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Overview
John Lukacs has spent a lifetime considering the complex personality and statesmanship of Winston Churchill. In previous books Lukacs told the story of Churchill's titanic struggle with Adolf Hitler in the early days of World War II. Now, in Churchill: Visionary. Statesman. Historian., he turns his attention to Churchill the man and visionary statesman. Each chapter of this book provides an essential portrait of Churchill at the height of his powers. In addition to vividly depicting his relationships with Stalin, Roosevelt, Eisenhower, and other world leaders, Lukacs reflects on Churchill's ability to foresee the coming of World War II and the Cold War; he weighs Churchill's stature as a historian looking backward at the conflicts of which he was so much a part; and he examines the often contradictory ways Churchill has been perceived by critics and admirers alike. The last chapter is a powerful and deeply moving evocation of the three days Lukacs spent in London attending Churchill's funeral in 1965, and it offers a final assessment of Churchill's place in history through the prism of the varied individuals who came to honor him after his death. In Churchill: Visionary. Statesman. Historian., Lukacs sets forth the essence of this towering figure with consummate mastery.Synopsis
"[This volume] would make a splendid stocking present for any reader. . . . Illuminated by a generosity, a high intelligence, and scholarship which will delight any admirer."—Max Hastings, Sunday Telegraph; "This superb little book is a pleasure for the reader . . . a tour de force."—Stanley Hoffmann, Foreign Affairs; "Lukacs convincingly portrays a leader of an empire in irreversible decline and a towering, if flawed, hero of our time."—Publishers Weekly; "You can trust John Lukacs to cast a fresh light on the great man and his accomplishments."—Frank Wilson, Philadelphia Inquirer; "Lukacs offers the reflections of a wise, experienced, philosophically minded historian."—Geoffrey Best, Los Angeles Times Book Review; "Among historians these days. . . . the 'great-man theory' of history is out of fashion, but in this instance. . . . Lukacs leave[s] no doubt that it was because this one man rose to the challenge that freedom not merely survived but prevailed." - Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post Book World
Author Biography: John Lukacs is the author of more than twenty books on history, among them The Hitler of History, The End of the Twentieth Century and the End of the Modern Age (which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize), Five Days in London, May 1940, The Last European War, 1939-1941, The Duel, At the End of an Age, and A Thread of Years, the last five of which are available from Yale University Press.
Also available by John Lukacs: Five Days in London, May 1940; The Duel; At the End of an Age; The Last European War; A Thread of Years
Booklist
Lukacs' ability to meld the scholarly with the popular is much in evidence here.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
John Lukacs has authored more than 20 books on 20th-century history, but perhaps the most central figure in all his work is Winston Churchill. One senses that the British prime minister engages Lukacs deeply both as a world leader and as a fellow world-class historian. In Churchill: Visionary, Statesman, Historian, Lukacs addresses this enigmatic titan in his varied roles as wartime politician, Cold War prophet, and reflective chronicler. The study culminates in Lukacs' very personal evocation of his three-day visit to London in 1965 for Churchill's funeral. Lukacs' examination of Churchill's complicated relationships with Stalin, Roosevelt, and Eisenhower presents these World War II leaders in a new light.Booklist
Lukacs' ability to meld the scholarly with the popular is much in evidence here.Library Journal
. . .[T]his book [consists of] tightly constructed essay[s] based on a thorough familiarity with. . . Churchill. . .[G]ood. . . for academic and. . . public libraries.Publishers Weekly
A prolific senior historian of modern Europe, Lukacs has written about Churchill many times before, most recently in Five Days in London, May 1940. That recycled a small part of his The Duel: 10 May-31 July: The Eighty-Day Struggle Between Churchill and Hitler. This rather thin new volume contains little that is new, and is seemingly a reorganization of Lukacs's lecture notes, leavings, reconsiderations and reviews. There are shrewd chapters on Churchill's cautious relations with Stalin, Roosevelt and Eisenhower, and on Churchill's critics. There are reevaluations of Churchill as a visionary and as a historian capable of "splendid phrases and passages," often at his best when "personal and participatory." Although Lukacs credits Churchill's extraordinary army of research assistants over much of a lifetime for his massive output, he fails to note that much of the work was written to order, fat contracts supporting an authorial lifestyle almost unique in his time. A chapter on Churchill and Eisenhower persuasively takes the political general down a peg or two, and the excoriation (and exposure) of the pompous Churchill-baiter John Charmley is overdue. A final chapter, personal observations on the three days in January 1965 when Lukacs went to London to observe the great man's obsequies, seems either padding or self-indulgence. Overall, though, Lukacs convincingly portrays a leader of an empire in irreversible decline and a towering, if flawed, hero of our time. (Oct.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.Forbes Magazine
John Lukacs' appreciation of Churchill makes this volume the perfect follow-on to Keegan's biography. Lukacs--Hungarian-born, proud of Europe's cultural heritage, a longtime resident of the U.S. (and another American Heritage contributor)--is an extraordinary historian, whose pathbreaking works have rightly won him acclaim. He makes an overpowering case for Churchill as a visionary, not least because, before others, Churchill recognized the mortal danger posed by Adolf Hitler, and in 1946 warned of the Soviet Union's Iron Curtain. In 1940 only Churchill stood between Hitler and conquest, something many historians, addicted as they are to the "impersonal forces" of human events, find hard to fathom. (3 Mar 2003)—Steve Forbes