The Long Week-End: A Social History of Great Britain, 1918-39

by Robert Graves, Alan Hodge

"The long week-end" is Robert Grave's and Alan Hodge's evocative phrase for the period in Great Britain's social history between the twin devastations of the Great War and World War II. With brilliant wit and trenchant judgments they offer a scintillating survey of seemingly everything that went on of any consequence (or inconsequence) in those years in politics, business, science, religion, art, literature, fashion, education, popular amusements, domestic life, sexual relations -- much else.

Across this crowded canvas of British life stride the Duke of Windsor and Mrs. Wallis Simpson, Neville Chamberlain, Charlie Chaplin, Virginia Woolf, Lord Beaverbrook, Evelyn Waugh, Winston Churchill, Marie Stopes, Aldous Huxley, Lloyd George, and dozens of other figures great and small who put their stamp on the era. From a postwar period of prosperity and frivolity defined by the high jinks of the Bright Young Things through the ever-darkening decade of the thirties punctuated by spiraling economic and political crises and shadowed by the inevitable conflagration to come The Long Week-End deftly and movingly preserves the details and captures the spirit of the time. It is social history the way it is meant to be written -- a classic of its kind.

*
Table of contents:

Armistice, 1918
Revolution averted, 1919
Women
Reading matter
Post-war politics
Various conquests
Sex
Amusements
Screen & stage
Revolution again averted, 1926
Domestic life
Art, literature & religion
Education & ethics
Sport & controversy
The depression, 1930
Pacifism, nudism, hiking
The days of the Loch Ness monster
Recovery, 1935
The days of non-intervention
'The deepening twilight of barbarism'
Three kings in one year
Keeping fit & doing the Lambeth walk
Social consciences
'Markets close firmer'
Still at peace
Rain stops play, 1939

Genres: History, Nonfiction, British Literature, 20th Century, War, Sociology, World War II

476 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1940

About the author

Robert von Ranke Graves was an English poet, soldier, historical novelist and critic. Born in Wimbledon, he received his early education at King's College School and Copthorne Prep School, Wimbledon & Charterhouse School and won a scholarship to St John's College, Oxford. While at Charterhouse in 1912, he fell in love with G.H. Johnstone, a boy of fourteen ("Dick" in Goodbye to All That) When challenged by the headmaster he defended himself by citing Plato, Greek poets, Michelangelo & Shakespeare, "who had felt as I did".

At the outbreak of WWI, Graves enlisted almost immediately, taking a commission in the Royal Welch Fusiliers. He published his first volume of poems, Over the Brazier, in 1916. He developed an early reputation as a war poet and was one of the first to write realistic poems about his experience of front line conflict. In later years he omitted war poems from his collections, on the grounds that they were too obviously "part of the war poetry boom". At the Battle of the Somme he was so badly wounded by a shell-fragment through the lung that he was expected to die, and indeed was officially reported as 'died of wounds'. He gradually recovered. Apart from a brief spell back in France, he spent the rest of the war in England.

One of Graves's closest friends at this time was the poet Siegfried Sassoon, who was also an officer in the RWF. In 1917 Sassoon tried to rebel against the war by making a public anti-war statement. Graves, who feared Sassoon could face a court martial, intervened with the military authorities and persuaded them that he was suffering from shell shock, and to treat him accordingly. Graves also suffered from shell shock, or neurasthenia as it is sometimes called, although he was never hospitalised for it.

Biographers document the story well. It is fictionalised in Pat Barker's novel Regeneration. The intensity of their early relationship is nowhere demonstrated more clearly than in Graves's collection Fairies & Fusiliers (1917), which contains a plethora of poems celebrating their friendship. Through Sassoon, he also became friends with Wilfred Owen, whose talent he recognised. Owen attended Graves's wedding to Nancy Nicholson in 1918, presenting him with, as Graves recalled, "a set of 12 Apostle spoons".

