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Birdsong Part 1 Chapter 1
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The chapter begins with a short description of Amiens
...

The Azaire’s house is then described as having “a strong, formal front,” (page 3)
...
It’s presented as a cold and masculine
house that is unwelcoming
...
The
narrator is omniscient, and not an actual person who could manipulate or perceive thing
objectively or biased
...

Stephen Wraysford is introduced
...
The room in
which he was staying in was described as “simple but had been decorated with some care
...

“It was a spring evening with a late sun in the sky beyond the cathedral and the sounds of
blackbirds from either side of the house
...
” (page 5) Because of this, he is perceived as paranoid
...
“He half-opened one and found himself looking into a steam-filled kitchen
...

When he finds the dining room, Madame Azaire stands up, which shows that she is well
mannered, assertive and respectful
...
Lisette and Grégorie are introduced as René’s children and Isabelle as his wife
...
Grégorie is
described around age 10
...

By not delving straight into the war, Faulks humanises the characters
...

René is described as “only forty years old but could have been ten years more
...

It can quickly be noted that René likes the conversation to revolve around him, the man of
the house
...
Whilst Stephen came across
as genuinely interested, Azaire simply ignored her, which gives the impression that this is a
regular occurrence
...
” (page 7) This colour choice has many connotations, such as a sense of purity, it is
colour imagery
...


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A ring at the door occurred after dinner was finished, the Bérard’s had arrived
...
” (page 7) This shows the reader that he
seems bored by his family yet entertained by his friends
...
Stephen and the women are reluctant to partake in the
conversation
...
He is rude and talks over Stephen
...
Music is a democratic form of art
...
” (page 9)
“’But forgive me René,’ he said ‘I cut you off
...
It is representative of how women were treated in the 1920’s, they were not
deemed as important as men
...
This made the
guests feel awkward and do not know how to react
...
The song was described as
a “sentimental ballad” (page 11)
...

Madame Bérard was described as “flushed with pride
...

After Bérard’s spontaneous outburst, they gather around to play cards and Isabelle excuses
herself, saying that she has a headache
...
Madame Bérard seems
worried for her well-being but René states “I have learned how to live with her little ways
...

Their conversation drifts to capitalism
...

When the Bérard’s leave, Stephen looks through the window “It gave a greasy film to the
window of the sitting room and then formed larger drops which began to run down the
glass
...
It’s as if Stephen feels like
he’s in a dream and is simply imagining this shell of a rich family
...

“There was an owl somewhere deep in the gardens, where the cultivation have way to
wildness
...
” (page 15) He is portrayed as both a secretive and reflective person
...
It shows
his intelligence
...
He ended up
outside Madame Azaire’s room “She was pleading,” (page 16) He felt a surge of anger but
quickly retreated once footsteps could be heard
...


Birdsong Part 1 Chapter 2
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In this chapter, Stephen accompanies René to his textiles factory and was given “a full tour
of Azaire’s business operations
...
Azaire’s factory was in the middle of a poverty-struck area “small
children in ragged clothes
...
The workers inside the factory will also be from similar
backgrounds
...
René is probably working at the
factory due to its cheapness in rent
...
When he
leaves, Stephen glances down at the factory floor and noticed “The workers were mostly
women,” (page 19) which was very stereotypical as they were sewing
...
The reason for his travels was to learn more yet in his eyes it appears as if they are
behind the times
...
Azaire explains to him that the
company Stephen is from in Manchester is interested in buying shares in their company and
Mayraux immediately shoots him down “Another cosserat,” (page 20)
...
“cosserat” (page 20) refers to when “the cost of
several jobs among local people,” (page 20)
...

Azaire states that “Employees on salaries will take a cut of one percent
...

He goes on to talk about how the workers produce “will no longer be measured by the
metre but by the piece
...

Meyraux doesn’t seem to be awfully bothered by the changes that are being made “was
impressively calm,” (page 21) probably as it will not be directly affecting him in anyway and
he will not have to worry about the financial problems as he too is not living in the desolate
areas and is not in poverty
...

Meyraux then says “I will not discuss it further in the presence of this young man,” (page 22)
and abruptly leaves
...

Stephen later returns to his notebook and refers to Madame Azaire in it as “pulse
...
” (page 22)

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Stephen looks at Madame Azaire in detail “Her white hands seemed barely to touch the
cutlery
...


Birdsong Part 1 – Chapter 3:
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A week after Stephen visited the factory “Azaire suggested to Meyraux that he should bring
Stephen to eat with the men in a room at the back of the factory where they had lunch
...

Three days in, Stephen felt ill and fled the room
...
I’ll be fine
...

During dinner the following day Azaire asked if he felt better
...

Because of this outburst, Azaire questioned her about how she’d disappear and wander
around town
...
” (Page 25) Azaire would have said this to make his
wife feel guilty about the outburst and to put himself back in charge
...
” (Page 26) Stephen
is very verbose when he looks at Isabelle
...

After dinner was over, the Bérard’s visited again and with them “brought with them
Madame Bérard’s mother,” (Page 26) who Faulks describes as very religious
...
“She barely contributed when he invited her to do so,” (Page 27) This shows that
Isabelle isn’t interested in the conversation and it seems like she doesn’t belong almost like
Stephen
...
” (Page 28)
“Azaire enjoyed being cast in the role of self-effacing joker that Bérard had created for him
...

Stephen goes into verbose detail when thinking about Isabelle
...
They begin conversing and the reader discovers
that Madame Azaire is Grégorie and Lisette’s step-mum “My husband’s first wife died eight
years ago
...


Birdsong Part 1 – Chapter 4
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Stephen was sitting in a café that he regularly ate lunch at when he “saw a familiar figure”
(Page 31)
...
He ran to catch up with
her and they ended up in a small apartment
...
“Some of them have five or six children
...
” (Page 33) When Stephen finds out about this,
which would presumably lessen his advances towards her, only instead he kisses her on the
cheek as he leaves
...
Her
maiden name was Fourmentier and “was the youngest of five sisters,” (Page 34) and had
“disappointed her father by not being the son he had wanted
...

Due to her large family and lack of compassion from her parents “The closest thing she had
to a confidante was her sister Jeanne,” (Page 35) who made sure to look after her
...

Her mother “assumed her husband had a mistress in Rouen,” (Page 35) This shows that
Isabelle has never been around a healthy relationship and had witnessed her sister having an
unsuccessful affair with a married man
...
” (Page 35) As it was the only attention she’d receive
...
” (Page 36) Rather than marry and live her own life
...
” (Page 36)
Isabelle “loved Jeanne as she loved no one else,” and this is almost foreshadowing future
events as she turns to her for advice
...
” (Page 36) Who incidentally, has the same name as
her sister
...
However, when
her father met him he declared “he was too old, too junior in rank, too undistinguished in
family and too dilatory in his courtship
...

Three years after their relationship, Isabelle was still at home “At the age of twenty-three
she no longer seemed the baby of the house
...
He “liked the look of René Azaire
...
“Isabelle’s father saw a solution to a number
of difficulties
...
” (Page 38) She had also
agreed that “she and Azaire should have children of their own
...


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“Azaire was at first proud to have married such a young and attractive woman and liked to
display her to his friends
...

It is apparent that “She did not love him,” (Page 38) it’s almost as if she gave up on the
possibility of love after Jean and was so desperate to leave her parents that she simply didn’t
care
...
” (Page 38/9) They would not discuss this side of
their relationship, which frustrated Isabelle
...
René thought that “he was being punished for marrying
Isabelle,” (Page 39) yet he could not decide on what he had done wrong
...
“She was frightened of
Stephen
...
” (Page 39)
On Sunday morning Stephen “had taken his knife and made a small sculpture from a piece of
soft wood,” (Page 40) which he gifted to Lisette
...
“The children were not excited,” (Page 40) which suggests that they have made this
trip often
...

“I shall be the helmsman in the stern of the craft,” (Page 42) Bérard said, taking charge as
per usual
...
” (Page 42)
Stephen sat opposite Isabelle “the pale skirt was drawn up to reveal the taunt stretch of the
stockings over her instep
...
Stephen also “tried to engage Madame Azaire’s
eye
...
” (Page 44)
As the day grew longer and the weather hotter one of Isabelle’s feet “lay unresting against
Stephens leg,” (Page 45) and no attempt was made to move it
...
” (Page
45)
After they had returned “Azaire began to talk about what a splendid trip they had had,”
(Page 46) even though the weather turned far too hot and stuffy
...

When Stephen went to sleep he heard “the sound of birds
...
Its wings battered frantically
on the glass
...
They beat their wings against the window panes, flapped them in his hair, then
brought their beaks towards his face
...
” (Page 48) Upon discovering this news, he wrote to them saying that
it “would take him another month
...
” (Page 48)
He did not want to go back to England “before he had resolved the conflicting passions that
were threatening to overpower him
...
During this meeting “several young men tumbled in carrying
banners and chanting slogans
...

Lucien Lebrun makes an appearance “Lucien gave a compassionate description of the
hardships endured by the strikers’ families,” (Page 49) He spoke about both exploitation and
poverty before he was interrupted
...
” (Page 50) Stephen didn’t make himself known
...
” (Page 50) Lucien then lost his self-control and began pushing and shoving
the crowd
...
” (Page 50)
Lucien accidentally hit a woman and then “went down on the floor under a swift blow from
the woman’s husband
...

Stephen left the factory and “walked towards the cathedral,” (Page 51) until he was far
away
...
” (Page 52)
He wrote a letter to Mr Vaughan, one of which he never intended to send that had the line
“I think I have fallen in love,” (Page 52) this of course was in reference to Isabelle
...
” (Page 53)
When Stephen returned home his hand was swollen but “Azaire was too concerned with the
events at the factory to be looking at the house guest’s hand,” (Page 53) where as Lisette
spotted it straight away
...
” (Page 53)
Stephen then mentioned to zaire that it would probably be a good idea for him to remain
home until things calmed down at Azaire’s factory
...

Stephen observed Madame Azaire, Grégorie and Lisette’s day whilst he and René would be
at work
...
” (Page 55) This suggests
that whilst René is away the atmosphere of the house is much nicer and calmer
...
” (Page
55) which is a juxtaposition of the connotations of each colour
...

It is then revealed that Stephen “didn’t have parents
...
” (Page 56)
Stephen then informs Lisette and Isabelle that he “shall be returning to England soon,” (Page
56) Madame Azaire suggested that one day he could visit
...
” (Page 57)
Isabelle then “pulled away from him and ran from the room,” (Page 58) in a last attempt to
stay faithful to her husband
...
”
(Page 58) After not experiencing these feelings for some time “Currents of desire and
excitement that she had not known or thought about for years now folded in her
...
” (Page 58) Which is
where their affair begins
...
”
(Page 59) She’d been taught her entire life to repress these feelings “No one upbraided her
...
” (Page 59) Yet when she was fully nude “She squeezed her eyes tight
shut in shame as she showed herself to him, but still no guilt came
...
” (Page 60)
When Stephen and Isabelle finally consummated Stephen “barely moved inside her, as
though he were afraid of the sensation or of what it might produce
...
It could also be
foreshadowing to future events
...
” (Page 60) Something that her relationship with
René did not
...
” (Page 61)
“It was the first time she had used his name
...


Birdsong Part 1 – chapter 7
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In this chapter the Azaires had arranged for the Bérards to come over for a game of cards
...
“I had a very strange dream
...
‘I’m not going to tell you
...
” (Page
63) Azaire “read only the great philosophers, often in their original languages,” (Page 64)
which means that he is well educated, like Stephen, and may be able to read his notebooks
...
“at dinner he did not address her
...
” (Page 64) It was “the

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first time he had admitted to anything so personal as childhood
...

He denied “I think I have imposed enough on your family outings
...
” (Page 65)
Isabelle marvelled at the way he spoke “She wanted to take the credit for him, to show him
off and sun herself in the approval he would win
...
” (Page 65)
“She had not spoken to him since,” (Page 65) they had been in the red room and Isabelle
had started to doubt their relationship “perhaps he had done what he wanted to do and
now the matter was finished for him
...
Isabelle “has to dress and conceal the
torn front of her blouse when she left the red room
...
She had to check and recheck
the room for signs of adultery
...
He was
happy to leave the evidence for someone else to clean up
...
” (Page 66)
Then the Bérards arrived “Marguerite went to answer the front door to the Bérards
...
” (Page 67) He wanted to be forced to leave situations like this but at the
same time “he wanted to stay,” (Page 67) but only to see Isabelle
...
‘A romance,
I’ll bet
...
I read only history myself
...
He then proceeds to ask her what it was
about and she replies with “It was about a young man from a modest family in the provinces
who goes to Paris and falls in with the wrong kind of people
...

