    • 4/5
      I have a long-held affection for the British WWI poets and that is what interested me in this book which takes real-life events and mixes them with fiction to tell a story about WWI and its terrible physical and psychological toll. A book which moves slowly but which draws the reader in. I was most taken by the way the author provided a window into the emotional toll of the war through her sparse descriptive style. A great book, number one in a trilogy - I must hunt out the other books in the series.
    • 3/5
      A classy novel about the horrors of World War I told with a focus on a group of literary/poetic officers as they and others are treated for shell shock. This oblique approach seems to capture the carnage and its effect on soldiers involved even more strongly than any attempt to directly describe the futility of the military tactics. Read March 2011.
    • 5/5
      In the midst of WWI a combat officer, Siegfried Sassoon, denounces the war and finds himself in a psychiatric hospital under the care of Dr. William Rivers, psychiatrist. The relationship between the two is quite intriguing, both no longer agree with the war but must come to terms with it. Rivers in that he must either find his patients fit or unfit to return to duty and Sassoon in his attitude to succumb to his responsibilities and return to the fighting. Several other patients are explored as well and the nightmare unfolds as to what war can do to an individual. A very moving book that puts the effects of war in perspective. (Book 1 of 3)
    • 5/5
      Light from the window behind Rivers' desk fell directly on to Sassoon's face. Pale skin, purple shadows under the eyes. Apart from that, not obvious signs of nervous disorder. No twitches, jerks, blinks, no repeated ducking to avoid a long-exploded shell. His hands, doing complicated things with cup, saucer, plate, sandwiches, cake, sugar tongs and spoon, were perfectly steady. Rivers raised his own cup to his lips and smiled. One of the nice things about serving afternoon tea to newly arrived patients was that it made so many neurological tests redundant.The story starts with the poet Siegfried Sassoon arriving at Craiglockhart, an institution for shell-shocked officers, after publishing his famous declaration against the war. But the main character is Dr. W.H.R. Rivers, the (real-life) doctor who treats him and other officers, until they are better enough to either return to the front or be released from the army and return to civilian life. Possibly Rivers' hardest case is an officer who is wasting away, unable to eat without vomiting after landing head first onto a corpse whose gas-filled belly had burst on impact, filling his mouth and nose with rotting flesh.Sometimes when you're alone, in the trenches, I mean, at night you get the sense of something ancient. As if the trenches have always been there. You know one trench we held, it had skulls in the side. You looked back along and . . . Like mushrooms. And do you know, it was actually easier to believe they were men from Marlborough's army than to to to think they'd been alive two years ago. It's as if all other wars had somehow . . . distilled themselves into this war, and that makes it something you . . . almost can't challenge.A fantastic book - very moving.
    • 5/5
      The first book in the trilogy. In 1917, Siegfriend Sassoon, having issued a public declaration against the continuance of the war, is persuaded to attend a Medical Board, and finds himself in a military hospital, Craiglockhart, where his doctor, Rivers, learns much from Sassoon's case, about the nature of treatment, and war, and the ethics of sending back Sassoon to France, where he might be killed. [Dec 2004]
    • 4/5
      In 1917, poet Siegfried Sassoon was sent to Craiglockhart War Hospital after a public protest about the war. While there, he was treated by Dr. W. H. R. Rivers, a neurologist and social anthropologist, and he formed a friendship with another WWI poet, Wilfred Owen. These facts are the basis of this fictionalized account of that encounter, the first in a trilogy of books.It was difficult to remind myself that this was mostly fiction. The story was well-written, and if the events did not happen this way, they could have. Here was a different perspective on how the war affected those who fought in it. I'm not sure we realize sometimes how very brutal WWI was, but a lot of it comes through in this book. It's not an exciting book, nor an eventful book, but it is very powerful in a low-key sort of way.
