The Long Shadow

In Britain, we have lost touch with the Great War. Our overriding sense now is of a meaningless, futile bloodbath in the mud of Flanders—of young men whose lives were cut off in their prime for no evident purpose. But by reducing the conflict to personal tragedies, however moving, we have lost the big picture: the history has been distilled into poetry.

In The Long Shadow, critically acclaimed author David Reynolds seeks to redress the balance by exploring the true impact of 1914-18 on the 20th century. Some of the Great War's legacies were negative and pernicious, but others proved transformative in a positive sense. Exploring big themes such as democracy and empire, nationalism and capitalism, and re-examining the differing impacts of the War on Britain, Ireland, and the United States, The Long Shadow throws light on the whole of the last century and demonstrates that 1914-18 is a conflict that Britain, more than any other nation, is still struggling to comprehend.

Stunningly broad in its historical perspective, The Long Shadow is a magisterial and seismic re-presentation of the Great War.