Editing Regeneration (novel) (section)

===Ideology===
Much of the novel explores the types of cultural ideologies, like nationalism and masculinity, that facilitated the War. Barker states that she chose to write about [[World War I]] "because it's come to stand in for other wars, as a sort of idealism of the young people in August 1914 in Germany and in England. They really felt this was the start of a better world. And the disillusionment, the horror and the pain followed that. I think because of that it's come to stand for the pain of all wars."<ref name="Reusch english" /> Critic Kaley Joyes argues that choices like the inclusion of the work by poet [[Wilfred Owen]] in the novel, whose life has been romanticised as "an expressive exemplar of the war's tragic losses," highlights this thematic interest in breaking down the common ideological interpretations of the war.<ref name="Joyes171-180">Joyes 171–180.</ref>
<!--- Critic Karin Westman identifies one of the central ideological struggles within the novel: Prior feels both compelled to complete his duty in his job to return soldiers to the front, and yet questions that duty because of his sympathy towards Sassoon's rebellion.<ref name =Westman26-29>Westman 26–29.</ref> ---->

====Masculinity====
The tension between traditional models of masculinity and the experiences within the war runs throughout the novel.<ref name="Harris290-292" /> Critic Greg Harris identifies ''Regeneration'', along with the other two novels in the trilogy, as profiling the non-fictional experience of Sassoon and other soldiers who must deal with ideas of masculnity.<ref name="Harris290-292" /> These characters feel conflicted by a model of masculinity common to Britain during this time:  honour, bravery, mental strength, and confidence were privileged "manly" characteristics.<ref name="Harris290-292" /> Yet they explore, internally and through conversation, what that model means for them and how the war changes how they should experience it.<ref name="Harris290-292">Harris 290–292</ref> In an interview with Barker in ''[[Contemporary Literature (journal)|Contemporary Literature]]'', Rob Nixon distinguishes between these ideas of "manliness" and the concept of masculinity as providing a larger definition for identity. Barker agrees with his assessment, saying, "and what's so nice about them is that they use it so unself-consciously: they must have been the last generation of men who could talk about manliness without going "ugh" inside."<ref name="interview">{{Cite journal | doi = 10.1353/cli.2004.0010 | issn = 1548-9949 | volume = 45 | issue = 1 | pages = –21 | last = Barker | first = Pat | author2 = Rob Nixon | title = An Interview with Pat Barker | journal = Contemporary Literature | date = 2004 | doi-access = free }}</ref>

In his discussion of the novel, Harris describes this "manliness" as becoming, for Barker's characters, an "unrealistic militaristic-masculine ideals"; practices such as the deliberate repression of emotion consume the novel's characters and create psychological instability, as well as being the cause of extensive discrimination during the war.<ref name="Harris290-292" /> Harris highlights how this thematic treatment fairly represents how the question of masculine identity effected Sassoon and other shell-shocked World War I soldiers.<ref name="Harris290-292" /> Harris also describes Barker, as author, and Rivers, as a period innovator, demonstrating how the use of therapy on soldiers offers an opportunity to shape and rethink this model of masculinity.<ref name="Harris294-295">Harris 294–295.</ref> The idea of reintegrating emotions, in relation to questions about the nature of masculinity, are an important part of the novel; Barker focuses on the same type of emotional reintegration that historians have identified in River's actual methods for treating victims of the war.<ref name="Harris296-301">Harris 296–301</ref>