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| ▲ | eszed 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| The Wind is Rising, by HM Tomlinson. It's a diary of the first year or so of the second world war. It has an unforgettable first line: "All we hear from Berlin is the music of marrow bones and cleavers," and is similarly vivid throughout. It looks like you can borrow it from archive.org, but I suggest buying a physical copy. It was printed in 1941 - and I don't believe ever had a second edition - so it's on thin, wartime paper, which adds to the experience of reading it. It's like something pulled out of a time-capsule, a tangible relic of the time it covers. |
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| ▲ | verisimi an hour ago | parent [-] | | > It has an unforgettable first line: "All we hear from Berlin is the music of marrow bones and cleavers," and is similarly vivid throughout. A nice example of the power of media to bring something to life in the reader. |
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| ▲ | xVedun 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Check out Demons of Unrest, which covers the few months before the American civil war. It covers the stories of Lincoln, other union leaders and Confederate leaders and their understanding and misunderstandings about what the other side thought. It's remarkable about what assumptions people can make without talking to people from other places. |
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| ▲ | distances 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| There's the diary 1660-1669 of Samuel Pepys, which covers as the Great Plague of London, the Second Anglo-Dutch War and the Great Fire of London. |
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| ▲ | TremendousJudge 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia is about his experience in the Spanish Civil War, published in 1938. He was there between '36 and '37 I think. It's pre WWII, and I found it very interesting for the same reason you say here: his account doesn't have the benefit of hindsight. The civil war wasn't even over when the book was published. It's very interesting to see his perspective, what things he saw coming, and what things he didn't. |
