Eric Dorn Brose
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195143355
- eISBN:
- 9780199872015
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195143355.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter shows that Germany reaped a bitter harvest in August and September 1914. The bold notion of winning the opening campaign quickly by a powerful out-flanking stroke through Belgium had had ...
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This chapter shows that Germany reaped a bitter harvest in August and September 1914. The bold notion of winning the opening campaign quickly by a powerful out-flanking stroke through Belgium had had a desperate quality ever since Schlieffen conceived it. The tradeoff for provoking Belgium and England, however, was a superiority of numbers in one region of the western front. Indeed, it was in Belgium that Moltke probably missed his best chance of “rolling the iron dice” and winning.Less
This chapter shows that Germany reaped a bitter harvest in August and September 1914. The bold notion of winning the opening campaign quickly by a powerful out-flanking stroke through Belgium had had a desperate quality ever since Schlieffen conceived it. The tradeoff for provoking Belgium and England, however, was a superiority of numbers in one region of the western front. Indeed, it was in Belgium that Moltke probably missed his best chance of “rolling the iron dice” and winning.
Barry Eichengreen
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195101133
- eISBN:
- 9780199869626
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195101138.001.0001
- Subject:
- Economics and Finance, Economic History
The gold standard and the Great Depression might appear to be two very different topics requiring two entirely separate books, and the attempt to combine them here reflects Barry Eichengreen's ...
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The gold standard and the Great Depression might appear to be two very different topics requiring two entirely separate books, and the attempt to combine them here reflects Barry Eichengreen's conviction that the gold standard is the key to understanding the Depression. The gold standard of the 1920s set the stage for the Depression of the 1930s by heightening the fragility of the international financial system, and was the mechanism that transmitted the destabilizing impulse from the USA to the rest of the world and magnified that initial destabilizing shock; it was the principal obstacle to offsetting action, and the binding constraint preventing policymakers from averting the failure of banks and containing the spread of financial panic. For all these reasons, the international gold standard was a central factor in the worldwide Depression; recovery proved possible, for these same reasons, only after abandoning the gold standard. The gold standard also existed in the nineteenth century, of course, without exercising such debilitating effects – the explanation for the contrast lies in the disintegration during and after World War I of the political and economic foundations of the prewar gold standard system. The dual bases for the prewar system were the credibility of the official commitment to gold and international cooperation: the credibility induced financial capital to flow in stabilizing directions, buttressing economic stability; the cooperation signaled that support for the gold standard in times of crisis transcended the resources any one country could bring to bear. Both were eroded by the economic and political consequences of the Great War, and the decline in credibility rendered cooperation all the more vital – when it was not forthcoming, economic crisis was inevitable. The decline in both credibility and cooperation during and after World War I reflected a complex confluence of domestic and international political changes, and economic and intellectual changes. This book attempts to fit all these elements together into a coherent portrait of economic policy and performance between the wars. The goal is to show how the policies pursued, in conjunction with economic imbalances created by World War I, gave rise to the catastrophe that was the Great Depression. The argument is that the gold standard fundamentally constrained economic policies, and that it was largely responsible for creating the unstable economic environment on which the policies acted.Less
The gold standard and the Great Depression might appear to be two very different topics requiring two entirely separate books, and the attempt to combine them here reflects Barry Eichengreen's conviction that the gold standard is the key to understanding the Depression. The gold standard of the 1920s set the stage for the Depression of the 1930s by heightening the fragility of the international financial system, and was the mechanism that transmitted the destabilizing impulse from the USA to the rest of the world and magnified that initial destabilizing shock; it was the principal obstacle to offsetting action, and the binding constraint preventing policymakers from averting the failure of banks and containing the spread of financial panic. For all these reasons, the international gold standard was a central factor in the worldwide Depression; recovery proved possible, for these same reasons, only after abandoning the gold standard. The gold standard also existed in the nineteenth century, of course, without exercising such debilitating effects – the explanation for the contrast lies in the disintegration during and after World War I of the political and economic foundations of the prewar gold standard system. The dual bases for the prewar system were the credibility of the official commitment to gold and international cooperation: the credibility induced financial capital to flow in stabilizing directions, buttressing economic stability; the cooperation signaled that support for the gold standard in times of crisis transcended the resources any one country could bring to bear. Both were eroded by the economic and political consequences of the Great War, and the decline in credibility rendered cooperation all the more vital – when it was not forthcoming, economic crisis was inevitable. The decline in both credibility and cooperation during and after World War I reflected a complex confluence of domestic and international political changes, and economic and intellectual changes. This book attempts to fit all these elements together into a coherent portrait of economic policy and performance between the wars. The goal is to show how the policies pursued, in conjunction with economic imbalances created by World War I, gave rise to the catastrophe that was the Great Depression. The argument is that the gold standard fundamentally constrained economic policies, and that it was largely responsible for creating the unstable economic environment on which the policies acted.
