The poetry of Siegfried Sassoon divides itself into
two rough classes--the idyllic and the satiric. War
has defiled one to produce the other. At heart
Siegfried Sassoon is an idealist.
Before the war he had hardly published a line. He
spent his summers in the company of books, at the
piano, on expeditions, and in playing tennis. During
winter he hunted. Hunting was a greater passion with
him than poetry. Much of his poetry celebrated the
loveliness of the field as seen by the huntsman in the
early morning light. But few probably guessed that
the youth known to excel in field sports excelled also
in poetry. For, in its way, this early poetry does excel.
It was characteristic of him that nearly every little
book he then wrote was privately printed. Poetry was
for him just something for private and particular
enjoyment--like a ride alone before breakfast. Among
these privately printed books are Twelve Sonnets
(1911), Melodies, An Ode for Music, Hyacinth
(all 1912). The names are significant. He was occupied
with natural beauty and with music. In 1913 he
publishes in a limited and obscure edition Apollo in
Doelyrium, wherein it seems that he is beginning to
find a certain want of body and basis in his poems
made of beautiful words about beautiful objects.
Later in the same year, with Masefield's Everlasting
Mercy (1911), Widow in the Bye Sheet (1912) and
Daffodil Fields (1913) before him, he starts to write a
parody of these uncouth intrusions of the sorrows of
obscure persons into his paradise but half way through
the poem adopts the Masefield manner in earnest
[Footnote: I had this from his own mouth.]
and finishes by unsuccessfully endeavouring to rival his
master. In 1914 the War breaks out. Home on leave
in 1915 he privately prints Discoveries, a little book
which contains some of the loveliest of his 'paradise'
poems. In 1916 the change has come. He can hardly
believe it himself. 'Morning Glory' (privately printed)
includes four war poems. He has not definitely
turned to his later style but he hovers on the brink.
The war is beginning to pain him. The poems 'To
Victory' and 'The Dragon and the Undying' show him
turning toward his paradise to see if its beauty can save
him ... The year 1917 witnesses the publication of
The Old Huntsman.
[Footnote: 'The Old Huntsman,' Dutton & Co., 1918.]
This book secured instantaneous success.
Siegfried Sassoon, on its publication,
became one of the leading young poets of England.
The book begins with the long monologue of a retired
huntsman, a piece of remarkable characterisation.
It continues with all the best of the 'paradise'
poems, including the loveliest in 'Discoveries' and
'Morning Glory.' There are also the 'bridge' poems
between his old manner and his new such as the 'To
Victory' mentioned above. But interspersed among
the paradise poems are the first poems in his final war
style. He tells the story of the change in a characteristic
manner--Conscripts (page 51, 'The Old Huntsman').
For like nearly every one of the young English poets,
he is to some extent a humourist. His humour is not,
however, even through 'The Old Huntsman' all
of such a wise and gentle tenor. He breaks out into
lively bitterness in such poems as 'They,'
'The Tombstone Maker' and 'Blighters.'