David Crumm’s Reviews > Churchill: Walking with Destiny > Status Update

Because Andrew Roberts has dug so deeply into Churchill's life and has so much space in this massive volume, I'm discovering truths about Churchill's war-time tightrope that I had not appreciated before this book. In the section I just finished, Roberts reports on efforts to vote "no confidence" in Churchill well into the war, efforts that Churchill deftly evaded partly by the pacing news he shared with the world.

Biographer Andrew Roberts did a remarkable job of digging through Churchill's archives as well as declassified documents relating to Churchill. One fascinating detail in this section of his book is that Britain actually was ahead of the U.S. in 1941 in proposing the development of a nuclear weapon. When Pearl Harbor was bombed, Churchill and FDR agreed that the U.S. had better resources to continue with the idea.

As a journalist, writer and editor, I'm pleased that Roberts looks closely at Churchill's writing and public speaking throughout his life, from the popular histories he published to pay the bills at home to his WWII-era speeches and radio broadcasts. Churchill understood the power of words. As the war began, for example, he changed the name of the Local Defense Volunteers to the Home Guard. Great branding.

Having now finished the lengthy section of Roberts' biography about early 1940, I now have to say I really have changed my mind about that film "The Darkest Hour," which I had enjoyed and I do think Gary Oldman deserved his Oscar. Roberts is exhaustive in searching for every possible perspective on events in those months. It reveals that movie to have been unfortunately fictionalized far more than I realized.

I just passed the May 1940 ascension of Churchill as wartime prime minister. What fascinates me is that Roberts' carefully researched version of those days differs significantly from the popular 2017 film, The Darkest Hour, for which Gary Oldman won an Oscar as Churchill. That movie jumbled some details of that May or changed them for dramatic purposes. Roberts details the accurate record from multiple perspectives.

Until this in-depth biography, I had not realized the extent to which Churchill was hands-on involved in several fronts during World War I. The fact that he was quite literally involved in trench warfare explains a lot about his fortitude in World War II.

I had not realized what a role Churchill played in the infamous Gallipoli campaign and that he also commanded troops literally down in the trenches of France in WWI.

There's so much in this biography that I did not appreciate about Churchill's life. For example, I knew that before WWII he had supervised the British Navy. What I did not realize was Churchill actually is credited with dramatic changes in that Navy prior to WWI. In fact, Roberts says that, had Churchill's life ended before WWII, he would have gone down in history as the man who prepared Britain for its role in WWI.