The entire time “Isabelle had grown increasingly quiet
...
” (Page 68) Yet Isabelle did not think
that Stephen would do that
...
” (Page 68)
They moved into another room to play cards
...
“The
shame and guilt belatedly overpowered her as she felt his eyes pierce her clothes,” (Page 69)
she couldn’t conceal these feelings when “Her stomach and breasts turned red beneath her
dress as the blood beat the skin in protest at her immodesty
...
“I think I shall go to bed, if you don’t mind,” (Page 69) she always seems to excuse
herself when the Bérards visit
...
” (Page 70) This is a
comforting thing that she may be doing because she misses Jeanne and seeks her advice
...
His knock was “soft but urgent,” (Page 70) when she called
him in he “approached in the dim light from the landing,” (Page 70) Isabelle immediately
told him “you must leave,” (Page 70) as she knew that this was her husband’s house and he
was just downstairs and it was very inappropriate
...
A sweet smell rose up from the bed
...
” (Page 70) The description of
Stephen’s actions is very verbose and romanticised
...

“The following morning Stephen went into town
...
He ended up “at
the back of the cold cathedral,” (Page 71) which could suggest that he is turning to religion
for answers
...
”
(Page 71)
“He saw a picture in his mind of a terrible piling up of the dead
...

When Stephen got home “He turned the handle on a door that led to a small study
...
” (Page 72) He went up to her and “kissed her and she
pressed herself close to him
...
” (Page 73)
They arranged to meet at the red room but decided against it
...
”
(Page 73)
“It was as though she had treated him like a boy and taunted him,” (Page 74) she left him
half undressed and told him to go to the red room
...
” (Page
74)
Isabelle questioned him about earlier “What could I have said? I would have given us away
...
” (Page 75)
Stephen then confronted her again about the sounds he had heard “One night I heard
sounds from your room as though he was…hurting you
...
Nothing seemed to happen
...
” (Page 76) This shows that Isabelle chose to be with Stephen and was
not forced to be with him like René
...

“I think that for some reason he felt guilty about marrying me
...
“He said I castrated
him
...
”
(Page 76) She tells him “it was out of frustration and shame
...
He takes a slipper sometimes and pretends I am a child
...
” (Pahe 76) She
does not mind the pain “It’s the humiliation
...
And I feel
sorry for him because he humiliates himself
...
” (Page 77) He
makes her feel dehumanised
...
” (Page 77)
Stephen asks if she feels guilty and she replies “I think perhaps I should feel guilty
...
” (Page 78) When they started to fall asleep after talking “There was the sound of
doves in the garden
...
” (Page 79) This shows
his ignorance and how unattached he is to his family that he doesn’t care what happens
...
” (Page 79) He was
infuriated with Isabelle and “At the root of his feeling, as Isabelle guessed, was a sense of
guilt
...
” (Page 79) She was different to his first wife, she “had the capacity to respond to the
physical act,” (Page 79) and was annoyed with her for that
...
” (Page 79) He felt as if Stephen was
below him and “He did not exactly like Stephen
...
” (Page 80) They were “qualities Azaire disliked in
himself
...
” (Page 80)
Stephen received a response to his telegraph “He was to stay until the end of the month,”
(Page 80) He was happy with the fact that he had managed to obtain another three weeks in
Amiens
...
” (Page 81) When
they were on the train Grégorie and Stephen engaged in conversation and Lisette accidently
called Monsieur Wraysford Stephen
...
” (Page 82) And eventhough Isabelle corrected her, “Neither Azaire or Grégorie
made anything of Lisette’s slip
...
” (Page 83)
When they arrived at the lake “Azaire installed himself on a canvas stool and lit his pipe
...
“These days there was not much to say to Isabelle, and
the children bored him
...

Afterwards, “They walked back to the station,” (Page 84) then went to a café of Bérards
suggestion for lunch
...
” (Page 84) Which is what she was wearing the
first day they met
...
” (Page 84) When he realised this “Stephen knew he would not return to
England
...
” (Page 85)
“After lunch they returned to the river
...
“You didn’t think it would be me, did you?” (Page
86) Stephen tried to convince her that nothing was going on
...
” (Page 86) He asks what she means “I
heard some sounds from an open window upstairs,” (Page 86) and also says “I heard
someone creeping oh-so-quietly along the corridor to her room then tiptoeing back

downstairs
...
” (Page 88) She “had
frozen at his touch;” (Page 88) and did not initiate anything further
...
They went through their “daily rituals of normal behaviour even though
their minds existed elsewhere
...

“They made love where they could: in the red room, in temporarily deserted sitting rooms,
on the grassy bank at the front of the garden
...
” (Page 89) Isabelle would not have dreamt of doing such a thing before Stephen
...

“The calm nature of his public behaviour was given to him by this imperative
...
Their relationship was not just
physical for Isabelle “She missed the intimacy of conversation,” (Page 89) in a way she is
seeking the emotional attachment that she does not have with René
...
” (Page 90) She was shocked
and didn’t expect her to act in such a way
...
” (Page 91)
The topic of Stephen returning to England came up “You will leave the husband who beats
you and go with the man who loves you
...
” (Page 91) To
which Stephen replied “And if you stay you will lose your life
...

Stephen asks whether the accusation raised about her having an affair with Lucien Lebrun
was true, she told him “There’s only you
...
”
(Page 92) Isabelle was pleased that “he would not persecute her with words or come to her
room later to air his frustration
...
“Azaire looked contented
...
”
(Page 93)
“Winters of loneliness stretched out in front of her;” (Page 93) She was not happy with
Stephen’s attitude
...

Azaire said “They told me that at the height of the strike someone was visiting little Lucien
and was taking him parcels of food to give to the dyers’ families
...
“But the
strangest thing about this woman was that she was married to the owner of a factory
...
” (Page 94) Her
“voice was surprisingly clam
...
“He tried to speak, but failed
...
“His courage visibly failed him
...
” (Page 95) Isabelle then said “Not
with Lucien
...
” (Page 95) She had outed their affair
...
I seduced her
...
” (Page 95) Stephen’s “slow
heart was beating hard
...
“The
brief sentences with which she had informed him of her unfaithfulness seemed to have
drained her resolve and she began to weep and apologize to him for what she had done
...
He demanded to know “in
which room?” (Page 96)
“Isabelle looked at Stephen and there was fear in her eyes
...
” (Page 96)
Azaire grew frustrated quickly “In my own house
...

Azaire told Stephen to leave “If you have any sense you will never let me see you again
...
” (Page 97) She also said
“I won’t be painted as some sort of whore by you, René,” (Page 97) and declared “I am going
upstairs to pack
...
” (Page 97) This is foreshadowing her future movements
...
She wanted to be out of the house, alone with Stephen
...
Stephen went to
collect his belongings “the sound of a woman’s voice shouting and sobbing on the floor
below
...

“Each space and unexpected corridor beneath the plunging roof with its conflicting angles
was alive with voices and the sound of feet, heavy, hesitant, running or turning back
...
” (Page 99)
It was as if she was losing her mother all over again
...
He ran his hands over them
...
” (Page 99) He found “no
signs of adultery
...
He raged with a
desire to see the filth and shame of what they had done to him
...
” (Page 99) He searched every bedroom
...
”
(Page 100)
“The doors to all the rooms stood open, their beds uselessly wrecked
...

“Stephen sat opposite Isabelle in the train going south towards Sossons and Reims
...
”

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(Page 100) Stephen was impeccably happy and Isabelle “shook her head incredulously from
side to side with closed eyes
...

Stephen reassured her “It’s not the first time a wife has left her husband
...
“He felt
it was important that he and Isabelle concentrated on themselves
...
” (Page 101) Isabelle drifted to sleep on the train and “dreamed
of pale faces beneath rose-coloured lights;” (Page 101)
“They stayed in a hotel in the spa town of Plombières
...
Isabelle was tired by the journey and the
strain of what she had done
...

“Stephen would sit beside her for hours
...
” (Page 102)
On this walk Stephen told Isabelle about his life “My father worked for the post office in a
flat part of England called Lincolnshire
...
They were not
married, and when she became pregnant he disappeared
...
“She was fond of me but never looked after me much
...
” (Page
103) And how “he would have bare-knuckle fights for money
...

Then, his “grandfather was arrested on some small charge and was sent to prison
...
” (Page 104) He didn’t like the home, he
thought it was “as though we were all being reduced to numbers, to ranks of nameless
people who were not valued in the eyes of another individual
...

He also reveals that “One day I had a fight with a local boy, and I hurt him much more than I
meant to
...
” (Page 104) But because he was too young to stand trial he
was never prosecuted, although the incident was reported in the local paper and Stephen
says that “a man I had never heard of called Vaughan must have read about it
...
”
(Page 104) So agreed to him becoming his guardian
...
” (Page 105) Isabelle
said “You seem so old to me,” (Page 105) due to his “big, sad eyes
...
“They stayed until some
money arrived for Isabelle wired from Rouen by Jeanne, whom she had contacted by letter
...
“Stephen did not mind the feeling of loneliness,” (Page 107) and “had
found a job as an assistant to a furniture maker
...


Birdsong Part 1 – chapter 10
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Two months had passed and “Isabelle stayed in the house for most of the day when Stephen
was at work
...
” (Page 109)
“She was not lonely,” (Page 109) and was elated to have left the presence of René
“At the end of December no blood came
...
” (Page 109) She had turned to
Jeanne after she had left with Stephen yet “there was a sense of being healed
...
” (Page 109)
“She intended to tell Stephen about the child she believed she was expecting
...
She justified it by convincing herself that “She had no wish to be cared
for or treated with special regard
...
” (Page 110) Yet, did not imagine him as a child
...
” (Page
110) The imagery she created in her mind was of a young man, suspiciously around the age
of a soldier
...
” (Page 110) These
thoughts “made her want to be reunited with her family, or at least with her sister Jeanne
...

Isabelle had “Started to feel uneasy about the things she and Stephen had done in Azaire’s
house
...
” (Page 111)
“She went into a church in St-Rémy to confess to the local priest, but found she could not
bring herself to describe in detail the extent of what had passed between them
...
” (Page 111)
“Isabelle felt unsatisfied,” (Page 111) but “she did not regret what had happened,” (Page
111) yet “she began to feel guilty
...

