The Captive Reader

In 1940, Behind the Lines by A.A. Milne was published as a diary of the first nine months of the war, written in light verse.  That makes for about as strange a book as you would expect, war and light verse not always being the most obvious companions.  But like any wartime diary, there is something terribly fascinating about it, particularly since Milne is not afraid to express strong opinions and attaches to each poem explanatory notes that give further insight into his feelings at the time.

Some focus on domestic affairs – the chore of drawing the blackout curtains (and mislaying the pins), the confusion of travelling by rail when conductors no longer call out the name of the next station, or the horrid scarcity of salted butter (a favourite topic for Milne through the years – he loathed unsalted butter, likening it to Vaseline) – while others turn a sharp eye on the government and its foes.  He is particularly good with poems about Hitler’s Germany, his passionate hatred of Hitler serving as his muse.  “Unity”, about a meeting of Hitler and his associates, was my favourite poem in the book and the one that most perfectly matches form with subject as he imagines the inner thoughts of and petty rivalries between Goering, Goebbels, Ribbentrop, et al.  His commentary is particularly pointed in these poems; in “The Supermen”, he ridicules Hitler’s fantasy of Aryan dominance and the superiority of the German mind when the Führer has so restricted their freedoms that these “supermen” have no chance to think for themselves:

A race of supermen indeed!
Who may not talk or think or read,
Or hear what all the world has heard,
Till Teacher kindly gives the world.
Their wonder-brains!  so ill-designed
To use the functions of the mind
That any thought remotely free
Unsettles the machinery.
One doubtful rumour from the Dutch
(It seems) would disengage the clutch;
One broadcast message from the Turks
Would absolutely crash the works;
One leaflet from a British plane
Would pulverise the wonder-brain!

Of the poems focusing on England, the more personal ones are the best, perhaps because they come closest to being a true diary (as opposed those that give more general commentary on society).  Part of what I like about Milne is that in all of his books you get to glimpse him.  And how better to get to know a person than to hear them voice their frustrations, as Milne does in “Weather Report”, lamenting that the local weather is no longer printed in the paper thus stealing the pleasure he used to get from knowing how the temperatures at his home compared to those in nearby villages and towns:

For in the happy days of old
One scanned the news to see
If Littlehampton were as cold,
Or Looe as hot, as we.
But now comparison is gone –
Not least of Hitler’s crimes
Is that he put the kybosh on
The weather in The Times.

…

I crack the still unrationed egg,
I carve the rationed ham,
I know it’s cold in Winnipeg
And cold in Amsterdam;
I munch the sparsely-buttered toast,
I stir the tasteless tea,
But know not (what intrigues me most)
The min. at Brightlingsea.

What is most interesting, to me at least, is Milne’s commentary on the moral implications of the war.  A lifelong pacifist, he had written Peace with Honour in 1934 detailing his beliefs and explaining why he was averse to war, or at least war as the world had known it up to that point.  But war with Hitler was another thing entirely, as he makes clear in “To America”:

Well, are you coming in?
It’s a fight between Good and Evil,
It’s a fight between God and the Devil.
Where do you stand today?
Which are you for?  You have chosen, yes,
But is it enough for men to bless
The men who fight, and to turn away?
Is it enough for women to cry,
And to say “Poor things” when the innocent die?
Is it enough to give your prayers,
And then – go back to your own affairs?
It’s a fight for all that you counted dear,
It’s a fight for all that you fought to win:
The fight is on, and the issue clear:
Good or Evil,
God or the Devil…
Well, are you coming in?

This idea of Good versus Evil comes up repeatedly and, knowing that other pacifists or conscientious objectors would have something to say about his apparent change of heart, he addresses them directly in one of his notes:

…I think that there is a difference between refusing to “use the sword” to defend oneself, and refusing to use it to defend the innocent and helpless.  I cannot believe that, if Christ in His journeys had come across a sadist torturing a child, He would have been content to preach a parable.  The Conscientious Objector does believe this.

Frankly, the majority of the poems are forgettable and a number feel laboured and are quite awkward to read.  Yet, every so often, there is one that pops out at you and it is those ones that make this book special, along with Milne’s reflections about the circumstances under which they were written.