Following his marriage and the end of the war, Graves belatedly took up his place at St John's College, Oxford. He later attempted to make a living by running a small shop, but the business failed. In 1926 he took up a post at Cairo University, accompanied by his wife, their children and the poet Laura Riding. He returned to London briefly, where he split with his wife under highly emotional circumstances before leaving to live with Riding in Deià, Majorca. There they continued to publish letterpress books under the rubric of the Seizin Press, founded and edited the literary journal Epilogue, and wrote two successful academic books together: A Survey of Modernist Poetry (1927) and A Pamphlet Against Anthologies (1928).

In 1927, he published Lawrence and the Arabs, a commercially successful biography of T.E. Lawrence. Good-bye to All That (1929, revised and republished in 1957) proved a success but cost him many of his friends, notably Sassoon. In 1934 he published his most commercially successful work, I, Claudius. Using classical sources he constructed a complexly compelling tale of the life of the Roman emperor Claudius, a tale extended in Claudius the God (1935). Another historical novel by Graves, Count Belisarius (1938), recounts the career of the Byzantine general Belisarius.

During the early 1970s Graves began to suffer from increasingly severe memory loss, and by his eightieth birthday in 1975 he had come to the end of his working life. By 1975 he had published more than 140 works. He survived for ten more years in an increasingly dependent condition until he died from heart

Reviews

[Jill H. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a re-read for me and it is just as good the first time as it was the second. I stand by my original review which is below:

One of the classic social/political histories of the inter-war period in Britain and the Empire. It begins with the "peace" in 1918 and ends as WWII began (for England) on September 3, 1939. The author, Robert Graves, whose autobiography Goodbye to All That also stands as a classic of the disillusionment that WWI brought to his generation. approaches this history seriously but still keeps tongue in cheek in some sections. He covers just about everything that was going on during those years......the fads, theater, film, style, government, sport, and the monarchy.......in other words, all encompassing. You will need to be familiar with British history of the time to relate to some of the allusions in the narrative. But even if you are not, this book will open up the world of those days where the world was changing rapidly and society/government was trying to ignore that another war was inevitable. Highly recommended.

[Nigeyb · Rating 4 out of 5]

For anyone interested in the era this book is essential

The Long Week End: A Social History of Great Britain, 1918-1939 was written by novelist Robert Graves (author of the excellent First World War memoir Goodbye to All That), and Alan Hodge.

I am fascinated by the first fifty years of the twentieth century and read a lot of fiction and non-fiction from this era. My focus tends to be on Europe, and in particular the UK, and so I was particularly interested in reading this "social history of Great Britain" during the peace that endured between World War One and World War Two.

The book was first published in 1940 and so is written without the knowledge of the outcome of World War Two.

That this book contains an alternate, idiosyncratic and personal history of Britain between World War One and World War Two, becomes very apparent when the reader arrives at the chapter headings. Here's a list of the 26 chapters contained within this book:

Armistice, 1918
Revolution Averted, 1919
Women
Reading Matter
Post-War Politics
Various Conquests
Sex
Amusements
Screen and Stage
Revolution Again Averted, 1926
Domestic Life
Art, Literature, and Religion
Education and Ethics
Sport and Controversy
The Depression, 1930
Pacifism, Nudism, Hiking
The Days Of The Loch Ness Monster
Recovery, 1935
The Days of Non-Intervention
'The Deepening Twilight of Barbarism'
Three Kings in One Year
Keeping Fit, and Doing The Lambeth Walk
Social Consciences
'Markets Close Firmer'
Still At Peace
Rain Stops Play, 1939

Furthermore, the topics covered within these chapters tend to meander about, and the authors touch on all manner of disparate elements of life in Britain during this era. This means the book is chock full of fascinating trivia and ephemera, however it also means the book can feel unstructured, kaleidoscopic, and - on occasion - somewhat overwhelming.

I suspect a book written now, about this era, might deem a lot of the information in this book superficial, insignificant or irrelevant. Every page contains a curious insight, or remarkable fact, or piece of period detail, that really illuminates the period. Based on my knowledge (which is far from comprehensive), this book appears to really capture the spirit of the years between 1918 and 1939.

Reading the book brought up parallels to modern times, showing that the more things change the more they stay the same. Moralists attacked the immorality of the times, popular music, books and movies were blamed for the lowering of the standards of decency and culture, the older generation decried the lax mores of the young, the high brows decried the intrusion of American low-brow culture. Sound familiar?

