Books

Sphinx editors in Brussels were steeped in the war as Churchill described it. Their volumes offer a splendid collection of wartime photographs.

Attracted by the works of Henry George, the young Churchill asked: Can justice only be achieved at the expense of individual liberty?

The first key to sales is an intriguing title and Mr. Napier succeeds admirably in that regard. But a reader expecting the “goods” will be rather surprised that the preamble and first chapter praise Churchill’s warnings of the need to rearm in the face of Nazi Germany, and his condemnation of the Munich Agreement. Napier then adds several straightforward chapters covering the early days of the war and Churchill becoming prime minister.

Many students of his canon consider that the hero is Churchill as he liked to imagine himself then. An appreciator of beauty and fine living, Savrola cannot live "in dreamy quiet and philosophic calm in some beautiful garden, far from the noise of men" while the life of the nation is at stake. "'Vehement, high and daring,' was his cast of mind. The life he lived was the only one he could ever live; he must go on to the end." Forty years later the novelist would exhort his countrymen: "We shall go on to the end....We shall never surrender."

In 1960 General Lord Ismay said that an objective Churchill biography could not be written for fifty years. Andrew Roberts weighs in at year fifty-eight. The delay paid off. Roberts’ book will be “unique even to jaded Churchillians.”

David Lough sheds bright light on the youthful Churchill's hopes and dreams, under the worldly, solicitous, loving influence of his American mother.

Brough Scott, who is highly qualified, explores Churchill’s long and sometimes significant equestrian life, complete with penetrating observations.

Piecing history together from her mother’s letters, Jill Rose shines welcome light on an obscure episode in Churchill’s wartime premiership.

Offering lessons in "Applied Churchill," Kryske's "Churchill without Blood, Sweat, and Tears" is a useful guide to our use of those principles today.

“Like a beaker of champagne,” Harold Nicolson described My Early Life, and Churchill’s account of his life through 1908 still sparkles over a century later.

Cusic tracks every reference to Churchillian music and song. They range from the marches, ditties and Gilbert & Sullivan Churchill loved to his favorite hymns.

Normandy and Beyond leaves us in awe at Churchill’s linguistic fluidity, clarity of thought, sense of humor, impish mischief, foresight, and ability to deal with “nests of cockatrices.”