Just finished “The Last Crusade” a book recommended by a fellow FReeper.
Fascinating subject and previously absent from my reading interests
I’m now looking for other good recommendations on the Spanish Civil War if any of you have suggestions???
Many of the ‘on line thumbs up recommendations’ are from the pro Communist / Socialist point of view. Read one that was horrible ...Helen Graham, “A short Introduction to the Spanish Civil War”
In another search I saw there are about 15,000 books written on the subject ! Most in Spanish.
Any recommendations welcome .... THX
The standard history in English is by Hugh Thomas. It is highly detailed, comprehensive, and...thick.
A more sprightly work, and very balanced, is Antony Beevor’s “Battle for Spain”
>Just finished “The Last Crusade” a book recommended by a fellow FReeper.
>Fascinating subject and previously absent from my reading interests
>I’m now looking for other good recommendations on the Spanish Civil War if any of you have suggestions???
“The battle for Spain” by Antony Beevor is a good general history of the war however it’s still tainted by the author eating commie propaganda whole from time to time. If you can read between the lines it’s pretty decent.
“The Cypresses Believe in God” by Jose Maria Gironella.
The whole trilogy is very good, but especially volume one (deals with the run- up to the war, 1932-35) which is terrific.
I'm told Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell is eye-opening and brilliant. Orwell went over there to fight in the Civil War to fight Franco's Nationalists as part of the Anarchist contingent, and watched the Soviet-controlled "Republicans" killing their own Anarchist allies rather than the Nationalist troops. The Republican force was just doing what Communists always do, which is to kill off your allies when you think you're going to win, so you can seize power without opposition.
Gosh, it's so sad the Communists wound up losing.
Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia is a must-read, and it is fairly short. A socialist, he went to fight with the Anarchists, and almost lost his life at the hands of his nominal “allies”, the Communists, in a purge. This time was certainly influential to his later anti-totalitarian fiction. Also has good accounts of front line life.
There is a video series available on you-tube on the war, it’s a Grenada production with BBC support.. It is definitely slanted to the left, but covers most of the war reasonably well.