Goodbye to All That [Hardcover]

Robert Graves (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1980 | ISBN-10: 0374932336 | ISBN-13: 978-0374932336 | Edition: Revised

GOODBYE TO ALL THAT is the author's autobiographical statement about WW I and the disillusionment that set in afterward. Graves went to Oxford, knew T. E. Lawrence and the Bloomsbury set, and lived at the artistic center as one of the reigning spirits. But in 1929 he abdicated and went to Majorca, there to live at his own pace and to produce works of his own design and construction.

"Argument about which is the finest set of British memoirs of WW I stops here. If there are standard works of autobiography, this is one." (The List of Books)

One of the finest modern British authors, Robert Graves is perhaps best known for his historical novels, I CLAUDIUS and CLAUDIUS THE GOD.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

8 1.5-hour cassettes --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 347 pages
• Publisher: Octagon Books; Revised edition (June 1980)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374932336
• ISBN-13: 978-0374932336
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,693,296 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars warts and all, September 15, 2000

By 

Peter Moss (Hong Kong) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Goodbye to All That (Hardcover)

I came upon 'Goodbye to All That' relatively late in life. I had enjoyed his fictional biography of Claudius, but here was Graves, speaking to me of his own youth, across a gap of more than seventy years, with a candour one hardly dares hope for in contemporary autobiography. Yes, he had loved, both men and women, and he dared admit it. He writes, not just with courage but humility, of his harrowing years on the Western front, which saw the wholesale slaughter of most of his generation. Along with fellow poets Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, he gave the lie to the 'honourable death' for King and Country. Despite their valour, the friends he lost had been slaughtered like cattle led to an abbatoir, and he spares us nothing of their suffering. A truly courageous book in every sense. I can't speak for the audio rendering, but its disappearance from the bookshelf would be a tragic 'Goodbye to All That' indeed.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I Graves, March 28, 2001

By 

Alex Lukic "cool_book_man" (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Goodbye To All That (Audio Cassette)

Along with Sigfried Sassoon's "Memoirs of an Infantry Soldier" and Erich Maria Remarque's "All Quiet on the Western Front", Graves' personal account of poetic inspiration in a background of horror is World War I's best first-hand chronicle ever compiled. The realism and power behind this book are electrical. Graves' coolness in the trenches while composing sonnets and seeking a blissful state of mind is almost disturbing when contrasting it with the demonic state of destruction and death. His unnerving pace and tranquil descriptions seem to underline an innocence lost in years past.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant evocation of the Lost Generation, July 14, 2000

By 

Laurence Jarvik "laurencejarvikonline" (Washington, DC USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Goodbye to All That (Isis Series) (Audio Cassette)

Robert Graves book is at one level a memoir and at another level a manifesto for the Lost Generation, disillusioned by the carnage and stupidity of World War I. Devastating in is portrayal of the British Establishment. Compelling in its picture of young poets like Sigfried Sassoon. The audiobook version is simply riveting, turning a drive from Washington, DC to NYC and back on a crowded I-95 into a distinct pleasure. Even traffic jams were transformed into a delightful chance to hear more of the story.