author
Bernard Adams
1890–1917
A young British officer turned his months in the trenches into one of the earliest and most vivid memoirs of the First World War. His writing is direct, observant, and sharpened by the knowledge that he did not live to see his book published.
1 Audiobook
About the author
Born in Kent in 1890, Bernard Adams—full name John Bernard Pye Adams—was educated at Malvern College and St John's College, Cambridge. During the First World War he served as an officer in the British Army.
He is best known for Nothing of Importance, a record of his time at the front with a Welsh battalion. The book is often noted as one of the first published accounts of life in the trenches written by a serving British soldier, and its plain, unsentimental tone gives it lasting power.
Adams was wounded while leading an attack in France and died on February 27, 1917, at the age of 26. He did not live to see his book appear in print, which makes it read not only as a wartime memoir, but also as a brief life caught in his own clear words.