- Paperback: 461 pages
- Publisher: Orbis Publishing; reprint edition (2002)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0304358401
- ISBN-13: 978-0304358403
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.8 x 3.2 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
361,734 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #26 in Books > History > Other Historical Subjects > Historians > Beevor, Antony
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Review
'he has produced a moving masterpiece of the indictment of war.' (Felipe Fernandez-Armesto THE TLS )
'Fascination lies in the human drama, superbly captured by Beevor... a vivid chronicle of a dreadful time and place.' (Max Hastings THE SUNDAY TIMES )
'he is also very good on the political manoeuvrings of this most intensely ideological of conflicts.' (Andrew Roberts THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH )
'it is an admirably clear-sighted account.... a great achievement.' (Miranda France THE DAILY TELEGRAPH )
'the story he tells is grimly familiar but he presents it with a freshness, an eye for detail and a degree of detachment that makes this one of the best accounts to date of the Spanish crisis.' (Richard Overy THE EVENING STANDARD )
'This is an enthralling bok. The narrative is masterly, wonderfully clear as a guide through the labyrinth. It is even-tempered and full of good sense.' (Allan Massie THE LITERARY REVIEW )
'To appreciate the magnitude of that rapid and extraordinary achievement, do read Antony Beevor's account of the bubbling cauldron of horror from which Spain escaped.' (Tom Rosenthal THE DAILY MAIL )
'clear prose, peppered with fresh perceptions, especially where strategy, tactics, and soldiers are concerned.' (Paul Preston THE TIMES )
Antony Beevor has produced an absorbing re-working of the book he originally wrote in 1982 (Paul Callan THE DAILY EXPRESS )
'It is powerfully brought to life, not only by his practical grasp but by often graphic material found recently in Spanish, German, and particularly, Russian archives. (Jeremy Treglown THE FINANCIAL TIMES )
'it's his most impressive book to date beacause he coolly makes sense of such a complicated story: the narrative sweep is consummate, the seamless use of so many sources masterful, and the eye for details makes it a superb read.' (Simon Sebag Montefiore THE MAIL ON SUNDAY )
'BATTLE FOR SPAIN is this summer's corking military history.... essential if you're going Iberian.' (David Sexton THE EVENING STANDARD )
'it looks destined to become the definitive popular work on the war.' (ROB STOKES SPAIN MAGAZINE )
'his characteristically excellent book' (Barrie Clement TRIBUNE )
'For the big picture of the war, all the more powerful for its blending of narrative intensity with emotional restraint, there is no rival to Antony Beevor's masterly, THE BATTLE FOR SPAIN' (Boyd Tonkin THE INDEPENDENT )
'Beevor's account of the war is a valuable work for anyone wishing to understand the complexities and contradictions of modern Spain.' (Kim Bielenberg THE IRISH INDEPENDENT )
'a brilliant account of the battle for Spain' (Dermot Bolger IRISH SUNDAY INDEPENDENT )
'essential reading' (Raymond Carr THE SPECTATOR ) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
'Fascination lies in the human drama, superbly captured by Beevor... a vivid chronicle of a dreadful time and place.' (Max Hastings THE SUNDAY TIMES )
'he is also very good on the political manoeuvrings of this most intensely ideological of conflicts.' (Andrew Roberts THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH )
'it is an admirably clear-sighted account.... a great achievement.' (Miranda France THE DAILY TELEGRAPH )
'the story he tells is grimly familiar but he presents it with a freshness, an eye for detail and a degree of detachment that makes this one of the best accounts to date of the Spanish crisis.' (Richard Overy THE EVENING STANDARD )
'This is an enthralling bok. The narrative is masterly, wonderfully clear as a guide through the labyrinth. It is even-tempered and full of good sense.' (Allan Massie THE LITERARY REVIEW )
'To appreciate the magnitude of that rapid and extraordinary achievement, do read Antony Beevor's account of the bubbling cauldron of horror from which Spain escaped.' (Tom Rosenthal THE DAILY MAIL )
'clear prose, peppered with fresh perceptions, especially where strategy, tactics, and soldiers are concerned.' (Paul Preston THE TIMES )
Antony Beevor has produced an absorbing re-working of the book he originally wrote in 1982 (Paul Callan THE DAILY EXPRESS )
'It is powerfully brought to life, not only by his practical grasp but by often graphic material found recently in Spanish, German, and particularly, Russian archives. (Jeremy Treglown THE FINANCIAL TIMES )
'it's his most impressive book to date beacause he coolly makes sense of such a complicated story: the narrative sweep is consummate, the seamless use of so many sources masterful, and the eye for details makes it a superb read.' (Simon Sebag Montefiore THE MAIL ON SUNDAY )
'BATTLE FOR SPAIN is this summer's corking military history.... essential if you're going Iberian.' (David Sexton THE EVENING STANDARD )
'it looks destined to become the definitive popular work on the war.' (ROB STOKES SPAIN MAGAZINE )
'his characteristically excellent book' (Barrie Clement TRIBUNE )
'For the big picture of the war, all the more powerful for its blending of narrative intensity with emotional restraint, there is no rival to Antony Beevor's masterly, THE BATTLE FOR SPAIN' (Boyd Tonkin THE INDEPENDENT )
'Beevor's account of the war is a valuable work for anyone wishing to understand the complexities and contradictions of modern Spain.' (Kim Bielenberg THE IRISH INDEPENDENT )
'a brilliant account of the battle for Spain' (Dermot Bolger IRISH SUNDAY INDEPENDENT )
'essential reading' (Raymond Carr THE SPECTATOR ) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Max Hastings, THE SUNDAY TIMES
'Fascination lies in the human drama, superbly captured by Beevor... a vivid chronicle of a dreadful time and place.'