“There was a whirring and banging of a bird’s wings above them as a fat pigeon, attracted by
the sight of the crumbling cake, descended from the gutter of the building behind them and
landed impudently between them on the bench
...
For God’s sake
...
” (Page 112) Isabelle clapped to scare it away and
asked what was wrong
...
” (Page 112) He said “I’ve always hated
birds
...
He had been taunting me about some crows that the gamekeeper had nailed up
to a fence
...
It had maggots under its
wings and drooling, milky eyes
...
” (Page 112)
A week later Isabelle “felt a pain just below the waistband of her skirt
...
She
pressed her hands flat over the pain and sat down heavily at the table
...
” (Page 112/3) She
tried to reassure it through the palms of her hands but “She felt further sharp probes going
right up into her womb
...
” (Page 113)
She went to the doctors, who examined her
...
” (Page 113) When she left, “Isabelle stopped at the church
and sat in a pew at the back
...
“She looked
at the altar where a wooden crucifix was lit by candles, the waxy flesh below the ribs pierced
and bleeding from the Roman soldier’s spear
...
”
(Page 114) She was the only person whom Isabelle had always had
...
I don’t know why I can’t do this
...
” (Page 114) She notes “Even when he has mentioned his own childhood he
speaks as though it were something that happened to someone else
...
” (Page 115) She was frightened that she may have to raise her child alone
...
” (Page 115) She
then stops writing as she doesn’t want to ask any more from Jeanne
...
” (Page 115)
Stephen too thought of home “His grandfather’s cottage had been at the end of a village
with a view to the church
...
” (Page 116)
“Isabelle privately made plans to visit Jeanne in Rouen
...
The purpose was so that “when she was there she would decide whether or not
to return
...
” (Page 116) He also
noticed that “she talked to him less and he wondered why
...
” (Page 116) Also “there had been another episode of pain and bleeding
...
” (Page 116) Yet she ripped it apart and left to walk to the station
...
At work, he “showed
no sign that anything had changed
...
” (Page 117)
“He sat in front of the fire and drank bottles of wine,” (Page 117) whilst “He felt himself
grow cold
...
The first chapter
starts off with “Jack Firebrace lay forty-five feet underground” (Page 121) He is a tunneller
and from his current position “His back was supported by a wooden cross,” (Page 121) which
is religious imagery
...
” (Page 121) This
shows that the tunnels were quite cramped and the tunnellers would have had to duck to
get through them
...
” (Page 121) This shows that he
spends most of his day digging tunnels instead of being on the field fighting
...
” (Page 121)
“The surface troops would not stay in their trenches without the protection of the men
underground
...
The tunnels were so narrow that Jack was “following Evan’s
crawling buttocks until he could stand
...
” (Page 122)
“I’d got my head close up to this timber and I could hear vibrations
...
In order to do this, the air-feed had to be turned off
...
” (Page 122) Jack held his head to the ground
...
” (Page 122)
It was important that Jack was right “If they evacuated the tunnel as a precaution and the
noise turned out to have been shellfire or surface movement then time would be lost on
their own tunnel
...
He had to be sure
...
” (Page 122) Then, “Jack made up his mind
...
So, “Jack crawled back into the darkness, feet first,”
(Page 123) and they continued digging
...
” (Page 123)
In the tunnels “Evan had tried to light a candle but there was not enough oxygen
...
” (Page 123)
“They crawled back until they saw lamplight
...
”
(Page 124) Then suddenly “there was a roar in the tunnel and a huge ball of earth and rock
blew past them
...
Jack, Weir and Evans were flattened against the side wall by the blast and
escaped the path of the debris
...
” (Page 124) The fact that “There was an arm with a corporal’s
stripe on it near his feet, but most of the men’s bodies had been blown into the moist
earth,” (Page 124) shows that death has no respect for ranking
...
” (Page 124) He is so used to being in the dark, desolate tunnels, it would take
a little getting used to being outside
...
” (Page 124) He didn’t want to open it yet as his wife might be “telling
him something important his mind was too tired to register
...
” (Page 125) For
the past year he had grown very close to Tyson and Shaw and “their company had grown
important to him
...
” (Page 125)

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“Sometimes he awoke to find a rat has crawled across his face
...
” (Page 125)
Captain Weir came down to the trenches “He was wearing a waterproof cape over his white
sweater and had changed into knee-length rubber boots
...

Jack tried to sleep once Captain Weir had left with Tyson and Shaw “He closed his eyes but
could see only the dark of the tunnel face
...
He
kept thinking about the previous explosion
...
” (Page 126) He woke up periodically in the night
“his body tensed and ready to fight
...
” (Page 126)
This shows that she is not very hopeful
...
” (Page 127)
“At the front he hardly ever thought of home
...
” (Page 128)
He ended up “stood on the firestep at the end of the trench on sentry duty for Tyson
...

The infantry battalion “referred to the tunnellers as ‘sewerrats’
...
” (page
128) He thought about his son and “sleep came to him like an unseen assailant
...
” (Page 129) He looked up to see Captain Weir and another
captain, who is later introduced as Stephen
...
It’s a court-martial
offence
...
” (Page 129) Jack would have known that this meant he
was to be shot at dawn
...
” (Page
130) It’s surprising that he was able to find a tree still in pristine condition
...
” (Page 130)
“If he was found guilty by court martial he could be shot
...
” (Page 130)
“They had became soldiers and were expected to kill the enemy not only by mining but with
bayonet or bare hands if necessary
...
” (Page 130) He “didn’t think the war would last long; he told Margaret he
would be home within the year, having saved half his pay
...
”
(Page 131) He thought about his possible execution “They would ask members of his own
unit, miners and diggers, men who had not even been trained to fire on the enemy to do the
job
...
There was “so much muscle and blood in the earth
...
“The continuous awareness that any moment could bring death in a number of
different ways that had been harder to understand
...
” (Page
131) He “prayed to God to save him
...
”

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(Page 132) He was aware that “It would make no difference to the outcome of the war
whether he himself lived or died;” (Page 132)
“Let them die, he prayed, shamefully; let them die, but please God let me live
...
”
(Page 132)
Jack made his way to the Captain’s quarters “He was ready to die
...
” (Page 133) He quickly noticed
“It was better made than most of the squalid arrangements he had seen
...
” (Page 133) He was told to sit down “He didn’t want to sit on a chair that
might belong to the officer commanding the infantry
...
” (Page 134) Which is what
Stephen used to make
...
“No further
action
...
“We’re
undermanned as it is
...
” (Page 136)
Stephen tells Jack that he’d like to go into the tunnels and how the soldiers are “terrified of
being blown up from underneath
...
” (Page 136)
When he left “From the officers’ dugout behind him came the sound of piano music
...


Birdsong Part 2 – chapter 2
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“The miners were allowed to go to a village further back than their usual billets for a rest
...
” (Page 139)
“He felt as though he were walking across a ravine and the road was a hundred feet below
...
” (Page 139) He
and all the other soldiers hardly ever got to rest
...
”
(Page 139)
When they got to the square “two small boys were playing
...

There was a woman’s voice “it spoke an unfamiliar language with a harsh accent that was
strange to his ears
...

“O’Lore and Fielding, had fallen asleep where they lay on the cobbles
...
He looked at
Shaw “His unshaved face was black with dirt
...
It “rested its head on Shaw’s motionless
knee
...
” (Page 140) Even
though these soldier’s lives were constantly at risk and they had been forced to sleep in the
trenches, they were still not given a proper bed
...
” (Page 140)

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“In the afternoon, Jack woke from his sleep
...
” (Page 141) This
was to clean the men’s uniforms
...

“What happened a few miles away was kept secret
...
“You would not believe, Jack
thought, that the fellow with his cap pushed back, joking with his friend at the window of
the butcher’s shop, had seen his other mate dying in a shellhole, gas frothing in his lungs
...
” (Page 141) No one wanted to take responsibility
...
” (Page 141) The other men
complained of the poor quality of the food “He was too ashamed to admit that the army
food, though irregular and sometimes contaminated when it arrived at the front, was
generally better than what they would afford at home
...
” (Page 142) Before “the men queued naked for the baths
...
” (Page 142) They
“they would recover clothes which, though clean, still contained the immovable lice
...
” (Page 142) And were allowed to go off and spend it
...
” (Page 142) Joking is a form of escapism
...
” (Page 143) The taste was
awful so “one of the younger women was prevailed on to fetch sugar which they stirred into
their glasses
...
” (Page 143) It was “a
way of pretending everything was normal
...
” (Page 143) It was noted that “No one had even
raised a glass to Turner
...
” (Page 144) He felt
himself above them
...
” (Page 144)
“Towards the end of his routine he felt the low onset of dread
...
” (Page 144)
The end of their night was concluded with a song “The tinkling words were gratefully taken
up by the men as though they expressed their deepest feelings
...
” (Page 145) When
he awoke “His eyes felt heavy with fatigue
...
” (Page
145)

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“His skull was throbbing beneath the surface with a broken, accelerated pulse
...
“He needed to go and reassure the men in his platoon
...
” (Page 145)
“He was not a popular officer
...
” (Page
145) He was reprimanded by Captain Gray for “telling one soldier he believed the war would
grow very much worse before there was a chance of its getting better
...
” (Page 145) Captain “Gray picked him out and sent him back to England for a
spell with an officer cadet training unit
...
” (Page 146)
“His dry mouth did not relish the forced jollity
...
Brennan and Douglas flattened themselves against the front of
the trench as it went over
...
” (Page
146) Stephen made his way along the trench to talk to the other men
...
” (Page 147) Due to Stephen’s friendship with
Weir “Stephen had learned about as much about the tunnellers as about his own men
...
” (Page 147) They “never
volunteered for anything dangerous but retained a compelling and relentless dislike for the
enemy
...
” (Page 147) This shows
how fearful everyone was of the shells that were falling around them
...
”
(Page 147) Tipper screamed out “His thin body was rigid and they could see the contortions
of his facial muscles beneath the skin
...
” (Page 147) This
would have alarmed the other men “Tipper’s face appeared to have lost all its circulation
...
” (Page 148) His “iris lost all light and
sense of life
...
” (Page 148) Stephen made Reeves and Wilkinson take Tipper away
...
” (Page 148)
“At Ypres and in other actions they had been able to prepare themselves to die
...
“Men who had prepared themselves to walk into machine guns or
defend their trenches to the last could not face death in this shape
...
” (Page 148) This shows
how the soldiers tended to be left scattered about and unrecognisable, buried in mass
graves
...
” (Page 148)
“Stephen began to be worried about the effects on all the men in his platoon
...


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“Towards midnight Weir came to the dugout
...
He’s taught me how to distinguish between each
gun
...
” (Page 150) Weir then said “I’ve got to think of
staying alive
...
” (Page 150)
Stephen spoke “There are your sewer rats in their holes three feet wide crawling
underground
...
We hear nothing from our
commanding officer
...
If they could see the way these men live they would not believe their eyes
...
” (Page 150) He said “I believe
that it has barely started
...
” (Page 150)
Stephen said “If I didn’t have that curiosity I would walk into enemy lines and let myself be
killed
...
Stephen says “I haven’t thought about them for a long
time,” (Pahe 151) and “I never think of women
...
” (Page
151) It is revealed that Weir is 32 and has never been with a woman
...

She got pregnant of course
...
” (Page 152) He asked what happened to her “I went home one
day and she hadn’t even left a note or a message
...
” (Page 153)
It went quiet outside “The two men looked at each other in the dim light, their faces grey
and weary
...
” (Page 153)
Weir says how he “was still living with my parents, I didn’t seem to be able to get away
...
” (Page 153)
“Stephen poured more whisky
...
” (Page 154) Hunt came into the dugout “There’s a lot of casualties
...
” (Page 154) He saw “stretcherbearers were trying to clear the debris to get to the wounded men
...
” (Page 154)
Stephen saw Wilkinson and familiarised himself with his personal details: his marriage and
baby on the way “Stephen saw that his smooth skin and the handsome face remained on
one side, but on the other were the ragged edges of skull from which the remains of his
brain were dropping on to his scorched uniform
...
” (Page 155) He went
over to him “Douglas’s blood was pumping from a shrapnel wound in his shoulder
...
“As he
pressed it to the wound he felt Douglas’s flesh slipping under his hands
...
” (Page 156)
“France lay bathed in radiant light
...
” (page 156) Douglas was taken away and Stephen
called out “Get this man’s blood off me
...

The men liked the town due to the “friendliness of the French girls
...
” (Page 157) It
was in a small, pleasant house
...
” (Page 157) When he tried to sleep “his body relaxed so quickly that his muscles
jumped and woke him
...
” (Page 157) These pills made him sleep so heavily that he didn’t want to take them
until night
...
” (Page 157) He couldn’t wipe certain things
from his mind “Douglas’s blood, the smell of which still came to him
...
” (Page 157) And “The others they had buried the next day when
the shelling finally lifted
...
” (Page 158)
“Nothing he had foreseen, nothing he had dreamed of could have bodied forth the shape
and taste of this existence
...
” (Page 158) He shaved and
“dressed in the clean clothes
...
He opened the window and
“there was no sign of shells
...
” (Page 158)
He wondered what had happened to Bérard “he imagined that Bérard would have found a
comfortable existence for himself;” (Page 158) He realised that “It was almost six years since
he had stepped out into the night, leaving the front door open, taking Isabelle on his arm
...
” (Page 158)
He could still “taste her flesh on his tongue
...
” (Page 159)
“he could not hear the voice,” (Page 159) when he tried to remember her “It was as though
she were dead and he bore the responsibility for killing her
...
” (Page 159) He stayed clinging onto the hope
that “She might need him
...
” (Page 159) He was “employed by a builder
...
” (Page 159) He invited Stephen out to meet his friends
...
” (Page 159)
In the next house along was a family with an 18 year old daughter called Mathilde
...
” (Page 159) He was “encouraged to take Mathilde
out
...
” (Page 160) Mathilde’s hair was “pulled
back with a ribbon,” (Page 160) like Lisette’s used to be
...
” (Page 160)
“He was left with the feeling of emotions undischarged, of a process uncompleted
...
” (Page 161) He joined the English army
...
” (Page 161)
He returned to London “The supressed frustration and unexpressed violence of his life were
turned into hatred of the Germans
...
” (Page 162)
“At first he thought the war could be fought and concluded swiftly in a traditional way
...
” (Page 162) He was able to grow “used to
the sight and smell of torn human flesh
...
” (page 162)
“He came to believe that much worse was to come;” (Page 162)
At breakfast he spoke to Captain Gray
...
” (Page 162)
“Gray was an unorthodox officer
...
”
(Page 163) He attended university and after which “he had became a doctor and had
qualified as a surgeon when the war broke out
...
” (Page 163)
Gray told him that he has to make his soldiers love him “They don’t want to have their brains
blown out in the service of some stuffed shirt
...
” (Page 164)
Price is mentioned, a man like Stephen who was promoted by Gray “the company couldn’t
function without him
...
” (page 165)
“Lieutenant Harrington, a tall, mournful man with a slight stammer, came into the dining
room
...
” (Page 166)

Birdsong Part 2 – chapter 5
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“Jack Firebrace’s application for leave to visit his son was turned down
...
He went back underground
...