Neville Wylie
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199547593
- eISBN:
- 9780191720581
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199547593.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter charts the evolution of the western European prisoner of war ‘regime’. It shows how Britain's experience of captivity during the Great War contributed to the development of a ...
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This chapter charts the evolution of the western European prisoner of war ‘regime’. It shows how Britain's experience of captivity during the Great War contributed to the development of a distinctively benign view on the issue of captivity, both within military and government circles and within society at large. It examines the part played by the United Kingdom government in drafting the 1929 Geneva Convention for POWs, and shows how closely the resultant POW regime reflected British interests and experience.Less
This chapter charts the evolution of the western European prisoner of war ‘regime’. It shows how Britain's experience of captivity during the Great War contributed to the development of a distinctively benign view on the issue of captivity, both within military and government circles and within society at large. It examines the part played by the United Kingdom government in drafting the 1929 Geneva Convention for POWs, and shows how closely the resultant POW regime reflected British interests and experience.
Eric Dorn Brose
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195143355
- eISBN:
- 9780199872015
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195143355.003.0010
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter shows that the failure of the German Army to defeat France in 1914 allowed the nightmarish scenario of prewar games and exercises to come true: a long slugging match on two fronts. The ...
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This chapter shows that the failure of the German Army to defeat France in 1914 allowed the nightmarish scenario of prewar games and exercises to come true: a long slugging match on two fronts. The great victory over the Russians at Tannenberg could not prevent this. Faced with an intensifying, widening, and deadlocked war, Germany invested heavily in weapons that had proven themselves since August 1914 or in new technologies that promised victory. Germany's prewar stock of 2,450 machine guns was impressively expanded to 8,000 in 1915. Monthly manufacturing totals rose from 200 to 600 that year, accelerating geometrically to 2,300 by mid-1916 as factories perfected methods of mass production.Less
This chapter shows that the failure of the German Army to defeat France in 1914 allowed the nightmarish scenario of prewar games and exercises to come true: a long slugging match on two fronts. The great victory over the Russians at Tannenberg could not prevent this. Faced with an intensifying, widening, and deadlocked war, Germany invested heavily in weapons that had proven themselves since August 1914 or in new technologies that promised victory. Germany's prewar stock of 2,450 machine guns was impressively expanded to 8,000 in 1915. Monthly manufacturing totals rose from 200 to 600 that year, accelerating geometrically to 2,300 by mid-1916 as factories perfected methods of mass production.
Vincent Sherry
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195178180
- eISBN:
- 9780199788002
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195178180.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
What basis did the Great War of 1914-1918 provide for the verbal inventiveness of “modernist” poetry and fiction? This book reopens this long unanswered question with a work of original historical ...
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What basis did the Great War of 1914-1918 provide for the verbal inventiveness of “modernist” poetry and fiction? This book reopens this long unanswered question with a work of original historical scholarship. It directs attention to the public culture of the English war. It reads the discourses through which the Liberal party constructed its Cause, its Great Campaign. A breakdown in the established language of liberal modernity—the idiom of Public Reason—marks the sizeable crisis this event represents in the mainstream traditions of post-Reformation Europe. Identifying it as such, the book outlines the occasion for momentous innovations in the work of Virginia Woolf, T. S. Eliot, and Ezra Pound. If modernist writing attempts characteristically to “talk back” to the standard values of Enlightenment rationalism, this book has recovered the cultural setting of its most substantial—and daring—opportunity. The literature that witnesses this exceptional moment in historical time regains its proper importance as the book retrieves the means of reading it accurately. In this book, the records of political journalism and popular intellectual culture combine with abundant visual illustration to provide the framework for groundbreaking engagements with the major texts of Woolf, Eliot, and Pound. The book relocates the verbal imagination of modernism in the context of the English war and, by restoring the historical content and depth of this literature, reveals its most daunting import.Less
What basis did the Great War of 1914-1918 provide for the verbal inventiveness of “modernist” poetry and fiction? This book reopens this long unanswered question with a work of original historical scholarship. It directs attention to the public culture of the English war. It reads the discourses through which the Liberal party constructed its Cause, its Great Campaign. A breakdown in the established language of liberal modernity—the idiom of Public Reason—marks the sizeable crisis this event represents in the mainstream traditions of post-Reformation Europe. Identifying it as such, the book outlines the occasion for momentous innovations in the work of Virginia Woolf, T. S. Eliot, and Ezra Pound. If modernist writing attempts characteristically to “talk back” to the standard values of Enlightenment rationalism, this book has recovered the cultural setting of its most substantial—and daring—opportunity. The literature that witnesses this exceptional moment in historical time regains its proper importance as the book retrieves the means of reading it accurately. In this book, the records of political journalism and popular intellectual culture combine with abundant visual illustration to provide the framework for groundbreaking engagements with the major texts of Woolf, Eliot, and Pound. The book relocates the verbal imagination of modernism in the context of the English war and, by restoring the historical content and depth of this literature, reveals its most daunting import.
