1939: A People's History of the Coming of WWII

A bestselling historian's chronicle of the dramatic months from the Munich Agreement to Hitler's invasion of Poland and the beginning of World War II. In the autumn of 1938, Europe believed in the promise of peace, but only a year later, the fateful decisions of just a few men had again led Europe to a massive world war. Still reeling from the ravages of the Great War, its people were desperate to rebuild their lives in a newly safe and stable era. Drawing on German and British contemporary diaries, memoirs, and newspapers as well as recorded interviews, 1939 is a narrative account of what the coming of the Second World War felt like to those who lived through it. Frederick Taylor, author of renowned histories of the Berlin Wall and the bombing of Dresden, highlights the day-to-day experiences of ordinary citizens as well as those who were at the height of power in Germany and Britain. Their voices lend an intimate flavour to this often-surprising account of the period and reveal a marked disconnect between government and people, for few people in either country wanted war. 1939: A People's History is also an interrogation of our capacity to go to war again. In today's Europe, an onset of uncertainty, a looming fear of radical populism and a revelatory schism are dangerously reminiscent of the perils of the autumn of 1938. "The Germans, despite all their feverish enthusiasm for Hitler's militaristic ambitions, were spiritually ill-prepared for war. The British, in contrast, had no martial enthusiasm but fatalistically accepted war's inevitability." - Gerard de Groot, The Times. 16 pages of black and white illustrations; 2 maps. 448 pages.