Gallipoli
A powerful account of the tragic WWI campaign at Gallipoli by the British Poet Laureate. A moving tribute to courage and sacrifice.
Listen on SWOO.About this book
Gallipoli is John Masefield's haunting narrative of one of World War I's most devastating campaigns. Published in 1916 while the war still raged, the book recounts the Allied attempt to capture the Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey, which resulted in catastrophic losses.
Masefield, who later became Britain's Poet Laureate, writes with both the precision of a historian and the heart of a poet. He chronicles the strategic planning, the landings at Anzac Cove and Cape Helles, the brutal trench warfare, and the eventual evacuation—the campaign's only successful operation.
The book stands as both a military history and a memorial to the thousands of British, Australian, New Zealand, French, and Turkish soldiers who fought and died there. Masefield's vivid prose captures the horror of war while honoring the extraordinary courage of those who served. The Gallipoli campaign became a defining moment in Australian and New Zealand national identity.
