Vera Brittain's reputation centers on her achievements as an influential British feminist and pacifist and on her famous memoir of World War I, Testament of Youth: An Autobiographical Study of the Years 1900-1925. That work has never been out of print since first published in 1933, and its influence has been strengthened by a 1979 BBC television adaptation and new paperback editions. During her lifetime Brittain was also known internationally as a successful journalist, poet, public speaker, biographer, autobiographer, and novelist. Interest in her writings, personality, and relationships (notably her close friendship with Winifred Holtby) has grown steadily, especially among feminist critics, and the publication in 1995 of a noteworthy biography by her friend and literary executor Paul Berry with Mark Bostridge has now provided scholarship with an authoritative account of her life and achievements.

Vera Mary Brittain was born in Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire in the Midlands, on 29 December...