A. P. Herbert's (1890-1971) The Secret Battle (1919) contains a memorable account of Gallipoli campaign and its impact on one particular soldier. Harry Penrose is an idealistic young Oxford graduate who approaches the campaign with an enthusiasm intensified by the association of the area with the Trojan War in Homer's Iliad. His story, narrated by an anonymous fellow officer, describes the hideous conditions under which Penrose and the soldiers under his command struggle. Fighting on an exposed plain under blazing sun, afflicted by ceaseless sniper attacks and flies that converge by the thousands whenever they try to eat or sleep, the men contract dysentery that renders them too weak to wage an effective attack. Despite these conditions Penrose, severely weakened with dysentery, carries on in a quietly heroic manner, engaging nightly in dangerous scouting missions under heavy fire. Eventually he collapses and is evacuated to England. After recuperating, he requests a return to his old outfit, now on the front line in France. Here he is brutalized by a new commanding officer, until he is wounded again and returned to England. By this time his nerves are obviously gone:

"Harry had black moods. . . . He lost his keenness, his cheerfulness, and his health. Once a man starts on that path his past history finds him out like an old wound. In Harry's case it was Gallipoli. No man who had a bad time in that place, ever got 'over it' in body or soul."

When he returns to the front again, he gives way under fire. As a result, he is brought up on charges of cowardice and found guilty with a recommendation of mercy, which is rejected by his commanding officer. In the end he is executed by a firing squad of men from his own battalion. The narrator's final comment summarizes the story: "my friend Harry was shot for cowardice--and he was the bravest man I ever knew."

The Secret Battle is one of the most poignant and memorable novels of the Great War. The critic Samuel Hynes sees Harry Penrose as the prototype of "the victim-as-hero," a figure that was to develop into the antihero, a staple of modern literature: "Herbert . . . found a structure, a language, and a subject for a new kind of narrative of human destiny."

In his introduction to later editions of the novel, Winston Churchill, the architect of the Gallipoli campaign, also calls attention to the novel's capacity to universalize its hero, calling it "a monument not of one but of millions, standing impassive in marble to give its message to all wayfarers who pass it."

Free term papers are not written to satisfy your specific instructions. You can use our professional writing services to buy a custom written research paper, term paper, or essay on World Literature at affordable price. CustomTermPapers is the best solution for those who seek help in writing term papers, essays, and research papers related to World Literature and other relevant topics.