“Weir ordered a second tunnel to be driven at a level of seventy feet
...
” (Page 167) As the tunnellers dug “Jack tried
not to imagine the weight of earth on top of them
...
” (page 167) He could feel “the earth
pressing in his mouth and eyes
...
” (Page 168) As they dug “their hearts worked as though in one body
...
He allowed them to speak to him without respect as
“conditions in the tunnel were difficult
...
” (Page 168)
Evans said “Let’s play Fritz
...
Weir didn’t

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understand the rules or scoring but allowed it as “it distracted the men and increased their
awareness of the enemy
...
” (Page 169) Gray informed him
that he was !going to ask Wraysford to take charge
...

Stephen asked the soldiers for volunteers and “No one offered
...
He asked Sergeant Adams which digger would go with them !It’ll be the
man who lost at Fritz
...

“Stephen gave a final look at the sky
...
” (Page 170) They crawled down the ladder and “had to
struggle to keep up with Jack Firebrace
...
”
(Page 170) Jack led them to the entrance “Byrne looked at what Jack described as the
entrance
...
Jack went first “His eyes were accustomed to working
in the murk
...
” (Page 171) Stephen asked if he was okay and he informed him that
he didn’t like being underground “Hunt had started to shake
...
Stephen “himself had a long horror of being in a
space so narrow that he could not turn round
...

Hunt refused to go further so Stephen told him “This is your chance to help kill some of
them
...
Stephen ended up in
the middle of the crawling men “If there was a problem he would be stuck
...
” (Page 173) Jack and Byrne went off before Hunt “began sobbing
...
” (Page 173)
He was desperate for comfort
...
” (Page 173)
“Byrne’s lanky figure, bent double but still scurrying, came into view
...
” (Page 174)
“There was the sound of an explosion
...
” (Page 174)
Then “Hunt began screaming
...

Footsteps started advancing towards them “Stephen and Jack managed to force their way
through the debris as gunfire broke out behind them
...
” (Page 174) Stephen saw
them get flung backwards
...
” (Page 175)
Stephen reached down to his belt to grab a grenade but his belt was tangled up “he shouted
out to the others to throw their grenades
...
He was
thrown backwards by the force
...
” (Page 175) Byrne picked up a German phrase telling them to
evacuate “they dragged Stephen along the tunnel back towards the gallery
...
” (Page 175) They were told that the regimental aid post “had
been wiped out by a direct hit
...
” (Page 176) There was “shrapnel in his

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shoulder and had been hit by a rifle bullet in the neck; he was concussed by the blast and
unconscious
...
” (Page 176) Stephen “lay for a day in the riche dug for him by Byrne,” (Page 176)
until he was taken to a dressing station
...
” (Page 175) When he woke sometimes “he found his body had moved
...
” (Page 176) He “urged
himself into the darkness
...
” (Page 177) He found himself “in a house on a French
boulevard in which he searched and called the name of Isabelle
...
” (Page 177) He feared “He would die alone
and unmourned
...
” (Page 177) the medical officer said that “They always do
...
”
(Page 177)
“The part of him that still lived was unreachable
...
He heard a voice
...
”
(Page 178)

Birdsong Part 2 – chapter 6
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“Jack Firebrace and Arthur Shaw sat on the firestep smoking cigarettes and drinking tea
...

They spoke about Wraysford
...
” (Page 179) He finished his tea “Winked at Shaw,” (Page 180) and set off
...
” (Page 180) After the
shells had ceased falling there was great destruction
...
” (Page 180)
Jack decides he’ll “say a prayer for him,” (Page 180) and walked to where the dead were
dumped “some were dismembered;” (Page 180) They were to be buried in a mass grave
“the row of dumped flesh
...
” (Page
180) It was Stephen and he said “Get me out
...
” (Page 181)

Birdsong Part 2 – chapter 7


“Michael Weir sat at the little table by the window and looked out at the rain on the grey,
poplar-lined street
...
” (Page 182) He believed Stephen would live as “there was some
untouchable quality of good fortune about him
...
He was worried about the trench “Too often the
sandbags were disturbed by men coming back from patrol, slithering hurriedly in before they
could be illuminated by a German flare
...
” (Page 182)
“The infantry tied empty tins to the wire to act as alarm bells,” (Page 183) this was so if
anyone was outside the soldiers would have a warning “Weir heard something different in
the sounds
...
” (Page 183) He felt “it was better in his ears
that the awful sound of shellfire
...
”
(Page 183) Weir went to visit some of the men “The miners’ clothes needed particularly
frequent attention
...
” (Page 183)
“There had been no word on Stephen from battalion headquarters when he went to check
that morning
...
” (Page 184) As he tried to sleep he began to think about what he would write in a
letter to Stephen’s next of kin “he was my closest friend, my strength and shield
...
Weir’s eyes
filled with tears
...
” (Page
184)

Birdsong Part 2 – chapter 8
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“Stephen Wraysford reinhabited his body cell by cell
...
” (Page 185) The pain was
“never more than he could tolerate
...
” (Page 185) Then
“One morning a boy of about nineteen appeared at the end of the ward
...
His boots seemed glued to his feet
...

Stephen “calculated that he had not taken off his socks for twenty-two days
...
” (Page 186) The “top layer of skin had gone
from his body
...
” (Page 186) The brown paper was
peeled from his face “The skin of his cheeks and forehead was marked with bluish-violet
patches
...
” (Page 186)
“Stephen could see that pattern of burns on his body
...
” (Page 186) Stephen asked
what had happened to him “He had apparently been caught by a gas attack some way
behind the front line
...
”
(Page 187)
When the boy’s voice came back to him “He begged to die
...
” (Page 187) Stephen “hoped his prayers had been
answered
...
” (Page 187)

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In the afternoon “A bundle of screaming blankets was carried dripping down the ward
...
” (Page 188) That night “Stephen prayed that
the boy would die
...
” (Page
188) The boy was dead
...
”(Page 188) A nurse
told him that he had a visitor “His voice uncurled in him like a cat stretching after a long
sleep
...
”
(Page 189)
“The wounds themselves were not that bad
...
” (Page 189) He then tells him he’s
being promoted “I want you to go on a course at Amiens
...
” (Page 189) Gray says “You’ve been in the front line for over a year
...
” (Page 190) Gray was suspicious of Stephen’s
response “Everyone knows we’re going to attack
...
” (Page 190) He
told him “They dumped you with the corpses
...
”
(Page 190) But he “could not leave until he had seen how it would end
...
I wouldn’t know where to go
...
Stephen tells him “I’ve been there
...
”
(Page 191)
Stephen asks who’s going “It’s mostly the new boys, Kitchener’s Army
...
”
(Page 192)
Stephen knew that “even after a week they built better trenches than the British
...
” (Page 192)
Weir said “Officers are not superstitious, Wraysford
...
” (Page 192) He told him to get rid of his wooden
figures and cards “You do it because of what happened to you when you were a child
...
But
if a child’s world is broken up by too much reality, that need goes underground
...
” (Page 194)
Stephen was given his orders “we move out on Friday and down to Albert
...
” (Page 194) Weir “had
heard from men returning from rest that there was a farmhouse on the other side of the
village where a light shone in the window all night
...
” (Page 195) It “filled Weir with anxiety
...
” (Page 195) What “he had heard about and what he
wanted to do seemed to him so shameful and so private
...
” (Page 195) He couldn’t help but wonder about “the strange conspiracy that kept
their actions hidden beneath their demure public behaviour
...
” (Page 196)
Weir “joined the Royal Engineers two years before the war broke out
...
” (Page 196) However “He did not like the
feeling that at any second in the trench he might be killed
...
” (Page 197) They would occasionally hear “the sound of a folk song
...
He “felt his body tense with hatred at the sound
of them
...
” (Page 197) He
“treasured his hatred as a means of saving his own life and those of his men
...
”
(Page 197)
Stephen and Byrne “eased out of the shellhole and began the crawl back into the trench and
Stephen gave Byrne some whisky
...
”
(Page 198) He was regaining his strength after being underground for so long “His thoughts
turned towards home
...
” (Page 198) He could “not put into words the effect that watching John had on
him
...
” (Page 198/9) He was “aware that John was an unlikely vehicle for such a
change in his own beliefs
...
” (Page 199) When he was “At the front and underground he
was often too preoccupied to think of John and Margaret
...
” (Page 199) The “care he took to try to stay alive was
so that he would see the boy again
...
” (Page 199) He decided not to open
it until after he came back from the tunnels “He might be killed in the tunnel and it would be
better to die in ignorance
...
”
(Page 199) The majority of his “sketchbook consisted of portraits of Arthur haw
...
” (Page 200) Stephen came into the
dugout “The surprise I told you about
...
” (Page 200) He noticed that “Stephen had also been drinking
...
” (Page 200)
Weir followed Stephen down the communication trench “Stephen hung back for fear of
being seen by Price
...
Stephen said that they needed it but the men refused to hand it over “looking
doubtfully at Weir, who was wearing his white pullover and soft shoes with no sign of rank
...




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


“Stephen felt a leap and surge of exhilaration
...
” (Page 201) Stephen
propped up the bike at the entrance while Weir took the bottle from his pocket and sucked
thirstily
...
” (Page 201) Weir was reluctant to go and refused to “I want to
leave
...
” (Page 202) Stephen waited for
Weir to disappear off with her “He wanted Weir to know what it felt like to be with a
woman, to feel that intimacy of flesh
...
” (Page 203)
“Stephen feared nothing anymore
...
” (Page 203) Weir was “more agitated than he had been during the
bombardment
...
” (Page 203)
“He fumbled down a wall and pushed open a door
...
” (Page 204) She
took him to a “room with a red lamp
...
” (Page 204)
She then moved onto Stephen, he “braced himself not to back away from her slavering
attention
...
” (Page 205) Almost “six years had passed since he touched a woman
...
” (Page 206) he looked at the younger girl “He did not know whether to take the girl
or kill her
...
” (Page 206) He ran it
down her body “He did not know what he was doing
...
”
(Page 207) She didn’t scream for help or back away “She should have killed him
...
” (Page 208) It was
evident that “they were going to attack
...
” (Page 208)
Whilst Jack “took out Margaret’s letter
...
” (Page 209) She wrote “There was nothing they could do for him
...
” (Page 209) He was
“overpowered by the grief of his loss
...
They were given “a suspiciously improved diet
that included oranges and walnuts
...
” (Page 209) He was “younger than
Stephen had expected
...
” (Page 210)







The colonel tells them “We’re attacking on that line towards Beaumont Hamel
...
” (Page 211)
The company commanders “joined them at an elegant table in a room with long windows at
the side of the house
...
” (Page 212)
“Stephen thought of the men in his platoon and the way they conjured cups of tea on tiny
spirit stoves in damp trench walls
...
” (Page 212)

