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A War Imagined
A War Imagined
Oct 21, 2024 9:29 PM

Author:Samuel Hynes

A War Imagined

Between the opulent Edwardian years and the 1920s the First World War opens like a gap in time. England after the war was a different place; the arts were different; history was different; sex, society, class were all different.

Samuel Hynes examines the process of that transformation. He explores a vast cultural mosaic comprising novels and poetry, music and theatre, journalism, paintings, films, parliamentary debates, public monuments, sartorial fashions, personal diaries and letters.

Told in rich detail, this penetrating account shatters much of the received wisdom about the First World War. It shows how English culture adapted itself to the needs of killing, how our stereotypes of the war gradually took shape and how the nations thought and imagination were profoundly and irretrievably changed.

Reviews

It is cultural history of a sweeping order... which can be savoured for its profusion of exhibits as well as for its ambitious thesis... A teeming book full of learning and humanity.

—— C. J. Fox , Independent

Makes tremendous sense... The wholly coherent effect of Hynes's study is all the more notable for the disintegrated nature of his material... A greatly rewarding study of how culture was dumbfounded.

—— Mick Imlah , The Times Literary Supplement

A definitively brilliant history of the whole story

—— A.N. Wilson , Evening Standard

Keenan has acheived razor-sharp recall of seminal incidents in a childhood that was extraordinarily insightful. Searingly honest. Eloquent

—— Herald

What distinguishes this account is the writing

—— Tom O'Sullivan , Financial Times

His story...is affectionally recalled from darkness to light

—— Iain Finlayson , The Times

Fascinating book

—— Kathryn Hughes , Mail on Sunday

Skilfully evokes the dread that corsairs aroused

—— Ludovic Hunter-Tilney , Financial Times

Tinniswood's artful blend of narrative and analysis brings the pirates' society to life. Beneath the vivid surface of this book there lie, sometimes obscured by the vividness, the careful investigation and astute judgement of one of the most incisive of our popular historians.

—— Blair Worden , Spectator

North African pirates were the scourge of the 17th century, and plundered as far as Cornwall. Tinniswood tells their story with verve

—— Keith Lowe , Telegraph

The author's style is an absolute joy and his stories of attacks, based in eyewitness accounts, make rather more thrilling than many fictional thrillers are... He also proves an even-handed judge. While there's no attempt to whitewash the privateers here, there are explanations of what caused men to turn their hand to conquering the seas.

—— Robert James , The Book Bag

This well-researched history of piracy presents brutal seafaring extortionists instead of eye-patched rascals.

—— Benjamin Evans , Telegraph Seven Magazine

Tinniswood unearths colourful characters and historical oddities while pointing out that the West's inability to deal with Somali pirates show how little we've learned in 400 years

—— Herald

Meticulously researched history of unrestrained murder, robbery and kidnapping on the high seas... This is a brisk, entertaining story, with royal proclamations, letters, maps and lavishness illuminating Tinniswood's vivid tales.

—— Lorraine Courtney , Irish Times

[He] has unearthed many colourful characters and historical oddities and uses eyewitness accounts to weave a fascinating tale

—— Chard & Ilminster News

An astounding story of bitter civil warfare that raged across many countries for decades. Butterworth's passionate account of the anarchist movements born in the late 19th century describes a conflict that spawned its own "war on terror"

—— Steve Burniston , Guardian
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