Editing Siegfried Sassoon (section)

==Legacy==
[[File:Siegfried Sassoon 23 Campden Hill Square blue plaque.jpg|thumb|left|[[Blue plaque]], 23 Campden Hill Square, London]]
On 11 November 1985, Sassoon was among 16 Great War poets commemorated on a slate stone unveiled in [[Westminster Abbey]]'s [[Poet's Corner]].<ref>{{cite web| url = http://net.lib.byu.edu/english/wwi/poets/poets.html| title = Poets of the Great War.}}</ref> The inscription on the stone was taken from [[Wilfred Owen]]'s "Preface" to his poems and reads: "My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity."<ref>{{cite web| url = http://net.lib.byu.edu/english/wwi/poets/Preface.html| title = "Preface", Manuscript and transcription from ''The Poems of Wilfred Owen''.}}</ref>

The year 2003 saw the publication of ''Memorial Tablet'', an authorised audio CD of readings by Sassoon recorded during the late 1950s. These included extracts from ''[[Memoirs of an Infantry Officer]]'' and ''The Weald of Youth'' as well as several war poems, including "Attack", "The Dug-Out", "At Carnoy" and "Died of Wounds", and postwar works. The CD also included comment on Sassoon by three of his Great War contemporaries: [[Edmund Blunden]], [[Edgell Rickword]] and [[Henry Williamson]].<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.ltmrecordings.com/SassoonCD.html| title = Siegfried Sassoon, ''Memorial Tablet'' CD audiobook (CD41-008).}}</ref>

Siegfried Sassoon's only child, [[George Sassoon]], died of cancer in 2006. George had three children, two of whom were killed in a car crash in 1996. His daughter by his first marriage, Kendall Sassoon, is patron-in-chief of the Siegfried Sassoon Fellowship, established in 2001.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.sassoonfellowship.org/|title=The Siegfried Sassoon Fellowship|website=sassoonfellowship.org|access-date=10 March 2017|archive-date=10 June 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170610100735/http://www.sassoonfellowship.org/|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Sassoon's [[Military Cross]] was rediscovered by his family in May 2007 and was put up for sale.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/glasgow_and_west/6695329.stm|title=War poet's medal to go on display|date=26 May 2007|website=BBC News: Scotland|access-date=17 March 2017}}</ref> It was bought by the [[Royal Welch Fusiliers]] for display at their museum in [[Caernarfon]].<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/military/story/0,,2076260,00.html|access-date=10 May 2007|work=The Guardian |title=War poet's medal turns up in attic | location=London | first=Duncan | last=Campbell | date=10 May 2007}}</ref> Sassoon's other service medals went unclaimed until 1985 when his son George obtained them from the Army Medal Office, then based at Droitwich. The "late claim" medals consisting of the [[1914–15 Star]], [[Victory Medal (United Kingdom)|Victory Medal]] and [[British War Medal]] along with Sassoon's [[Commander of the Order of the British Empire|CBE]] and Warrant of Appointment were auctioned by [[Sotheby's]] in 2008.<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.sothebys.com/en/catalogues/ecatalogue.html/2008/english-literature-history-children39s-books-and-illustrationsl08411#/r=/en/ecat.fhtml.L08411.html+r.m=/en/ecat.lot.L08411.html/123/+r.o=/en/ecat.notes.L08411.html/123/|title=Auction of medals|access-date=24 October 2015|archive-date=19 November 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161119115952/http://www.sothebys.com/en/catalogues/ecatalogue.html/2008/english-literature-history-children39s-books-and-illustrationsl08411#/r=/en/ecat.fhtml.L08411.html+r.m=/en/ecat.lot.L08411.html/123/+r.o=/en/ecat.notes.L08411.html/123/|url-status=dead}}</ref>

In June 2009, the University of Cambridge announced plans to purchase an archive of Sassoon's papers from his family, to be added to the university library's Sassoon collection.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/news/dp/2009062501| title = University of Cambridge news}}</ref> On 4 November 2009, it was reported that this purchase would be supported by £550,000 from the [[National Heritage Memorial Fund]], meaning that the University still needed to raise a further £110,000 on top of the money already received to meet the full £1.25&nbsp;million asking price.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/nov/04/siegfried-sassoon-archive-award-cambridge|title=Siegfried Sassoon archive likely to stay in UK after £550,000 award•Siegfried Sassoon papers attracted interest from US•Cambridge library still short of asking price|first=Mark|last=Brown|work=The Guardian |date=4 November 2009|access-date=4 November 2009 | location=London}}</ref>

