German Bomb Research Articles

The First Woman in Kefar Ḥasidim: Ḥannah Golda Hopstein’s Memoir

This paper presents an unusual Hasidic figure and sketches her compelling biography in broad outlines. Ḥannah Golda Hopstein (1886–1939), was a unique Hasidic woman, a Zionist pioneer and had a fascinating life story which ended in tragedy. She left Poland in 1924 for Mandatory Palestine, where she was one of the founders of the Hasidic-agricultural settlement Kefar Ḥasidim. She later returned to Europe to visit family and was killed by a German bomb during the invasion of Poland in September 1939. Hopstein’s fourteen-page, Hebrew handwritten diary lies lost in the archives of Kefar Hasidism, Israel. It is entirely translated and published here for the first time with a biographical introduction. This short memoir can be a base for future extensive research, since it teaches us much about several key issues, such as the role of women in Hasidism, Hasidic attitudes towards Zionism, and female leadership among Hasidim.

A Story with Characters and Action

A Story with Characters and Action

Sifting

Sifting

A letter about Jean Fernel by Charles Sherrington and the mind-brain connection.

In 1940 during the early phase of the Nazi aerial assault on Britain, the English neurophysiologist, C.S. Sherrington, age 83 years, had just published a philosophical work, Man on His Nature, and was researching the writings of Jean Fernel, a 16th century French physician. Sherrington's study of Fernel stemmed from a common interest they shared in the association between the mind and the brain. This essay was prompted by a short letter penned by Sherrington in December 1940 and bound years later in his biography, The Endeavour of Jean Fernel, published in 1946. The letter requested information about a particular medical work by Fernel but also mentioned in passing Sherrington's recent forced evacuation from his home in Ipswich, threatened by German bombing and invasion. The letter in the book invited a reprise of his remarkable career and a study of his last neurological concern - the mind-brain mystery.

The Secret History of RDX: The Super-Explosive That Helped Win World War II by Colin F. Baxter

Reviewed by: The Secret History of RDX: The Super-Explosive That Helped Win World War II by Colin F. Baxter Rich Hamerla (bio) The Secret History of RDX: The Super-Explosive That Helped Win World War II. By Colin F. Baxter. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2018. Pp. x+204. $45. In The Secret History of RDX: The Super-Explosive That Helped Win World War II, Colin F. Baxter presents the story of the development of RDX (Research Department Explosive), which begins at the Woolrich Arsenal in London in 1941. Baxter hopes this study will contribute to the “History from the Middle” of the Second World War, as opposed to the usual accounts that focus on activity at the top (leadership and campaigns), or the bottom (small-unit histories and solider/sailor biographies). The story takes us from London to Canada and, most importantly, to the Holston Ordinance Works near Kingsport, Tennessee, United States. The British, looking to procure a more powerful explosive for the war, achieved this by working with its own scientists and military personnel and with her allies in Canada and the United States. While initially developed to replace older explosives used in bombs—Amatol—which made up approximately 30 percent of the munitions’ weight when an equivalent German bomb was 50 percent explosive by weight, RDX and its spinoffs were, the author argues, on par with more familiar technologies that helped in the war for the Allies. RDX-based products such as Composition B2 and C-4 were used in a variety of applications, including the biggest non-nuclear air-dropped bombs during the war: the 14,000 pound Tallboys and the 22,000 pound Grand Slams. Torpex, another RDX byproduct, was a crucial ingredient used in confronting the U-Boat threat to Great Britain. Baxter commits an entire chapter to this subject, which is arguably the best in the book. Baxter emphasizes familiar themes in the history of the relationships between governments, modern militaries, science, and technology. For example, all Allied militaries were skeptical of civilian scientists’ ability to understand military needs, which was coupled with a military culture characterized by a pervasive anxiety over secrecy. This caused friction between various ordinance personnel, government research committees, and civilian-dominated councils. In the end, though, relationships smoothed and the Tennessee Eastman Company was hired to develop RDX production processes, which it did on a massive scale, from a production output of 60 tons a week by British manufacturing in 1941 to 340 tons per day in the United States by the end of the war. While an interesting and useful book from a scholarly perspective, The Secret History of RDX also includes several anecdotes that many military veterans will find familiar and amusing, this reviewer included. One occurred in 1944 when bomber crews were taken in by a rumor begun by senior [End Page 366] officers concerned over mishandling the new RDX-based munitions. This led young bomber crews to believe that Composition B2 (RDX) bombs were exceptionally fragile and prone to exploding if handled too roughly. On one particularly turbulent mission to Germany on 20 April, the nervous bombardiers dumped 2,472 of 6,344 bombs into the English Channel rather than risk delivering them to their targets. Based on this and similar incidents, ordnance officers and crews were then told to disregard information that suggested RDX bombs required special, delicate handling. The outcome of this change-in-message resulted in a predictable fiasco just a few months later when, on 15 July, a detail of American airmen found themselves delivering a load of 500-pound bombs to an ammo dump in Suffolk, England on a Saturday night. The young men, sure the munitions were safe and anxious to complete their work before a night on the town, disregarded standard unloading procedures. The driver of one of the trucks put the vehicle in reverse, gunned the engine and slammed on the breaks, jettisoning the cargo onto the tarmac. The crew was successful in quickly unloading the bombs, but in doing so, 12,000 tons of RDX-based explosives went off, killing five airmen in an explosion that could be heard miles away. Generally, then, this...