Birdsong Part 2 – chapter 11








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




“The battalion marched to a village called Colincampus
...
” (Page 213) Gray tried to make a deal with a woman
about having the men stay “By nightfall they had got the men inside with clean straw and a
hot meal from the mobile cooker
...
” (Page 213) Stephen “could feel the
vibrations run through the wooden floor of the loft
...
” (Page 214) Stephen knew that “it was only a matter of
hope, that his own side should prove stronger than the enemy
...
”
(Page 214)
“The countryside was shaking beneath their feet as the bombardment entered its third day
...
” (Page 215) The songs “died on their lips and the air was reclaimed by
the birds
...
” (Page 215)
Colonel Barclay gave a speech to the soldiers “You are going to fight and you are going to
win
...
” (Page 215) He says “I need hardly remind you of the glorious
history of this regiment,” (Page 216) and “You must strive to win for your families, for your
king and your country
...
”(Page 216)
“The police concluded with a list of men who had been executed for cowardice
...
” (Page 216) His mind “flickered back to that
hot day by the river with the Azaire family
...
” (Page 217)
“As they left the village and its trappings of normality,” (Page 217) the men “retained a
fearful static quality that stayed in the mind until death
...
” (Page 217) Whereas “Weir’s face was
lit by a strange excitement
...
” (Page 218)
“A towering red mist hung over them where the brick of the villages was pulverised by the
bombardment
...
Stephen
looked at their blank, marbled eyes
...
” (Page 219) The bad weather had caused
the attack to be delayed two days “Gray’s face was a line of whipped anxiety
...
Casualties
will be at ten per cent
...
” (Page 220) Stephen asked why “you are a mad, cold-hearted devil and that is
what we are going to need
...
” (Page 220) He told Stephen “Don’t tell them, just pray for
them
...
” (Page 220) Weir wrote to his parents “We expect that this
push will end the war,” (Page 221) and “I ask you not to worry about me
...
” (Page
221)
Stephen “felt a terrible anger coming over him
...
” (Page 222) He wrote “I am trying to contemplate my death,” (Page
222) and “you are the only person I have ever loved
...
I have seen what shells can do
...
” (Page 223) He talks about John
“He has given back to me memories of him when he was a little boy
...
” (Page 223)
Byrne wrote to his brother, even though he was not “a regular correspondent
...
” (Page 223)
“Eight hours before the revised time of attack the guns went quiet
...
” (Page 224)
Stephen “went to Hunt, who was kneeling on the trench floor, praying
...
” (Page 224)
Gray informed them “The attack will be at seven thirty
...
” (Page 224)
“Men drank greedily
...
” (Page 225) Stephen watched as “Some men taking photographs from
their pockets, kissing the faces of their wives and children
...
” (Page 225)
“The air overhead was packed solid with noise that did not move
...
” (Page 225) Stephen waited to tell the men when to attack “The second
hand of his watch in slow motion
...
” (Page 225)
“Stephen saw men trying to emerge from the trench but being smashed by bullets before
they could sound
...
” (Page 226)
Hunt fell down “Stephen saw his head opening up bright red under machine gun bullets as
his helmet fell away
...
Some force had blown him
...
” (Page 227)
“There was a man beside him missing part of his face, but walking in the same dreamlike
state
...
” (Page 227) Stephen spotted a gap
and ran towards it “He breathed in as he reached it, clenching for his death
...
” (Page 227)
“He could not see what lay beyond
...
”
(Page 228) No answering fire came so “Stephen presumed that most of the men who had
begun the attack with him were dead
...
” (Page 228) One of the men who was firing at him
“plucked at Stephen’s regimental badge, then cut his throat with his finger and pointed back
over his shoulder towards the carnage of no man’s land
...
” (Page 229) He fired twice at his
feet “It was the first life he had taken that day
...
” (Page 229) They had done their part “By the crater they saw young men
dying in quantities
...
” (Page 229)
Jack prayed “Please let them send no more men into this hurricane
...
” (Page 229) Whilst “Shaw had begun to
weep
...
” (Page
230) Horrocks fell to his knees but did not pray “Jack knew what had died in him
...

“Nothing was diving anymore; everything was profane
...
” (Page 230) At noon “The noise had not diminished
...
” (Page 231) Stephen “believed
he had to go on
...
” (Page 231)
Byrne shouted “Colonel’s dead
...
” (Page 231) They hid in holes
“Byrne and Stephen lay down with a sleeping boy and a man who must have been dead for
some hours
...
” (Page 232) Stephen “watched the packets of
lives with their memories and loves go spinning and vomiting into the ground
...
” (Page 232)
“Azaire’s parting words filled his head
...
”
(Page 233)
“Within two hours they had blown Byrne’s head, bit by bit, off his body so that only a hole
remained between his shoulders
...
” (Page 233) Stephen
“decided to run
...
” (Page 234) He tried to calm down “It
was the way the world had been dislocated
...
” (Page 234) Around him were “the
people who had killed his friends, his men
...
” (Page 234)
“He tried to focus on fragments of definite memory
...
Then “An impact took his head as though a brick thrown at
great speed had struck his temple, and he fell to the ground
...
” (Page 235)
“He could feel no pain in the leg
...






During roll call afterwards, the men’s “faces were shifty and grey in the dark
...
” (Page 236)
“The men walked on as though in a dream,” (Page 237) and “their faces expressionless yet
grained with sadness
...
” (Page 238) Weir came over to him
and told him “There aren’t enough trains to get the men out
...
” (Page 238) His voice was unsteady as
he spoke “Two of the generals have committed suicide
...
” (page 238) Men “began to come up like worms from their
shellholes, limping, crawling, dragging themselves out
...
” (page 239) They
were “limping and dragging back to reclaim their life
...
” (Page 239) Weir started crying
“As he listened to the soil protesting, he heard the sound of a new world
...
” (Page 239)
Weir was restless “call me by my name
...
” (Page 240)

Birdsong Part 3 – chapter 1













“In the tunnel of the underground, stalled in the darkness, Elizabeth Benson sighed in
impatience
...
” (Page 243) The soldiers were fighting the Germans
...
” (Page 243) A
man in the carriage “began to sing old music-hall songs
...

She passed an off-licence that “beam its vulgar welcome
...
When she got home “the clanking plastic carrier bag
...
” (Page 244) She
went to her friend’s Mark and Lindsay’s home
...
”
(Page 245) Elizabeth knew that her friends had invited him to be set up with her
...
” (Page 245)
“She often thought the three of them would not now become so close if they were meeting
for the first time
...

When they talked about children she closed her ears “partly through an unacknowledged
anguish
...

Lindsay told her “you frighten men off,” (Page 245) and “Men are such timid creatures
...
” (Page 246) Lindsay says “He’s
never going to leave his wife
...







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


She speaks to a man named David, she tells him “I run a clothing company
...
” (Page 247)
“The more vigorously she must have rejected the idea of children or male partnership
...
” (Page 248)
The next day she read the paper, there was an article on “the sixteenth anniversary of the
1918 Armistice
...
Yet something in it troubled her
...
” (Page 249) She had
“married a heavy-drinking man
...
” (Page 249)
There was “a photograph of Elizabeth at the age of three being held by her grandmother
...
” (Page 249) She “knew even
less about her grandfather
...
” (Page 250)
“Something about the war article had unsettled her
...
” (Page 250)
She decided that “She would track this man down
...
” (Page 251)
The tunnel was “dug by sweating tunnellers on a navy’s day rate
...
” (Page 252) Her “coffee tasted of acorns, earth and
steam
...
She began working “There were meetings to
arrange, a cloth warehouse to visit
...
” (Page 253) She went to a restaurant “These were the lines of her life, these were
the things that concerned her
...

She went to a village in the Dales and a boy of nineteen spoke to her “He had fair hair and an
unconvincing beard
...
” (Page 255)
“She liked living alone, she liked being alone
...
” (Page 256) She didn’t know much, nor did Erich “Your English schools
should have taught you all about it
...
It all seemed so boring and depressing
...
” (Page 258)
She was 38 and had gone “without giving more than a glance to the occasional war
memorial or dull newsreel, she was not sure what she expected to find
...
” (Page 259)
She wondered “would it all have been tidied away?” (Page 259) Her friend had given her a
book about the battle
...
” (Page 259)
“Her mind turned to Robert
...
Elizabeth’s friends knew about
her affair, Stephen and Isabelle had to keep it silent
...
” (Page 260)
“Robert pretended that Elizabeth did not exist
...
She saw “the top of a cathedral or substantial church ahead of her
...
” (Page
261) She looked up Arras in Bob’s book and found “a number of baffling numbers and names
of regiments, battalions and officers
...
” (Page 261)
“Her small determination hardened into something like resolve
...
” (Page 262)

Birdsong Part 3 – chapter 4






“The next day she drove to Bapaume
...
” (Page 263) She drove towards it “The curious arch stayed in
view, visible from any angle, as its designers had presumably intended
...
” (Page 264)
“Every grain of the surface had been carved with British names
...
” (Page 264) He told her that they were
“Just these fields
...
” (Page 264) She said as she ran her “red-painted nails,” (Page 264)
through her hair
...
” (Page 265)
They had gotten ready to go out for dinner “it was easier to talk once the closeness had
been re-established
...
” (Page 266) She told Robert about how
“a small bird-like man,” (Page 267) had helped her pick out books on the war
...
” (Page 267) The cleaner had
showed her “a shell they had found in the wood last week
...
” (Page 268) She said how her “whole body is
yearning so strongly
...
” (Page 268)
She went to see her mother and “went up to the attic
...
” (Page 269) She found memorabilia from the
second war that was not connected to her grandfather
...
” (Page 271) There were “three medals and a
hipflask
...
On the inside was written
“Captain Stephen Wraysford, April 1917
...
” (Page 271)
The notebook “appeared to be written in Greek script
...
” (Page 272) She said that the majority were thrown away
...
” (Page 273) She asked Bob for help de-coding it “Elizabeth passed over the
notebook, guiltily, not sure of the propriety of allowing something her grandfather had
written so many years ago to come under the scrutiny of this strange little man
...
” (Page 275) He says “It depends how much is
private code
...


Birdsong Part 3 – chapter 6







Elizabeth and Stuart arranged to go out to dinner “Elizabeth was surprised but not
displeased to hear from him
...
” (Page 277)
They drank coffee and he went over to a piano and turned on a “red-shaded light beside it
...
” (Page 278)
When Elizabeth was about to leave she was “happily humming the tune he had played
...
” (Page 278)
“It was just possible that she had chosen someone unobtainable for that very reason: that
he did not threaten her independence
...
” (Page 281) It had “been raining for three weeks
...
” (Page 281) They had marched for so long that
“already the skin on their backs was rubbed raw by the movement of the webbing beneath
the load
...
” (Page
281) They were “thigh-deep in sucking mud
...
” (Page
282) They had “seen things no human eyes had looked on before, and they had not turned
their gaze away
...
” (Page
282)








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












Stephen “could not comprehend the lengths to which they allowed themselves to be
driven
...
” (Page
282) They “looked like creatures from some other life
...
” (Page 282) Stephen knew “they had locked up in
their hearts the horror of what they has seen
...
” (Page 283) He himself “did not feel hardened or strengthened by
what he had seen
...
” (Page 283) Some were “reduced to particles so small that only
the wind carried them
...

“The bursts of light as shells exploded could be viewed as comforting
...
” (Page 284) Ellis “smoked
incessantly,” (Page 284) but never drank
...
” (Page
284) He asked Stephen if he had been before, he told him “It’s got a fine cathedral
...
” (Page 284)
Stephen went to check on the men, they had “scraped sleeping holes for themselves in the
front wall
...
” (Page 285) He believed that “surely the place could hold no disquieting
reminders
...
” (Page 285) They went
back to the dugout and drank whisky
...
” (Page 285)
“Weir had been on leave in England
...
” (Page 286) He had not been home in two years “his telegram had gone
astray
...
” (Page 286)
He found his father and asked what he was doing
...
” (Page 286) He praised the toad he was feeding “He’s a champion, this one
...
” (Page 287) He went upstairs
“he was waiting for the moment when the familiar wash of normality would come over him
and he would be restored to his old self
...
”
(Page 287) His chest of draws didn’t look normal “it was hard to imagine that he had seen it
before
...
” (Page 287)
“Weir ate the meal alone in the dining room
...
” (Page 288) He and his father spoke about the war “we’ve
read about it in the paper
...
” Page 289) His
father told him “Everyone’s doing their bit
...
” (Page 289)

Birdsong Part 4 – chapter 2


Weir asked Stephen to tell him his fortune “He wants me to tell him he’s going to survive
...
” (Page 290)





















Ellis was confused with Stephen and Weir’s relationship “he apparently depended on
Wraysford’s coldness
...
” (Page 291)
Ellis was new to the infantry, he did not expect to see “small joints of meat being dropped
into the bag
...

