Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks

I have a goal (more like a dream!) to finish reading all the Top 100 Books of the Last 100 Years. This is now my 32nd. So here goes!  (Warning: May contain spoilers.)  

When I started reading Birdsong I was immdiately hooked. It is a beautifully written love story about Captain Stephen Wrayford, a British soldier who fought in the 1st World War, and about Elizabeth his granddaughter 60 years later. It is written in an episodic structure which alternates between the past and the present and leaves the reader clues as to what happened to Captain Wrayford to be revealed only at the end where both past and present meet. It's also a novel about Elizabeth's going back to her roots in the hopes of finding her identity and that of her child.  


Sebastian Faulks



I had been putting off reading Birdsong for fear that it would take me through the cruel brutalities of war. To my pleasant surprise I found it beautifully written, instead of just the brutal narration I thought it would have. Of course the trenches, gunfure, mud and blood were still there, but Sebastian Faulks also takes time to dwell into the thoughts of Captain Wrayford and his co-soldiers, into momentary interludes of relaxed conversations over tea, into the lives and loves of these war-torn men and the friendships that sprung between them.

There are a lot of themes that run along the entire novel but reading about these relationships of love and friendship was what I enjoyed most about Birdsong. They were like superhuman triumphs whose goodness were magnified by the contrast of war. Stephen was an orphan and was raised by a guardian who financed his education but failed in terms of devoting any fatherly affection. Perhaps this lack of parental love while growing up contributed to his feeling guilty for surviving the war when all his friends had been killed. In the end Stephen is saved after being trapped in an underground tunnel for several days by a Jewish German soldier, supposedly the enemy, but with whom Stephen shares a passionate embrace. Thus my favorite quote in the book is:

"Where there is real love between people, as there was between all of us, then the details don't matter. Love is more important than the flesh and blood facts of who gave birth to whom."

There are also many references to birds throughout the novel. But I particularly liked the ending:

"In the tree above him they disturbed a roosting crow, which erupted from the branches with an explosive bang of its wings, then rose up above him towards the sky, it harsh ambiguous call coming back in long, grating waves towards the earth, to be heard by those still living".

Birdsong.