Forgotten Voices Of The Great War

(Paperback)

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Description

In 1960, the Imperial War Museum began a momentous and important task. A team of academics, archivists and volunteers set about tracing WWI veterans and interviewing them at length in order to record the experiences of ordinary individuals in war. The IWM aural archive has become the most important archive of its kind in the world. Authors have occasionally been granted access to the vaults, but digesting the thousands of hours of footage is a monumental task. (There are over 2,500 interviews, some as long as 20 hours long). As a result, those seeking first-person quotations for their works have only used a tiny fraction of the available pre-transcribed material. Now, 40 years on, the Imperial War Museum has at last given author Max Arthur and his team of researchers unlimited access to the complete WWI tapes. These are the forgotten voices of an entire generation of survivors of the Great War. Their stories have rested unheard for almost half a century, and nearly all of those interviewed have since passed away. The resulting book is an important, unique and compelling story of WWI in the words of those who experienced it.

Reviews

An extraordinary and immensely moving book -- Stephen Fry
This extraordinary book is crammed with details, conjuring up the atmosphere of war as vividly as the frequent descriptions of appalling violence * Daily Telegraph *
The words of the soldiers are as fresh as if they were written yesterday ... extraordinary * Mail on Sunday *
These stories are so harrowing, and their witness so precise and devastating * The Times *
The stories of these now long-dead vets simply jump off the page * FHM *

Author Bio

Acclaimed author Max Arthur specialises in first hand recollections of historical events. Previous titles include The Manchester United Air Crash; Above All Courage; Northern Ireland Soldiers Talking; Men of the Red Beret;, There Shall Be Wings- The RAF 1918 to the Present; The True Glory- The Royal Navy 1914 to Present.