Naples 1944: The Devil's Paradise at War

by Keith Lowe

Overview

Award-winning author Keith Lowe's newest critical deep-dive into the history of Naples during WWII.

Keith Lowe has chronicled the end of WWII in Europe in his award-winning book Savage Continent and the war’s aftermath in the sequel, The Fear and the Freedom. In Naples 1944, he brings readers another masterful chronicle of the terrible and often unexpected consequences of war. Even before the fall of Mussolini, Naples was a place of great contrasts filled with palaces and slums, beloved cuisine and widespread hunger. After the Allied liberation, these contrasts made the city instantly notorious. Compared to the starving population, Allied soldiers were staggeringly wealthy. For a packet of cigarettes, even the lowest ranks could buy themselves a watch, a new suit or a woman for the night. As the biggest port in Allied hands, Naples quickly became the center of Italy’s black market and has remained so ever since. Within just a few months the Camorra began to re-establish itself. Behind the chaos and the corruption, there was always the threat of violence. Army guns were looted and traded. Gangs of street kids fought running battles with the military police. Public buildings, booby-trapped by departing Germans, began to explode, seemingly spontaneously.

Then in March 1944 - like an omen - Vesuvius erupted. Naples was the first major European city to be liberated by the Allies. What they found there would set a template for the whole of the rest of Europe in the years to come. Keith Lowe’s Naples 1944 is a page-turning book about a city on the brink of chaos and glimpse into the dark heart of postwar Italy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250235060
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	03/11/2025
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	384

About the Author

KEITH LOWE is the author of the critically-acclaimed Inferno: The Devastation of Hamburg 1943, and Savage Continent, an international bestseller and the winner of both the Hessell-Tiltman Prize for History (2013), and Italy’s prestigious Cherasco History Prize (2015). He lectures on both sides of the Atlantic, appears on TV and radio in Europe and the US, and writes for a variety of magazines and newspapers around the world. He lives in north London with his wife and children.
Keith Lowe is the award-winning author of Savage Continent: Europe in the Aftermath of World War II, and the critically acclaimed history Inferno: The Fiery Devastation of Hamburg, 1943. He is widely recognized as an authority on the Second World War, and has often spoken on TV and radio, both in Britain and the United States. He was an historical consultant and one of the main speakers in the PBS documentary The Bombing of Germany, which was also broadcast in Germany. His books have been translated into several languages, and he has lectured in Britain, Canada and Germany. He lives in North London with his wife and two kids.

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Prisoners of History:

"Compelling...powerful...[Lowe] looks at the ways in which a diverse set of countries have memorialized that bloody conflict, which set the stage for the world in which we still live... What Prisoners of History does do—and does well—is explain why groups in each country built the monuments in the first place and how changes in politics and international relations affected interactions with them afterward." —Wall Street Journal

“[An] inspired idea . . . Always thoughtful and evocative, sometimes controversial . . . Lowe’s sensitive, disturbing book should be compulsory reading for both statue builders and statue topplers.”

—The Sunday Times (UK)

"Thought-provoking . . . a perceptive and persuasive call for remembering the tragedies and triumphs of the past." —Publishers Weekly

"Fascinating and thoughtful." —Lawrence Freedman, Foreign Affairs Magazine

“The well-balanced range here enables the retelling of some remarkable war stories, while also providing fascinating insights into the ways different nations have remembered or denied issues around national identity and the glory and horrors of war . . . this is some of the most thought-provoking writing about the Second World War.”

—Spectator Magazine

“In this timely book, which neatly combines history, art criticism, and travelogue . . . Lowe is a fine guide to these monuments because he feels the moral force—for good or bad—of each site he visits.”

—The Times (UK)

"[Lowe’s] examples might rightly raise some hackles . . . Insightful accounts of memorials where there is usually more than meets the eye." —Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher