Robert Ross is the protagonist. He begins the novel a young man, barely past his 19th birthday. Despite his young age, he experiences extreme horror and suffering. He leaves behind a privileged life in Canada and finds himself immersed in the barbarity of the First World War. He watches people suffer and die. Robert himself is compelled to murder innocent people. Robert experiences the reality of war on every level, from the horrible sinking mud to officers’ stupidity to animals suffering. Gradually, his faith in the military as an institution (and humanity as a whole) fades away. He abandons his childhood notions of heroes and patriots, eventually throwing off the shackles of the military and rebelling against the absurdity and horror he sees around him. For this, he is punished. Robert ends his life scarred and broken, a used-up product of the First World War and all of its attendant terrors.

Robert is introduced to the audience at his nadir. The opening prologue sets the scene of an officer who has found himself in an impossible circumstance. Though the audience is not yet familiar with the