The Wars utilizes first-, second-, and third-person narrative points of view, which is very rare in literature.
A young man named Robert Ross is introduced as squatting in a tattered Canadian military uniform, with a pistol in hand.
Robert Ross enlists in the army to escape the guilt he feels after the recent death of his sister, Rowena, who died from falling out of her wheelchair while playing with her beloved rabbits in the barn.
Robert feels guilty because he was unable to save her since he was making love to his pillows in his bedroom when he should have been watching her.
"[4] On February 28, 1916, the Germans set off a string of land mines, strategically placed along the St. Eloi Salient.
Following a shelling of the dugout, his fellow soldier Levitt loses his mind, and Robert finds himself close to the brink.
Ordered to place guns in a location sure to be a deathtrap, Robert and his men find themselves on the wrong end of a gas attack in the middle of a freezing cold winter.
As he descends the side of crater, Robert slips and smashes his knees on a discarded machine gun, creatin?
Robert takes control with his pistol and instructs the men to urinate on strips of clothing and hold them over their faces.
One night, Juliet thinks it would be a neat prank to dress up as Lady Sorrel, walk into Robert's room, and light the candles.
When Robert eventually leaves the home, Juliet slips him a candle and a box of matches in an effort to explain herself and apologize.
He burns his only picture of Rowena, as an act of charity, reasoning that it would be horrible for something so innocent to exist in such a perverse world.
Robert turns down an offer of euthanasia from a nurse from Bois de Madeleine hospital before being sent to England and tried in absentia.
Robert suffers great guilt[6] over the accidental death of his sister, Rowena, who died from a fall onto cement ground in the barn.
After Rowena's death, Robert became distant from his mother and much closer to his father, who continued to support and encourage him throughout his experience in the war.
Even though Robert is determined, he was not a natural killer; this weakness was seen in his inability to kill the injured horse or Rowena's rabbits.
Robert's desperate attempts to save animals throughout his war experiences reflects his love for the dead animal-loving sister.
He was the more lenient parent in the family and loved every member enough to encourage Robert to go for what he wants while withstanding the accusations surrounding Rowena's death.
She seems to be the only character who understands the delicate homoerotic undertones in male friendships without being confused or disturbed by them.
From the very beginning when he is first introduced, he plays the game of hitting bottles off of posts with stones, displaying strength and perfect accuracy.
Later, upon discovering him having sex with the Swede, Robert's homophobia causes him to cease regarding Taffler as a role model.
In Penguin's Modern Classic edition, published 2005, Canadian author Guy Vanderhaeghe wrote the “Introduction” for The Wars.
Vanderhaeghe points towards Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front as being perhaps the only other work to "so efficiently compress and crystallize the horrors of combat in so few pages."
Vanderhaeghe continues, however, that "But unlike Remarque, Findley achieves this impressive economy by piecing together a collage of arresting images and brief, telling scenes that not only cohere in a compelling narrative but whose form mimics the fractured lives of soldiers and civilians shattered by war."
[8] Guy Vanderhaeghe, in his introduction to The Wars in Penguiern Classics 2005 edition, states that "Like the frieze of horse and dog, or the occasional glimpse of Harris's blue scarf, the wars [emphasis in original] hovers in the reader's consciousness, heard as the faintest of dire whispers.
It is as impossible to boil simple meaning from these two words as it is to impute clear and unambiguous motives' for Ross's actions, or to determine how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
"[7] The bald third-person summaries of casualties, contrasted with Robert's idealized view of war, also heighten the book's impact on readers.
[8] Among the most common or meaningful: The four classical elements of earth, air, fire, and water are all featured in the novel.
It is also a tool with which Robert vents his violent feelings, such as when Juliet witnesses him destroying a tree with his gun.
The film was directed by Robin Phillips from a screenplay written by Findley, and starred Brent Carver as Robert Ross.