Dr Avram Farkic (1866-1925), the founder and the owner of the first physical therapy institute in Serbia

Methods of physical medicine, many of which have been empirically applied since the ancient times, have become particularly popular in 19th century Europe. The first examples of the works of Serbian doctors in this area originate from the same period. In 1838 and 1839, Dr. Konstantin Peicic wrote about Prissnitz?s method of hydrotherapy. In 1842, Dr. Dimitrije Radulovic published in Latin his doctoral dissertation concerning medical gymnastics. In the middle of the 19th century, in the Principality of Serbia, hydrotherapy treatments (by Dr. Andrija Ivanovic, 1850) and electrotherapy (by Dr. Jovan Valenta, 1857) w?re applied. Among the pioneers of physical medicine in Serbia, Dr Avram Farkic is a very important figure. In 1896, Farkic founded the first Serbian institute for physiotherapy in Belgrade, and, two years later, the First Institute for Orthopedics, Swedish Gymnastics and Massage. These institutions were merged in 1899. After the death of Dr. Farkic in 1925, the Institute worked under his name until the German bombing of Belgrade on April 6, 1941. The diversity and continuous introduction of modern therapeutic procedures were the main characteristics of the Institute during its 45-year-long existence. Dr. Farkic was also the initiator of the establishment of the Therapy Joint Stock Company, which founded the first institute for physical medicine in Vrnjacka Banja, the Therapy Institute for Treatment by Water and Electricity, in 1911. Until the First World War, it was the most modern spa sanatorium in Serbia. During spa seasons of 1911, 1912, 1913, and 1924, Dr. Farkic himself was the manager and the main physician of the Therapy Institute.

John Hedley Cule

This doctor’s life is a remarkable one and merits recognition and recording. John Hedley Cule was born in Ton Pentre in the Rhondda Valley. His father, Walter Edwards Cule, was...

John Richard Carr Gardham

John Richard Carr Gardham was the first child of medical parents. His father, John Gardham, was a consultant surgeon at University College Hospital, and his mother, Audrey, was a general...

“Dogs Bark”: War, Narrative, and Historical Syncopation in Gertrude Stein's Late Work

In 1937, with bloody civil war dividing his native and Fascist power consolidating across Europe, Pablo Picasso began to produce his most explicitly politicized compositions. As he completed final version of his celebrated protest against German bombing of Guernica, his friend and artistic collaborator, Gertrude Stein, was at work on rather different project: short study of Picasso himself, his painting, and status of aesthetic production in twentieth century. Picasso, her first major work written in French, appeared in 1938 as part of series of art books published by Librairie Floury and was later translated by Alice Toklas for English and American publication. Written in Stein's ostensibly more accessible style, book incorporates biography and art criticism into an effort to explain her friend's (and her own) aesthetic intentions and, by extension, to continue her sustained project of defining poiesis adequate to contemporary moment. In its tone, celebratory and even cheerful, it seems to emanate from different world-one that had not just produced and (1937).Although original French edition of Picasso refers to un grand tableau sur l'Espagne: Guernica (a painting about Spain: Guernica), by 1938 mural's title has been quietly redacted from Englishlanguage translation.1 There, appears in last pages only obliquely, as nameless large picture about Spain whose only significance is that it marked Picasso's triumphant return to painting after brief and painful withdrawal. Stein attributes his renouvellement (translated as effervescence) to civil war, but forecloses political interpretation of its effect on him: It was not events themselves that were happening in which awoke Picasso but fact that they were happening in Spain. She makes no mention of painting's content or context, describing only formal quality of its calligraphy.2The brief epilogue following passage is breathless encomium to airplanes and destruction that refrains from acknowledging their terrible historical intimacy.3 earth seen from an airplane is more than from any earthbound perspective and reminds Stein of the lines of cubism . . . mingling lines of Picasso, coming and going, developing and destroying themselves. The twentieth century is splendid for this reason and because it is a time when everything cracks, where everything is destroyed; Picasso's lies in his uncanny vision of world as if seen from an airplane (without his having flown in one) and of things destroyed as they never have been destroyed.1 But is there modern painting whose perspective is more emphatically ground level than that of Guernica? Considered next to Picasso's contemporaneous treatment of these same subjects, Stein's might seem almost obscene. How, in book about Picasso, who has just stunned world with Guernica, can Stein write so gaily of airplanes and destruction?Juxtaposition of their two projects might seem to validate criticism voiced by both Stein's contemporaries and our own that, in her literary work as in her personal opinion, she was politically oblivious, at best. At moment when, as Carl Van Vechten wrote to her, [e]ven Muriel Draper is holding communist meetings in her pretty room and talking like mad about Sacco and Vanzetti and Scottsboro Boys over telephone, Stein seems content to write about beauty and splendor of Picasso's painting, and of her charming friendship with him.s This sort of criticism intensifies when turned to her wartime writings: even as she and Toklas served as ambulance drivers while Great War raged all around them, Stein's literary attention remained focused on formal innovations of sort developed in Tender Buttons (1913); her World War II writings, most of which address war explicitly, attracted still greater derision. …

