"TO WHAT EXTENT DID TRENCH WARFARE ON THE WESTERN FRONT AND THE EXPERIENCE OF TOTAL WAR AFFECT THE MENTAL STATE OF THE SOLDIERS PARTICIPATING IN THE WAR AND HOW WAS THIS PORTRAYED?"
Topic and Research Question Explanation:
Our group came to the unanimous decision to research the mental state of the soldiers throughout the course of the First World War. Our curiosity sprung from our learnings in class where we discussed the patriotic and excited states of mind of all of the soldiers which were only to be followed by mental health issues such as depression, shell shock and PTSD after the war. Within four years people lost their nationalistic views and saw war as murderous, as opposed to a glorious event worth being celebrated. This then begged the question to us: "TO WHAT EXTENT DID TRENCH WARFARE ON THE WESTERN FRONT AND THE EXPERIENCE OF TOTAL WAR AFFECT THE MENTAL STATE OF THE SOLDIERS PARTICIPATING IN THE WAR AND HOW WAS THIS PORTRAYED?".
In an effort to answer this question we decided there were three main stages of the war that we had to focus on; pre-war, during war and post war. We wanted to examine why it was the men went to fight so willingly, what happened in the trenches that changed their attitude towards war and how it eventually lead to mental health issues for many of them. In order to do this we developed the following sub questions:
“WHAT WAS THE ESSENCE OF THE PRE-WAR MORALE AND THE SOLDIERS’ PSYCHE PRIOR TO THE ACTUAL CROSSFIRE?”
“HOW DID THE SOLDIERS’ MINDSETS TRANSITION OVER THE COURSE OF THE WAR AND IN WHAT ASPECTS DO WE SEE THE WAR DAMAGING THEIR MENTAL STATE? “
“WHAT DID THE AFTERMATH OF THE WAR MEAN FOR THE SOLDIERS AND WHAT PSYCHOLOGICAL AND MENTAL PROBLEMS WERE PREVAILINGLY COMMON AMONGST THEM?”
We decided to research the countries of the Triple Entente, the alliance which consisted of England, France and Russia throughout our studies. After conducting our research (which can be found in the above tabs) we came to the conclusion that the only suitable way to portray the progression of the mindsets of the soldiers would be through a drama performance. We felt as though it would be the best way to reach our audience during the exhibition and the most interesting way to convey our research. Prior to writing the script we thought it was a necessity to develop characters from different socio-economic backgrounds from different countries to show how the war affected people of different social classes. In this way we were able to develop our fourth research question:
“HOW DID THE COURSE OF THE WAR AFFECT SOLDIERS OF DIFFERENT AGE GROUPS, SOCIAL STRATA AND POSITIONS OF EMPLOYMENT?”
As the goal of this exhibition piece was to create an educational piece that pertains both to English and to History equally. In an effort to do this successfully our created our script for our play completely from lines of poetry, literature and letters that were written at the time of the war. Our script (along with a video of our performance) can be found on the last tab up top. The bottom pages of the script show the pieces of written work where we took the text from, who it was written by and when, as well as how it was modified to fit our play. We used our history research to guide the plot of play and to help us develop our characters, their reason to go into war, the experiences within the trenches, and how the war on a whole take a toll on their mental health.
Our main theme of our play is Change. How did a patriotic French soldier lead to a paranoid isolated mentally ill boy? Watch the video to find out!
Research Question Explanation:
Concisely explains the body of our research and what we want to show in the product of our play. The overall wording and topics within the questions make sure that we would have to answer to have a finalised, specific product. By looking specifically at the trench warfare impact, we are specifically narrowing down to what type and experiences the soldiers would have gone through, rather than home life, and other personal occurrences. However we have decided to generalise it by the concept of total war as a whole instead of specifically referring to a certain time era and place. The purpose therefore was so that there was a broad research capability for our play to expand to several cultures and backgrounds, whilst still being historically correct. That is why we included the sub questions of HOW DID THE COURSE OF THE WAR AFFECT SOLDIERS OF DIFFERENT AGE GROUPS, SOCIAL STRATA AND POSITIONS OF EMPLOYMENT. By doing so we look into the specificities of how wealth, social strata and age historically affected the soldiers. And by doing so we could use the correct literary poetry for our play, in the right context. By saying mental state, we could look at all aspects of mentality. At first an idea was to look solely on mental health, however by looking at the mental state detailed research on the change of the state could be made. By looking on how it was portrayed we could focus on how the horrors specifically were not only felt but seen in the soldiers, which gave us the possibility to portray it ourselves in our product (the play).
Sub-questions:
- “What was the essence of the pre-war morale and the soldiers’ psyche prior to the actual crossfire?”
- “How did the soldiers’ mindsets transition over the course of the war and in what aspects do we see the war damaging their mental state? “
- “What did the aftermath of the war mean for the soldiers and what psychological and mental problems were prevailingly common amongst them?”
- “How did the course of the war affect soldiers of different age groups, social strata and positions of employment?”
- How did trench warfare initiate soldiers to explore literature and how did it help them throughout and after the war?