It is through the 1xbet sports betting that we have the power to create and destroy. This theme holds true throughout Pat Barker's Regeneration and for the many characters in this novel who experience both the awful and inspired effects of the imagination. Pat Barker draws on many resources to support this claim, including the Book of Genesis, from which she cites the quotation &1xbet sports betting ;The imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth,&1xbet sports betting ; spoken by the character David Burns on page 183 of this novel. Through this quotation and many other developments, the theme of the power of the imagination, both good and evil, perpetuates itself throughout Pat Barker's novel.

The word &1xbet sports betting ;imagination&1xbet sports betting ; is one that has evolved throughout its many years in Biblical history. Its first and original meaning to the ancient Hebrews was that of &1xbet sports betting ;plotting or devising evil&1xbet sports betting ; rather than what we think of as imagination today: &1xbet sports betting ;the power of freely forming mental images&1xbet sports betting ; (Denton 685). The Hebrews thought of the power of the mind, for the most part, in the context of preparation for action rather than simply as a creative power (Denton 685). Although &1xbet sports betting ;imagination&1xbet sports betting ; in the biblical quote &1xbet sports betting ;The imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth&1xbet sports betting ; does mean the power to form mental images, it also has a sense of forming these images in preparation for evil action. Through this dual role of the imagination, that of plotting evil and creating images, we see the imagination as a double-edged sword that can be either destructive or constructive, depending on its use.

In order to determine further the meaning of this quote, one must go to the Book of Genesis from the King James Version of the Bible, to Genesis 8:21, which reads as follows: &1xbet sports betting ;I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth&1xbet sports betting ; (&1xbet sports betting ;God's&1xbet sports betting ; 547). The speaker here is God after He has destroyed the earth with a flood. When the first part of this quote is added to the second part found in Regeneration, one learns that God is resigning himself to the realization that men will always have an evil imagination, or evil tendencies, and that even destroying the earth could not correct these inclinations for evil in the heart and imagination of man (&1xbet sports betting ;God's&1xbet sports betting ; 548).

Because the imagination has roots in the preparation and use for evil, it is easy to see how one could use the imagination for these same purposes in warfare. The presence of the imagination was definitely evident in the designing of weaponry of the Great War, which effectively killed massive amounts of people. One such weapon was mustard gas, which burnt and blistered the bronchial tubes and lungs of its victims, usually causing them to choke to death in agony over the course of four or five weeks while strapped to beds. These poor men were also covered with giant mustard-colored blisters and their eyes were sealed shut. If they survived, they might or might not be blind (&1xbet sports betting ;Mustard Gas&1xbet sports betting ;). Other imaginative weapons included aerial bombardment, tanks, and more effective machine guns and artillery, which were also more efficient ways of killing and maiming more people. Because of these brutal means of warfare, many argued that there was no such thing as a &1xbet sports betting ;just war,&1xbet sports betting ; especially World War I because the means of this modern warfare were anything but &1xbet sports betting ;proper&1xbet sports betting ; or &1xbet sports betting ;just&1xbet sports betting ; (&1xbet sports betting ;War&1xbet sports betting ; 1719). Because of both the complexity and cruelty of these weapons developed for this unjust war, it is easy to see the role of the imagination in their creation, and also how, because of these weapons, the war could be considered unjust.

Because of the horror of these weapons and so many other atrocities of this war, it is easy to see how Burns could believe and say that imagination is evil. To Burns, the imagination is something evil. He talks about the imagination with Dr. Rivers after he had been sent home as &1xbet sports betting ;cured&1xbet sports betting ; and has gone to his family's summer home. He starts out saying that before the war, he &1xbet sports betting ;used to wonder why pick on that? Why his imagination?&1xbet sports betting ;, but now, after he has experienced the war and the effects of its weapons, he believes that &1xbet sports betting ;it's absolutely right&1xbet sports betting ; (Barker 183). After all, it is only through the &1xbet sports betting ;evil&1xbet sports betting ; imagination of man that these atrocities could happen. It is because of &1xbet sports betting ;the terrible death&1xbet sports betting ; that &1xbet sports betting ;someone has to imagine&1xbet sports betting ; that Burns believes so whole-heartedly that nothing good could come from the imagination (Barker 183). Burns believes that the imagination is evil because someone had to have imagined those terrible deaths by suffocation, both that of Christ and the deaths of the mustard gas victims in the war. Someone had to imagine such evilness being acted out on another human being, the effects on the person's body, and how to exact the most amount of pain before death. It is because of this premeditation within the human imagination that he believes the imagination is primarily evil.