I found the extensive quotes from newspapers illuminating, particularly leading up to the declaration of war.

For anyone interested in the era this book is essential: providing a fascinating alternate history of Britain between the wars, and one that focuses as much on the general public, the mood of the nation, the fashion and trends, as the bigger picture.

4/5

[Numidica · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF. This is the least engaging book by Graves that I have read. I'm sure the detail of this book would interest someone who lived through the period he describes, but there is far too much minutiae for me to crawl through.

[Will Ansbacher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well. A lot happened in those 20- odd years between the end of the First World War and the beginning of the Second, and Graves has done well to capture it. He starts with disarming frankness:

“This book is intended to serve as a reliable record of what took place, of a forgettable sort, during the interval between the two great European wars”.

But although it’s a mistake to read The Long Weekend as a true history book, and it is exclusively about England, the events he writes about are anything but inconsequential.

I mean, think back on the period from the mid-nineties until now (Weekend was written in 1939 at the start of WW2), and try to condense what was - and decide what will be – significant and relevant in everyday life, from politics, philosophy and economics to art, poetry, fashion and social customs. It would be hard to get the balance right, though if those fields don’t really seem to capture “everything”, you’re right - there is not too much about science, medicine or technology. Graves is not exactly anti-science but at one point he does denigrate scientists as “cold-blooded people who had no use for religion”. But then Graves was a writer and poet so I suppose that’s forgivable (being charitable here!).

It’s full of observations, like charming habits that rapidly fell out of favour through the Twenties – it was no longer acceptable for pedestrians to stop cars and demand rides, for example (who knew?) – or for travellers to talk to each other on trains (though I remember a similar era in air travel when you were expected to exchange life stories with your seat-mate)

What also stands out for me was the strength of pacifism towards the end of the decade. For someone who was at school in the sixties, this was a surprise; growing up then was a time when WW1 was still spoken of as the “Great War”. It seems to me as if, in the shadow of WW2, WW1 had been re-mythologized.

Reading Weekend, the twenties appear superficially as a very modern decade, in the sense that mores became so much more relaxed. Though you only have to remember their attitudes to homosexuality, for example - “almost unknown among working people”, he says - and explained in terms of adolescent public-school fascination with perversity – to remember that it was very alien too.

Then the Depression changed everything. It didn’t initially affect England that much, as poverty had still been so widespread before it – despite the 20s being such a gay flapper era, it really was for the well-to-do only. But the refusal of the US to forgive England’s war debts (they were set to run until 1984 ... 1984!!) and trade barriers that went up did gradually take their toll. And gradually attitudes hardened, fascists took over in Europe; and fairly rapidly, it seemed, everyone was talking about war again – it was felt to be “inevitable”, although there was (apparently) no particular enemy.

The immediate pre-WW2 events do suffer a bit from a lack of distance. You get a sense of the last half of the Thirties rushing by out of control almost (and I suppose they were really). Appeasement in 1938 appears almost out of nowhere, it had been immediately preceded by this common view of Hitler: “not that he was yet generally thought of as an enemy, [he] seemed only an unpleasantly dynamic element”.

What detracts from Weekend however, is the format, where Graves piles huge screeds of text into page-long paragraphs, but jumps mid-stream from one topic to another that’s barely related. It makes for difficult reading and there is much that could be condensed. It’s also written in a detached, sometimes wry tone that becomes too distant at times.

In fact there is only one place where Graves’s own personality intrudes into it – near the end, he mentions how he had a conversation with Winston Churchill, urging him to make a speech about the growing danger of Nazi Germany; I hadn’t realized the two had known each other, and the injection of the first person brings that small episode dramatically alive; I wish more of the book had been like that. Shoot, this should have been a 4-star book.

He does say in the intro that he wished he’d been able to rewrite it for the 2nd edition (which was published just a year or so later) but the type for the first ed. had been melted down for the war effort.

[Val · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wonder how on earth Robert Graves and Alan Hodge decided what to include in this book and what to leave out. I'm undecided whether to call the selection esoteric or eccentric.
It's very entertaining though.