    • 5/5
      The novel follows Siegfried Sassoon during his stay in Craiglockhart War Hospital after an ill-timed war protest labelled him "shell-shocked." A number of the other characters (his doctor, Rivers, and fellow patient Wilfred Owen, among others) are based on real people as well. We see a number of the patients, all suffering from some manner of neurasthenia, and get their stories, as well as Rivers's, from their own points of view. The shifting points of view coupled with a spare style when it comes to setting make the story feel a bit fragmented (though never difficult to follow), and this seems utterly appropriate for a novel about this subject. The exploration of the psychiatric and ethical issues facing the soldiers and their doctors is compelling and the descriptions of the conditions in the trenches harrowing. An excellent read. Recommended.
    • 4/5
      A remarkable small novel set during World War I in England, set in a "mental" hospital where troops are sent after suffering from "battle fatigue", or as we might call it now - Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. The main soldier being "treated" is there because he has become strongly Anti-War and a friend pulled strings to have him "treated" for such an unusual stance rather than suffer Court Martial. There is a good depiction of the mind set in England during the war, and how totally unusual it would be to become Anti-War and remain an officer and a gentleman. The novel also explores homosexuality and poetry. The doctor providing the treatments is also drawn sympathetically, and his views on the War and all the rest are explored equally as are those of the other characters. A remarkable novel in that it deals with so much in so few pages. Deep. Thought provoking. Well written.Recommended.
    • 4/5
      It has been a long time since I was so moved by an author. I look forward to reading the remaining 2 volumes of this trilogy.
    • 5/5
      A TRILOGY that is essential reading for those who have an interest in what stops and what makes a man 'tick' in the midst of unimagined brutal combat. Remarkable writing on a very remarkable subject. Ms Barker has said she always wanted to write about World War One, but could not for some years find a topic that had not already been covered: In her complex, harrowing, detailed narrative exploration of the character of real WW1 psychiatrist-clinician Professor Rivers and his role in restoring to "mental/physical fitness" severely traumatised soldiers ("shell-shock"/"PTSD" are far too simple terms for what the books describe) and therefore ready anew for war service the author found a profoundly disturbing and deeply moving aspect of that vast Total War era. Within the trilogy she covers landmark literary figures, Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen who were genuine 'patients/inmates' of Prof Rivers' new-science methods establishment. Fictional characters also play their part in a raw, emotional, almost in parts passion-play of the lives of men who have endured the unendurable and are made to recover sufficiently to have to go and endure it all over again. Barker's trilogy is not a tribute, but it is a mirror held up to those times when the whole Social Order was being turned upside down by a tragic conflict no one had ever conceived of as humanly possible. Sadly, in our world, we all know very differently.
    • 5/5
      No one does PTSD better than Barker.
    • 3/5
      This World War I story focuses on a group of shell shocked British soldiers who are all patients at a psychiatric hospital in Scotland. It is an interesting way to portray the horrors of war. The reader gets snippets of some devastating scenes through the dialog between soldier and psychiatrist. Although the writing style is a bit stiff and detached, the impact is still strong. I would include this as another good anti-war book along with The Things They Carried and Catch-22.
    • 5/5
      The first in a trilogy about British soldiers in WW1, this book highlights a few officers, including known poet, Siegfried Sassoon , suffering from PTSD and residents at the Craiglockhart War Hospital, an institution where they're receiving treatment and rest. The main objective of the medical team, which includes Dr William Rivers, an anthropologist, is to try to treat them to the point where they are 'cured' and can be returned to front to help fight the war.It's an incredibly sensitive study of soldiers who have been in the midst of horrific conditions, seeing their friends cut down in front of them, having go crawl through dismembered bodies, one soldier even being hurled in the air after an explosion, only to land head first into the decomposing body of a German soldier, or forcing themselves out of the trenches, knowing they'll be walking into enemy fire. The relationship Rivers builds with some of the patients and his method of treatment highlights the fact that PTSD, not a term used or even understood back then, is not a form of weakness or madness and should not be stigmatized, as it was in those days, and still is to a certain extent today. The author puts a very human face to each of his characters, and raises the ethical and philosophical questions about war, making this not just historical fiction but also a very thought provoking read. The declaration by Sassoon is quoted in the beginning and is the foundation upon which the psychological and fatal effects of war may be argued. All in all, a thoroughly good read.
