Reviews Archives - Page 3 of 11 - Richard M. Langworth

Robert Hardy in Susskind’s “Churchill.” (PBS).

“Leaders: Churchill,” with Robert Hardy (1986)

17 August 2022 Comments 2 Comments

With all its flaws and inaccuracies, the performance brings out Churchill's greatest characteristic. That was his essential humanity, which made him so different from other leaders past and present. James Humes noted another quality. "Churchill told his audiences what he wanted them to hear." And Sir John Gielgud closes with words to remember. "Churchill was as ordinary as any of us—and as extraordinary as any of us can hope to be."

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Winston Churchill in “Peaky Blinders” and On the Art of Sleep

20 July 2022 Comments 0 Comments

Given the differences in ages, Maskell's makeup and mannerisms are excellent. Close-ups are better than full figure shots. Unfortunately the scriptwriter didn't consult the right experts. For example, Churchill wouldn't have lorded over Tommy Shelby for being lesser born than he. That simply was not Churchill's style. Nor did he regard Oswald Mosley as a serious a threat as "Peaky Blinders" makes him.

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Echoes and Memories: Foreword to “Churchill in Punch” by Gary Stiles

25 June 2022 Comments 0 Comments

Gary Stiles's new book, "Churchill and Punch," captures their long relationship during an unprecedented career. The best artists of their time represented Punch’s often querulous, at times hilarious, sometimes wry, yet almost always respectful attitude toward Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill. In these pages, Gary Stiles and those artists renew those echoes and memories for future generations.

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Review: Bucknell University’s Panel on “Churchill, Hero or Colonialist?”

15 April 2022 Comments 0 Comments

In an age where Churchill is often subject to one-sided discussions by panelists who agree with each other, Bucknell deserves great credit for seeking balance on a fraught subject. Likewise the panelists, Drs. Arnn, McMeekin and Mukerjee, who manage to disagree without rancor, and to acknowledge each other's points of view. The Bucknell program is definitely worth the time of thoughtful readers.

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Fantasies: Trollope’s Brittanula, Churchill’s Battle of Gettysburg

11 April 2022 Comments 0 Comments

1930: Kaiser Wilhelm II may today occupy "the most splendid situation in Europe." But "let him not forget that he might well have found himself eating the bitter bread of exile, a dethroned sovereign and a broken man loaded with unutterable reproach...if Lee had not won the Battle of Gettysburg."

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“Munich, The Edge of War,” with Jeremy Irons: Fine Acting, Edgy History

25 February 2022 Comments 1 Comment

Regardless of whether you like the movie—and Jeremy Irons gives it an authentic, watchable flavor—we know much more about Munich in the light of scholarship since. We know that Soviet Russia was prepared to stand with Czechoslovakia in 1938, and had become a German ally in 1939. We know how—with the help of Czech armaments—Poland was eradicated in three weeks, the Low Countries in eighteen days, France in six weeks. If resisting Hitler was so ludicrous an idea in 1938, what was there about fighting him in 1939-40 that made it preferable? Given what we know, we are obliged to consider Churchill’s opinion—which was, characteristically, far from baseless.

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“My Visit to Russia”: Clementine Churchill’s Wartime Travelogue

5 February 2022 Comments 0 Comments

Clementine Churchill dramatic word-picture of Russia’s devastation remind us of Winston’s words to her about war: “I feel more deeply every year—and can measure the feeling here in the midst of arms—what vile and wicked folly and barbarism it all is.”

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“Churchill Defiant,” by Barbara Leaming: Still the Best on Churchill Postwar

30 January 2022 Comments 0 Comments

Barbara Leaming: “Others Heard Taps, Churchill Heard Reveille”

Churchill Defiant: Fighting On 1945-1955, by Barbara Leaming. London: Harper Press, 394 pages.

“Great captains must take their chance with the rest. Caesar was assassinated by his dearest friend. Hannibal was cut off by poison. Frederick the Great lingered out years of loneliness in body and soul. Napoleon rotted at St. Helena. Compared with these, Marlborough had a good and fair end to his life.” —Winston S. Churchill, Marlborough: His Life and Times, 1936, Book Two.

A decade on, still a book to read

Readers sometimes ask for the best books to read on Churchill’s career after the Second World War.…

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Christmas Eve, Washington, 1941: Eighty Years On

24 December 2021 Comments 1 Comment

"Here, in the midst of war, raging and roaring over all the lands and seas, creeping nearer to our hearts and homes, here, amid all the tumult, we have tonight the peace of the spirit in each cottage home and in every generous heart. Therefore we may cast aside for this night at least the cares and dangers which beset us, and make for the children an evening of happiness in a world of storm." —WSC

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Guelzo on Robert E. Lee: “To Err on the Side of Absorbing Society’s Defaulters”

15 November 2021 Comments 0 Comments

Allen C. Guelzo, Robert E. Lee: A Life (New York: Knopf, 2021), 608 pages, illus., $35, Kindle $15.99. First published in The American Spectator, 9 November 2021.

“Who’s that man on the horse?”…

…I asked my father at a young age. “That’s Lee—he led a Southern army in the Civil War.” He gave me a book I still have, Illustrated Minute Biographies, by William DeWitt. Published 1953, it is utterly non-judgmental. Opposite the page on Lee (“Leader of a Lost Cause”) is a page on Lenin (“Father of the Russian Revolution.”)

Among DeWitt’s 150 personalities, Lee fascinated. I’ve always had a soft spot for underdogs.…

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