I think they trawled through newspaper and magazine archives to collect information on what was of concern throughout the inter-war years and then added their own commentary on those events. I would also imagine that most of the hard work in the archives was done by Alan Hodge and most of the commentary was written by Robert Graves, but the collaboration is pretty much seamless. All the major events of the era are covered and the commentary gives an informed explanation of the context. It is not an unbiased commentary, the bias is Graves', but not the strong personal viewpoint of Goodbye to All That.
A lot of ephemera also makes its way into the book. Modern archaeologists tell us that the every day objects tell us more about how a society functioned than the great treasures; that the truths of that society are to be found in that ephemera. This was not a commonly held idea in the early C20th, so Graves and Hodges were ahead of their time. This book is good social science.
It is also good political science. It was fascinating to read about the different political viewpoints in the years before the Second World War. This was written at the outbreak of war, without the benefit of knowing the outcome and without years of hindsight.

It was produced remarkably quickly for the work which must have gone into both the research and the writing. This sometimes shows, as the work could be better organised in places, but that touch of disorganisation is part of its charm.

I took a few weeks to read this book because it seemed more appropriate to read a few chapters at a time, which made the piecemeal style more enjoyable and less random. This may not be the best approach for everyone, but I include the comment for anyone who might like to consider doing the same.

[Beth (bibliobeth) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book as part of a British Empire challenge hosted by one of my groups on GoodReads, eager to learn a little more about the history of the time between the two World Wars. The authors note that the “Long Weekend” kicked off with the Armistice and ended with a telegram from Hitler, however it focuses on that time in-between where so much of note happened to change the world yet is generally ignored, being sandwiched between the atrocities that happened in two World Wars. We have the famed Roaring Twenties followed by the Threadbare Thirties due to the Depression, yet we also have huge events such as the first women in Parliament and the first flights across the Atlantic. With chapter headings like The Days of the Loch Ness Monster, Education and Ethics, Amusements, Pacifism, Nudism, Hiking and Three Kings in One Year, the authors cover a lot of ground with interesting and relevant information and facts to keep the reader turning the page.

Personally, I thought this book was jam-packed with intriguing bits of trivia that made me feel like I had learned a lot about the time period whilst giving me the drive to go read even more. However, I did feel that the structure was somewhat clunky in parts, and it is clear that it was written in a hurry to describe events immediately before it was published. It was interesting to read how much the world changed in this short period of time regarding new technology and media, how the politicians of whatever government was in power would stick their heads in the sand when threatened with the prospect of another war, and how the older generations were horrified at the behaviour of the youngsters of the time – hmm… perhaps like nowadays? I think we do have to remember when the book was written i.e. at the beginning of the Second World War, so some views and statements may be slightly dated by today’s standards. In general though, this was an interesting read, that although I wouldn’t read it again, I’m glad I did as I feel a better appreciation and understanding of the history of the period.

Please see my full review at http://www.bibliobeth.com

[Hal Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Near the end of The Long Week-End, Graves and/or Hodge write:

“The summer of 1938 was passing with the usual news of holiday crowds and cricket matches, but by August the difficult-looking word ‘Czechoslovakia’ had begun to appear daily in the newspaper columns. Little was known about his place except as a country which apparently exported cheap gloves, glassware, and boots. Newspaper readers now learned with interest that it was a democratic country near Austria, which had come into being as a result of the Peace of Versailles—while they were reading about Hawker’s Atlantic flight, Sir Alec Black’s ‘The Panther’, and Lady Diana Manners’s wedding” (p441).

This brings you back, if you will now turn to the beginning of the book, to: “What most caught the popular imagination were the various attempts to fly the Atlantic…Harry George Hawker…etc.” (p84).

This is a book about distractions, and brilliantly it is also a book of distractions. I mean both that it is a book about how over a “long week-end” (surely the most cynical and cutting title ever devised) England frittered away the lessons of the Great War and the promise of peace, focusing on ephemera like fashion, entertainment, and talking mongooses; it is also a book about fashion, entertainment, and talking mongooses. International events, which thanks to the magic of dramatic irony we know to be loomingly important, get buried beneath an avalanche of trivia. We, as well as they, have spent our time reading about Hawker.