Stephen set up his voodoo, which involved carving out a dead rat Ellis said “You should be
ashamed of yourselves
...
” (Page 292)
As Stephen turned the cards over “Weir looked delighted
...
” (Page 293) Weir said “You knew what cards were on the table and you just made it up
that was what I needed
...
Ellis said “We know they’ve
done it for a good cause
...
” (Page 294) Weir said “I wish a great bombardment would smash down
along Piccadilly into Whitehall and kill the whole lot of them
...
” (Page 294) He wishes they were dead
...
” (Page 294) He was mad that people in factories
were striking “we were dying on a shilling a day
...
”
(Page 295) He shares another story from his childhood as he “was drunk enough to be
confessional
...
” (Page 295) And “I
wanted to believe that I had some important destiny
...
” (Page 295)
Stephen’s speech was slurred “I heard a voice
...
” (Page 296) He said “You can believe in
something without compromising the burden of your own existence
...
” (Page 296) He “took Ellis by the shirt and hauled him
down
...
” (Page 297) There was
“no chance of movement
...
” (Page 297)
Jack wrote a letter home “It really is the lap of luxury
...
”
(Page 298)

Birdsong Part 4 – chapter 3




“They bore the stench of their packed, unwashed bodies for the sake of the warmth and
safety
...
” (Page 299)
“One morning they heard sounds of German activity above them
...
” (Page 299) The tunnel could not be fully
evacuated so Weir ordered two men to stay “The two listeners were buried under



















thousands of tons of Flanders soil
...
” (Page 300)
“Weir was so angry that he had stopped trembling
...
”
(Page 300) Stephen “not often felt himself out-argued by Weir, saw that he had little
choice
...
Stephen responded with “I’m not frightened of going underground
...

“The opening was not much more than a rabbit hole
...
” (Page 301) Stephen was “breathing
hard
...
Stephen
shuddered at the sound
...
” (Page 302) Weir realised that the blast had
completely destroyed the tunnel “They’ll both be dead
...
” (Page 303) Weir said “Shaw was one
...
” (Page 303) Stephen asked what they do now “We say a
prayer
...
” (Page 303) Stephen “ached with fear
...
” (Page 303)
They clay fell on to his arm as he “let out a cry
...
” (Page 304)
It was a court-martial offence
...
” (Page 304) He reached out towards the
bird and its wings touched his hand “Stephen screamed
...
” (Page 305) Weir
couldn’t bear to so he asked Stephen to “The two men looked at each other over the tiny
yellow head between them
...
” (Page 306)
“With teeth clamped very tight together he held out both hands to Weir
...
” (Page 306)
Stephen could feel “the feathery weight beneath his face
...
” (Page 306)
“He longed for the mud and the stench, for the sound of shells
...
” (Page 307) When they existed, Stephen went to get help
for Weir
...
” (Page 307)

Birdsong Part 4 – chapter 4


“The next day the train took them into a countryside almost buried by the debris of conflict
...
” (Page 308) They saw “the first trunk not blasted and
blackened by shells, but still covered with brown bard and crowned with brances in which
pigeons and thrushes were gathered
...
” (Page 309)
Ellis asked about Stephen’s voodoo
...
” (Page 309) He said “He’s frightened that it doesn’t make sense,
that there is no purpose
...
” (Page 310) The infantry “had taken to
sticking their arms in the rapidly unwinding winch gear in the hope of serious damage
...

“The sounds of war were leaving him
...
” (Page
310)
“They walked up towards the cathedral
...
” (Page 311)
Stephen dragged Ellis to a café he once went to “the man who used to run this restaurant
was deported to Germany
...
” (Page 313)
“Stephen had a desire to reach oblivion quickly
...
When he was drinking “Ellis had volunteered him to help with some interpreting
...
” (Page
314)
Stephen went for a walk, he “was glad of the cold air against his face after the heat and
smoke of the bar
...
”
(Page 316) He went inside “They began to sing all together in loud, confident voices
...
” (Page 317) He saw a woman walk into the bar “Stephen felt his stomach tighten
as shock waves passed through him into the palms of his hands
...
” (Page 317)
Stephen went after her “The woman seemed reluctant
...
” (Page 319) He decided that “If
he could confirm things she already knew then he could prove his reliability
...
”
(Page 319)
He reassured her by saying “I’ve no wish to make things difficult
...
” (Page 320) René
agreed to “take her bac as though nothing had happened
...
” (Page 321) She tells him that
“Isabelle was injured
...
Stephen says “I want to see her
...
Jeanne agreed to
“tell her we’ve met
...
” (Page 324) He couldn’t believe the Azaire house
was still there
...
” (Page 324) He
“could not believe that the house would be there
...
” (Page 325) He walked to the house “a large
section of the rear of the house had been destroyed
...
” (Page 325)
He decided not to sleep and instead walk around “He was so used to not sleeping that he
felt no ill effects from the night
...
He soon discovered that “his clean
shirt, like his old one, had lice in it
...
” (Page 326)
Jeanne took Stephen to where Isabelle was staying
...
” (Page 327) He walked into the room and “could see Isabelle,”
(Page 327) on the side of a round table
...
” (Page 327) He could see that
“The left side of her face was disfigured
...
” (Page 328) She smiled as she spoke “it’s good that you’ve
survived this awful war
...
” (Page 329)
!I can hardly remember a life before it
...
She told him
about what happened to her- how she went to her family home and how her “father gently
introduced the idea of my returning to Amiens
...
”
(Page 330)
When she spoke to Azaire “he seemed quite ashamed
...
” (Page 331) She said how the British troops came to the town and “left
us to the mercy of the Germans,” (Page 331) about how their house had been taken “over to
accommodate a dozen German officers
...
” (Page 332) Isabelle told Stephen about Max, a German soldier
whom she’d grown fond of as he “paid special attention to Isabelle’s two-year-old
daughter
...
” (Page
332)
“She had kept her pregnancy a secret from him
...
” (Page 332) Max and Isabelle were only together for
a few days but “it was long enough for Isabelle to fall in love with this soldier who played
with her infant daughter
...
” (Page 333)
When Max was on leave “She travelled secretly to Vienna
...
” (Page 334) Once she had finished talking she
noticed Stephen “had said nothing during her account
...
” (Page 334) Stephen asked about
Lisette “She married Lucien Lebrun
...

There was a noise that Isabelle dismissed as cats
...
”
(Page 335)
Stephen had told Isabelle “This was all I needed to know
...
” (Page 335)




Stephen raised a hand to her cheek “Her skin flushed with blood
...
” (Page 336)
“He stood up and left the room without speaking
...
” (Page 337)
The next day Stephen went to see Colonel Gray “Stephen opened the door to his office,
which was the converted parlour of a farm
...
” (Page 337)
Gray told him that he needed to put him in for a staff job
...
” (Page 338)
There were “tears in his eyes
...
” (Page 338) He had said to Stephen “It was so long since anyone
had spoken to him with this degree of sympathy
...
” (Page 339) He said that he would “remind them of their dead friends
...
” (Page 339) Gray asked him
whether he would happily kill the enemy “with your own hands?” (Page 340) He said he
would and “we have degraded human life so far that we must leave some space for dignity
to grow again
...
” (Page 340) Gray asked what Stephen believed in “I want to see how it will
end
...
” (Page 341) Stephen says to him “I saw the great void in your soul, and you saw
mine
...
” (Page 342) During the service “the padre read
the prayers
...
” (Page 342) There “seemed to him no reason
to suppose that his friend would survive any more than his son
...
” (Page 342)
“The random violence of the world ran supreme; there was no point in trying to find an
explanation
...
” (Page 342)
Afterwards they drank “They drank the bottle quickly
...
” (Page 343)
“There was this memory of Shaw, this painful memory, kept in place by his sober, conscious
mind
...
”
(Page 344)



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




“There was something disdainful, almost cruel in his confidence
...
” (Page 344) He wanted the men to laugh louder
“to drown out the war with their laughter
...
” (Page 344)
Jack ended with a song “the cheapest, simplest things were the best
...
” (Page 345)
“Jack could almost feel the supple shape of Shaw’s body as it had curved to accommodate
him in the narrow, stinking dugouts where they had slept
...
” (Page 345)
Two days later they had “the rare drama of divisional baths
...
” (Page 345)
When ridding the lice from their clothes with fire “their fiery deaths were silent,” (Page 346)
but sometimes they gave a “satisfying crackle
...

Jack “scratched almost all the time
...
” (Page 346)
“Jack climbed into a tub with several men from his platoon
...
” (Page 347) He felt
guilty as he did not feel respectful towards his dead comrade but “He would take any
pleasure than helped
...
” (Page 347)

Birdsong Part 4 – chapter 8












“There was a letter for Stephen from Amiens
...
” (Page 348)
It was from Jeanne
...
” (Page 348)
Jeanne wrote “Life is surprisingly normal
...
” (Page 349) It became apparent that “Isabelle no
longer loved him
...
” (Page 349) Ellis had trouble finding men to help retrieve the dead “It’s only death
...
” (Page 350)
Stephen asked Weir to accompany them “Weir’s eyes opened in interest,” (Page 350) when
rum was mentioned
...
” (Page
350) There was the “Taste of death,” (Page 350) at the firestep
...
” (Page 350) There was “A crow
disturbed, lifting its black body up suddenly, battering the air with its big wings
...
Brennan picked up a
torso without a head “it was his brother
...
” (Page 351)






Weir said “I wonder what my father would say
...
” (Page 351) Stephen was frightened of “the thought that one of those men was going
to be alive
...
” (page 352) He was happy that his brother
will “have a proper burial
...
” (Page 352)
“All night he sang for his brother, whom he had brought home in his hands
...
” (Page 353) They had done things they “never
thought themselves capable of enduring
...
” (Page 353)
“Their young rose like the squawl of starlings
...
” (Page 354)
He started writing a letter to Jeanne, glad to have some contact with the “sane world
...
” (Page
354) They were not expecting the “expressionless creatures who stepped ashore were not
the men with gleaming kit
...
” (Page
355)
A man named Gilbert gave Stephen some forms
...
” (Page 355)
He walked to the end of the platform where there was a “red-brick waiting room
...
” (Page
355) He realised that “He had had no plans
...
” (Page 356) He wanted to “lose himself in the great
blackness of the city
...
The owner of the shop
did an “involuntary recoil
...
” (Page 356) He was
“confused by the decision
...
” (Page 357)
He picked up a newspaper “There was no news of the war on the front page
...
” (Page 358)
He picked up a book to read on the train that he could not concentrate on “His head seemed
too clogged and numb for him to be able to follow the simple narrative
...
” (Page 358)
He drifted asleep and woke up to find “he had only dreamed his awakening
...
” (Page 359)
He went to purchase food “It had been years since he had been confronted with such
variety
...
” (Page 360) The food was “too subtle for him to taste
...
” (Page 360)
As he drank his wine “it felt as though he were drinking some complex essence of France
itself
...
” (Page 361) From his window he saw a
“chestnut tree’s white blossom blocked out the sky
...
” (Page 361) He found that
“Incidents and men he had forgotten recurred with vivid immediacy
...
” (Page 362) He was
fearful even though “he was safe in a tranquil English village
...
”
(Page 362)
There was the “gentler calling of wood pigeons
...
” (Page 363)
“He wanted also to be forgiven for all he had done
...
” (Page 364)

Birdsong Part 4 – chapter 10













Stephen went back to Amiens to stay with Jeanne “Amiens station had the look of an old
landmark to him
...
”
(Page 365)
“He had begun to feel almost like the young man who had arrived at the boulevard du
Cange
...
” (Page
366)
Jeanne told him about how “it meant a good deal to her,” (Page 366) when he had visited
Isabelle she told Stephen that she’ll likely stay in Amiens as her father “would like me to stay
and look after him
...
” (Page 367) Jeanne “brought the
bottle and a jug of water,” (Page 368) to Stephen, which shows her generosity
...
” (Page 368) Jeanne had “been
kept at home by a sense of duty to her father
...
” (Page 369)
“He had feared the moment of separation more than anything: it was abandonment
...
” (page 369)
He told her “I can no longer bring my mind to it
...
” (Page 370)

