The Spanish Front: Writers on the Civil War

by Valentine Cunningham

The Spanish Civil War--the most momentous political and cultural flashpoint of the 1930s--struck deep into the conscience and conciousness of the West. This anthology offers a vivid, moving, and often surprising cross-section of the writing it generated--prose and poetry, public and private,
documentary and fictional, convinced and skeptical, left-wing and right-wing. It includes contributions from a number of lesser-known authors, as well as the famous names, and the distinctive participation of women is ehre recognized and represented for the first time. The book shows writers
taking sides; reflecting on the war's progress in essays, diaries, letters, journalism, poems, stories, and novels; reporting their visits to the fighting zones; and expressing their responses ranging from hope to despair, from satisfaction to horror. Included are selections from Ernest Hemingway,
Graham Greene, Randall Jarrell, Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot, W.B. Yeats, Wyndham Lewis, Virginia Woolf, Leon Trotsky, Vita Sackville-West, Claude Simon, Antoine de Saint-Exupery, George Orwell, John Dos Passos, Helen Waddell, David Gascoyne, Antonia White, Ford Madox Ford, and many more. The
publication of this book is timed to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of the Spanish Civil War.

Genres: Spanish Civil War

Hardcover

First published July 17, 1986

Reviews

[Joy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book I have come across regarding the spanish civil war. The story told through a variety of perspectives it fascinating, one minute you are reading a famous author who is completely against foreign aid in the war and the next you are reading the story of a poor american jew who dedicated their time to fight fascism. Covers so many opinions and ideas of what the spanish civil war was to those who volunteered their time to the cause and those who sat back and critiqued.

[Jane Fudger · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book albeit it was hard work in some areas. Basically the book is about writers who fought and/or observed the Civil War in Spain as the country fought against Franco
The premis of the book is a collection of extracts from memoirs,novels, journalistic reports, playwrights and poets There are famous authors such as George Orwell, Ernest Hemingway and Graham Greene along with poets such as Steven Spender,John Cornford and W H Auden.There were also a number of authors I did not know but enjoyed their work which caused me to check them out on line and add some of their books to my TBR list.
An excellent read