Childhood under fire
A change of view
One person affected by the First World War was John Ronald Reuel (J R R) Tolkien. After completing his studies at Oxford, in 1915, he enlisted as a second lieutenant in the Lancashire Fusiliers, seeing bloody action at the Battle of the Somme in 1916. Two of his friends died in the fighting. Many experts believe these experiences had a major influence on his fantasies, The Hobbit (1937) and The Lord of Rings (1954-55), both of which are still hugely popular today. This continuing effect of the First World War on culture cannot be over-estimated.
Half a century before the conflict, though, writing for children and young people was already in the throws of a revolution. It had come into its own in 1865, with the publication of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, which invented a free-flowing, fun fantasy world liberated from adult rules and moral lessons.
The change from the moralising tone of the Victorians to more fun-filled themes could not be more evident than in Henry King, one of Hilaire Belloc's Cautionary Tales for Children (1907), which starts:
'The Chief Defect of Henry King
Was chewing little bits of String.'
Fantasies, such as Anna Sewell's Black Beauty (1877), Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island (1883), Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows (1908) and A A Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh, became welcome escapes from the grim reality of the First World War. They sometimes mimicked the conflict in larger-than-life fight scenes, and sometimes counteracted it with the cuddly warmth of a pretend bear, the romance of a horse or the gentleness of a family of rabbits.
J M Barrie's play, Peter Pan (1902) – the story of a boy who would never grow old – was adapted for the novel Peter and Wendy in 1911. For some it became a poignant reminder of the terrible loss of young life caused by the First World War, which, in part at least, helped to ensure the story's continued popularity.
Illustrated papers like The Bystander, with artwork by Bruce Bairnsfather, were read by many adults as well as children
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Meanwhile, some children and young people found their escape from daily life in action stories. In the last 30 years of the 19th century, G A Henty had produced some 80 stories, generally featuring a teenaged boy hero, to help build the genre of the historical adventure story. These paved the way for the many spying and action-packed novels that became popular, thanks to the 'excitement' of the First World War.
Of course, the Government was not slow to realise the need to encourage children and young people to support the war and, to this end, it enlisted the support of its propaganda department. It produced titles such as Why Britain Went to War: To Boys and Girls of the British Empire (1914), which portrayed the war as a school fight against a bully.
Other publications were launched, either by the government propaganda machine or independent publishers who felt they needed to do their patriotic bit – whilst also realising the commercial opportunity of the war. Most of these publications were aimed at teenagers, but there were some books for young children, including The Animals Do Their Bit in the Great War by Frank Hart, published not long after the war.
Titles published for an older audience included Under Foch's Command by Captain Brereton, which told the story of American soldiers fighting in France. The tale of the Americans at war was also picked up by Robert Drake in The Boy Allies At Jutland, which told the story of an American and an Englishman in action together. It mirrored the nations allied in the war effort. Drake created a whole array of other war-based stories, from The Boy Allies On The North Sea Patrol and The Boy Allies Under Two Flags to The Boy Allies With The Flying Squadron.
Papers and comics aimed at young people – such as The Boys Own Paper and The Girl's Own Paper – had existed since the 19th century, but their stories of brave fighters attracted greater interest during the war. The popularity of the illustrated paper was not reserved for young people, however. For example, the drawings of cartoonist/illustrator Bruce Bairnsfather, and his pictures of trench life, moved many adults when they were published in The Bystander magazine from 1915.
The idealistic and romantic portrayal of warfare pedaled by comics and much writing remained common in children's literature after the First World War. This was most apparent in William Earl Johns' famous Biggles books, published from 1932, which celebrated the daring exploits of a flying ace. Meanwhile, adult writing had moved on and had grown tired and suspicious of the glorification of war.