The trivia is interesting, somewhat arbitrary, and intensely personal—Laura Riding and T.E. Lawrence keep popping up because: Graves—and in another book this “social history” would be its own reward. But here it’s the revelation that everything that looked like a struggle at the time—the Depression and the Abdication Crisis and labor unrest etc.—was really just a holiday, and with WWII the real work of man re-begins. The world is at war and it’s only Monday. In 1940, it must have seemed a toss-up whether a weekend would ever roll around again.

[Joshua Buhs · Rating 3 out of 5]

Intriguing. I’m just not sure how far to trust it.

Look, all history is peculiar to the historian and shaped by the culture and times in which it is written. But some is more so than others, for good and ill: breaking through conventional thought or being so idiosyncratic (or ideological) as to be problematic.

I worry that this book falls in the latter category, idiosyncratic and ideological. It reflects, especially, Graves personal history (and even weakly hides it) as well we his own conservatism: his dislike of 1930s’ social-realism and confusion about the modernism earlier in the century (which shared his preference for the classical, but was too structurally innovative).

The book is organized thematically, though the thematic chapters form a chronology, starting with the years just after World War I and ending with the beginning of World War II. The book bills itself as a social history, but in today’s terms would probably be better understood as a cultural history.

Graves and Hodge range widely, discussing popular literature, cinema, politics, fashion, technology, and science, although their preference is clearly for the arts and politics. (Science is squeezed into two sections, the first being that scientists were distant from the developments of society, the second that they developed a social conscience in the 1930s, but were inclined to speak about subjects they had no experience of.)

Through these, there is a running thesis: the baleful effect of America on British culture. American-style breezy writing infected British literature, making it easier to read, but less precise, and blurring the boundaries between fiction and non. American cinema, American fashion, and other American arts also infected Britain.

Meanwhile, according to the authors, British culture was mostly stagnant, after centuries of progressive growth, Health was bad—but doctors were concerned only with cutting particular diseases, not making a healthy population. Artists were confused, looking to modernism or social realism, not the traditional canon. Newspapers (and radio and television) turned from informing the citizenry to dazzling them with spectacle: stories of psychics and mediums and the Loch Ness Monster and Gef the Talking Mongoose distracted them from important subjects.

The confusion was particularly keen in matter of politics, which the authors suggest—strongly—was the cause of World War II. Conservatives were not sure of what to make of Germany, whether there should be battle o accommodation. Liberals wanted war, but did not know what to do when it finally came. Not engaged fully, Britain let the world slip away. Its society, too: there were two occasions for a revolution that the book thinks would be right, one based on the experiences if the soldiers in the Great War, who wanted to clear house of the current rulers and install more pragmatic men, a movement that cut across classes. But in 1919 and 1926 this potential revolution was cut short by the establishment, which associated the current government with the nation.

Probably there are elements that are correct here, especially the bits about the influence of America on Britain, as well as resentment at this influence. But there are no citations, and so much of this seems a peculiar—and particular—remembering that it’s hard to take at face value. That sense is enhanced when it becomes obvious that some of the telling anecdotes here are about Robert Graves himself, but the book refuses to say that he was the one involved. (For example, the review of Hadrian the Great, which is used to illustrate all of the evils of the American influence on British literature, was written by Graves.)

There’s much to think on here, but taking it as tested and reviewed historical interpretation would seem dangerous. Better, this is a primary source book, offering one very particular view of the era in question.

[Lizzie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A sharp, clever, gossipy review/revue of the UK of the 20s and 30s by war-poet Robert Graves and Alan Hodge (whose wife Graves shortly swept up and ran off with). If you are a bit obsessed with this corner of history (as I have been ever since picking up a Dorothy Sayers mystery, and she too is chronologued here), then the book is well worth the time. From dance crazes to political scandal, from recreational drugs to midbrow literature to anti-Semitism and the abdication crisis, the book covers wide ground with incisive wit and a light touch. Obviously, Graves was a bit player himself and it shows, most notably his extended paeon to Laura Riding's poetical vision. Nevertheless, rather delightful, all in all.

