The Myth of the Blitz

The Myth of the Blitz PDF Author: Angus Calder
Publisher: Jonathan Cape
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 348

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Book Description
During World War II, there seemed to be a gap between the reality and what could be called the "myth of the Blitz". The author shows that this myth was not purely propaganda but was a deep-rooted, common conception of pastoral England and the perfect gentleman.

The Myth Of The Blitz

The Myth Of The Blitz PDF Author: Angus Calder
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1448104041
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 318

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Book Description
The Myth of the Blitz was nurtured at every level of society. It rested upon the assumed invincibility of an island race distinguished by good humour, understatement and the ability to pluck victory from the jaws of defeat by team work, improvisation and muddling through. In fact, in many ways, the Blitz was not like that. Sixty-thousand people were conscientious objectors; a quarter of London's population fled to the country; Churchill and the royal family were booed while touring the aftermath of air-raids; Britain was not bombed into classless democracy. Angus Calder provides a compelling examination of the events of 1940 and 1941 - when Britain 'stood alone' against the Luftwaffe - and of the Myth which sustained her 'finest hour'.

The Myth of the Blitz

The Myth of the Blitz PDF Author: Angus Calder
Publisher: Jonathan Cape
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 348

Get Book Here

Book Description
During World War II, there seemed to be a gap between the reality and what could be called the "myth of the Blitz". The author shows that this myth was not purely propaganda but was a deep-rooted, common conception of pastoral England and the perfect gentleman.

Media, Myth and Terrorism

Media, Myth and Terrorism PDF Author: D. Kelsey
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137410698
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 199

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Book Description
Media, Myth and Terrorism is a rigorous case study of Blitz mythology in British newspaper responses to the July 7th bombings. Considering how the press, politicians and the public were caught up in popular accounts of Britain's past, Kelsey explores the ideological battleground that took place in the weeks following the bombings.

The Splendid and the Vile

The Splendid and the Vile PDF Author: Erik Larson
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 038534872X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 609

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Book Description
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The author of The Devil in the White City and Dead Wake delivers an intimate chronicle of Winston Churchill and London during the Blitz—an inspiring portrait of courage and leadership in a time of unprecedented crisis “One of [Erik Larson’s] best books yet . . . perfectly timed for the moment.”—Time • “A bravura performance by one of America’s greatest storytellers.”—NPR NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • Time • Vogue • NPR • The Washington Post • Chicago Tribune • The Globe & Mail • Fortune • Bloomberg • New York Post • The New York Public Library • Kirkus Reviews • LibraryReads • PopMatters On Winston Churchill’s first day as prime minister, Adolf Hitler invaded Holland and Belgium. Poland and Czechoslovakia had already fallen, and the Dunkirk evacuation was just two weeks away. For the next twelve months, Hitler would wage a relentless bombing campaign, killing 45,000 Britons. It was up to Churchill to hold his country together and persuade President Franklin Roosevelt that Britain was a worthy ally—and willing to fight to the end. In The Splendid and the Vile, Erik Larson shows, in cinematic detail, how Churchill taught the British people “the art of being fearless.” It is a story of political brinkmanship, but it’s also an intimate domestic drama, set against the backdrop of Churchill’s prime-ministerial country home, Chequers; his wartime retreat, Ditchley, where he and his entourage go when the moon is brightest and the bombing threat is highest; and of course 10 Downing Street in London. Drawing on diaries, original archival documents, and once-secret intelligence reports—some released only recently—Larson provides a new lens on London’s darkest year through the day-to-day experience of Churchill and his family: his wife, Clementine; their youngest daughter, Mary, who chafes against her parents’ wartime protectiveness; their son, Randolph, and his beautiful, unhappy wife, Pamela; Pamela’s illicit lover, a dashing American emissary; and the advisers in Churchill’s “Secret Circle,” to whom he turns in the hardest moments. The Splendid and the Vile takes readers out of today’s political dysfunction and back to a time of true leadership, when, in the face of unrelenting horror, Churchill’s eloquence, courage, and perseverance bound a country, and a family, together.

The Blitz and its Legacy

The Blitz and its Legacy PDF Author: Peter J. Larkham
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351893890
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 434

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Book Description
Triggered in part by contemporary experiences in the Balkans, the Middle East and elsewhere, there has been a rise in interest in the blitz and the subsequent reconstruction of cities, especially as many of the buildings and areas rebuilt after the Second World War are now facing demolition and reconstruction in their turn. Drawing together leading scholars and new researchers from across the fields of planning, history, architecture and geography, this volume presents an historical and cultural commentary on the immediate and longer-term impacts of wartime destruction. The book's contents in 14 chapters cover the spread of themes from experiencing the war to reconstruction and its experiences; and although many chapters draw upon the UK experience, there is deliberate inclusion of some material from mainland Europe and Japan to emphasise that the experiences, processes and products are not London-specific. A comparative book tracing destruction to reconstruction is a relative rarity, and yet of the utmost importance in possessing wider relevance to post-disaster reconstructions. The Blitz and Its Legacy is a fascinating volume which includes war experiences of destruction, architecture, urban design, the political process of planning and reconstruction, and also popular perceptions of rebuilding. Its findings provide very timely lessons which highlight the value of learning from historical precedent.

