Juliet GardinerReviews

It's quite a challenge to pick up this book with the intention to read it cover to cover - all 700 or so pages of it. I'm so glad I have. This is a book that fleshes out in considerable detail the knowledge that most of us have - or think we have - of life on the Home Front in WWII. Though scholarly, it's intensely readable, and each chapter is crammed with nuggets of fascinating information, whether it's about evacuees, the unremitting horrors of the Blitz, coping with rationing, wartime crime....anything and everything about daily life in the bleakly difficult years of the war. I'm left with a renewed respect for the citizens who coped with privation, hunger, homelessness, loss and just general dinginess, as well as surprise at the level of lawlessness among certain sections of the population. This book is a really absorbing read.

A speedy review of the Bronte sisters' lives, with extracts from their letters and journals. This book is not great on Kindle, due to the frequent illustrations with very long captions, which interrupt the flow of the text and make it a little clumsy for reading. And, honestly, if you've already read the Brontes' letters in full, or if you've read a comprehensive biography, the summing up and skimming over in this book just simply feels like it's not enough. If you want to know about the Brontes, I recommend you search out a more complete volume of their letters and let them tell you about themselves without an intermediary.

There were a number of typos, too, and a photo supposedly of Charlotte Bronte which has, for some years now, been pretty convincingly attributed to Ellen Nussey.

For the British, there is perhaps no more iconic event of the 20th century than the Blitz. The German bombing campaign that stretched from September 1940 until June 1941 was an event that people experienced throughout the British isles, from London and the southeast to Belfast in Northern Ireland. As such it was a shared experience, albeit one filtered through the personal circumstances of the individual and their particular experience of the war. Yet for all of the specific moments in which the Blitz touched their lives, it was an inescapable experience for everyone,

Encapsulating this within the covers of a single book is just one of the challenges undertaken by Juliet Gardiner in writing a history of the event. Another is to penetrate the shared mythology of the event that has grown up around it over the decades in order to convey the realities of the experience and the response of its survivors. In both respects her book is an unqualified success, as she moves beyond the "keep calm and carry on" legend to convey a more nuanced portrait of how Britons coped. For while many rose to the challenge, others faltered in response to a crisis unprecedented in its nature. Its impact proved far-reaching, forcing adjustments to a situation that unfolded in ways few anticipated. Gardiner's coverage here is impressively comprehensive, addressing everything from the shifts in official policy to the problems of looting and other criminal activities it spawned.

All of this makes Gardiner's book an excellent read for anyone seeking to learn about the Blitz. Yet its greatest strength is its focus. For while Gardiner addresses the evolution of official policy in response to the attacks, her narrative is centered primarily upon the experiences of the people themselves. By drawing upon contemporary reporting, published accounts, and the oral histories collected years afterward, she provides her readers with a superb study that conveys well the broad impact of the Blitz and its legacy for British history. For as she argues, it was from this event more than any other of the war that the commitment to the postwar "New Jerusalem" was forged. In this respect, the Blitz left an imprint upon Britain in ways that are still visible today, decades after the last craters were filled and bombed sites rebuilt.

Juliet Gardiner's Wartime is a superb social history of Britain's "Home Front" experience in the Second World War. Drawing both upon the abundant literature about the war and Mass-Observation diaries kept by contemporaries, she gives readers a real sense of what the war was like for the people of Britain. By far the best book about the subject, it is essential reading for anyone interested in learning about how Britons lived, survived, and died during the long conflict that continues to cast its shadow upon the nation.

This is a fantastic survey of a controversial decade in British history. A longtime historian and writer, Juliet Gardiner provides a readable and informative overview of the 1930s, using specific events to open up a broader examination that takes in the politics, society, and culture of the times. In doing so, she presents the traditional interpretation of a working-class population suffering through the Depression, while at the same time illustrating the gains being made by a growing middle-class consumer society. Combining both provides for a remarkably holistic view of the times, one that both entertains with anecdotes while informing with an impressive amount of detail. For anyone seeking to learn more about the 1930s in British history, this is an excellent place to begin.

I haven't yet read or consulted this work because I haven't had a need to do so. But I do notice that the list of contributors (included in the front matter) is MOST impressive. I wouldn't hesitate to cite these sources in a forum at any university in the world. Some might argue, but nobody would laugh.

CYA, man! CYA.

We wove a web in childhood,
A web of sunny air;
We dug a spring in infancy
Of water pure and fair [...]

For life is darkly shaded
And its joys fleet fast away!