[Roger Norman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Something of a potboiler from two well-known authors, described as 'breathless' on the cover of the Penguin edition, but still an absorbing study of the norms and fashions and attitudes of inter-war Britain. It will survive, I suspect, because there's nothing else quite like it and was written (in a hurry)in the immediate aftermath (1940) of the period it describes.

[Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ranging from the momentous to the trivial, Graves and Hodge survey the years between the end of the Great War and the start of World War II.

[Lauren Albert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having a newer edition, I hadn't really thought about how old the book was until I realized, "wait, Robert Graves is one of the authors?" Copyrighted in 1940 I am still impressed by how un-dated the book is right up until the end. But the book's age shows for sure when the authors discuss gays and "negroes." After saying that "[homosexuals were] on the increase among the upper classes for a couple of generations" they write "The upper-class boarding school system...was responsible. In most cases the adolescent homosexual became sexually normal on leaving school; but a large minority of the more emotional young people could not shake off the fascination of perversity." Later they refer to "Soho negroes" as "simply sensual people." These two brief passages made me cringe but the book was otherwise surprisingly up-to-date for a 76-year old book.

Worth reading if you can get passed the authors' bigotry.

[Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the handful of reviews have pointed out, this book covers EVERYTHING going on in England in the 20's and 30's--politics (such as the end of the Liberal Party), economic theory, religion (like the creepy rise of the occult in the aftermath of the war), social changes, art, literature, music. One fun example is how "football" begins to replace rugby and cricket as the sport of the masses. Another is how traffic laws had to be developed. It even discusses the invention of professional wrestling. It would be easy for a book that covers such a wide variety to be flippant, but it is not. It was also written in 1940, so I would have expected it to be littered with mistakes of judgment about the importance of various events. But, it is right on the money.

[Cynthia · Rating 4 out of 5]

About 1/3 of the way through.

[Samuel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mostly very enjoyable, but a bummer of an ending.

[Alexa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Started reading 3.5 years ago with a very, very, very long break in the middle. 20th century British social histories are my jam these days, though I'm more interested in the postwar decades, or in histories specific to the working class.

This one stands apart from others in this category in that it was written by a member of the upper class (which was much more of a big deal before WW2 and very noticeable at times here), and that it is a contemporary review, having been published in 1940. Other social histories of 1950-1980 were published mostly in the first decade of the 21st century, with the benefit of hindsight added to the opinions.

I would say I'm not rating this higher only because it isn't about the period I'm the most interested in. And in many ways, politics is also a topic that is less interesting to me than others, though in this case it is fascinating to observe the feelings and opinions of the people 'in real time'. There is such a tradition of the unity of Britain during the war, that we've nearly forgotten how splintered political parties were in the thirties. Not just Conservatives and Liberals and the growing Labour movement, but the Communists, the Socialists, the SNP, and others.

If another author was to take it upon themselves to write a new treatise about this twenty year period today, it would not be as rich and colorful as this one is. 3.5 stars.

[Hunted Snark]

Brilliant resource for anyone interested in dense detail about the daily lives, activities, obsessions, politics, social trends and passing whims of Britain in the Interwar period.

Minuses:
* It covers a lot of ground. So it can be quite glancing in its views at times.
* it must be said that the views are sometimes very clearly just the authors', and they are sometimes ... a trifle eccentric (apparently there were no gays among the working classes before the First World War—who knew?)
* no references, no footnotes. You get the feeling—as it was first published in 1940—that the authors were sometimes just writing down what they recalled of the past 20 years.

Plusses:
* it's well enough written—with occasional wry humour—that it's a pleasure to read
* because it's colloquial and mildly opinionated, rather than scrupulously factual you get an actual tone and flavour of the times, which is something a text book is always going to struggle with
* it's a great companion to Mass Observation, in its way, being closer in spirit to that grand project than to history
* it covers a lot of ground—giving you a wealth of facts, rough figures, and the names of places, people, ads and fancies to go and look up in more detail elsewhere.
* The chapters are arranged thematically, but with an overall drift from 1918 to 1939. It also gives us topics from a few different angles.

[David Mayes · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an extraordinary journal of life and society in Britain in the inter-war years from 1918 to 1939. It needs to be seen in the context of the rising threat of fascism, and the denial and escapism that typified British society after the horrors of World War I. This is the period I studied at Oxford, particularly Ramsay MacDonald's First Labour government and the 1920's.

