Visions And Ideas Of Europe During The First World War

Download or read book Visions and Ideas of Europe During the First World War written by Jan Vermeiren and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Given the destruction and suffering caused by more than four years of industrialised warfare and economic hardship, scholars have tended to focus on the nationalism and hatred in the belligerent countries, holding that it led to a fundamental rupture of any sense of European commonality and unity. It is the central aim of this volume to correct this view and to highlight that many observers saw the conflict as a 'European civil war', and to discuss what this meant for discourses about Europe. Bringing together a remarkable range of compelling and highly original topics, this collection explores notions, images, and ideas of Europe in the midst of catastrophe.

Download or read book Dance of the Furies written by Michael S. Neiberg and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2011-04-25 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: By training his eye on the ways that people outside the halls of power reacted to the rapid onset and escalation of the fighting in 1914, Neiberg dispels the notion that Europeans were rabid nationalists intent on mass slaughter. He reveals instead a complex set of allegiances that cut across national boundaries.

Download or read book The War That Ended Peace written by Margaret MacMillan and published by Random House. This book was released on 2013-10-29 with total page 935 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • The Economist • The Christian Science Monitor • Bloomberg Businessweek • The Globe and Mail 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. Praise for The War That Ended Peace “Magnificent . . . The War That Ended Peace will certainly rank among the best books of the centennial crop.”—The Economist “Superb.”—The New York Times Book Review “Masterly . . . marvelous . . . Those looking to understand why World War I happened will have a hard time finding a better place to start.”—The Christian Science Monitor “The debate over the war’s origins has raged for years. Ms. MacMillan’s explanation goes straight to the heart of political fallibility. . . . Elegantly written, with wonderful character sketches of the key players, this is a book to be treasured.”—The Wall Street Journal “A magisterial 600-page panorama.”—Christopher Clark, London Review of Books

Download or read book July 1914 written by Sean McMeekin and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2014-04-29 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When a Serbian-backed assassin gunned down Archduke Franz Ferdinand in late June 1914, the world seemed unmoved. Even Ferdinand's own uncle, Franz Josef I, was notably ambivalent about the death of the Hapsburg heir, saying simply, "It is God's will." Certainly, there was nothing to suggest that the episode would lead to conflict -- much less a world war of such massive and horrific proportions that it would fundamentally reshape the course of human events. As acclaimed historian Sean McMeekin reveals in July 1914, World War I might have been avoided entirely had it not been for a small group of statesmen who, in the month after the assassination, plotted to use Ferdinand's murder as the trigger for a long-awaited showdown in Europe. The primary culprits, moreover, have long escaped blame. While most accounts of the war's outbreak place the bulk of responsibility on German and Austro-Hungarian militarism, McMeekin draws on surprising new evidence from archives across Europe to show that the worst offenders were actually to be found in Russia and France, whose belligerence and duplicity ensured that war was inevitable. Whether they plotted for war or rode the whirlwind nearly blind, each of the men involved -- from Austrian Foreign Minister Leopold von Berchtold and German Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Sazonov and French president Raymond Poincaré- sought to capitalize on the fallout from Ferdinand's murder, unwittingly leading Europe toward the greatest cataclysm it had ever seen. A revolutionary account of the genesis of World War I, July 1914 tells the gripping story of Europe's countdown to war from the bloody opening act on June 28th to Britain's final plunge on August 4th, showing how a single month -- and a handful of men -- changed the course of the twentieth century.

Download or read book The Path to War written by Michael S. Neiberg and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2016 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1914 America was determined to stay clear of Europe's war. By 1917, the country was ready to lunge into the fray. The Path to War tells the full story of what happened.

Download or read book Views of Violence written by Jörg Echternkamp and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2019-01-02 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Twenty-first-century views of historical violence have been immeasurably influenced by cultural representations of the Second World War. Within Europe, one of the key sites for such representation has been the vast array of museums and memorials that reflect contemporary ideas of war, the roles of soldiers and civilians, and the self-perception of those who remember. This volume takes a historical perspective on museums covering the Second World War and explores how these institutions came to define political contexts and cultures of public memory in Germany, across Europe, and throughout the world.

Download or read book Visions and Ideas of Europe during the First World War written by Matthew D'Auria and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-08-02 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Given the destruction and suffering caused by more than four years of industrialised warfare and economic hardship, scholars have tended to focus on the nationalism and hatred in the belligerent countries, holding that it led to a fundamental rupture of any sense of European commonality and unity. It is the central aim of this volume to correct this view and to highlight that many observers saw the conflict as a ‘European civil war’, and to discuss what this meant for discourses about Europe. Bringing together a remarkable range of compelling and highly original topics, this collection explores notions, images, and ideas of Europe in the midst of catastrophe.