📖 Blog Tour ~The Human Kind by Alexander Baron

 

Imperial War Museum
2024

My thanks to the publisher for my copy of this book
and to Random Things Tours for the invitation to the blog tour

MARKING THE FIFTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUMS WARTIME CLASSICS SERIES

Alexander Baron’s remarkable Trilogy of the Second World War to be published together for the first time

Spanning the Sicilian countryside to the brothels of Ostend, and the final book in Alexander Baron’s War Trilogy, The Human Kind is a series of pithy vignettes reflective of the author’s own wartime experiences.

From the interminable days of training in Britain to brutal combat across Northwest Europe, the book depicts many of the men, women – and, in some cases, children – affected by the widespread reach of the Second World War.

In his trademark spare prose, Baron’s work provides an emotive and incisive snapshot into the lives of myriad characters during this tumultuous period in history.

Based on Alexander Baron’s own wartime experiences, this new edition of a 1953 classic includes an introduction from IWM which puts the work in historical context, and concludes the author’s War Trilogy.

📖 My Review..

Based on the author’s own wartime experiences, and first published in 1953, this last volume completes the War Trilogy which began with From the City, From the Plough and There’s No Home. In this collection of twenty five short stories Alexander Baron focuses on what war meant to the ordinary people who were caught up in extraordinary events. It’s an interesting collection and perhaps not what I was expecting, as it reads a bit like a personal memoir however, each of the stories have a beautiful lyrical quality which bring into stark reality some unique war time experiences. 

Some stories are quite difficult to read with emotional content which show the suffering, others are a little lighter but no less powerful. I was particularly impressed by The White Domain which shares the experiences of coal miners who were working alongside soldiers in constructing underground headquarters and on finishing Old Beethoven I have to admit to shedding a few tears. There are many of the twenty five stories which have stayed with me, particularly Chicolino which reiterates the vulnerability of children and their means of survival.

I have been particularly impressed by the stark power of these stories which linger in your mind even when you move onto the next one. Beautifully written, The Human Kind reminded me that although for us in the twenty first century these stories now read as historical fiction, for the author, this challenging time was his war-time reality and his powerful writing reminds us, quite forcibly, of that fact.

About the Author

Alexander Baron (1917 – 1999) was a British author and screenwriter. Widely acclaimed in his lifetime, he rose to prominence with his first novel, From the City, From the Plough, published in 1948 and based on his experiences of D-Day and the advance into Normandy.

It quickly became a bestseller, achieving both popular success and critical acclaim, and reportedly went on to sell in excess of one million copies. The novel cemented Baron’s reputation as a skilled, powerful, authentic writer, and he went on to write many more books, including the second and third in the sequence, both best-sellers, alongside scripts for Hollywood and screenplays for the BBC.

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