[Aurelin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was hoping to love the book more but I guess it takes being British or being REALLY familiar with the history and social situation of UK in that period to enjoy the book to the full. A lot of the names were unfamiliar to me and I guess my knowledge is just not enough to keep up with all the information. However, that is my shortcoming not that of the book. It's very readable and flows nicely.

[Vintagebooklvr · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this a fascinating social history that explores all aspects of social history between the two World Wars, everything from clothing to movies to sports and even Loch Ness. There are some more serious issues here as well, but it was the first time that I realized that frivolous things could be considered serious history too.

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anglophiles will appreciate this in-depth social history of Britain between the wars. Indeed, published in 1940, the Second World War had barely started - but the authors knew both that war was coming and that it would serve as a bookend to WWI. A fascinating read, but those who aren't Anglophiles will likely find themselves picking and choosing selected bits to read.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most interesting indeed.

[Jeslyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot to like, a lot foreshadows current events, which is sobering. But something about it was difficult for me to buckle down and simple READ.

[ErnstG · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wonderful erudition and marshalling of information. Gave me a much better appreciation for the era .

ch 19 Abyssinia and Spain
ch 21 Three Kings

La Kermesse Heroique

[Maggie Timlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fascinating book! What does it not cover in the political, socioeconomic world of British subjects during the 1919-1939 interlude between the world wars? Very little than I can imagine and I'm pretty imaginative: movies, plays, theater, ballet, music, popular dance, fashion, dining, literature, poetry, humor/comedy, medicine, psychiatry, the media (press, magazines, radio and early television; the British finally realize the press can be a propaganda arm of the government-shocking!), other activities (weekend hiking, short and long vacations,sexuality, tobacco, alcohol), religon, politics (Liberal, Conservative, Labour, Socialist, Communist; Fascist), politicans (Chamberlain, Churchill, Baldwin, Lloyd George, Eden, Hitler, Mussolini, and more), wars/crisis (the depression, abdication of Edward the VIII for Mrs Simpson, the invasions of Abyssinia & Albania, by Italy, the Spanish civil war, occupation of the Rheinland, Sudaetenland crisis and break up of Czechoslovakia) and more.

Interestingly, as best that I can tell, Graves (who did much of the writing) tries to be objective. At times he praises and pillories anyone or anything. The organization of this colossal amount of information generally follows a time line, so some subjects reappear as the times change. What often interested me was the role that American culture had on Britain. Many I would have expected, however, others I would have not - advertizing?

Still if you are seriously interested in history, this book is one you might wish to read and even enjoy. I did. The British politics can prove difficult, but what politics of any country aren't?

[Billhotto · Rating 4 out of 5]

A 1940 survey of British (mostly English) life between the world wars. Brits were traumatized by the losses of WW I. They were then hit by the global depression. Understandably they wanted to escape from their woes. Gossip, trivia, fads and popular culture enabled this. There was a need to think that things were going to get better, even though it was apparent they were not. The book describes the growing influence of America on Britain's popular culture, business practices and advertising. American movies, jazz and literature showed a glamorous and confident world that many Brits could only dream of. Britain was changing, the Labor Party became the second major party, technologies such as cars, airplanes, the talkies, magazines and especially radio (the BBC) were altering the conversation. Newspapers were still the most important media, each of the numerous papers reflected its publisher's political stance. There was a great deal of self censorship, papers often sat on important stories. The British public only learned about the existence of Mrs. Simpson a week before the crisis of her relationship with Edward VIII came to a head. Some things remained the same, the class system was intact, the belief that England would always win the last battle, the tendency to retreat to sheer bloody-mindedness. Hodges and Graves see the government (often a National Coalition of moderate Tories and Laborites) as lacking any vision and content to just muddle through. Graves has acerbic commentary on modern poets and literature, burning quite a few of his remaining bridges. Of politicians, Stanley Baldwin is the dominant figure, the authors feel that he unfairly pushed Edward VIII off the throne. Neville Chamberlain was a failure, Churchill had the right idea, but was out of the loop.
There was a great deal of pacifism, even defeatism, especially among the upper and educated classes. Neither the Left nor the Right (e.g. Oswald Mosley) had much influence besides theoretical. The subjects covered are idiosyncric, garnered from newspaper clippings. But this is still an interesting look on what life was like during the time between "Downton Abbey" and "Home Fires". The writing, given the number of obscure references, is lucid and often humorous. What is especially fascinating is that the book was published in 1940. The authors didn't know how the story would turn out. IT's wonderful to be able to read it as nostalgia rather than as an obituary.

