Robert falls and hurts his knees during the same storm, an injury that causes him and Harris to be disembarked to an infirmary together when they arrive in England, where they become even closer. Robert is forced to shoot one of the horses when it breaks its leg during a rough storm, an act that traumatizes him and begins the gradual loss of innocence he faces at war. On the journey, Robert befriends another young soldier named Harris and takes over his job of overseeing the horses on board when Harris contracts pneumonia. The other soldiers convince Robert to go to a nearby brothel, where he has a humiliating encounter with a prostitute named Ella and is horrified to see Taffler having sex with another man.Īfter training, in December 1915, Robert is promoted to Second Lieutenant and turns nineteen years old before embarking on the S.S. At military training, he meets Captain Taffler, a heroic soldier whom he hopes will teach him how to fight courageously and kill without fear. Ross, has Rowena’s beloved pet rabbits killed, Robert enlists in the Canadian army in order to escape the guilt and trauma of his sister’s death. Robert, who has always viewed himself as his handicapped sister’s “guardian,” blames himself for the accident. In April 1915, when Robert is eighteen, his beloved older sister Rowena falls from her wheelchair and dies. Robert is a shy, intelligent, athletic young man who comes from an affluent family. Additionally, Findley inserts the reader into the narrative by making them a participatory character who is looking through archives of Robert’s family photographs and other old documents in the present day. Although the main storyline takes place between 19, the narration occasionally switches to interviews with Juliet d’Orsey and Marian Turner (who knew Robert during the war) during the novel’s contemporary time period, roughly sixty years after World War I.

The Wars follows a young Canadian soldier named Robert Ross who is fighting in World War I.

The wars timothy findley sparknotes