Personal Narratives Peripheral Theatres Essays On The Great War 1914 18

This book is a collection of essays on neglected aspects of the Great War. It begins by asking what exactly was so "Great" about it, before turning to individual studies of various aspects of the war. These fall broadly into two categories. Firstly personal, micro-narratives that deal directly with the experience of war, often derived from contemporary interest in diaries and oral histories. Presenting both a close-up view of the viscerality, and the tedium and powerlessness of personal situations, these same narratives also address the effects of the war on hitherto under-regarded groups such as children and animals. Secondly, the authors look at the impact of the course of the war on theatres, often left out in reflections on the main European combatants and therefore not part of the regular iconography of the trenches in places such as Denmark, Canada, India, the Levant, Greece and East Africa.

This study of historical, sociological, philosophical and literary sources, shows how, by both consolidating and contesting national myths, fiction continues to construct the 1914-1918 conflict as a cultural trauma, illuminating at the same time some of our most recent ethical concerns.

This book presents a multi-layered analysis of the situation in Central Europe after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The new geopolitics emerging from the Versailles order, and at the same time ongoing fights for borders, considerable war damage, social and economic problems and replacement of administrative staff as well as leaders, all contributed to the fact that unlike Western Europe, Central Europe faced challenges and dilemmas on an unprecedented scale. The editors of this book have invited authors from over a dozen academic institutions to answer the question of to what extent the solutions applied in the Habsburg Monarchy were still practiced in the newly created nation states, and to what extent these new political organisms went their own ways. It offers a closer look at Central Europe with its multiple problems typical of that region after 1918 (organizing the post-imperial space, a new political discourse and attempts to create new national memories, the role of national minorities, solving social problems, and verbal and physical violence expressed in public space). Particular chapters concern post-1918 Central Europe on the local, state and international levels, providing a comprehensive view of this sub-region between 1918 and 1923.

How did the First World War, the so-called 'Great War' - widely seen on all sides as 'the war to end all wars' - impact the development of German philosophy? Combining history and biography with astute philosophical and textual analysis, Nicolas de Warren addresses here the intellectual trajectories of ten significant wartime philosophers: Ernst Bloch, Martin Buber, Ernst Cassirer, Hermann Cohen, György Lukács, Martin Heidegger, Edmund Husserl, Franz Rosenzweig, Max Scheler and Georg Simmel. In exploring their individual works written during and after the War, the author reveals how philosophical concepts and new forms of thinking were forged in response to this unprecedented catastrophe. In reassessing standardized narratives of German thought, the book deepens and enhances our understanding of the intimate and complex relationship between philosophy and violence by demonstrating how the 1914-18 conflict was a crucible for ways of thinking that still define us today.

Highlighting the central importance of theological configurations of immortality and eternal life from 1914-1945, Mårten Björk explores the key writings of Franz Rosenzweig, Karl Barth and Oskar Goldberg to situate their ideas in relation to the political turmoil of the period, including the rise of social Darwinism, nationalism and fascism. The conversations happening among Christian and Jewish theologians and philosophers on the nature of immortality and eternal life during the period constitute what Björk calls a 'politics of immortality'. The speculative question of eternal life became a way to address the meaning of 'a good life' in a period when millions of lives were lost to war, camps and prisons. This book shows how theology was related to central political concepts and ideas of the era, revealing how the question of immortality pursued by Rosenzweig, Barth and Goldberg became a way to resist the reduction of life to race, blood and soil. By situating the exact political consequences of theological and metaphysical theories of immortality and eternal life, Björk's discussion of Rosenzweig, Barth and Goldberg confronts the perennial question on the relation between life and death and exposes the important connections between political theology and philosophical posthumanism.

A fresh approach to scholarship on the diverse nature of Indian anticolonial processes. Brings together a varied selection of literature to explore Indian anticolonialism in new ways Offers a different perspective to geographers seeking to understand political resistance to colonialism Addresses contemporary studies that argue nationalism was joined by other political processes, such as revolutionary and anarchist ideologies, to shape the Indian independence movement Includes a focus on a specific anticolonial group, the “Pondicherry Gang,” and investigates their significant impact which went beyond South India Helps readers understand the diverse nature of anticolonialism, which in turn prompts thinking about the various geographies produced through anticolonial activity

SHORTLISTED FOR THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE 2021 AN ECONOMIST AND HISTORY TODAY BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020 'Compelling and highly original ... The Asia that we see today is the product of the 'underground' which Harper describes with skill and empathy in this monumental work' Rana Mitter, Literary Review The story of the hidden struggle waged by secret networks around the world to destroy European imperialism The end of Europe's empires has so often been seen as a story of high politics and warfare. In Tim Harper's remarkable new book the narrative is very different: it shows how empires were fundamentally undermined from below. Using the new technology of cheap printing presses, global travel and the widespread use of French and English, young radicals from across Asia were able to communicate in ways simply not available before. These clandestine networks stretched to the heart of the imperial metropolises: to London, to Paris, to the Americas, but also increasingly to Moscow. They created a secret global network which was for decades engaged in bitter fighting with imperial police forces. They gathered in the great hubs of Asia - Calcutta, Singapore, Batavia, Hanoi, Tokyo, Shanghai, Canton and Hong Kong - and plotted with ceaseless ingenuity, both through persuasion and terrorism, the end of the colonial regimes. Many were caught and killed or imprisoned, but others would go on to rule their newly independent countries. Drawing on an amazing array of new sources, Underground Asia turns upside-down our understanding of twentieth-century empire. The reader enters an extraordinary world of stowaways, false identities, secret codes, cheap firearms, assassinations and conspiracies, as young Asians made their own plans for their future. 'Magnificent - it reads like a thriller and was difficult to put down' Peter Frankopan, History Today

The Great War is a collection of seven original essays and three critical comments by senior scholars dealing with the greatest conflict in modern history to its time - the 1914-18 World War. The Great War is edited by the distinguished historian of the First World War, R.J.Q.Adams.