[Joyce · Rating 3 out of 5]

Readable social history of England after WW I, rushed out to press as the country was going back to war.

A hundred years ago:
"American participation in the war, though officially welcomed, had never touched the British heart; and the Americans were accused of exaggerating their eleventh-hour services in France at the expense of those who had borne the heat and burden of the day. ... In the United States it was also currently believed that Britain had been prostrated by her war effort and would never again recover her former proud position. She was described as a mangy lion licking her sores, and it was confidently prophesied that before long England would be a pastoral country without dependencies and with much the same political significance as Denmark."

American cultural influence in smoking habits -
"Virginian cigarettes were a little vulgar even for men: there was a transitional stage in the early Twenties, before the general adoption of Virginians, when in offering a cigarette-case one would say 'I hope you don't mind, it's only a Virgin' or, more familiarly, 'Excuse stinkers!'"

In a section on the popularity of war books, Graves says slyly "Robert Graves' Goodbye to All That, another best-seller of the time, was neither a war-book nor literary, but a reckless autobiography in which the war figured, written with small consideration for anyone's feelings."

The ruthless press -
"True dialog in 1928 in the reporters' room of a big London daily:
Small boy running in: 'Case of suicide. Worth half a crown, Guv'nor.'
Reporter, eagerly: 'Police told yet?'
Newsboy: 'No, 'course not.'
Reporter: 'Woman?'
Newsboy: 'Yep.'
Reporter: 'Young?'
Newsboy: 'Mother of five.'
Reporter: 'Oh... Why did she do it?'
Newsboy: 'Booze.'
Reporter: 'Where?'
Newsboy: 'Down in Stepney, I came running right here.'
Reporter: 'Stepney - that's no good. Any last letter?'
Newsboy: 'No, she forgot.'
Reporter, disgusted: 'For God's sake, don't tell me she just put her blooming head in a gas oven?'
Newsboy: 'Sorry, Guv'nor , that's what she did. But it's worth half a dollar, honest Guv'nor. And I brought it here straight away, same as they told us. It's my mother, Guv'nor.'
Reporter: 'O have it your way, then, blast you! It's not your fault, I suppose. Here's the blood money!'

[Gary Land · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have had this book on my shelf for a long time but never got around to reading it because I did not teach British history. Now I have and found most of it quite interesting. The title refers to the period between the two world wars when the British apparently did everything they could to forget the trauma of WWI. This is not an academic history. Robert Graves was a famous novelist and poet while his coauthor, Alan Hodge, who may have written most of the book, was a young man just recently out of university who proposed the idea for the book, which they completed just as WWII was beginning. The descriptions of popular culture, increasingly influenced by American film and music, were excellent as well as the discussions of British politics and the persistance of pacifism, which blinded the British to Hitler's evil potential. Some of the fads that the authors describe appear in the later episodes, of one of my favorite TV programs, Upstairs/Downstairs, and gave me greater appreciate for its historical veracity. I got lost sometimes, however, as the authors describe changing clothing fashions, as I did not always know the terminology, and at other times they refer to things that British at the time would know but as an American reading the book seventy years later I am not acquainted with. But the book holds up well and should be both useful and interesting to anyone wanting to know more about this period.

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

This social history of England between the world wars is comprehensive, but not scholarly, and is distinguished by the fact that it was published in 1939 (and is still in print); it is very interesting to read a contemporary account of the period juxtaposed with the reader's own hindsight about the era and the subsequent events of WWII. The tone is sometimes breezy, often dated in respect to social issues and “isms,” and entirely judgmental and entertainingly catty about cultural trends of the time – all of which contributes, inadvertently or not, to giving the reader a real feel for the times.