London 1945: Life in the Debris of War

by Maureen Waller

Overview

When Hitler unleashed a fierce barrage of weapons on the defiant capital of England, London's resilient citizens were undaunted. With colorful detail and rich insight, historian Maureen Waller takes readers through London in the last year of war. She reveals the magnificence of human spirit that carried a besieged people through agonizing travails and the long, giddy transformation the metropolis made as it passed through battle, to celebration, and back to life as usual.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312338046
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	06/13/2006
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	528
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.22(d)

About the Author

Maureen Waller was educated at University College London, where she studied medieval and modern history. She received a master's degree at Queen Mary College, London, in British and European history 1660—1714. After a brief stint at the National Portrait Gallery, she went on to work as an editor at several prestigious London publishing houses. Her first book was the highly acclaimed 1700: Scenes from London Life. Her other books include Sovereign Ladies: The Six Reigning Queens of England and Ungrateful Daughters: The Stuart Princesses Who Stole Their Father's Crown.  She currently lives in London with her husband, who is a journalist and author.

Editorial Reviews

Thoroughly engrossing...builds up a detailed picture of daily life in London.” —The New York Times

“Joins the ranks of such works as Philip Zeigler's London at War and Robert Hewison's Under Siege: Literary Life in London, 1939–1945... Her depiction of the daily fabric of wartime life in the capital is unrivaled.... An illuminating approach.” —The Atlantic Monthly

“Waller...balances an enormous amount of data with a journalistic attention to anecdote and oral history in this stunning book.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“A gracefully rendered portrait of a great city at war...Vivid and highly readable.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Waller's book masterfully supplements Philip Ziegler's London at War, 1939–1945 and provides the reader with a well-crafted story of war and its cruel impact on a large European city.” —Library Journal

From the Publisher

Waller (1700: Scenes from a London Life) has written a chilling account of London life during the last months of World War II and the dawn of the postwar era. Suffering under the deadly attacks of Hitler's newly developed V-2 rocket, launched from nearby Holland, Londoners learned to tell by sound just how close these horrible missiles (dubbed "doodlebugs") would land. Waller describes the chronic food and clothing shortages and the incredible stress on families. She also presents the remarkable and, at times, unbelievable spirit of defiance that carried most Londoners through their darkest hours. Waller's book masterfully supplements Philip Ziegler's London at War, 1939-1945 and provides the reader with a well-crafted story of war and its cruel impact on a large European city. Recommended for all collections.-Ed Goedeken, Iowa State Univ. Lib., Ames Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

A gracefully rendered portrait of a great city at war. Waller (Ungrateful Daughters, 2003) writes with illuminating and abundant detail: Whereas other histories of WWII mention that the historic, square-mile City of London was badly damaged in Luftwaffe bombing raids, she notes that "a total of 417 high explosive bombs were dropped on the City alone, 13 parachute mines, 2,498 oil bombs, and thousands of incendiaries." Other parts of the metropolis fared no better, and thousands of civilians died. By 1945, the last year of the war, the numbers of dead were declining somewhat as Hitler's forces turned to a desperate defensive war, but the toll was still heavy. Londoners escaped as best they could-physically, by burrowing underground, and emotionally, by indulging in such outlets as they could, some good, some bad. Waller takes a daily-life approach to chronicle that last year, which seemed to dawn without promise of relief. January, she writes, was the coldest in half a century: "There were sheets of ice in the Straits of Dover and in London Big Ben froze." Food supplies were dwindling, too, though Londoners made do with what they could get until rations were slashed after the peace was signed. Waller writes of the renaissance in book publishing as Londoners turned to reading as never before, even as publishers were forced to make do with printing paper that, George Orwell grumbled, was flimsier than toilet tissue; and of the equally remarkable flourishing of prostitution as London filled with foreign soldiers and once-respectable neighborhoods sprouted brothels that, as a patriotic measure, put low-paid British servicemen on a different tariff from the higher-paid Yanks. If there was agood side to it all, Waller observes, it was that the bombings afforded London a chance to rebuild an overgrown and somewhat decrepit city, though the job of rebuilding took 50 years. She concludes, "It has been worth the wait."Vivid and highly readable: for students of WWII and urban history alike.

Kirkus Reviews