The People's War

The People's War PDF Author: Angus Calder
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 144810310X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 658

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Book Description
The Second World War was, for Britain, a 'total war'; no section of society remained untouched by military conscription, air raids, the shipping crisis and the war economy. In this comprehensive and engrossing narrative Angus Calder presents not only the great events and leading figures but also the oddities and banalities of daily life on the Home Front, and in particular the parts played by ordinary people: air raid wardens and Home Guards, factory workers and farmers, housewives and pacifists. Above all this revisionist and important work reveals how, in those six years, the British people came closer to discarding their social conventions than at any time since Cromwell's republic. Winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys prize in 1970, The People’s War draws on oral testimony and a mass of neglected social documentation to question the popularised image of national unity in the fight for victory.

1940

1940 PDF Author: Clive Ponting
Publisher: Ivan R. Dee Publisher
ISBN: 9781566630368
Category : Great Britain
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
It was the year of the glorious Battle of Britain, of the heroic evacuation of Dunkirk. It was the time when the mighty British empire declared its intention to fight the Nazis-alone if necessary-to the bitter end. It was, as Churchill dubbed it, Britain's "Finest Hour." In 1940: Myth and Reality, Clive Ponting reveals that it was nothing of the sort. Britain was broke in 1940 and utterly dependent on the United States for economic aid. The government fabricated German casualty figures after the Battle of Britain, suppressed knowledge of the complete fiasco that led to Dunkirk, and actually tried secretly to sue for peace that year. The British people were at best grimly resigned to the war; at worst they suffered appalling privations. Without denigrating the heroism of individuals, Mr. Ponting offers a startling account of the ineptitude and propaganda that marked much of 1940: Britain's stormy relations with France, its bizarre attempts to force a united Ireland, and the unpopularity of Winston Churchill. While he made rousing speeches in the House of Commons, Churchill rarely broadcast to the nation: his stirring "we shall fight on the beaches" speech was in fact broadcast by the actor who played Larry the Lamb on Children's Hour.

Writing the 'People's War'

Writing the 'People's War' PDF Author: Lola Serraf
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
En la memoria popular de los británicos, el Blitz se recuerda como un periodo de la guerra durante el cual la moral de los civiles se mantuvo alta, las producciones del país se vieron poco afectadas por los bombardeos y la voluntad de vencer a los Nazis permaneció más fuerte que nunca en una sociedad fraternal, sin jerarquía social. La «guerra del pueblo» convirtió a los civiles en héroes extraordinarios en su rutina ordinaria, mientras ese nuevo tipo de «guerra total» se libraba tanto en las primeras líneas como en el «frente interno». Sin embargo, desde fines de los años 1980, varios historiadores han empezado a cuestionar esa versión idealizada del coraje invencible del pueblo británico. En The Myth of the Blitz, Angus Calder escribe que la imagen de una nación unida en la adversidad y resistiendo las dificultades fue casi exclusivamente construida por la propaganda política de los años 1940. Considera necesario cuestionar la memoria colectiva del evento del Blitz, explicando que se ha ignorado lo aterrador y confuso que fueron los bombardeos (1991, p. 18). Esta tesis sale del capítulo «Formulations of Feeling» en el libro de Calder, en el cual se le da poco crédito a la capacidad de los escritores de la segunda guerra mundial de ver más allá de la propaganda del gobierno británico. El historiador sugiere que la literatura del conflicto ofrece poco material para entender cómo fue realmente la experiencia individual durante los bombardeos, ya que pocos autores trabajan fuera del paradigma del «Mito» (1991, pp. 143-144). Aunque sea verdad que la literatura fue reclutada dentro del esfuerzo de guerra por un gobierno que la recogía como un principio democrático (Hartley, 1997, pp. 6-7), me parecen reductivos e incompletos los argumentos de Angus Calder y Mark Rawlinson según los cuales los escritos de la guerra eran fuertemente determinados por su relación con los discursos oficiales de las autoridades británicas (Rawlinson, 2000, p. 205). Sostengo que es imprudente considerar que autores de la guerra no podían reflexionar críticamente sobre la sociedad y solamente crearon obras que participaban en la defensa de los objetivos del gobierno. Esta tesis es entonces uno de los primeros trabajos de recerca que se basa en el marco teórico del «Mito del Blitz» de Angus Calder para analizar obras poco conocidas, escritas por mujeres en los años 1940. En su análisis, Calder deconstruye el 'mito' confrontándolo con datos históricos. En este trabajo, sigo la misma metodología, comparando aspectos específicos de la retórica de la «guerra del pueblo» con la producción literaria de escritoras. He destacado tres aspectos principios del estudio de Calder que considero cruciales en su definición del «Blitz spirit»: las «clases socioeconómicas», el «patriotismo» y, más abstracto, la «representación del cuerpo herido». Reflexiono sobre esos temas en los tres capítulos de ese trabajo, centrándome en tres textos diferentes en cada uno de ellos. A través del análisis de los nueve textos elegidos, mi objetivo es echar luz sobre autoras olvidadas que produjeron obras que nos presentan una visión de la guerra que contesta, y hasta cuestiona, el contexto de propaganda política en el cual fueron escritas. Mi propósito principal es ayudar a colocar escritoras femeninas en una categoría de autores de la guerra talentosos y reconocidos, destacando su capacidad de mantener su individualidad y su habilidad de criticar y opinar, incluso estando rodeadas por la convincente y efectiva propaganda de Churchill.

Remembering the Second World War

Remembering the Second World War PDF Author: Rune Marcus Ryberg Poulsen
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description


Media, Myth and Terrorism

Media, Myth and Terrorism PDF Author: D. Kelsey
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137410698
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
Media, Myth and Terrorism is a rigorous case study of Blitz mythology in British newspaper responses to the July 7th bombings. Considering how the press, politicians and the public were caught up in popular accounts of Britain's past, Kelsey explores the ideological battleground that took place in the weeks following the bombings.