Between The Wars: 1919 1939

Description

At the end of 1918 one prescient American historian began to write a history of the Great War. "What will you call it?" he was asked. "The First World War" was his bleak response. In Between the Wars Philip Ziegler examines the major international turning points - cultural and social as well as political and military - that led the world from one war to another. His perspective is panoramic, touching on all parts of the world where history was being made, giving equal weight to Gandhi's March to the Sea and the Japanese invasion of China as to Hitler's rise to power. It is the tragic story of a world determined that the horrors of the First World War would never be repeated yet committed to a path which in hindsight was inevitably destined to end in a second, even more devastating conflict.

Reviews

Ziegler is an elegant, unfailingly lucid writer -- Simon Callow. One of the most experienced and versatile biographers of his generation. Observer. Ziegler writes with urbanity and wit but is unflinching in his judgments. Times Literary Supplement. Fascinating. -- Bill Bryson on The Black Death. A skillful historian. Kirkus Reviews.

Author description

Philip Ziegler was a diplomat before becoming an editorial director at the publishers William Collins. His many books include acclaimed biographies of Laurence Olivier, William IV, Lady Diana Cooper, Lord Mountbatten and Harold Wilson, as well as the classic history of the Black Death.