Birdsong Part 4 – chapter 11





“The assault on the Messines Ridge was planned hard and in detail
...
” (Page 371) He
told him he has to “lead an attack on the canal to the left
...
” (Page 372) Stephen’s men “had not
attacked for nine months
...
” (Page 372) He remembered before how he had prayed for the
men “This time he had no prayers to offer
...
” (Page 372) Since then he had
started “drawing Stephen instead
...
” (Page 372)
“What is waiting for you can’t be changed
...
” (Page 373)
Weir went to Stephen’s dugout “His eyes were wild and his hair disarrayed
...
” (Page 373)
Stephen told him “I fix the cards
...
They don’t mean a thing
...
” (Page 374) He was “rolling with anger
...
” (Page 374) Stephen wanted to
be alone
...
” (Page
374)
“He wrapped himself in the cloak of his remembered world, hoping he would be safe in it
where no shells or bullets could reach him
...
” (Page 375)
Price “looked up at Stephen as though in hope of delivery
...
” (Page
375) He knew “there was no help
...
” (Page 375) He was reminded that “only a
few hours earlier he had been having dinner with Jeanne and now he was preparing to die
...
” (Page 375)
“There was no way back
...
”
(Page 376) Stephen watched and “felt his heart seize up with pitying love for them
...
” (Page 376) He watched as “The last fifty yards became a
hopping, dodging exercise as men weaved through fire and left over fallen bodies
...
” (Page 377)
He “found Ellis, damp with sweat, and blank in some other world
...
” (Page 378)
There were a series of “yelled and half-heard orders
...
” (Page 378)
Stephen landed “on the body of a German corporal whose legs had been removed by a shell
...
” (Page 378) Stephen “watched the men go
on madly, stepping over the bodies of their friends
...
” (page 379) He “could see nothing except a distant line of prisoners being taken
back
...
” (Page 380) Ellis was weeping “I want to save
my men
...
” (Page 381) He told him “Your orders are to withdraw
...
” (Page 381) The men “did not ask about the
fate of their friends
...
” (Page 382) There was “some urgency about the work since the attack on the
Messines Ridge was imminent
...
” (Page 382) There were
“blackbirds and thrushes at play in the garden,” (Page 382) whilst he wrote
...
” (Page 382)
He wrote that Ellis was “killed by enemy machine gun fire,” (Page 383) and that “The grave
has been properly marked
...
” (Page 383) Stephen was
“tired of writing such letters
...
” (Page 384) Jack
“emerged exhausted into the sunlight
...
” (Page
384)
“Jack was beginning to think that the worst of the war might be over for him
...
” (Page 384) Then “a sniper’s bullet
entered his head above the eye
...
” (Page 385)
“Stephen sat still for a minute,” (Page 385) When he was told “Weir alone had made the war
bearable
...
” (Page 385)
“He felt more lonely than ever in his life before
...
” (Page 386) He envied “men with
the opportunity to pour machine gun fire into those who had killed his friend
...
” (Page 386) He felt selfish as “he felt more sorry for
himself than for his dead friend
...
” (Page
386)
“A sense of interest was beginning to penetrate the blackness of his grief
...
When he managed to get Stephen to respond
“a small smile of triumph,” (Page 388) was on his face “Stephen had the feeling as often
before that he had been played like an instrument
...
” (Page 388)
“He wrote to Jeanne almost every day
...

He met up with two French officers
...
” (Page 389) The other “seemed unwilling to say anything that might
embarrass his senior officer
...
” (Page 389) But he decided against it
“Depression had begun to sink into the army’s bones
...
” (Page 390) She “was worried by his listlessness
...
” (Page 390)
Jeanne told him “you must be strong
...
” (Page
390)
“His life became grey and thin, like a light that might at any moment be extinguished; it was
filled with quietness
...
” (Page 393)
Irene told Elizabeth “your grandad seems to have covered his tracks pretty well
...
” (Page 393)
She drove to Buckinghamshire and “Her car was searched thoroughly for bombs
...
” (Page 393)
“People don’t always appreciate what sacrifices were made for them
...
” (Page 394) She found “Prominent among the names revealed by the
regimental history was that of a captain, later Colonel, Gray
...
She looked into his name and found “an address and telephone number
in Lanarkshire
...
” (Page 396) She tried again and Mrs Gray answered
...
” (Page 397) Then “a quavery but loud voice came on the line
...
” (Page 397) He told her about Stephen
“He was a strange man,” (Page 397) and “He was a tremendous fighter
...
He never seemed very happy about it
...
” (Page 397) He
described him as “Self-contained
...
I can’t remember his name
...
” (Page 398)
She hung up “In the silence Elizabeth could hear the thump of music from the flat upstairs
...
The matron “told her that
Brennan was barely worth visiting
...
”
(Page 399)
When she arrived she was introduced to Mrs Simpson “She was a surprisingly young woman
with peroxide hair and red lipstick
...
” (Page 400)
Brennan was “admitted in nineteen-nineteen,” (Page 400) and had “No surviving family
...
” (Page 400)
“We do encourage radio and newspapers but they can’t follow them
...
” (Page 401)
Mrs Simpson told Elizabeth “This man lives in a world of his own
...
In nineteen-forty-nine
...
” (Page
402) There was Brennan “The little man in the wheelchair was like a bird on its perch
...
” (Page 402) And “felt him hold onto her hand
...
” (Page 403) As
Brennan spoke he was “looping from one random recollection to another
...
” (page 404) Elizabeth was “moved by
what she had heard
...
” (Page 404) She felt that “She had rescued vital connection
...
” (Page 406) She “detangled her earlier arrangements,” (Page 406) for
the evening so that she could see him
...
Instead he agreed to go to lunch with
her “We’re frightened of your bloody police and your Home Office regulations
...
” (Page 407) He told Elizabeth “You have no respect for us wretched
refugees
...

Erich pointed out “that man puts you in a good mood
...
It was better to have some source of happiness than none
...
”
(Page 407)
“Robert had a small top-floor flat in a block off the Fulham Road
...
” (Page 407) In his flat there were “red candles,” (Page 407) that
he had only kept because his “daughter liked them
...
” (Page
408)
“He had been unfaithful to his wife for one ill-advised night before he met Elizabeth,”(Page
408) but this time “He believed he had married the wrong woman
...
” (Page 408)
When Elizabeth arrived at his flat she said “What on earth is this?” (Page 408) At his sweater
...
” (Page 409) He changed his clothes and watched as “she set about cooking the
food she had brought
...
” (Page 409)s

Birdsong Part 5 – chapter 4


Françoise telephoned to say she had found twenty more notebooks in the attic
...
She had a
bath and “wondered whether some law would prevent the Gas board from going on strike
...
It had stopped being history and had turned into experience
...
” (Page 411) It was Stuart “Elizabeth was dumb
...
” (Page 411) She ran to her bedroom and
sorted her hair out slightly “She could hear him knocking at the open door
...
” (Page 411)
“She could hardly have made it clearer that she was not expecting anyone
...
” (Page 412)
Stuart picked up a buckle and asked what it was “I found it on the carpet,” (Page 412)
Elizabeth said it was “Just something I got in a junk shop
...
” (Page 412)
“Stuart hadn’t seemed to mind that chaos of her arrangements; in fact he had hardly
seemed to notice
...
” (Page 413) Her life was a “rush and slither
of trivial crises; of uncertain cashflow, small triumphs, occasional sex and too many
cigarettes; of missed deadlines that turned out not to matter; of arguments, new clothes,
bursts of altruism and sincere resolutions to address the important things
...
“(Page 414) She had decided that she was “impressed by his piano playing
and flattered by his attention, but the way he spoke was intolerable
...
” (Page 414) He said that he was going to tell
her a story, and when she tried to interrupt “he held up his hand to silence her
...
” (Page 414) Elizabeth felt embarrassed
“Stuart himself showed no trace of self-consciousness
...
” (Page 415)
“I’m asking you to marry me
...
” (Page 415) He described her as “very unusual woman
...
” (Page 415) He said “He’s married, isn’t he?” (Page 415)
And “Is that your future?” (Page 415)
Elizabeth became defensive “You shouldn’t talk about people you don’t know
...
” (Page 415)
He told her to think about it “I certainly won’t forget
...
” (page 417) She felt “as though he had
forced himself on her
...
She would
“smoke less, she would visit Tom Brennan once a fortnight, if he wanted, or, if he didn’t, she
would visit someone else of his generation
...
” (Page 417) She “took
Brennan a cake her mother had baked
...
” (Page 417)



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




She put two mothballs in a handkerchief to “breathe in camphor rather than the cloying
smell of urine
...
” (Page 418)
Elizabeth asked him questions, yet “His answers bore no relation to her questions
...
” (Page 418)
She figured out “when her last period had been
...
” (Page 419)
Robert’s carefulness was described as being done “neurotically
...
” (Page 419) She went to tell Irene twice but “discretion made her change the subject
...
” (Page 419)
“She was frightened of the physical changes and worried about what people would say;”
(Page 419)
Bob telephoned her “I’ve cracked it
...
” (Page 419) He told her “I put a couple of pages in the post this
morning
...
” (Page 420)
Robert rang after midnight “She told him straight away that she was going to have a baby
...
” (Page 420) He said “Just give
me time to get used to it
...
” (Page 420)
She felt that “the past was alive
...
” (Page
421) And “Since Weir??? died I have not been very close to reality
...
I do not know how people there can lead a life
...
” (Page 421) And “we have lost the
power to be afraid
...
” (Page 421) And “I am tired in my soul
...
” (Page 421) And “I feel guilty because I have survived
...
” (page 422) And “No child or future
generation will ever know what this was like
...
” (page
422) And “We will seal what we have seen in the silence of our hearts
...
” (Page 425) He was reading a magazine “His eyes scanned
each page but barely read
...
” (Page 425) He could “hear an
owl’s call
...
” (Page 425) His childhood
seemed so long ago “it felt as though someone else had lived it for him
...
” (Page 425) His
movements were “still swift and certain
...
” (Page
426) He told Stephen “Our lot have done pretty well
...
” (Page 426) Gray asked
“what words will we inscribe on it?” (Page 426) In reference to the memorial
...
” (Page 426)






Gray told Stephen “Your staff attachment is finished
...
” (Page 426) And
“You don’t look very pleased
...
” (Page 427)
Gray said “Quite soon we are going to attack
...
” (page 427)
“As our punishment for God knows what, we were there, and our men died in each of those
disgusting places
...
” (page 427) Stephen said he
liked the word “Final
...
” (page 428) Jack Firebrace wrote a letter
home
...
” (Page 428) He wrote “most of
the men think it better than tunnelling
...
” (Page 428) He told her “we’ve made
our contribution to the war,” (Page 428) and “we are all keeping cheerful and bright
...
” (Page 429) here were “small boys running n the cobbles
...