The Children of the King by Sonya Hartnett (review)

Reviewed by: The Children of the King by Sonya Hartnett Deborah Stevenson Hartnett, Sonya. The Children of the King. Candlewick, 2014. [272p]. Trade ed. ISBN 978-0-7636-6735-1 $16.99 E-book ed. ISBN 978-0-7636-7042-9 $16.99 Reviewed from galleys R* Gr. 5-8 See this month’s Big Picture, p. 347, for review. When German bombs begin to fall on London, Cecily Lockwood, her older brother Jeremy, and their mother leave the city for the safety of the family’s country seat, Heron Hall. On the way there, Cecily impulsively insists they also take in an evacuee child, and so calm, intrepid May, more grown at ten than Cecily is at twelve, joins them at the Hall. The country peace can be deceiving, however: Cecily frets that May proves to be an independent being rather than a grateful toy, Jeremy seethes at being forced to flee when he wants to help defend his home and country, and the girls are intrigued but troubled by the strange boys they find hiding in the ruins of nearby Snow Castle. As Uncle Peregrine, owner of Heron Hall, spins the tale of the fallen stronghold, it becomes clear that centuries-old stories and centuries-old savagery have surprising relevance to the children’s current lives. The scenario here is familiar and even cozy: a country house, well-heeled children, a mid-century adventure, and possible ghosts, and even the wartime atmosphere is pleasantly adventurous at the Lockwoods’ safe distance. With skilled layering, though, Australian author Hartnett embraces this scenario in a way that its fans will appreciate but also subtly tweaks it, making classic pleasures and contemporary judgment strangely comfortable partners. Her writing is superb, carrying echoes of Austen but also touched with a perceptive yet incisive wit that recalls Muriel Spark, and the book stealthily alludes to the Lockwoods’ considerable privilege and shades its dismantling. Cecily (blessed with “well-fed certainty”) has never encountered a situation that her beloved father can’t solve and sees no reason why the war will be any different; Jeremy both struggles against the luxury of safety (and the “agony of being insignificant”) and the threat to his future enjoyment of the life he has expected; Jeremy’s eventual break with parental control shatters his mother not just because of maternal anxiety but also because this is the first time she’s failed to get her way. Similarly, the third-person narration focalizes through Cecily but wryly and persistently observes her limitations (“Cecily had taken to the role of instructor with ease, and found it hardly any bother to be constantly criticising and instructing”), a technique that heightens her contrast with self-possessed May, whose inner thoughts remain uncatalogued, and whose secret remains hidden (from Cecily, at least) until just before the end. An underlying theme of humanity’s lust for power and its terrible consequences plays out most overtly in Uncle Peregrine’s story: told in episodes, with archetypal terms for characters rather than names, it’s actually the tale of Richard III and the young princes in the Tower, who are rumored to have ended their days at Snow Castle. The interpolated tale becomes gripping in its own right, and it [End Page 347] converges with the World War II story in places both expected and unexpected, with the long-gone victim princes perhaps able to make their final peace with the help of Cecily and May, and possibly providing one last connection for May with her beloved late father. Yet other themes rise strongly as well: Cecily and Jeremy begin to realize the human limitations of their parents; Cecily begins to reach just a little past her comfortable complacency; all of the characters face the reality of change in both their loved ones and the world they know. Together, it’s an atmospheric concoction, haunted in the nicest possible ways, and readable at various levels of sophistication (and also suitable for an ongoing readaloud). Fans of classic children’s literature will delight in seeing a familiar plot so richly interpreted, and sharp readers will appreciate the provocative new resonance under the old story. (See p. 360 for publication...

