Bursting the myth of the “people’s war”

D.H. Robinson

Blue Jerusalem: British Conservatism, Winston Churchill, and the Second World War Kit Kowol (Oxford University Press, £30) ON THE EDGE OF MY DESK IS A MUG that’s been through my dishwasher too many times. Wrapped around its face are four Warholic images of a svelte Boris Johnson aw-shucksing his hand through his hair, with the words “Conservative Future” printed alongside. Like everything in the Cameron years, there is something not quite right about it. Somewhere between old mugs, Boris Johnson, and conservative futurism my eyes wander back to Kit Kowol’s brilliant book on wartime conservatism. Specifically to the Cleveland housewife who attributed all the evils of the world to Adolf Hitler’s failure to get his end away: “Why doesn’t Hitler marry and settle down?” she wrote to her MP in…

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The Critic (Digital) - 1 Issue, November 2024

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