Includes bibliographical references (p. [540]-544) and index.
Contents:
July 1945 -- To write or not to write? -- Contracts: Churchill against the publishers -- Papers: Churchill against the bureaucrats -- Reputation: Churchill against mortality -- Taking the plunge -- I: The gathering storm, 1919-1940, 1946-1948 -- Setting a course -- The unnecessary road to Munich -- Twilight for Chamberlain, new dawn for Churchill -- Prophet of the past and the future -- II: Their finest hour, 1940, 1946-1949 -- Between memoir and history -- "Victory at all costs" -- The battle of Britain and the Mediterranean gamble -- His finest hour -- III: The grand alliance, 1941-1942, 1948-1950 -- "In the event of your death" -- The crisis of spring 1941 -- Forging an alliance -- "Man of the half-century" -- IV: The hinge of fate, 1942-1943, 1948-1951 -- "The worst mess yet" -- Asian disasters, desert victory, and the silence of Stalingrad -- Second front: when, where, and how? -- Fighting with allies-- and colleagues -- "The best of Winnie's memoirs" -- V: Closing the ring, 1943-1944, 1949-1952 -- Deadlines -- Churchill and "the Mediterranean strategy" -- The tyranny of overlord -- The future of Europe -- "On the defensive" -- VI: Triumph and tragedy, 1944-1945, 1950-1954 -- A very diplomatic history -- Overlord and underdog -- The unnecessary cold war -- "It seems incredible" -- Leaving it to history, 1955-1965 -- January 1965.
Summary:
As Britain's prime minister from 1940 to 1945, Churchill courageously led his nation and the world away from appeasement, into war, and on to triumph over the Axis dictators. His classic six-volume account of those years has shaped our perceptions of the conflict and secured Churchill's place as its most important chronicler. This book explains how Churchill wrote this masterwork, and in the process enhances and often revises our understanding of one of history's most complex, vivid, and eloquent leaders. It forces us to reconsider much received wisdom about World War II, and peels back the covers from an unjustly neglected period of Churchill's life, his "second wilderness" years, 1945-1951.--From publisher description.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.