Vera Brittain
Vera Brittain is a woman with an incredible, painful story who overcame a great deal of psychic torment to become a famous essayist and novelist. In fact, she struggled with severe PTSD following her time as a volunteer nurse for combat victims in WWI, when all her friends and family died around her in the battles. This story covers her journey from her misogynistic environment, through absolute hell and warfare, and into a self-respecting life as a thoughtful author.
Vera Brittain's perspective stresses the importance of female, non-combatant accounts of the First World War in a genre dominated by the male soldier narrative. In particular, it emphasises the pivitol role nurses played during the war and validates their trauma by showing the unique horrors they faced on the 'second battlefield'—the war hospital.
Winifred
Winifred is a good friend with whom Brittain becomes very close after her time in Europe. They work as journalists and they toy around with book ideas, but they are also best friends and pals. They adventure off to make new memories together in Europe, not like the unimaginable horror of WWI, but instead, the cover the new developing stories about the newly formed League of Nations.
G
After her time at war as a volunteer nurse, and after some long years of self-actualization, after she has already become an essayist and author, then Vera Brittain meets her husband, G. She tells of overcoming her fear of losing him and gaining the courage to tell him the truth about her, but when she thought he would be like all the other guys, G shows that not all men have stupid ideas about women—when she tells him she doesn't want to feel trapped in a traditional marriage, G says she should be free.
Hometown friends
This is a sad, but true detail that Vera is careful to include. She survived WWI, but there were many soldiers and volunteers alike who died in those wars, and she remembers these members of her community and explains her memories with each of them: Edward, her brother, and Victor and Geoffrey. In addition to this she also helps many other kids their own age who are brutally harmed in battle.
Roland Leighton
A close friend to Edward Brittain, Roland Leighton met Vera Brittain in Uppingham in 1913. The two began courting, bonding over their shared literary interests, and became engaged in August 1915. When war broke out, Roland, like most public schoolboys, was eager to enlist and fight for his country. In March 1915, he was sent to France but quickly became disillusioned with the war. His letters to Vera, captured in Testament of Youth, highlight the reality of the First World War—its horror, futility and senseless bloodshed. He died aged 20 in December 1915, just days before he was due to return home and marry Brittain.
Roland's abrupt, unceremonious death symbolises the 'lost generation' of men who were encouraged to enlist with tales of glory and heroism, only to be tragically killed by a war they no longer believed. Vera was devastated by the death of her fiance, describing how his death made her existence feel 'singularly pointless'.
Edward Brittain
Vera's beloved older brother and Roland's close friend, Edward Brittain left Oxford University to join the army. In early 1916, he was posted to the Western Front, only to be quickly injured during the Battle of the Somme. Edward and Vera share a close sibling bond, writing letters to one another and threating over each other's safety. Edward died in June 1918, after being shot down by an Austrian sniper.
Edward's character highlights the huge psychological impact war trauma can have on people. Once intelligent, intellectual and charming, Vera describes how, after the loss of his friends, Edward eventually shrinked into a silent, stoic depression—one that not even his sister could penetrate. As she explains in Testament of Youth, he sank into 'an unfamiliar, frightening Edward, who never smiled nor spoke except about trivial things, who seemed to have nothing to say to me and indeed hardly appeared to notice my return...'
