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An Intimate History of Killing

Face to Face Killing in Twentieth Century Warfare

Contributors

By Joanna Bourke

Formats and Prices

Price

$25.99

Format

Trade Paperback

Format:

Trade Paperback $25.99

This item is a preorder. Your payment method will be charged immediately, and the product is expected to ship on or around November 27, 2000. This date is subject to change due to shipping delays beyond our control.

The characteristic act of men at war is not dying, but killing. Politicians and military historians may gloss over human slaughter, emphasizing the defense of national honor, but for men in active service, warfare means being – or becoming – efficient killers. In An Intimate History of Killing, historian Joanna Bourke asks: What are the social and psychological dynamics of becoming the best “citizen soldiers?” What kind of men become the best killers? How do they readjust to civilian life? These questions are answered in this groundbreaking new work that won, while still in manuscript, the Fraenkel Prize for Contemporary History. Excerpting from letters, diaries, memoirs, and reports of British, American, and Australian veterans of three wars (World War I, World War II, and Vietnam), Bourke concludes that the structure of war encourages pleasure in killing and that perfectly ordinary, gentle human beings can, and often do, become enthusiastic killers without being brutalized. This graphic, unromanticized look at men at war is sure to revise many long-held beliefs about the nature of violence.

On Sale
Nov 27, 2000
Page Count
544 pages
Publisher
Basic Books
ISBN-13
9780465007387

Joanna Bourke

About the Author

Joanna Bourke is a professor of history at Birbeck College in London. Her previous books include Dismembering the Male: Men’s Bodies, Britain, and the Great War.

Learn more about this author