“Among the most beautiful synagogues of Western Europe”: A virtual reconstruction of the Rotterdam synagogue of the Boompjes (1725–1940)

In May 1940 the synagogue of the Boompjes (dedicated in 1725) was destroyed during the German bombing of Rotterdam. As very few members of the Rotterdam Jewish community survived the war, the synagogue was never reconstructed and eventually forgotten. Inspired by similar reconstruction projects, the current article will present a computer model of the synagogue of the Boompjes. The actual building's architectural history will be discussed briefly, as will the model's creation. The rationale for virtually reconstructing the synagogue will also be addressed.

Malign or Maligned? – Arthur Winnington-Ingram, Bishop of London, in the First World War

AbstractArthur Winnington-Ingram, Bishop of London, features prominently in all the scholarly narratives of the activities of the Church of England during the First World War. Particular emphasis has been placed on his description of the conflict as a “Holy War”, on his assertion that those who died in the cause of Britain and her allies should be seen as martyrs, and on his very successful efforts to persuade men to enlist as combatants. Furthermore, many books claim that the Bishop in a 1915 sermon called on his hearers to “Kill Germans”.This paper closely examines contemporary narratives of that sermon and the way in which an anti-clerical writer of the 1930s edited the original text, thus seriously distorting Winnington-Ingram’s message. An analysis of the Bishop’s declaration which was made in 1960, but significantly modified in 1971, is identified as being highly influential in shaping contemporary perceptions of him.The context of a short article in which the Bishop described the conflict as a “Holy War” is examined and an attempt is made to show that such pronouncements were the logical development of the then widely-held perception of Britain as a nation especially chosen by God to take to the world both the benefits of its Empire and the light of the Gospel. It is shown that the most balanced assessments of his activities have come from non-British historians and theologians who have been able to offer a more detached and less anachronistic analysis than, in particular, some ordained Anglican writers.The way in which the scholarly critique of Winnington-Ingram has in recent years been taken up by more popular authors in a process of distillation and embellishment is described. Finally, his repudiation of popular calls for reprisals against German civilians, in the context of the serious loss of life incurred through the German bombing of London, is offered as a corrective to the highly prejudicial way in which the war-time activities of Arthur Winnington-Ingram have been presented in both the scholarly literature and popular narratives.

“Bomb Back, and Bomb Hard”: Debating Reprisals during the Blitz*

In Britain, popular memory of the Blitz celebrates civilian resistance to the German bombing of London and other cities, emphasising positive values such as stoicism, humour and mutual aid. But the memory of such passive and defensive traits obscures the degree to which British civilian morale in 1940 depended on the belief that if Britain had to “take it”, then Germany was taking it as hard or harder. Contrary to the received historical account, opinion polls, Home Intelligence reports and newspaper letter columns show that a majority of the British supported the reprisal bombing of German civilians by Bomber Command. The wartime reprisals debate was the logical legacy of prewar assumptions about the overwhelming power of bombing; but it has been forgotten because it contradicts the myth of the Blitz.

The Romeo and Juliet Code (review)

Reviewed by: The Romeo and Juliet Code Elizabeth Bush Stone, Phoebe . The Romeo and Juliet Code. Levine/Scholastic, 2011. [304p]. ISBN 978-0-545-21511-4 $16.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad Gr. 5-7. With German bombs exploding over her London home, eleven-year-old Felicity can see the prudence in relocating temporarily to stay with her father’s family in the United States. There’s clearly tension among the relatives, and the obvious estrangement between the adult brothers in particular is only the first of many [End Page 299] mysteries Felicity (quickly nicknamed “Flissy” by her makeshift guardians) will encounter as America edges closer to entry into World War II and her parents seem to disappear from her life. Flissy tries to hold the Rathburn family at emotional arms’ length, but their steady affection and the discovery of an adoptive cousin, Derek, who has been secretly recovering upstairs from a polio attack, draw her into the family circle. She and Derek set out to investigate Uncle Gideon’s strange comings and goings, coded messages that arrive from Felicity’s father in the mail, the identity of bureaucratic visitors from Washington, the actual whereabouts of Flissy’s parents, and climactically (but not at all surprisingly) the dark family secret concerning her parentage. There’s a heckuvalot going on here, and the metaphoric layer of Flissy’s absorption in the works of Frances Hodgson Burnett (there’s no mistaking The Secret Garden’s echoes in the story) threatens to send the entire enterprise over the edge. Moreover, Flissy’s bouts of babyishness, which manifest in projecting her emotions onto her stuffed bear, can be mighty annoying. The theme of wartime espionage, ramped up with a spicy backstory of a mum/dad/ uncle love triangle, may nonetheless draw in readers who favor a bit of melodrama in their historical fiction. [End Page 300] Copyright © 2011 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Lewis H. Wright Memorial Lecture: Roger Eltringham, M.B.Ch.B., F.R.C.A., to Present ‘Anaesthesia for All’

