Sassoon's account of his experiences in the trenches during World War I, between the spring of 1916 and the summer of 1917, creates a picture of a physically brave but self-effacing and highly insecure individual.

The narrator, George Sherston, is wounded when a piece of shrapnel shell passes through his lung after he incautiously sticks his head over the parapet at the Battle of Arras in 1917.

The book portrays Sherston's emotional and intellectual coming of age, as he learns "that he is but one insignificant person caught up in events beyond anyone's comprehension".

"Harold Nicolson wrote in the Daily Express that it was a book "of deep beauty and abiding significance.

"[3] A Daily Telegraph reviewer said that "Those who in future really want to understand the atmosphere of the years 1916 and 1917, and the conditions of life, will turn back to this book".