Goodbye to All That

English poet and classicist Robert Graves wrote his autobiography, Good-Bye to All That, in 1929, at the age of 34. Graves undertook the writing of his autobiography with the hope of crafting a best-selling book that would support his career as a writer. Good-Bye to All That details Graves’s life from his upper-middle-class childhood in England to his service as a military officer in World War I, and on to his first few years as a veteran. This memoir provides a candid account of military service tinged by Graves’s poetic sensibilities, and also serves as Graves’s account of his coming-of-age and leaving of his home country.

Graves begins his autobiography with his first childhood memories and a genealogical history of his parents' families. His father, Alfred Graves, comes from a line of loquacious Irish preachers and his mother, Amalie von Ranke, comes from a reserved German family of physicians and clergymen. Graves is the middle child of ten, born late in his parents' lives, and spends most of his childhood cared for by a nurse in a large house in Wimbledon, outside of London. As a boy, Graves’s mother instills in him a strong sense of Protestant values and Graves’s father, a poet, exposes Graves to classical and canonical literature.

Graves spends his high school years at a private preparatory school in Surrey called Charterhouse. There, Graves feels oppressed and upset by the school's strict adherence to traditions. With tensions between England and Germany rising, Graves becomes self-conscious of his German middle name, von Ranke, which he drops. At school, Graves writes poetry, takes up boxing, and begins a romantic relationship with a younger boy, whom he calls “Dick.” Graves also begins to question his once unshakable faith in the Church of England and practicing "implicit obedience to orders" (58).

England enters World War I just after Graves finishes Charterhouse and he enlists just "a day or two later" (67), hoping to avoid going to college at Oxford. Graves undergoes Officers' Training School and, at just 19, becomes a second-lieutenant with the prestigious Royal Welch Fusiliers. After graduating, Graves spends a few months commanding soldiers at a detention camp for Germans in England. He then joins the fighting in France, where he spends the next year in the trenches, dealing with gas attacks, heavy shelling, and heavy casualties. Due to these experiences, Graves begins to suffer from neurasthenia, or post-traumatic stress disorder.

After suffering a severe wound in battle, his colonel erroneously reports Graves’s death to his mother. However, Graves survives his wounds and, after a period of recovery, rejoins the Royal Welch in France. Bronchitis sends Graves back to England, and after resuming a post as an officers' trainer, Graves realizes he "should not have been back on duty" (265). Graves, having married a childhood friend, Nancy Nicholson, receives his "demobilization" (283), with a few tricks involved to do so. After this, Graves, Nancy, and their infant children move to Oxford, where Graves begins his degree in English Literature.

Between 1919 and 1925, Graves and Nancy have four children. Nancy, a painter, and Graves, now committed to making a living from his writing alone, struggle to make ends meet. They try to start a shop outside Oxford but it fails. When Nancy's doctor recommends a winter in Egypt for her health, Graves finds himself offered a position teaching at the "newly-founded Royal Egyptian University, Cairo" (323). Graves accepts the position and the memoir ends with his academic year spent teaching English literature to "the sons of rich merchants and landowners" (326) and cavorting with British aristocrats and Egyptian royalty. In the memoir's Epilogue, Graves explains that he and Nancy separated in 1929 and later divorced. Three of their four children served in World War II and Graves himself volunteered for "infantry service" (345) but could only get "a sedentary appointment" (345). After spending WWII in South Devon, England as an "Air Raid Warden" (345), Graves returns to Majorca, Spain where he spends the rest of his life writing.