He remembered the feel of No Man’s Land, the vast, unimaginable space. By day, seen through a periscope, this immensity shrank to a small, pock-marked stretch of ground, snarled with wire. You never got used to the discrepancy. Part of its power to compel the imagination lay precisely in that. It was the difference between seeing a mouth ulcer and probing it with your tongue. He told himself he was never going back, he was free, but the word ‘free’ rang hollow. Hurry up, Sarah, he thought.
Last Week | Reading Schedule | Further Resources
Welcome to Week 6 of a slow read of Regeneration by Pat Barker. I am your guide, Simon Haisell, and this is Footnotes & Tangents, a book group where we take our time to live inside great stories.
Each week, I offer you my footnotes and tangents. You will have your own, and I encourage everyone to treat the slow read as an opportunity to explore, reflect and create. You can join the discussion in the comments to let us know what caught your eye or ask the group any questions you may have. And if you’ve tumbled down a rabbit hole or taken your reading off on a tangent, please share where you have been and what you have found.
This week, we are reading chapters 17–19. On my website, there is a reading schedule and a page of further resources.
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