“He had grown very thin and his skin had become lined and leathery about the eyes
...
” (Page 429) His “movements
had a dreamlike quality,” (Page 429) he “smoked without seeming to know that he did
...
Thins
thought made her feel easier in her mind
...
” (Page 430) She said
“I went to the cathedral to help them take out the stained-glass windows
...
” (Page 430) She tells him “I think they’ve almost given up
hope with their daughters
...
” (Page 430) That told them about Isabelle leaving
...
” (Page 430)
“Isabelle said she was happy, though Max is not well
...
” (Page 430) Jeanne said to him “You’re looking very
distracted and pale
...
” (page 430) She said “You mustn’t let yourself go
...
Any day now we’ll advance and you’ll be free to resume your life
...
” (Page 431) She said “You’ll do something better, you’ll do something
worthwhile
...
” (Page
431) She “took his hand and led him through the gardens
...
” (page 431) Stephen “laughed
for the first time
...
” (Page 432)
Jeanne decided “I’m going to make you laugh
...
” (Page 432)
She spoke about the home she wanted in the future “perhaps a swing for children to play on
– if not my own, then visiting children
...
” (Page 432) Jeanne suggested that they’d have a singer and Stephen said “Perhaps we
could persuade Bèrard
...
” (Page 433) She “could see he was making efforts for her benefit
...
” (Page 434) He
hugged her thighs and “She felt him begin to sob
...
” (Page 435)
There were celebrations “Stephen had acquired a reputation for survival
...
” (Page 435)
The tunnellers were doing trench maintenance
...
” (Page 435)
They were eating tinned stew with “fresh cabbage
...
He had a “sense of grievance that made him a tenacious
arguer
...
He said “I’ll come
and inspect it
...
”
(Page 436) Stephen looked up at the sky before going underground “It was a clear, pale blue
with a few high clouds
...
” (Page 437)
And “It would be the same underground as here in the warm air, with the birds singing and
the gentle clouds above them
...
”
(page 437) When they reached the bottom “they would all go down the main one
...
” (Page 438)
“The air had a dense, damn quality
...
” (Page 438) There was “no fear or sense of the unusual
...
” (Page 438)
Crawshaw “made a downward motion with both hands
...
” (Page 439) Evans “lay tight against the tunnel wall, like
an unwashed and unqualified doctor listening for signs of hostile life
...
” (page 439)
“He could sense their fear through the tension of the bodies that pressed against his
...
” (page 439) He “had no fear of going
forward provided he felt he could get back
...
” (Page 440) He thought back to “the feelings of tenderness he used to have for the
men
...
” (Page 440)
“Lorimer’s face tightened
...
” (Page 441)
“He tried to move but felt himself pinned down, as though the earth had wrapped him in
heavy, comfortable blankets and was urging him to sleep
...
” (Page 441)




























“He tried to swallow, but could not gather enough saliva in his dry, earth-filled mouth
...
” (Page 442) He
believed it was “the contemptible voodoo of survival
...
” (page 442) he thought “Perhaps some of the others in the
parallel tunnel had been further from the impact
...
” (Page 442) Yet “The way back appeared to be open
...
” (page 443) He moved rubble from around
him “He had been very lucky
...
” (Page 443) Jack “felt a sense that it was right that he should be rescued by
someone he had himself saved;” (Page 444)
“Jack was surprised that he was able to talk to well
...
” (Page 445) Stephen
then said “I must rest
...
” (Page 445) His head was “resting
on Jack’s chest
...
” (Page 445)
Jack “made a vow that if he made it up to the surface he would never go underground
again
...
” (page 445) There was “Nothing would penetrate his fatigue
...
” (Page
446) Jack thought “it might now be impossible for a rescue party to reach them
...
” (Page 446) He “felt the death he had
wanted come closer to him
...
” (Page 446)
He managed to pull Jack free
...
” (Page 446) Stephen “tried to
comfort him
...

Jack said “They’ll be no one else
...
” (Page
447)
Stephen put Jack on his shoulders “Jack was biting the fabric of Stephen’s tunic to keep
himself from screaming
...
” (Page 447) He had an
“urge to sleep
...
” (Page 448)
“He was weighing his own life against the chances of saving any of his friends
...
” (Page
448) They got to the end of the tunnel to find “a good deal of earth had come down
...
” (Page
449) Stephen “shouted out in the darkness
...
” (Page 449)
When Stephen got back to Jack his eyes were closed “for a moment Stephen thought he was
dead
...
” (Page
449)
Jack said “Don’t leave me again
...
”
(Page 449) Stephen “carried him as he would have done a sleeping child
...
” (Page 450) The tunnel was blocked “this is
where the second explosion went off
...
” (Page 450)
“Neither man had the energy to move
...
” (Page 450) There was “a perverse appeal in the thought that he would
complete what no enemy had managed
...
” (Page 451) He also said “It’s strange, isn’t it?
That I should be with you at the time I die
...
” (Page 451)
Jack started talking about his son “in the lament he had denied himself at the time of John’s
death
...
” (Page 452) And “He was
from another world, he was a blessing too great for me
...
” (Page 452) Jack said
...
” (Page 452) And “I would trust them to
breathe for me, to pump my blood with their hearts
...
” (Page 453)
“There seemed to Stephen something frivolous about their hope as they laboured back into
the darkness
...
” (Page 453) Jack’s legs had “developed a cloying smell of blood
...
” (Page 434) Jack felt that Margaret “belonged to a different existence from the one
he now inhabited with such unwanted intensity
...
” (Page 454)
“After a few more yards he needed to rest again
...
” (Page 455) He “saw a trousered leg sticking out from the
earth
...
Shaw, Tyson, Evans, Jones and me
...
” (Page 455)
Jack “began to tremble and to brush imaginary hands from his face
...
” (Page 455)
Stephen said “I think this is the end
...
” (Page
455) And “The thought if streams and pools and gushing taps is all that’s keeping me going
...
Stephen realised “Jack was calling to his mother
...
” (Page 456) Stephen moved away from Jack “There he would
try to sleep and hope not to wake again
...
” (Page 456)
He touched some cloth and “explored the material further with his fingers
...
” (Page 456)
“Presumably they had felt this part of the tunnel to be particularly vulnerable
...
” (Page 457)
He went to wake Jack up “Jack shouted incoherently
...
” (Page 457)
“Stephen knew that to Jack his face was a reminder that he was still alive
...
” (Page 458) H asked Jack
about a possible explosive chamber “They would have told the captain, but he wouldn’t
necessarily tell me
...
” (Page 459) He told Stephen “I just want to die in
peace
...
” (Page 459) He “desperately wanted
Jack to survive
...
” (Page 460) He stopped using his arm
and opted for his mouth “He was barely aware of the discomfort as he worked on
...
” (Page 460) He found the explosives “He
allowed himself to give in to the sensation of hope
...
” (Page 461)
He “asked himself if the effort was really worthwhile
...
” (Page 461) He found “a small pool of water on the floor in one corner which he
sucked into his mouth
...

“He worked with the instinct of an animal
...
” (Page 462)
“He feared that he might die before it was completed
...
” (Page 462) When he spoke “Jack’s voice was almost inaudible
...
” (Page 463) He “wanted to watch it burn
through the ammonal, then he would know they were going to be all right
...
” (Page 464)
“He was pitched forwards by an explosion that tore out tunnels, walls and earth and hurled
the debris up into the air above the ground
...
” (Page 464)
“There are usually two explosions, aren’t there?” (Page 465) Levi said “Give it an hour
...
” (Page 465) Two soldiers called Kroger and Lamm reported to him “Kroger was a
refined and clever man who had refused promotion on several occasions
...
” (Page 466) They were “issued with enough food and water to last for three
days
...
” (Page 466) He remembered his brother “expected to
go down and inspect the system at some time to make sure they had efficiently closed the
British tunnel
...
” (Page 467) One of their soldiers
“survived eight days with just a bottle of water
...
” (Page 468)
“Levi felt from the moment Joseph was born a great tenderness towards him
...
” (Page 469) He “did not want Joseph to be killed in a fall caused by his
own men
...
” (Page 469) Stephen
knew “Weir’s old company wouldn’t let them down
...

Stephen kicked Jack “There was a faint groan
...
” (Page 470)
“Towards the upper end of their space there was something breathable
...
” (Page 470)

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The hole after the blast was even smaller “when he first felt the size of it Stephen cried out
in despair
...
” (Page 470) He “enjoyed the familiar feel of the single,
scrupulously sharpened, blade
...
You must believe
...
He spoke about when Shaw “Tore his cross off
...
I’m glad
...
” (page 471) He said that when he dies “I’ll be with the men
who understand
...
” (Page 471)
Stephen spoke about the first time he went to Amiens “At that age you have no fear
...
” (Page 472) And “I made my own reasons for
living
...
” (Page 472)
“I fell in love with her and I believed she loved me too
...
” (Page 472)
“It sounded to Stephen as though Jack was choking
...
” (Page 473)
“Levi followed the other two with a mixture of eagerness and apprehension
...
” (page 474)
“We’ve established what happened and we can take your brother back to the surface and
give him a proper burial
...
” (Page 475) Levi said “They don’t want to be left beneath this
foreign field
...
” (Page
476) He had to “hold his body rigid to prevent himself from screaming
...
” (Page 477)
“It’s the rescue party
...
” (Page 477) Jack said “The
hacking, rattling sound filled the narrow space, then stopped
...
”
(Page 477) Stephen “felt bitterly alone
...
” (Page 478) The
German soldiers heard Stephen’s tapping “It could have been a rat, he thought at first, but it
was too rhythmic and too far underground
...
” (Page 478/9) They believed it to be a British soldier “Then
it would be the man who killed my brother and his two companions?” (Page 479)
Kroger began “to feel light-headed with grief and fatigue
...
” (Page 479) The closer they dug the more “The sound of tapping
was frantic and much closer than before
...
” (Page 480) He “thought of Jeanne and of the astonishing smile that rose like a
sunburst to her eyes
...
” (Page 482) e “loosened the earth
sufficiently at the end of Stephen’s coffin
...
There was air
...
” (page 482)
“They were clothed in the German feldgrau
...
” (Page 482)



“Levi looked at this wild-eyed figure, half-demented, his brother’s killer
...
”
(Page 483)

Birdsong Part 6 – chapter 4


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“They helped Stephen to the bottom of the rope and gave him water
...
” (Page 484) When they
were outside “They had to cover their eyes against the powerful rays of the sun
...
” (Page 484) They “could hear the sound of birds
...
” (Page 484)
They sat next to each other in the trench “Each listened to the heavenly quietness
...
” (Page 484)
“Four years that had lasted so long it seemed that time has stopped
...
” (Page 485)
“He did not know what to do
...
” (Page 485) They
“brought up Jack’s body and, when the man had rested, they dug a grave for him and Joseph
Levi
...
” (Page 485) Levi “took the
buckle from his belt and gave it to him as a souvenir
...
” (Page 485)
“He felt dry
...
” (Page 485)

Birdsong Part 7 – chapter 1








“Elizabeth was worried about what her mother would say when she told her she was
pregnant
...
” (Page 489) In
order to break the news “she decided to invite her mother up to dinner in London
...
” (Page 489) Irene was “also
displeased
...
” (Page 489) She came to apologise later and
gave her “a pair of knitted woollen socks
...
”
(Page 490) People told her “You can’t expect the child not to have a father
...
” (page 490) She learned “it was possible to keep a secret
...
” (page 490) Elizabeth
“finally had some picture in her mind of what it had been like
...
” (Page 490/1) She tried to work out the ages “Something did not
quite add up in her calculations
...
” (Page 491)
She “ordered expensive wine
...
”
(Page 491)
“I’m expecting a baby
...
I’m delighted
...
” (Page 492) She told
Elizabeth “My own mother wasn’t married to my father
...
” (Page 492)
“Your grandfather married Grand’mère, Jeanne, in 1919, after the war
...
She was Jeanne’s
younger sister
...
Your grandfather went to stay with a family before the war
...
When she discovered she was pregnant, she left him
and eventually went back to her husband
...
I was sent to Jeanne from Germany,
where I had been living, because my real mother had died
...
” (page 493) She
told her about Max “he died himself not long afterwards
...
” (Page 494)
“He didn’t speak for two years after the war
...
And Grand’mère said it was two years of silence
...
He spoiled me really
...
” (Page 494) He never spoke about the was “From that day on it
was as though it hadn’t happened
...
”
(Page 494) He “never really recovered
...
” (Page 494) Jeanne “nursed him like a
mother
...
” (Page 495) During classes “Elizabeth made a note to ask for an
epidural at the earliest permissible moment
...
” (Page 495)
“Most of the questions at the antenatal class had been concerned with what the women
called getting their figures back
...
” (Page 496) She “could not quite believe that she and Robert had created an
autonomous human life from nothing
...
” (Page 496) His wife “believed he was travelling to Germany for a conference
...
” (Page 497) Just like the cottage
Stephen and Isabelle stayed in
...
” (Page
497) She “thought of her grandmother, Isabelle, and wondered when and how she had given
birth
...
” (Page 498) Elizabeth said “I just can’t
imagine it
...
” (Page
498)

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

“She slept badly that night
...
” (Page 498) Her “compelling confidence had not allowed her to understand how
painful and exhausting it would be
...
” (Page 499) Robert asked if this was it “I don’t know
...
It might
be
...
” (Page 500) Elizabeth
walked around the house “he left her alone
...
” (Page 500) Her “upper body
contracted and heaved once more, but produced only blood
...
I want to be alone
...
”
(Page 501) The head emerged “Streaked with blood and slime
...
” (Page 502) There was “no power on earth could stop the combined
force of muscle, instinct and will power as it drove on to its appointed end
...
” (Page 502)
“It was a boy
...
” (Page 502) Robert went outside, he “heaved his shoulders up and down and
forced out several long, sobbing breaths
...
” (Page
503)
“Now here was John, his boy, another chance
...
” (Page 503)



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