What to Read Next: WWI in literature

Issue #341: Featuring Willa Cather and Barbara Tuchman

In John Nash’s painting Over The Top, the artist depicted a disastrous attack in which he himself took part. Over the 80 men who took part in this skirmish, Nash was one of twelve who surived. A painting bereft of glory, it remains “an acknowledged masterpiece” of war art.

Happy Friday, readers!

Last week, I mentioned featuring Demon Copperhead in this newsletter, but I decided to instead feature a couple of Pulitzer winners that delve into WWI. It’s a rich area of study — for both fiction and non-fiction — that often gets eclipsed on bestseller lists by Civil War and WWII narratives. And it certainly won’t be the last time this Pulitzer Project explores the Great War; up until the next world war, WWI featured in a number of titles in the non-fiction categories.

Barbara Kingsolver’s Demon Copperhead will come next week, along with her Pigs in Heaven.

Let’s jump in.

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One of Ours by Willa Cather

Among the early Pulitzer winners in the “Fiction” category, World War I prominently looms in the background. The war lasted from 1914-18 and the prize started in 1917. Given that the themes of popular art and culture are always driven by what’s going in the world around us, it makes sense that WWI is rather visible, popping into plotlines now and then the way COVID does in contemporary novels.

In Willa Cather’s One of Ours, the Great War takes center stage.

The first half of the story is reminiscent of Cather’s other work, heavily featuring frontier and homestead themes. In the second half, One of Ours transforms into a story more like Stephen Crane’s famous Red Badge of Courage. Protagonist Claude Wheeler goes from country boy to eager, glory-hungry soldier.

Cather expertly explores the themes of meaning-making and even patriotism, while also conveying much of the meaninglessness that defined World War I’s brutalities. It’s a complex line and I appreciate that Cather never sought to give an answer to that question of patriotism vs undue sacrifice. She just told a story and allows readers to grapple with those moral intracacies.

One of Ours was a worthwhile and thought-provoking read, but is probably my least favorite of Cather’s novels. As I’ve said before, if you’re going to read Cather, start with her Great Plains trilogy.

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The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman

Barbara Tuchman’s book about the onset and start of World War I was considered a classic nearly from the moment it hit bookstore shelves in 1962. In October that year, John F. Kennedy famously used The Guns of August as a study in what not to do during the Cuban Missle Crisis.

Tuchman brilliantly outlines how miscommunication, pride, and bungled timing all contributed to a war that went on far too long and for no good reason.

Over 480+ pages, Tuchman covers a fairly narrow timeline of only the lead-up and first month of war in August 1914. Her narrative prowess is undisputed — from the first page, readers are treated to all the dramatic political and strategic intrigue that led to Germany’s invasion of Belgium and France, their subsequent (foolhardy) push into Russia, and the Allied defense which drew in the U.K. and eventually the U.S.

Her primary plotline miss — and it’s a big one — is not giving nearly enough space (as in, hardly any) to the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. For most historians, that was the key which turned and started the whole European machine towards war.

Tuchman occasionally got into the weeds a bit much and my eyes indeed glazed over now and then. But overall I was hooked by her storytelling and her ability to draw out insights of human nature that are often neglected by classical historians. I was never bored while reading The Guns of August and always looked forward to picking it back up. It’s certainly not for everyone, but if you enjoy European or military history, it’s a classic for good reason.

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Thanks so much for reading. I deeply appreciate your time and inbox space.

-Jeremy