World War One in Other Words

You’ve been reading my posts about the First World War so let’s turn now to the words of others. The following is a list of books written about WW1, recommended by The Culbert Family History blog. All summaries are written by the publishers. Check to see if a bookstore near you or your local library carries these titles.

Canada’s Great War Album
By Canada’s National History Society
Toronto: HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd., ©2014. 

Published to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War, Canada's Great War Album is an unprecedented and remarkable collection of Canadian photographs, memorabilia, and stories of the war. Two years ago, Canada's History Society invited Canadians to tell their family stories from the First World War. The response was overwhelming and assembled for the first time are their personal stories and photographs that together form a compelling and moving account of the war. Canada's Great War Album also includes contributions from Peter Mansbridge, Charlotte Gray, J.L. Granatstein, Christopher Moore, Jonathan Vance, and Tim Cook. In the spirit of the bestselling 100 Photos That Changed Canada, the war that changed Canada forever is reflected here in words and pictures.

Firing Lines: Three Canadian Women Write the First World War

By Debbie Marshall
Toronto, Ontario: Dundurn, 2017.

Europe: 1914–18. Mary MacLeod Moore, a writer for Saturday Night Magazine, covered the war’s impact on women, from the munitions factories to the kitchens of London’s tenements. Beatrice Nasmyth, a writer for the Vancouver Province, managed the successful wartime political campaign of Canadian Roberta MacAdams and attended the Versailles Peace Conference as Premier Arthur Sifton’s press secretary. Elizabeth Montizambert was in France during the war and witnessed the suffering of its people first-hand. She was often near the fighting, serving as a canteen worker and writing about her experiences for the Montreal Gazette.

The reportage from these three women presents an insightful, moving, funny, and compelling body of observations of a devastating conflict, from underrepresented points of view. Firing Lines is based on the letters, articles, and books they wrote, as well as the records of those who knew them. The book offers a fresh perspective on a war that touched nearly every Canadian family and changed our sense of ourselves as a nation.

The Secret History of Soldiers: How Canadians Survived the Great War

By Tim Cook
Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Allen Lane, an imprint of Penguin Canada Books, Inc., 2018.

There have been thousands of books on the Great War, but most have focused on commanders, battles, strategy, and tactics. Less attention has been paid to the daily lives of the combatants, how they endured the unimaginable conditions of industrial warfare: the rain of shells, bullets, and chemical agents. In The Secret History of Soldiers, Tim Cook, Canada’s foremost military historian, examines how those who survived trench warfare on the Western Front found entertainment, solace, relief, and distraction from the relentless slaughter.

These tales come from the soldiers themselves, mined from the letters, diaries, memoirs, and oral accounts of more than five hundred combatants. Rare examples of trench art, postcards, and even song sheets offer insight into a hidden society that was often irreverent, raunchy, and anti-authoritarian. Believing in supernatural stories was another way soldiers shielded themselves from the horror. While novels and poetry often depict the soldiers of the Great War as mere victims, this new history shows how the soldiers pushed back against the grim war, refusing to be broken in the mincing machine of the Western Front.

The violence of war is always present, but Cook reveals the gallows humour the soldiers employed to get through it. Over the years, both writers and historians have overlooked this aspect of the men’s lives. The fighting at the front was devastating, but behind the battle lines, another layer of life existed, one that included songs, skits, art, and soldier-produced newspapers.

With his trademark narrative abilities and an unerring eye for the telling human detail, Cook has created another landmark history of Canadian military life as he reveals the secrets of how soldiers survived the carnage of the Western Front.

The War That Ended Peace: The Road to 1914

By Margaret MacMillan
New York: Random House, 2014.

From the bestselling and award-winning author of Paris 1919 comes a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction, a fascinating portrait of Europe from 1900 up to the outbreak of World War I.

The century since the end of the Napoleonic wars had been the most peaceful era Europe had known since the fall of the Roman Empire. In the first years of the twentieth century, Europe believed it was marching to a golden, happy, and prosperous future. But instead, complex personalities and rivalries, colonialism and ethnic nationalisms, and shifting alliances helped to bring about the failure of the long peace and the outbreak of a war that transformed Europe and the world.
 
The War That Ended Peace brings vividly to life the military leaders, politicians, diplomats, bankers, and the extended, interrelated family of crowned heads across Europe who failed to stop the descent into war: in Germany, the mercurial Kaiser Wilhelm II and the chief of the German general staff, Von Moltke the Younger; in Austria-Hungary, Emperor Franz Joseph, a man who tried, through sheer hard work, to stave off the coming chaos in his empire; in Russia, Tsar Nicholas II and his wife; in Britain, King Edward VII, Prime Minister Herbert Asquith, and British admiral Jacky Fisher, the fierce advocate of naval reform who entered into the arms race with Germany that pushed the continent toward confrontation on land and sea.

There are the would-be peacemakers as well, among them prophets of the horrors of future wars whose warnings went unheeded: Alfred Nobel, who donated his fortune to the cause of international understanding, and Bertha von Suttner, a writer and activist who was the first woman awarded Nobel’s new Peace Prize. Here too we meet the urbane and cosmopolitan Count Harry Kessler, who noticed many of the early signs that something was stirring in Europe; the young Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty and a rising figure in British politics; Madame Caillaux, who shot a man who might have been a force for peace; and more. With indelible portraits, MacMillan shows how the fateful decisions of a few powerful people changed the course of history.

Taut, suspenseful, and impossible to put down, The War That Ended Peace is also a wise cautionary reminder of how wars happen in spite of the near-universal desire to keep the peace. Destined to become a classic in the tradition of Barbara Tuchman’s The Guns of August, The War That Ended Peace enriches our understanding of one of the defining periods and events of the twentieth century.

And finally, an illustrated book written for children age 8 and up...

In Flanders Fields: The Story of the Poem by John McCrae

By Linda Granfield and illustrated by Janet Wilson
Markham, ON: Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 2014. ©1995

In May 2015, "In Flanders Fields," one of the most popular poems ever written on the subject of war, marked 100 years since it was written. This special edition celebrates that emotional anniversary.

John McCrae's poem has been recited by many generations who have embraced and continue to cherish its underlying message of respect for the fallen, longing for peace and its call to action.

In this award-winning book, the lines of the celebrated poem are interwoven with fascinating information about the First World War (1914-1918) and details of daily life in the trenches in Europe. Also included are accounts of McCrae's experience in his field hospital and the circumstances that led to the writing of "In Flanders Fields."

• New introduction by noted historian Dr. Tim Cook of the Canadian War Museum.
• Vibrant new painting by Janet Wilson on the cover.
• Original text, maps, and evocative paintings of the acclaimed, now classic, 1995 edition.
• An invaluable reference for classroom studies of war and remembrance.
• A lasting gift for history buffs, veterans, and families determined never to forget the sacrifices of war.