As we approach the 100th anniversary of the end of the first world war, the bravery and heroism of the soldiers and the futility and stupidity of the Generals tactics in trench warfare have been told many times in fine plays and musicals such as RC Sheriff's "Journeys End", Joan Littlewood's "Oh what a lovely war" , Michael Murpugo's "War Horse" and Stephen Foulk's "Birdsong". All of them created revealing and emotional connections with the soldiers in the front line. Ian Hislop and Nick Newman have unearthed and tell the extraordinary true story of The Wipers Times produced by the soldiers on printing presses found near the front line in Ypres and occasionally written by the troops in the trenches .
While the play's appears to borrow elements from all the above plays in its settings, characters and its style , it does pay strong tribute to this remarkable tale and the unrecognised editors who put the paper together from 1916 to 1918 in Ypres and Amiens. The paper was made up of poems, stories , wry in-jokes and lampoons of the military hierarchy in a humorous tongue in cheek style that appealed to the troops and irritated some of the staff command. The style has continued in Hislop's own magazine Private Eye today.