Priya Satia
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195331417
- eISBN:
- 9780199868070
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195331417.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Early Modern History
This book offers a cultural history of British intelligence–gathering in the Middle East in the era of World War One and its consequences in British literary and political culture and military and ...
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This book offers a cultural history of British intelligence–gathering in the Middle East in the era of World War One and its consequences in British literary and political culture and military and state practice. Culture mattered especially in this intelligence endeavor because of British agents' orientalist preconceptions of “Arabia” as an inscrutable, romantic space offering adventure and spiritualism. They developed an intelligence epistemology grounded in intuition, elevating as “experts” those claiming an innate “genius” for understanding the region, regardless of empirical knowledge. This intelligence culture assured the agents an unusual influence in the running of the Great War campaigns and postwar mandatory administrations in the region, notably in the British state's conspiracy fears and consequent design of a brutal air control regime for Iraq. The book argues that violence and culture were more closely allied in imperial rule than has been recognized, ironically, especially at a moment of popular anti–imperialism and increasing mass democracy. As the British public demanded control over foreign policy in the Middle East, the imperial state developed new means of keeping its affairs secret, developing a style of colonial rule that Priya Satia calls “covert empire,” in which airpower, intelligence agents, and propaganda were critical. As democratic oversight vanished, colonial violence reached a new pitch, with lasting consequences in the Middle East, British attitudes towards the state, and, and military tactics. The book offers a new understanding of the legacies of the Great War and of the British empire in the 20th century.Less
This book offers a cultural history of British intelligence–gathering in the Middle East in the era of World War One and its consequences in British literary and political culture and military and state practice. Culture mattered especially in this intelligence endeavor because of British agents' orientalist preconceptions of “Arabia” as an inscrutable, romantic space offering adventure and spiritualism. They developed an intelligence epistemology grounded in intuition, elevating as “experts” those claiming an innate “genius” for understanding the region, regardless of empirical knowledge. This intelligence culture assured the agents an unusual influence in the running of the Great War campaigns and postwar mandatory administrations in the region, notably in the British state's conspiracy fears and consequent design of a brutal air control regime for Iraq. The book argues that violence and culture were more closely allied in imperial rule than has been recognized, ironically, especially at a moment of popular anti–imperialism and increasing mass democracy. As the British public demanded control over foreign policy in the Middle East, the imperial state developed new means of keeping its affairs secret, developing a style of colonial rule that Priya Satia calls “covert empire,” in which airpower, intelligence agents, and propaganda were critical. As democratic oversight vanished, colonial violence reached a new pitch, with lasting consequences in the Middle East, British attitudes towards the state, and, and military tactics. The book offers a new understanding of the legacies of the Great War and of the British empire in the 20th century.
Austin Carson
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780691181769
- eISBN:
- 9780691184241
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691181769.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
This chapter describes the confluence of political, technological, and social changes that prompted the emergence of covert military intervention as an escalation-control technique. It lays the ...
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This chapter describes the confluence of political, technological, and social changes that prompted the emergence of covert military intervention as an escalation-control technique. It lays the foundation for assessing how more recent political and technological changes, such as cyberwarfare and drones, influence the covert sphere. In particular, this chapter highlights the special role of World War I. It conceptualizes the Great War as a critical juncture that dramatized the dangers of large-scale war escalation and accelerated political, social, and technological developments that influenced escalation control. These changes sharpened the problem of escalation control by making leaders more vulnerable to hawkish domestic constraints and making intentions about limited war harder to discern. Yet it also made possible new ways of using military force anonymously through, for example, the development of airpower. World War I prompted major powers to experiment with ways of limiting war; this included manipulation of the form of external military intervention.Less
This chapter describes the confluence of political, technological, and social changes that prompted the emergence of covert military intervention as an escalation-control technique. It lays the foundation for assessing how more recent political and technological changes, such as cyberwarfare and drones, influence the covert sphere. In particular, this chapter highlights the special role of World War I. It conceptualizes the Great War as a critical juncture that dramatized the dangers of large-scale war escalation and accelerated political, social, and technological developments that influenced escalation control. These changes sharpened the problem of escalation control by making leaders more vulnerable to hawkish domestic constraints and making intentions about limited war harder to discern. Yet it also made possible new ways of using military force anonymously through, for example, the development of airpower. World War I prompted major powers to experiment with ways of limiting war; this included manipulation of the form of external military intervention.