    • 5/5
      After reading All Quiet on the Western Front, I realized that several more of the novels from the Guardian's 1000 Novels list dealt with World War I in some way, and thought it would be good to read some more of them. I picked up the first and last of this trilogy at a local used book sale and they seemed like a good bet, even though I'd tried another of Barker's books years ago and didn't get very far.Unlike Remarque 's book, Barker's trilogy are historical novels informed more by research and imagination than personal experience. Not only that, she has bravely made several historical figures into central characters in her books: the poets Siegfried Sassoon, Robert Graves, and Wilfred Owen, and William Rivers who is probably only known to you if you are involved in the treatment of what we now call PTSD and was then called shell-shock. In this first volume Rivers is treating Sassoon, Owen, and a fictional officer, Billy Prior at Craiglockhart, a military hospital near Edinburgh. Sassoon, a decorated and brave officer, has published a manifesto against the conduct of the war and is in the hospital more or less as an excuse. Rivers' job is to get him to go back to the front. As one might expect he feels conflicted about this. Prior, who comes from a working-class background but was made an officer because of his intelligence and educational attainment, feels conflict too and also becomes involved with a young woman who works in the local munitions factory. Except for some of the reminiscences of the patients we never see the war in France, only its various effects on the people at home and those who come back from the Front. The feelings of Prior and others in the book are very similar to those Remarque's protagonist has when he goes home on leave. Regeneration also has a lot to say about class, about the relationship between a psychotherapist and his patients, and even about the process of making poetry from wartime experiences. Highly recommended, but be warned, you'll want to read all three volumes.
    • 5/5
      Read this for my book club and was totally taken in. Characters are intriguing and well developed. Touches on everything from class structure (particularly in Britain), pacifism debate (conscientious objectors to the war), mental health ("shock therapy"), doctor/patient relationships... I liked it better than most in my group and want to read the rest of the Pat Barker books. She was a good find.
    • 5/5
      This little book has been a long time waiting for me. I am so glad I have finally read it! It follows the story of Sigfried Sassoon who was admitted to a WWI mental hospital for examination, and for his anti-war feelings to be eliminated/mended/erased so that he could be sent back to the front and continue doing his duty. The medical officer in charge of this feat is William Rivers. He is a middle aged man schooled in the ways of the mind, he is a kind man and a skilled manipulator of others, in a way that helps them see that their afflictions (shell-shock, anxiety and the like) can be overcome that they can carry on.The book is so much more than its plot though. It is about war and politics, it is about mental health and the effects of what continued anxiety can do to the mind and body, and it is about right and wrong. It is beautifully written, and coupled with a great story is everything I like about books.
    • 5/5
      I loved this book, it's beautifully written in a tight, almost bald style. The central characters are well drawn and sympathetically portrayed, with an excellent feel for time and place. Barker explores WWI through real characters and draws on some known accounts of their experiences; Sassoon, the 'war poet' is a central character, but it is Billy Prior, shell-shocked and distressed beyond words who affects us the most.

      Barker explores themes of loss, manhood, war, comradeship and early psychiatry in a powerful, moving and ultimately rewarding novel of the highest order.
    • 3/5
      Somewhat tedious, but with some good insights.
    • 2/5
      I can't overstate how tedious and oblique this book was. I saw on the front 'Booker Prize Winner', and as I have generally rated these books quite highly I bought it. Unfortunately it was only the author who won the prize - not this particular book. I can only assume the book that did win was a whole lot better than this one.Obviously, given the subject matter, and the fact that it 'resurrects heroes' (to quote the blurb on the back), it's going to attract a certain amount of learned attention, as well as sentimental adulation. It wasn't entertaining, though. If I wanted to read about World War I poets I would prefer to read a reference book.