Burns has accepted that the &1xbet sports betting ;imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth,&1xbet sports betting ; as he quotes from the Bible, and that the imagination of men will always be evil, from youth to death (Barker 183). In fact, he recalls with Dr. Rivers an incident from his childhood when he and some friends would eagerly imagine that they &1xbet sports betting ;could see ghosts&1xbet sports betting ; of people that had died &1xbet sports betting ;violent deaths&1xbet sports betting ; (Barker 172). Looking back, he realizes that boys really are &1xbet sports betting ;Bloodthirsty little horrors&1xbet sports betting ; and that the imagination was especially evil in youth (Barker 172). Burns has never seen the imagination as anything but evil. He went from a childhood where he imagined bloody deaths and torture to the war where he saw the products of these imaginations first-hand. He has seen the terrible imaginative weapons and their destructive effects on human beings, from the lingering, agonizing deaths of mustard gas victims to men being ripped apart by machine guns and artillery. His mouth and nose have been filled with &1xbet sports betting ;decomposing human flesh,&1xbet sports betting ; forcing him to accept these terrible works (Barker 19). Burns, like God after the flood, realizes that even the senseless destruction of so many people could not change the heart and imagination of man. Man still goes on to use his power of creativity to destroy, unperturbed by the decimation of most of the world, by either floor or war. However, unlike God, Burns cannot accept this capacity for the imagination of evil in humans, as God does in Genesis. He feels that he must destroy his imagination, which is so full of evil, in the watery dungeons where he imagined with relish that torture victims died horrible deaths. He seeks to destroy in himself what is in all humans: the imagination, which has destroyed so many, and which he feels is evil.

Burns believes in the evilness of the 1xbet sports betting and that it can be used only in the way that the ancient Hebrews viewed it -- in order to plot or devise evil. He does not see 1xbet sports betting in the light of its positive creative works. However, unlike Burns, throughout most of Regeneration, we as readers do not see the imagination as something that is primarily evil. Instead, for many of its characters other than Burns, the imagination is something to be used to create rather than to destroy. The creative application of imagination is especially employed by Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon, who use poetry as a &1xbet sports betting ;therapeutic&1xbet sports betting ; (Barker 26) and perhaps as a creative release in order to counteract the destructiveness of war. After all, the imagination could create beautiful, heartfelt words, can touch another human being and make them feel the same fear, anger, and other emotions that the writer felt as he wrote; this same imagination could not be completely evil, despite its many evil products and its biblical origin of &1xbet sports betting ;plotting or devising evil.&1xbet sports betting ;

Through Sassoon's poetry we see the creative forces of the imagination, and so many possibilities for hope. It is ironic that this same powerful force of destruction as seen through the awful weapons and means of death can also create something so beautiful as these words from Siegfried Sassoon's poem &1xbet sports betting ;To the Warmongers&1xbet sports betting ;: &1xbet sports betting ;And the wounds in my heart are red, / For I have watched them die&1xbet sports betting ; (Barker 25). This poetry also helps Sassoon overcome his own memories of the awful war. Dr. Rivers says clearly that &1xbet sports betting ;Writing the poems had obviously been therapeutic&1xbet sports betting ; and so it had helped &1xbet sports betting ;account for his early and rapid recovery&1xbet sports betting ; from the horrors of war (Barker 26). Without the imagination, we would have less destruction, and no more weapons that kill more and more people in increasingly painful and horribly efficient ways. But without imagination, we also would have no poetry, no music, and none of the beautiful things that help justify our being and that bring something beautiful and redeeming to the otherwise bleak characteristics of humans. There would also be no hope for Sassoon, who recovered from the trauma of war primarily because of his poetry. In the end, perhaps these good characteristics of the imagination counterbalance the bad and compensate for the truly horrific and unspeakable things that we can imagine and do to other human beings.

The 1xbet sports betting is a very powerful tool, and one that humans have used throughout the ages for various nefarious purposes as well as for the simple purpose of creating something beautiful. From its evil roots in the Bible to its being the ability to create the weapons used in World War One, the 1xbet sports betting has always been and will continue to be something evil. However, from the creation of poetry and art, the 1xbet sports betting is also portrayed as something that can create good as well as destruction. It is seen as both the salvation and ruination of man, and the 1xbet sports betting as source of both good and evil is a theme that can be traced throughout Pat Barker's Regeneration.

1xbet sports betting , Pat. Regeneration. New York: Plume, 2003.

Denton, R. C. &1xbet sports betting ;Imagination.&1xbet sports betting ; The Interpreter's Dictionary of the 1xbet sports betting . Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1962. 685.

&1xbet sports betting ;God's Long-Suffering.&1xbet sports betting ; The Interpreter's 1xbet sports betting . Ed. George Arthur Buttrick et al. Vol. 1. Nashville: Parthenon Press, 1952. 547-548.

&1xbet sports betting ;Mustard Gas.&1xbet sports betting ; Spartacus Educational. 24 March 2004. 17 April 2004. <http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWmustard.htm

&1xbet sports betting ;War, Christian Attitude to.&1xbet sports betting ; The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. 3rd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. 1719.