Richard Niland
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199580347
- eISBN:
- 9780191722738
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199580347.003.0005
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism, European Literature
This chapter looks at Conrad's writing during the Great War as his response to the conflict. It then turns its attention to Conrad's lifelong obsession with Napoleon Bonaparte, exploring Conrad's ...
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This chapter looks at Conrad's writing during the Great War as his response to the conflict. It then turns its attention to Conrad's lifelong obsession with Napoleon Bonaparte, exploring Conrad's representations of Napoleon throughout his career and culminating with his sustained effort to represent the Napoleonic era in his final works. The chapter places Conrad's interest in Napoleon in a French Romantic literary tradition, drawing comparisons between Conrad's work and that of Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas. The chapter argues that Conrad's view of Napoleon shifts in response to the First World War. The critical attitude to the French Emperor and his complex position in European and Polish culture seen in A Personal Record and ‘Autocracy and War’ is replaced with a more accepting view of Napoleonic greatness in The Rover and Suspense, one still treated, of course, with Conrad's characteristic scepticism.Less
This chapter looks at Conrad's writing during the Great War as his response to the conflict. It then turns its attention to Conrad's lifelong obsession with Napoleon Bonaparte, exploring Conrad's representations of Napoleon throughout his career and culminating with his sustained effort to represent the Napoleonic era in his final works. The chapter places Conrad's interest in Napoleon in a French Romantic literary tradition, drawing comparisons between Conrad's work and that of Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas. The chapter argues that Conrad's view of Napoleon shifts in response to the First World War. The critical attitude to the French Emperor and his complex position in European and Polish culture seen in A Personal Record and ‘Autocracy and War’ is replaced with a more accepting view of Napoleonic greatness in The Rover and Suspense, one still treated, of course, with Conrad's characteristic scepticism.
MARK CONNELLY
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199278602
- eISBN:
- 9780191707056
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199278602.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, Military History
This chapter focuses on the importance of internal cohesion in a battalion. During the course of the Great War, the East Kent Regiment along with the entire British army faced the huge task of trying ...
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This chapter focuses on the importance of internal cohesion in a battalion. During the course of the Great War, the East Kent Regiment along with the entire British army faced the huge task of trying to maintain internal cohesion in the most difficult circumstances. The flood of volunteers, later supplemented with conscripts, mostly lacked any type of military experience; they had to be moulded rapidly into efficient fighting units and made to understand and respect the ways of the army. However, the army was pragmatic enough to realise that it also had to change and modify its approach in order to maintain general harmony and effectiveness in a time of such unprecedented emergency. In addition, heavy casualties meant that battalions were rebuilt, sometimes almost from scratch, several times over. The medal rolls reveal that some 35,000 men passed through the Buffs during the course of the war. In these circumstances, the task of re-establishing an identity both survivors and fresh drafts could accept and rally round was a challenging one. Understanding how the regiment reacted to these conditions is vital to an overall analysis of its performance during the Great War.Less
This chapter focuses on the importance of internal cohesion in a battalion. During the course of the Great War, the East Kent Regiment along with the entire British army faced the huge task of trying to maintain internal cohesion in the most difficult circumstances. The flood of volunteers, later supplemented with conscripts, mostly lacked any type of military experience; they had to be moulded rapidly into efficient fighting units and made to understand and respect the ways of the army. However, the army was pragmatic enough to realise that it also had to change and modify its approach in order to maintain general harmony and effectiveness in a time of such unprecedented emergency. In addition, heavy casualties meant that battalions were rebuilt, sometimes almost from scratch, several times over. The medal rolls reveal that some 35,000 men passed through the Buffs during the course of the war. In these circumstances, the task of re-establishing an identity both survivors and fresh drafts could accept and rally round was a challenging one. Understanding how the regiment reacted to these conditions is vital to an overall analysis of its performance during the Great War.
