All About The Boys

Wilfred Owen, one of the foremost soldier poets of WW1, is not regarded as a contemporary poet because very few of his poems were published in his lifetime. Killed in his unit’s very last battle of the war, his poems remained in notebooks and documents held by his family.

The play All About the Boys dramatises a story where the soldiers hear some of Owen’s poems as they prepare and fight the battle. It explores the affect on the soldiers, particularly given the rigid disciplinary code of the Army and the ironic humour of the soldiers. The battle saw great bravery with one of Owen’s fellow officers earning a posthumous VC. As Owen falls, the poetry echoes in the feelings of the soldiers.