Description
The First World War comes to harrowing life through the intertwined lives of the soldier poets in Michael Korda’s epic Muse of Fire
Michael Korda, the best-selling author of Hero and Alone, tells the story of the First World War but through the intertwined lives of the soldier poets who came to describe it best, and indeed to symbolise the war’s tragic arc and lethal fury.
His epic narrative begins with Rupert Brooke, “the handsomest young man in England” and perhaps its most famous young poet in the halcyon days of the Edwardian Age, and ends five years later with Wilfred Owen, killed in action at twenty-five, only one week before the armistice.
Korda’s dramatic account not only brings to life the soldier poets but paints an unforgettable picture of life and death in the trenches, and the sacrifice of an entire generation.
As Korda demonstrates, the poets of the First World War were soldiers, heroes, martyrs, victims, their lives and loves endlessly fascinating—that of Rupert Brooke alone reads like a novel. Muse of Fire is at once a portrait of their lives and a narrative of a civilisation destroying itself, among the rubble, shadows, and the unresolved problems of which we still live.
Reviews
"[Muse of Fire] is original and disturbing… Korda is particularly good on [Rupert] Brooke, whose nostalgia for thatched cottages and clear streams gave people an image of the Englishness they thought they were fighting for." — Roger Lewis, The Mail on Sunday
"Erudite and often funny... Korda’s group portrait of soldier poets skillfully depicts how different classes of men experienced the Western Front and offers an entry point into a rich seam of under-read war poetry." — Alice Winn, The New York Times Book Review
"Michael Korda’s group biography of Siegfried Sassoon, Wilfred Owen and others is richly detailed and elegantly written...Korda, keenly attuned to the nuances of Britain’s class system and its overlapping literary circles, excels at tracing the bonds of acquaintance, collegiality, amity and sometimes physical attraction that knit these men to one another... engrossing." — Julia M. Klein, The Washington Post
"Korda... expertly traces his poets’ shifts in outlook and subject matter, and along the way showcases candid, visceral verse that has lost none of its power to shock and move . . . ‘Muse of Fire’ enlarges our understanding of these men and gives us a renewed appreciation of their work. At the same time, it prompts us to contemplate the potential that was robbed and the talent that was wasted by the so-called war to end all wars." — Malcom Forbes, The Wall Street Journal
"Every page of Muse of Fire betrays a profound intimacy with both the ‘sheer horror’ of the war and, even more, of a time when ‘poetry mattered to people in a way it no longer does to us.’ Michael Korda’s unique angle allows him to break through the cliches and restores to us these poets with a fierce immediacy. His book is itself a moving memorial." — Daniel Mendelsohn, author of An Odyssey: A Father, a Son, and an Epic
Also By: Michael Korda 
Alone: Britain, Churchill, and Dunkirk: Defeat into Victory
Paperback, 2018
Combining epic history with rich family stories, Michael Korda chronicles the outbreak of the Second World War and the great events that led to Dunkirk.
Catnip: A Love Story
E Book, 2018
From silly to sweet, 365 cat sketches by Michael Korda, drawn with love for his wife.
Alone: Britain, Churchill, and Dunkirk: Defeat Into Victory
Hardback, 2017
Combining epic history with rich family stories, Michael Korda chronicles the outbreak of the Second World War and the great events that led to Dunkirk.
Alone: Britain, Churchill, and Dunkirk: Defeat into Victory
E Book, 2017
Combining epic history with rich family stories, Michael Korda chronicles the outbreak of the Second World War and the great events that led to Dunkirk.
Catnip: A Love Story
Hardback, 2017
From silly to sweet, 365 cat sketches by Michael Korda, drawn with love for his wife.
Ebook
9781631496899
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