Vincent Sherry
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195178180
- eISBN:
- 9780199788002
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195178180.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This chapter puts the Liberal support of the Great War in the context of 19th-century British Liberalism. This legacy places an exceptionally high degree of value on Reason, a priority that results ...
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This chapter puts the Liberal support of the Great War in the context of 19th-century British Liberalism. This legacy places an exceptionally high degree of value on Reason, a priority that results often in a reliance on verbal reason over factual evidence. This susceptibility is evidenced in the rhetoric of support for the war, which was at odds with the major tenets of Liberal policy, and so evinced a most strenuous exercise of sheer verbal rationalization. The language of “seeming reason” is followed across a wide body of writing in support of the war, ranging from the partisan press to scholarly articles and monographs. The prevalence of this new tone in national politics is established as the basis of a number of verbal initiatives in literary modernism, beginning with the critical work of I. A. Richards, whose signature doctrine of “pseudo-statement” answers specifically to the tone of the political times.Less
This chapter puts the Liberal support of the Great War in the context of 19th-century British Liberalism. This legacy places an exceptionally high degree of value on Reason, a priority that results often in a reliance on verbal reason over factual evidence. This susceptibility is evidenced in the rhetoric of support for the war, which was at odds with the major tenets of Liberal policy, and so evinced a most strenuous exercise of sheer verbal rationalization. The language of “seeming reason” is followed across a wide body of writing in support of the war, ranging from the partisan press to scholarly articles and monographs. The prevalence of this new tone in national politics is established as the basis of a number of verbal initiatives in literary modernism, beginning with the critical work of I. A. Richards, whose signature doctrine of “pseudo-statement” answers specifically to the tone of the political times.
Rebecca Mitchell
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780300208894
- eISBN:
- 9780300216493
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300208894.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, Russian and Former Soviet Union History
This chapter explores how questions of national identity and patriotism took center stage with the outbreak of war in 1914. For Nietzsche’s orphans, the cultural heritage upon which musical ...
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This chapter explores how questions of national identity and patriotism took center stage with the outbreak of war in 1914. For Nietzsche’s orphans, the cultural heritage upon which musical metaphysics was based became particularly problematic, leading to attempts to redefine contemporary German militarism as “Prussian” in contrast to the “German” values embodied in past cultural achievements. Russia’s salvific task in this “Holy War” (it was argued) was to save all humanity from the evils of “Prussianism”. The impact of growing exclusive nationalism is assessed in relation to all three composers, who failed to reunify society: Scriabin through his death in 1915; Rachmaninoff through his pessimistic outlook on events; and Medtner through his now unacceptable “German” identity.Less
This chapter explores how questions of national identity and patriotism took center stage with the outbreak of war in 1914. For Nietzsche’s orphans, the cultural heritage upon which musical metaphysics was based became particularly problematic, leading to attempts to redefine contemporary German militarism as “Prussian” in contrast to the “German” values embodied in past cultural achievements. Russia’s salvific task in this “Holy War” (it was argued) was to save all humanity from the evils of “Prussianism”. The impact of growing exclusive nationalism is assessed in relation to all three composers, who failed to reunify society: Scriabin through his death in 1915; Rachmaninoff through his pessimistic outlook on events; and Medtner through his now unacceptable “German” identity.
Alex Danchev
- Published in print:
- 1991
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198222996
- eISBN:
- 9780191678561
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198222996.003.0011
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Modern History, Military History
This chapter examines the trends in the 1960s related to the historiography of World War I. During this period, there were four disparate enterprises which conjoined to reanimate public interest in ...
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This chapter examines the trends in the 1960s related to the historiography of World War I. During this period, there were four disparate enterprises which conjoined to reanimate public interest in World War I. These include A. J. P. Taylor's television lectures about the war and his book The First World War, John Terraine's book The Great war, the epic 26-part television series The Great War which was first shown on BBC2 during the summer of 1964, and the Theatre Workshop's production of the play Oh! What a Lovely War.Less
This chapter examines the trends in the 1960s related to the historiography of World War I. During this period, there were four disparate enterprises which conjoined to reanimate public interest in World War I. These include A. J. P. Taylor's television lectures about the war and his book The First World War, John Terraine's book The Great war, the epic 26-part television series The Great War which was first shown on BBC2 during the summer of 1964, and the Theatre Workshop's production of the play Oh! What a Lovely War.
Eric Dorn Brose
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195143355
- eISBN:
- 9780199872015
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195143355.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter discusses the events leading to the Great War. When Russia refused to cancel its mobilization, Germany declared war on Russia and France. On 4 August, units of the German cavalry rode ...