The funds were raised and in December 2009 it was announced that the University had received the papers. Included in the collection are war diaries kept by Sassoon while he served on the [[Western Front (World War I)|Western Front]] and in Palestine, a draft of "[[s:Finished with the War: A Soldier's Declaration|A Soldier's Declaration]]" (1917), notebooks from his schooldays and post-war journals.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE5BH00F20091218?type=artsNews|title=Cambridge acquires anti-war poet Sassoon's papers|first=Mike|last=Collett-White|date=17 December 2009|access-date=31 December 2009}}</ref>

Other items in the collection include love letters to his wife Hester and photographs and letters from other writers. Sassoon was an undergraduate at the university, as well as being made an honorary fellow of Clare College; the collection is housed at the Cambridge University Library.<ref>{{cite web|title=Sassoon Journals|url=http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/sassoon|publisher=Cambridge Digital Library|access-date=1 August 2014}}</ref> As well as private individuals, funding came from the Monument Trust, the JP Getty Jr Trust and Sir [[Siegmund Warburg]]'s Voluntary Settlement.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cambridgeshire/8418787.stm|title=War poet Siegfried Sassoon's papers arrive in Cambridge|publisher=BBC News|date=17 December 2009|access-date=31 December 2009}}</ref>

In 2010, ''Dream Voices: Siegfried Sassoon, Memory and War'', a major exhibition of Sassoon's life and archive, was held at Cambridge University.<ref>[https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/jul/21/sassoon-notebook-exhibition-cambridge Siegfried Sassoon archive goes on show at Cambridge] Maev Kennedy, ''The Guardian'', Wednesday, 21 July 2010.</ref> Several of Sassoon's poems have been set to music, some during his life, by [[Cyril Rootham]], who co-operated with the author.<ref>{{cite web|title=Music|url=http://siegfried-sassoon.firstworldwarrelics.co.uk/html/music.html|website=Siegfried Sassoon Bibliography|access-date=14 March 2018|archive-date=14 March 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180314174953/http://siegfried-sassoon.firstworldwarrelics.co.uk/html/music.html|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Set to music|url=https://sassoon.blog.lib.cam.ac.uk/?cat=70|work=Sassoon Project blog|publisher=[[Cambridge University Library]]|access-date=19 January 2013|author=John|date=October 2010|archive-date=9 January 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150109070530/https://sassoon.blog.lib.cam.ac.uk/?cat=70|url-status=dead}}</ref>

The discovery in 2013 of an early draft of one of Sassoon's best-known anti-war poems had a biographer saying she would rewrite portions of her work about the poet. In the poem "Atrocities", which concerned the killing of German prisoners of war by Allied troops, the early draft shows that some lines were cut and others diluted. The poet's publisher was nervous about publishing the poem and held it for publication in an expurgated version at a later date. Sassoon biographer [[Jean Moorcroft Wilson]] said "This is very exciting material. I want to rewrite my biography and I probably shall be able to get some of it in. It's a treasure trove".<ref>{{cite news|last=Alberge|first=Dalya|title=Draft Siegfried Sassoon poem reveals controversial lines cut from Atrocities: Manuscript shows World War I poet toned down piece about British soldiers killing German prisoners|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/feb/03/siegfried-sassoon-poem-atrocities|newspaper=The Observer|date=2 February 2013}}</ref> In early 2019, it was announced in ''The Guardian'' that a student from the University of Warwick, whilst looking through Glen Byam Shaw's records at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, had serendipitously discovered a Sassoon poem addressed to the former, which had not been published in its entirety.<ref>{{cite news|last=Alberge|first=Dalya|title=Student discovers lost Siegfried Sassoon poem to young lover|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jun/09/student-discovers-new-siegfried-sassoon-love-poem|newspaper=[[The Observer]]|date=10 June 2019|access-date=5 November 2019}}</ref>