RIP Paul Fussell
Author Paul Fussell has died at 88. I read only two things he wrote, but both of them were extraordinary. The first was his magnum opus, the one that made him famous (at least in some circles), The Great War … Continue reading →
Author Paul Fussell has died at 88. I read only two things he wrote, but both of them were extraordinary. The first was his magnum opus, the one that made him famous (at least in some circles), The Great War … Continue reading →
I noticed in some recent comments that a lot of people believe that World War I was a turning point in the changes we’ve seen in attitudes towards the foundations of Western Civilization. That reminded me of the following post … Continue reading →
[NOTE: The following is a slightly changed version of a post of mine. If you follow the links in the second paragraph, you’ll find three other pieces I’ve written about the decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima.] Once again … Continue reading →
[NOTE: The following is a slightly changed version of a post of mine. If you follow the links in the second paragraph, you’ll find three other pieces I’ve written about the decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima.] Once again … Continue reading →
Lindsay Shepherd has begun the process: Incidentally, the title of that video—“Goodbye to the left”—makes me think of the title of Britisher Robert Graves’ marvelous memoir of WWI and much more: Goodbye to All That. I haven’t read it in … Continue reading →
I missed this news when it happened, about a month ago: A nuclear disarmament group has won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize for its decade-long campaign to rid the world of the atomic bomb. As nuclear-fuelled crises swirl over North … Continue reading →
[NOTE: The following is a slightly changed version of a post of mine. If you follow the links in the second paragraph, you’ll find three other pieces I’ve written about the decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima.] Once again … Continue reading →
And I fear we never shall. When I was in school, World War I was hardly touched on in my history classes, so eager were the teachers to get to World War II before the year was over. It was … Continue reading →
Gerard Van der Leun has written a rumination on the return of history, post-9/11. I offer a few excerpts here, although they don’t really capture the full flavor of the thing (to do that, it needs to be read as … Continue reading →
In this thread about the decision to drop the atomic bomb, anonymous asks: Why didn’t they drop a nuke on an unpopulated area and say, ‘See that goddamn horror? We’ll drop another one on your heads in two days if … Continue reading →
Both Austin Bay and Clive Davis recently cited this famous essay by literary critic Paul Fussell in their posts on the 60th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb. I had read Fussell’s 1988 essay, provocatively titled “God Bless … Continue reading →