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This chapter discusses the events leading to the Great War. When Russia refused to cancel its mobilization, Germany declared war on Russia and France. On 4 August, units of the German cavalry rode into Belgium. On the same day, England declared war on the violators of Belgian neutrality and Europe's conflagration had begun. Germany's long debate about war in the machine age had ended. The battlefield experience of high summer 1914 adjudicated all prewar disputes.Less
This chapter discusses the events leading to the Great War. When Russia refused to cancel its mobilization, Germany declared war on Russia and France. On 4 August, units of the German cavalry rode into Belgium. On the same day, England declared war on the violators of Belgian neutrality and Europe's conflagration had begun. Germany's long debate about war in the machine age had ended. The battlefield experience of high summer 1914 adjudicated all prewar disputes.
David Ellwood
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198228790
- eISBN:
- 9780191741739
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198228790.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History, American History: 20th Century
This chapter describes the way European élites became aware of the rising power of America following the Spanish–American war of 1898; shows how the British saw a chance to create a new Anglo-Saxon ...
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This chapter describes the way European élites became aware of the rising power of America following the Spanish–American war of 1898; shows how the British saw a chance to create a new Anglo-Saxon power, and their disappointments; highlights awareness that America as a great power was different, with a commercial, mass cultural and human dynamism — of personalities — which seemed likely to sweep the world, and could not leave Europe untouched; this chapter also presents the repertoire of reactions by politicians, philosophers, crowned heads, news media, Churches to the new presence in all its forms. In its second half, the chapter describes impact of America on the Great War: men, ideas, commerce, cinema, Wilson, suggesting the legacy which survived after Wilson's debacle in Paris.Less
This chapter describes the way European élites became aware of the rising power of America following the Spanish–American war of 1898; shows how the British saw a chance to create a new Anglo-Saxon power, and their disappointments; highlights awareness that America as a great power was different, with a commercial, mass cultural and human dynamism — of personalities — which seemed likely to sweep the world, and could not leave Europe untouched; this chapter also presents the repertoire of reactions by politicians, philosophers, crowned heads, news media, Churches to the new presence in all its forms. In its second half, the chapter describes impact of America on the Great War: men, ideas, commerce, cinema, Wilson, suggesting the legacy which survived after Wilson's debacle in Paris.
Vincent Sherry
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195178180
- eISBN:
- 9780199788002
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195178180.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
The Prologue presents the need for a historically informed reading of the modernist literature prompted by the Great War of 1914-1918. The prominence of Paul Fussell's The Great War and Modern Memory ...
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The Prologue presents the need for a historically informed reading of the modernist literature prompted by the Great War of 1914-1918. The prominence of Paul Fussell's The Great War and Modern Memory has allowed critical attention to be focused on the combat writing of the war. But the proper contemporary context for reading and understanding the modernist literature of the war, which was prompted by the civilian circumstances of urban London and the policy documents of the partisan Liberal press, has still to be reconstructed. This work of historical reconstruction and critical analysis is the major project of The Great War and the Language of Modernism.Less
The Prologue presents the need for a historically informed reading of the modernist literature prompted by the Great War of 1914-1918. The prominence of Paul Fussell's The Great War and Modern Memory has allowed critical attention to be focused on the combat writing of the war. But the proper contemporary context for reading and understanding the modernist literature of the war, which was prompted by the civilian circumstances of urban London and the policy documents of the partisan Liberal press, has still to be reconstructed. This work of historical reconstruction and critical analysis is the major project of The Great War and the Language of Modernism.
Jonathan Atkin
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719060700
- eISBN:
- 9781781700105
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719060700.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
The Great War still haunts us. This book draws together examples of the ‘aesthetic pacifism’ practised during the Great War by such celebrated individuals as Virginia Woolf, Siegfried Sassoon and ...
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The Great War still haunts us. This book draws together examples of the ‘aesthetic pacifism’ practised during the Great War by such celebrated individuals as Virginia Woolf, Siegfried Sassoon and Bertrand Russell. It also tells the stories of those less well known who shared the attitudes of the Bloomsbury Group when it came to facing the first ‘total war’. The five-year research for this study gathered evidence from all the major archives in Great Britain and abroad in order to paint a complete picture of this unique form of anti-war expression. The narrative begins with the Great War's effect on philosopher-pacifist Bertrand Russell and Cambridge University.Less
The Great War still haunts us. This book draws together examples of the ‘aesthetic pacifism’ practised during the Great War by such celebrated individuals as Virginia Woolf, Siegfried Sassoon and Bertrand Russell. It also tells the stories of those less well known who shared the attitudes of the Bloomsbury Group when it came to facing the first ‘total war’. The five-year research for this study gathered evidence from all the major archives in Great Britain and abroad in order to paint a complete picture of this unique form of anti-war expression. The narrative begins with the Great War's effect on philosopher-pacifist Bertrand Russell and Cambridge University.
