Edmund Blunden in Thiepval - late October, 1916

from Undertones of War, pages 127-128:

Then we went into the trenches round about Thiepval Wood, which not long before had been so horrible and mad; but now they had assumed a tenderer aspect, were voted "a rest-cure sector," and we were envied for them.... In spite of the sylvan intricacies of Thiepval Wood, and a bedroom in the corridored chalk bank, and the tunes of the "Bing Boys" endlessly revolved, one was not yet quite clear of Stuff Trench [where the battalion had recently endured heavy shelling]; my own unwelcome but persistent retrospect was the shell-hole there used by us as a latrine, with those two flattened German …   more >>
cite as

Edmund Blunden, Undertones of War (Harmondsworth, 1982), p. 127-128. https://led.kmi.open.ac.uk/entity/lexp/1395327633442 accessed: 20 April, 2024

location of experience: Thiepval

Listeners

Edmund Blunden
university teacher, Poet
1896-1974

Listening to

hide composers
The Bing Boys [Are Here]
written by Nat D. Ayer

Experience Information

Date/Time late October, 1916
Listening Environment in the company of others, outdoors

Notes

'The Bing Boys Are Here' was the first of a series of 'Bing' music revues at London's Alhambra Theatre. It opened in April 1916 and starred George Robey and Violet Loraine, who performed the song 'If you were the only girl in the world'. Blunden doesn't make clear whether tunes from the show were being sung and whistled by the troops, or whether one of the officers had a gramophone - an original 1916 cast recording was made.


Originally submitted by hgb3 on Thu, 20 Mar 2014 15:00:33 +0000