- from 'Retrospection' by Charlotte Brontë (1835)

2017 marked the bicentenary of the birth of the least celebrated of the Brontë siblings, Branwell. As with the group portrait he painted of his surviving sisters and himself he appears as a ghostly figure, barely mentioned and then only with sadness. He left some poetry, youthful writings, a handful of paintings (on the evidence we have mostly of mediocre merit) and a record of a life wasted, an existence which brought him and those who knew him pain and distress.

But Branwell -- for all his likely hidden talents -- is not the gifted individual who springs to mind when the name Brontë is mentioned; more likely it will be Charlotte, Emily or Anne who commands our immediate attention. The World Within recounts the family history, from Patrick Brunty's birth in County Down in 1777 to Charlotte Brontë's death in 1855. There will be little I suspect to surprise Brontë fans so rather than give a synopsis of their lives and accomplishments I will merely point out what makes this title worth more than a brief look.

First of all what recommends The World Within is the variety of illustrations. Maps, portraits, photos, landscapes, prints, silhouettes -- all bring the family's existence into vivid focus. Particularly worthwhile are the sketches and paintings by the siblings, which to me show how much artistic talent Charlotte and Emily had, certainly in comparison to the pedestrian efforts of their brother Branwell.

Next are the copious quotations from the letters, diaries, poems and other writings that have survived from the siblings -- particularly Charlotte, the longest living of the six children -- and from their contemporaries such as biographer Mrs Gaskell and literary critics from various periodicals.

Finally, Juliet Gardiner's own commentary lays out their story in strict chronology, serving to contrast the setbacks and tragedies with the accomplishments and triumphs. To the biographical details Gardiner adds a list of personages, relevant topographical sites in Yorkshire and suggestions of places for modern pilgrims to visit, along with an index, a list standard sources and acknowledgements of sources for illustrations, help and advice.

The title, by the way, is a quote from lines by Emily, rather poignant in its implications and perfectly pointing out how imagination was the lifeline that saved the sisters from drowning in a sea of cares and worries:
So hopeless is the world without
The world within I doubly prize.

https://wp.me/s2oNj1-brontes

Borrowed from my friend Surrey who grew up in Bristol during this time, it’s the book from an exhibit at the UK’s Imperial War Museum. I knew a little about children being sent to live in the country, and it’s fascinating. It has interviews with grown up children, photos, letters, and all kinds of archival information.

A splendidly readable narrative account of Britain during the second world war, focusing on the fabric of civilian life, rather than on major political and military events, though there is sufficient detail of these to provide the necessary understanding of the context. The book's great achievement is to enable the reader really to feel what it meant to be a citizen of a country at war, the day to day impact of restrictions on activities as well as the horrors of the Blitz and the V1/V2 raids. It also covers in a balanced way less well known aspects such as conscientious objectors of various kinds and the frankly outrageous treatment meted out to German and Italian people living in Britain, the great majority of whom were loyal to Britain and in many cases were refugees from Nazism, including Jews, or long settled Italian families running restaurants. A fascinating eye-opener of a book.

2638 The Brontes of Haworth: The World Within, Selected and Introduced by Juliet Gardiner (read 21 Aug 1994) This is a compilation for people who would visit Haworth. I'd like to go to Haworth, but I never will so reading this is the next best thing. The book is full of mood-inspiring illustrations. And full of marvelous Emily Bronte lines such as:

There is a spot mid barren hills
Where winter howls and driving rain
But if the dreary trumpet chills
There is a light that warms again
The house is old, the trees are bare
And moonless bends the misty dome
But what on earth is half so dear,
So longed for as the hearth of home.

Six British historians contribute to a comprehensive dictionary which not only is a reference work for events, people and places from 43 AD, but also acknowledges that history is as much about the writing of what happened as what actually did happen. It also includes information on historical concepts and controversy. The contributors are Dr David Bates (University of Wales, College of Cardiff), John Gillingham (London School of Economics), Dr Diarmaid McCulloch (University of Bristol and University College London), Joanna Innes (Somerville College, Oxford), Dr David Englander (Open University) and Dr John Stevenson (Worcester College, Oxford).

The Edwardian age (1904-1914) was the last time the rich could afford to build enormous country houses surrounded by formal landscaped gardens. These homes, where the owners often entertained guests at week-long house parties, were run by an army of servants working nearly round the clock. What happens when modern people volunteer to live in such a mansion - either as the owner and his family or as their servants - under the watchful eye of video cameras in every room? The Edwardian Country House, the companion book to the TV series of the same name, chronicles the experiment. The participants re-create the daily life of the time, both upstairs and "below stairs," with the help of authentic historical diary extracts, letters, advice manuals, and recipes. With color photos throughout, projects are also included to help readers re-create the period at home with a range of authentic Edwardian activities and crafts.