Vincent Sherry
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195178180
- eISBN:
- 9780199788002
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195178180.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This chapter tracks Eliot's poetic development from his arrival in London in August 1914 until the publication of The Waste Land in 1922. The initial difficulties he experienced in composing poems ...
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This chapter tracks Eliot's poetic development from his arrival in London in August 1914 until the publication of The Waste Land in 1922. The initial difficulties he experienced in composing poems are attributed to the oppressive hegemony of Liberal rationalist language in the capital, which Eliot records in letters and reviews. The poet breaks the blockage by writing verse exercises in French, indulging the sheer acoustic of the foreign language, and manipulating the sense-making gestures of French in creative play. This breakthrough initiative is developed in the pseudo-logical prosody of the major quatrain poems of 1917-1919, “Sweeney among the Nightingales”, “Burbank with a Baedeker: Bleistein with a Cigar”, and “A Cooking Egg”, while the monologue of “Gerontion” exercises the new poetics in a vivid evocation of its founding historical context. The draft manuscripts and revisions of The Waste Land are discussed in relation to the same poetic principles.Less
This chapter tracks Eliot's poetic development from his arrival in London in August 1914 until the publication of The Waste Land in 1922. The initial difficulties he experienced in composing poems are attributed to the oppressive hegemony of Liberal rationalist language in the capital, which Eliot records in letters and reviews. The poet breaks the blockage by writing verse exercises in French, indulging the sheer acoustic of the foreign language, and manipulating the sense-making gestures of French in creative play. This breakthrough initiative is developed in the pseudo-logical prosody of the major quatrain poems of 1917-1919, “Sweeney among the Nightingales”, “Burbank with a Baedeker: Bleistein with a Cigar”, and “A Cooking Egg”, while the monologue of “Gerontion” exercises the new poetics in a vivid evocation of its founding historical context. The draft manuscripts and revisions of The Waste Land are discussed in relation to the same poetic principles.
Vincent Sherry
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195178180
- eISBN:
- 9780199788002
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195178180.003.0005
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This chapter situates Virginia Woolf's creative response to the Great War in the deep context of the English Liberalism she knew intimately through her father, Sir Leslie Stephen, who was a dean of ...
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This chapter situates Virginia Woolf's creative response to the Great War in the deep context of the English Liberalism she knew intimately through her father, Sir Leslie Stephen, who was a dean of high Victorian Liberal thought. Where the Liberal government travestied the language of rationalism in its defense of its war policy, Woolf found freedom from the Word of an oppressive patriarchy. Her major development shows in her masterful play with the gestures and postures of logical language. This countermeasure surfaces first in the short stories she wrote during and just after the war, most notably “The Mark on the Wall” and “Solid Objects”. The liberation she enjoyed is witnessed in the new verbal textures of her characteristically modernist novels, most notably Jacob's Room, Mrs. Dalloway, and To the Lighthouse, where her stylistic experiments are matched with probing accounts of the historical legacy of the war.Less
This chapter situates Virginia Woolf's creative response to the Great War in the deep context of the English Liberalism she knew intimately through her father, Sir Leslie Stephen, who was a dean of high Victorian Liberal thought. Where the Liberal government travestied the language of rationalism in its defense of its war policy, Woolf found freedom from the Word of an oppressive patriarchy. Her major development shows in her masterful play with the gestures and postures of logical language. This countermeasure surfaces first in the short stories she wrote during and just after the war, most notably “The Mark on the Wall” and “Solid Objects”. The liberation she enjoyed is witnessed in the new verbal textures of her characteristically modernist novels, most notably Jacob's Room, Mrs. Dalloway, and To the Lighthouse, where her stylistic experiments are matched with probing accounts of the historical legacy of the war.
Richard Niland
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199580347
- eISBN:
- 9780191722738
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199580347.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism, European Literature
This work examines the philosophy of history and the subject of the nation in the literature of Joseph Conrad. It explores the importance of nineteenth-century Polish Romantic philosophy in Conrad's ...
