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040			_cAL
041			_aeng
082			_223 _a823.912 _bFORG
100			_aC S Forester _968131
245			_aGeneral
260			_aAustralia _bPenguin Books _c1936
300			_a233p. _bPB _c18x11cm.
365			_2English
520			_aThe book John Kelly reads every time he gets a promotion to remind him of ‘the perils of hubris, the pitfalls of patriotism and duty unaccompanied by critical thinking’ The most vivid, moving – and devastating – word-portrait of a World War One British commander ever written, here re-introduced by Max Hastings. C.S. Forester’s 1936 masterpiece follows Lt General Herbert Curzon, who fumbled a fortuitous early step on the path to glory in the Boer War. 1914 finds him an honourable, decent, brave and wholly unimaginative colonel. Survival through the early slaughters in which so many fellow-officers perished then brings him rapid promotion. By 1916, he is a general in command of 100,000 British soldiers, whom he leads through the horrors of the Somme and Passchendaele, a position for which he is entirely unsuited and intellectually unprepared. Wonderfully human with Forester’s droll relish for human folly on full display, this is the story of a man of his time who is anything but wicked, yet presides over appalling sacrifice and tragedy. In his awkwardness and his marriage to a Duke’s unlovely, unhappy daughter, Curzon embodies Forester’s full powers as a storyteller. His half-hero is patriotic, diligent, even courageous, driven by his sense of duty and refusal to yield to difficulties. But also powerfully damned is the same spirit which caused a hundred real-life British generals to serve as high priests at the bloodiest human sacrifice in the nation’s history. A masterful and insightful study about the perils of hubris and unquestioning duty in leadership, The General is a fable for our times.
650			_aEnglish Fiction _968132
650			_aEnglish Novel _968133
700			_aFORESTER (C S) _968134
942			_2ddc _cDB
999			_c226163 _d226163