Sir Winston S. Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953 "for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values."
Over a 64-year span, Churchill published over 40 books, many multi-volume definitive accounts of historical events to which he was a witness and participant. All are beautifully written and as accessible and relevant today as when first published.
During his fifty-year political career, Churchill served twice as Prime Minister in addition to other prominent positions—including President of the Board of Trade, First Lord of the Admiralty, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Home Secretary. In the 1930s, Churchill was one of the first to recognize the danger of the rising Nazi power in Germany and to campaign for rearmament in Britain. His leadership and inspired broadcasts and speeches during World War II helped strengthen British resistance to Adolf Hitler—and played an important part in the Allies’ eventual triumph.
One of the most inspiring wartime leaders of modern history, Churchill was also an orator, a historian, a journalist, and an artist. All of these aspects of Churchill are fully represented in this collection of his works.
The first volume of Winston Churchill's six-volume memoirs as a statesman and leader during World War II, The Gathering Storm begins with his thoughts on World War I--and how its ending laid the foundations for the next global conflict. As a military and political leader during both wars, Churchill was well placed to give readers a behind-the-scenes tour of history as it was being created, by a man who had a definitive part in shaping it. The volume continues with contemporary letters and memoranda from the British government documenting the country's terrifying descent into war. As Prime Minister during World War II, Churchill possessed a unique understanding of these documents' connection to historical events--and guides the reader through them with vivid narrative skill.
In the 1930s, well before Britain entered the War, Winston Churchill warned about the Nazi threat building in the east--even as many European leaders were urging caution and diplomacy. Arms and the Covenant is a collection of forty-one of Churchill's speeches from 1928 to 1938--speeches that would prove highly prescient, and ultimately successful in inspiring Britain's action as the first country to stand against Hitler.
The speeches range in tone from weighty solemnity to an almost lighthearted approach. Notable among these speeches is "The Disarmament Fable," in which Churchill presents the case for disarmament in the guise of negotiations among animals as to who should be allowed to keep their horns, and who should be permitted teeth and claws.
This volume presents a fascinating look at Churchill's tactics in convincing the British government and public of the rising danger building in the east--and at his versatility and skill as one of the best orators of the twentieth century.
This second volume in Churchill's five-volume series The World Crisis is by far the most personal-dealing frankly with Churchill's failures as a military leader and his ultimately unsuccessful battle to break the European deadlock. After the disastrous Gallipoli landings on the Dardanelles, Winston Churchill served for several months as commander of the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers. During this time, he served on one of the most violent stretches of the front lines, making a total of 36 courageous expeditions into No Man's Land. Here, Churchill provides an unflinching narrative of a particularly challenging time in World War I and in his own career-providing fascinating insight into the mental and psychological challenges faced by a major historical leader.
