Over the Top

Description

Over the Top is Arthur Guy Empey’s first and, at the same time, one of his most notable works – a novel published in 1917 and made into a film only a year later, starring the author himself.

Over the Top is a World War I novel that recounts the author’s own experiences as a soldier deployed in the first front-line. Empey was an American citizen, but after the Germans had sunk the Lusitania, Empey considered his country’s response to the disaster inadequate and travelled to England to join the Royal Fusiliers and to fight in the war.

The story of the book being informed by Empey’s own experiences as a soldier, but being narrated as if told by a Private named Tom, the book blends autobiography and fiction. The portrayal of the events is very realistic; the traumas suffered by the soldiers are very bluntly and naturalistically described.

The soldiers suffer from the inhuman conditions in the trench, from starvation, lice, from having to witness the death of fellow soldiers. However, the realistic recollections do not lack a hint of humor – without a sense of the grotesque, these tragedies would not have been bearable – as well as a sense of community and sharing. Great friendships are also born in the trench and they are described just as vividly as the other events and emotions.

Empey wrote this book after he had been discharged from the army, and the novel became an instant best-seller. The fast-paced action is only one of the features that made Over the Top so popular when it first came out and that makes it so interesting in our days, too – the other is the complexity of the depictions paired with objectivity. Though many have accused the novel of being slightly propagandistic, it is an incredibly accurate and valuable memento of the War, fascinating and exciting.
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