The First World War Retold

by Paul Cornish, The Duke of Cambridge (Foreword)

IWM was founded on 5 March 1917 when the War Cabinet approved a proposal by Sir Alfred Mond MP for the creation of a national war museum to record the events still taking place during the First World War. The intention was to collect and display material as a record of everyone's experiences during the war - civilian and military - and to commemorate the sacrifices of all sections of society.The First World War Retold tells the story of that war from a fresh perspective, fully illustrated with objects, photographs and works of art from IWM's unparalleled collections. It presents events as they happened, through quotations from diaries, letters or reported conversations written or spoken within hours, days or weeks of the events they describe. Through these voices and objects - emotive, immediate, and sometimes surprising - the story of the war is retold from a compelling new angle, allowing us to both understand and reflect upon the landmark conflict that still shapes our lives today.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

413 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 11, 2017

Reviews

[Ana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good basic entry to learning about the First World War.

Bought 8/20/2023 from Imperial War Museum in London, UK

[Tristram · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is great as an accompanying book to the Imperial War Museum exhibition, as when I visited last month I didn't get a chance to read all the information or have a good long look at the collection. It's also a good reflection to a general audience of the basic structure of how WWI progressed from a British perspective, as well as the social side to the war - both in the trenches and at home. The design and layout of the book itself is very nice to look at and includes a good balance of text and pictures.

One of the biggest things I liked about this was the inclusion of colonial forces into the discussion, as it is something that is almost completely neglected in Western reportage of the Great War. It was called a world war for a reason, and people forget that. Empire propaganda of the European struggle for peace on the continent has distracted from the fact that countries outside the Central and Allied Powers were forced to become involved. Nevertheless, I feel it still hardly mentioned these countries enough, but it was better than nothing.

I'm not entirely sure why the title of the book includes 'Retold', as it put me under the impression that I was going to be reading a new, fresh take on the event. Nope. Even though it was a good book and all, there wasn't anything new. A little bit of false marketing, methinks. The other thing that irritated me was the lack of bibliography; yes, this is a museum book, so I imagine all the information was sourced from their own collection, but as far as I'm aware this wasn't stated anywhere.

[Pop Doru · Rating 2 out of 5]

An introduction to the First World War. It has good pictures, but I was hoping the information was more precise.

Two Example:
- At the beginning of Chapter 2: Seven million men marched to war in August 1914. More would follow as the armies completed mobilisation. By the end of the year a million of these men lay dead, millions more had been wounded.
So it says, that in 1914 1 million soldier died.

But latter, you find the following passage:

By the end of 1914 Austria-Hungary had suffered a devastating 957,000 casualties.

How can 1 million solider die in 1914, but Austria-Hungary had 957,000 casualties? Maybe the latter number includes civilians. However, in the preceding phrases the author keeps saying troops.

The second example:
The [Gallipoli] campaign had cost the two sides half a million casualties between them, roughly equally shared.
So the Allies should have lost about 250 000. But then the author says:
Gallipoli cost the lives of 56,707 Allied soldiers. 11,430 of them came from Australia and New Zealand..
So 56 707 soldiers. Not even close to 250 000.

[Nicola · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very good, basic walk through of the war. A good selection of pictures and a focus on the ordinary people involved, makes this a fantastic initial work for someone like me who wants to learn about the 'big picture' without wading through enormous tomes.