Books reviewed - Following lunatics The fantasies of Mussolini and Hitler
“We can only shake our heads”, one German general remarked, “at how all of us followed this lunatic..." We live in an age of
anniversary hype, but nothing has exposed our passion for commemoration more
acutely than the current effort to reiterate in one form or another the events
of the Second World War. While we are busy recalling the seventy-fifth
anniversaries of the war’s ending, there is a further wave lapping behind for
the eightieth. None of the four books reviewed here is strictly an anniversary
book, but they will add to the bulging shelves (or swollen websites) filled
with ever more studies on the war.
HITLER - Volker Ullrich
THE SECOND WORLD WARS - Victor Davis Hanson
MUSSOLINI’S WAR - John Gooch
BRITAIN’S WAR - Daniel Todman
Reviewed by Richard Overy
It is not difficult to
understand the enduring interest. The geopolitical structure of the globe was
transformed by the conflict, laying the foundation for the current
post-imperial age and the rise of Asia as a world player. It was also an
experience of intense drama, and as with the inexhaustible studies of a Shakespeare play,
historians continue to explore every angle of the tragedy, every subplot, every
major (even minor) character. The jaded reader might well ask “what more is
there to say”, but there is always more.
As the history has become globalized,
so the angles of vision change. The warring societies used to be spectators of
the predominantly military history of the conflict. Now they are centre-stage,
their mobilization, suffering and endurance reconfiguring the familiar story of
the war, as they have done for the history of the First World War... read more:
