Category: <span>Book reviews</span>

Category: Book reviews

“The Big Book of Wisdom” review

by Larry CullifordPublished by Hero Press, 19th March 2020ISBN (Paperback): 9781789551211ISBN (Ebook): 9781789551228 Heather Speight This intriguing book is the work of a retired psychiatrist and Life Member of MAW. The title may be slightly disconcerting…but one is soon drawn in. Cultivating wisdom seems very relevant to MAW’s central message. …

“Postnational Memory, Peace and War: Making Pasts Beyond Borders” review

by Nigel YoungRoutledge, 2019. 364 pp, 64 illus  Colin Archer Memory is now a specialised field of its own and the author has spent much of his career deeply engaged in it, especially as it relates to modern war, genocide and mass violence – including nuclear weapons. Drawing on a …

“Antimilitarism: Political and Gender Dynamics of Peace Movements” review

by Cynthia CockburnPalgrave Macmillan, 2012 Sue Gilmurray No matter how passionately we loath war, there is a place for turning our critical faculties on the peace movement and asking questions about what we do and how we might be more effective. Cynthia Cockburn provides a bracing look at a variety …

“Deserters” review

by Lars G. PeterssonDanish Resistance Museum Publishing, 2005also published as “Hitlers Fahnenflüchtige”, chipmunkapublishing, 2012 Annette Bygott In Germany during World War II, a careless remark, an anti-war entry in a diary, a kind gesture towards a Russian prisoner – all could be viewed as ‘aiding the enemy’ and prove fatal. …

“Keeper of the Nuclear Conscience: the Life and Work of Joseph Rotblat” review

Andrew BrownOxford University Press, 2011 Brian Heale Much of this book reads like a nightmare. Joseph Rotblat’s early life in Poland seems almost idyllic, of another world. The First World War soon destroyed this, and the consequences for his family were extreme hardship and threat to life. But Rotblat’s unusual …

“The Glorious Art of Peace: From the Iliad to Iraq” review

by John GittingsOxford University Press, 2011 Lesley Docksey John Gittings has chosen a very broad subject – the development of ‘peace consciousness’ from ancient Greece to the present day. He starts by looking at how Homer, rather than supporting the Trojan War, stresses the futility and violence of it. As …