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This work examines the philosophy of history and the subject of the nation in the literature of Joseph Conrad. It explores the importance of nineteenth-century Polish Romantic philosophy in Conrad's literary development, arguing that the Polish response to Hegelian traditions of historiography in nineteenth-century Europe influenced Conrad's interpretation of history. After investigating Conrad's early career in the context of the philosophy of history, the book analyses Nostromo (1904), The Secret Agent (1907), and Under Western Eyes (1911) in light of Conrad's writing about Poland and his sustained interest in the subject of national identity. These novels treat the question of the nation and history, with Conrad juxtaposing his belief in an inherited Polish national identity, derived from Herder and Rousseau, with a sceptical questioning of modern nationalism in European and Latin American contexts. Nostromo presents the creation of the modern nation state of Sulaco; The Secret Agent explores the subject of ‘foreigners’ and nationality in England; while Under Western Eyes constitutes a systematic attempt to undermine Russian national identity. Conrad emerges as an author who examines critically the forces of nationalism and national identity that troubled Europe throughout the nineteenth century and in the period before the First World War. This leads to a consideration of Conrad's work during the Great War. In his fiction and newspaper articles, Conrad found a way of dealing with a conflict that made him acutely aware of being sidelined at a turning point in both modern Polish and modern European history. Finally, this book re-evaluates Conrad's late novels The Rover (1923) and Suspense (1925), a long-neglected part of his career, investigating Conrad's sustained treatment of French history in his last years alongside his life-long fascination with the cult of Napoleon Bonaparte.Less
This work examines the philosophy of history and the subject of the nation in the literature of Joseph Conrad. It explores the importance of nineteenth-century Polish Romantic philosophy in Conrad's literary development, arguing that the Polish response to Hegelian traditions of historiography in nineteenth-century Europe influenced Conrad's interpretation of history. After investigating Conrad's early career in the context of the philosophy of history, the book analyses Nostromo (1904), The Secret Agent (1907), and Under Western Eyes (1911) in light of Conrad's writing about Poland and his sustained interest in the subject of national identity. These novels treat the question of the nation and history, with Conrad juxtaposing his belief in an inherited Polish national identity, derived from Herder and Rousseau, with a sceptical questioning of modern nationalism in European and Latin American contexts. Nostromo presents the creation of the modern nation state of Sulaco; The Secret Agent explores the subject of ‘foreigners’ and nationality in England; while Under Western Eyes constitutes a systematic attempt to undermine Russian national identity. Conrad emerges as an author who examines critically the forces of nationalism and national identity that troubled Europe throughout the nineteenth century and in the period before the First World War. This leads to a consideration of Conrad's work during the Great War. In his fiction and newspaper articles, Conrad found a way of dealing with a conflict that made him acutely aware of being sidelined at a turning point in both modern Polish and modern European history. Finally, this book re-evaluates Conrad's late novels The Rover (1923) and Suspense (1925), a long-neglected part of his career, investigating Conrad's sustained treatment of French history in his last years alongside his life-long fascination with the cult of Napoleon Bonaparte.
Andrea Orzoff
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195367812
- eISBN:
- 9780199867592
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195367812.003.0002
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
Masaryk and Beneš fled the Czech lands in 1914 and worked abroad for the rest of the war, meeting with leaders and diplomats in London, Paris, and Washington and organizing a Czech-led fighting force ...
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Masaryk and Beneš fled the Czech lands in 1914 and worked abroad for the rest of the war, meeting with leaders and diplomats in London, Paris, and Washington and organizing a Czech-led fighting force on the side of the Allies. The myth they created drew on the tenets of 19th-century romantic nationalism, particularly the work of historian František Palacký, but updated his ideas for the new Wilsonian order. They claimed that Czechs and Slovaks were brother nations, the country's Germans an insignificant minority, and that all “Czechoslovaks” would faithfully uphold Wilsonian democratic ideals. None of this was quite true. But, unlike other small nations petitioning the Great Powers, the Czechs received everything they asked for, thanks in no small part to Masaryk and Benes's propaganda work.Less
Masaryk and Beneš fled the Czech lands in 1914 and worked abroad for the rest of the war, meeting with leaders and diplomats in London, Paris, and Washington and organizing a Czech-led fighting force on the side of the Allies. The myth they created drew on the tenets of 19th-century romantic nationalism, particularly the work of historian František Palacký, but updated his ideas for the new Wilsonian order. They claimed that Czechs and Slovaks were brother nations, the country's Germans an insignificant minority, and that all “Czechoslovaks” would faithfully uphold Wilsonian democratic ideals. None of this was quite true. But, unlike other small nations petitioning the Great Powers, the Czechs received everything they asked for, thanks in no small part to Masaryk and Benes's propaganda work.