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
Recent events indicate that the Spanish civil war is not yet entirely finished. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
Recent events indicate that the Spanish civil war is not yet entirely finished. Read the first page
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Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
233 of 242 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Best book on the Spanish Civil War,
By
This review is from: The Battle for Spain (Cassell Military Paperbacks) (Paperback)
The Spanish Civil War is often poorly understood, indeed misunderstood, firstly because of its complexity (as Antony Beevor makes clear there were multiple conflicts going on at different levels, not least the strife between different Republican groups which weakened the Republican government fatally), secondly because most of us outside Spain know about the war from those who fought on the Republican side and subsequently wrote about it (best known of whom is of course George Orwell in Homage to Catalonia). Antony Beevor cuts through the confusion with a marvellously clear and concise account of the war, not sparing the reader a taste of how horrific conditions were in Spain for combatant and non-combatant alike. The introductory chapters on the state of Spain and the origins of the Civil War are particularly enlightening. The book also makes clear and obvious why the Nationalists won - they were better organised, more professional soldiers, better tacticians - and had the support of Hitler and Mussolini, to say nothing of the fatal internecine conflict among the Republican parties. Perhaps Beevor is a little sniffy about the non-intervention of the western democracies but how realistic this would have been (and whether it would have done anything to help the fatally fissile Republican cause) is to me questionable. But as Beevor points out, as the Spanish proverb has it, history is a common meadow in which everyone can make hay, and there is plenty of raw material for discussion in this excellent book. It should be read by anyone who is interested in European history, 20th century history, politics or simply those interested in how a country can disintigrate into such horror in such a short time.
59 of 63 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Spanish Civil War,
By
This review is from: The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939 (Paperback)
Antony Beevor's (AB) book on the Spanish Civil war is excellent background reading on this rather tragic event in Spain's History. AB goes through every single detail of the war.
He starts off with describing the development of Spain right up to the `Rising of the Generals' in 1936 and follows this up by going through the various factions involved. There is also a whole section on the involvement of other countries - most notably that of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union - in the civil war. When he covers the intellectuals' reaction to the whole event, I was quite surprised at some of the `nostalgic views' expressed. The section, which made me shudder was the book's section on the internal power struggle between the various Republican factions. A lot of this was a copy-cat event of the Stalinist purges in the Soviet Union during the 1930s. AB goes into quite a bit of detail. I must agree that some of the battles can be hard to follow, but it does help if you study the maps quite thoroughly. But then again I think it would also help if these maps weren't all at the beginning of the book but instead put at the spot of the corresponding battles. AB of course covers the nationalist victory plus the time after and he doesn't exactly mince words on the style of politics under Franco. But he also asks if a republican victory would have been the better solution and he does not give any definite answer except saying that a Stalinist-type communist regime could have been significantly worse. All told I found this book very good.
38 of 42 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Tragic Spain,
By
This review is from: The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939 (Hardcover)
The Spanish Civil war must be one of the most tragic European wars of all time. Spaniard against Spaniard, a bloody conflict characterised by the failures on both sides but mainly the Republicans, to recognise modern warfare when they saw it and the clash of two bitterly opposed, totalitarian beliefs, Stalinist communism and Fascism. The contribution of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Soviet Russia and indeed, France and Great Britain to the perpetuation of this conflict as a testing ground for troops, tactics and weapons is well documented in this book.
Antony Beevor works through the mire of 1930's Spanish politics with aplomb, if confusingly, between the plethora of parties on both the left and the right, many identified simply by acronyms such as the POUM and the JONS. However, once the reader perseveres through the initial, context setting chapters the book opens up into a rich account of the often bloody and generally wasteful war through to its conclusion in 1939 on the eve of World War 2. The final chapter relates the continuing, relentless repression of the left in Spain right up to the 1960's when the advent of the package holiday finally opened up the country to peaceful outside influences and with General Franco's death, brought economic growth and stability. This book was written sometime ago (1982) and it shows. A less polished if undoubtedly scholarly Antony Beevor shows through in comparison with later works (Stanlingrad, Berlin) and overall, the book has a more `academic' feel to it. One cannot help but feel the hand of a publisher seeing an early work re-published with a new title as a money-spinner. That said, I am pleased that it was and would recommend the book to all but the very casual reader.
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