Plumes (The Joseph M. Bruccoli Great War Series) - Softcover

Stallings, Laurence

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1570036497 ISBN 13: 9781570036491

Publisher: Univ of South Carolina Pr, 2006

Synopsis

An autobiographical novel of the Great War's aftermath, Plumes is the story of the personal trials of a soldier, returned from the front disabled and disillusioned, and of the wife and child he left behind. Like his creator, Laurence Stallings, Richard Plume is a U.S. Marine whose combat injuries ultimately cost him a leg and much faith in his government and society. Carefully structured to emphasize the immediacy of problems faced by its players, the novel relegates combat scenes to flashbacks and centers instead on the struggles Richard faces as he tries to carve out a humble but honest existence in postwar Washington, D.C., for his wife, Esme, and son, Dickie. As he struggles to understand the external and internal causes that made him a victim, he turns to his heritage. Patriotic Plumes men fought in every American conflict from Valley Forge onward, and while all returned with wounds and woes, none ever doubted that battlefield glory was worth the price-none until Richard, who yearns to spare Dickie from the fate of his forebears.

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

"As fine a novel of the war as has been written."--Time

"An intensely interesting story. . . . No one, not even the most convinced of patrioteers, could read so straightforward and unvarnished a tale as Plumes without being just a little shaken by the truths which it reveals."--The Nation

About the Author:

Steven Trout is a professor of English at Fort Hays State University. He is the author of "Memorial Fictions: Willa Cather and the First World War" (Nebraska 2002) and the coeditor of "The Literature of the Great War Reconsidered: Beyond Modern Memory," Contributors include Mary Chinery, Debra Rae Cohen, Michael Gorman, Jennifer Haytock, Pearl James, Celia M. Kingsbury, Susan Meyer, Margaret Anne O'Connor, Wendy K. Perriman, Mark A. Robison, Ann Romines, Mary R. Ryder, Janis P. Stout, and Steven Trout.

About this edition

• Publisher: Univ of South Carolina Pr
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 1570036497
• ISBN 13: 9781570036491
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 353