*Lewis H. Wright Memorial Lecture: Roger Eltringham M.B.Ch.B., F.R.C.A., to Present ‘Anaesthesia for All’ is reprinted with permission of the American Society of Anesthesiologists, 520 N. Northwest Highway, Park Ridge, Illinois 60068-2573. The Lewis H. Wright Memorial Lecture is sponsored annually by the Wood Library-Museum of Anesthesiology (WLM) and honors its namesake who was a pioneer in American anesthesiology. Dr. Wright was committed to enhancing the stature of anesthesiology as a clinical science and as an advanced medical specialty. He was a founding member of the WLM Board of Trustees and later served as its president emeritus. In 1973, the New York State Society of Anesthesiologists endowed this lectureship to honor Dr. Wright, who died the following year. This year’s distinguished guest is Roger Eltringham, M.B.Ch.B., F.R.C.A., Consultant Anaesthestist at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital, Gloucester, United Kingdom. Dr. Eltringham was born in Hampstead, London; shortly thereafter, the German bomb blitz of 1940 prompted his family to move to Kent in southeast England. He planned to become a physical education instructor but changed to a medicine major rather late in the curriculum. Dr. Eltringham received a medical degree from St. Andrews University in Scotland in 1964 and completed anaesthesia training at Bristol and the University of Colorado in Denver. In 1971, he became a Fellow of the Royal College of Anaesthetists (F.R.C.A.). Dr. Eltringham was appointed to two significant positions in 1974: Consultant in Anaesthesia and Intensive Care at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital and Medical Advisor to the Gloucester Rugby Football Club. He assumed responsibility for teaching programs and exchange rotations in overseas universities. His medicine and sport careers continued for decades in Gloucester, and this is the city that anchored his travels around the world. Dr. Eltringham was elected to the Council of the Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland in 1980. He joined the International Relations Committee and served as Chairman from 198286. In this role, he responded to requests for help in creating curricula for anesthesia education in overseas departments. He also provided guidance on selection and maintenance of anesthesia equipment. Eventually, Dr. Eltringham “took to the road” and visited departments and hospitals to assess the challenges faced by developing countries. He gave lectures, tutorials and gentle advice to our colleagues who had limited resources. For his years of dedication and generous service, Dr. Eltringham received the Pask Certificate of Honor Award in 1995. The Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland bestow this honor to recognize outstanding contributions.

Charred churches or iron harvests?

The bombing of London by the German Luftwaffe between August 1940 and May 1941 is a pervasive theme in popular memories and cultural representations of the Second World War, but it has been memorialized in a peculiarly restrained and disjointed manner. This article examines this phenomenon of memory fragmentation with reference to a specific site, St James’s Church Piccadilly. In contrast to these and other inscribed scraps of official memory I propose a re-examination of London’s ‘Iron Harvest’: the continual recovery of unexploded German bombs. By reconsidering James Young’s concept of the ‘counter-monument’ and the performativity of commemorative processes, I argue that these discoveries can be regarded as acts of commemoration. As the Second World War slips out of living memory we need more diverse and imaginative forms of remembrance to represent both the fragmented traces of modern wars and the absences they create.

Comments on Choices Under Fire

March/April 2008 Historically Speaking 41 not kindness. (One might point out that surrender was not an option to Europe'sJews when facing the Nazis, yet anodier factor putting their plight in a separate category.) Nor did Allied airpower intentionally target the helpless (although the idea was considered by the 9th Air Force in 1945 in Europe.) We can mock the concept of "collateral damage," but it was taken most seriously at the time as a byproduct of the destruction of industrial areas in cities. Allied governments accepted the killing of civilians for military purposes because their leaders believed that the lives of their citizens were worth more than those of their enemies. From Washington 's point of view, did it really matter if the invasion of Kyushuwould have cost "only" 20,000 American lives if these same lives possibly could be saved by killing 120,000Japanese at Hiroshima and Nagasaki? The answer was quite the contrary. Indeed, the Western Allied military apparatus was designed to generate huge amounts of firepower at every level to kill the enemy. There was no moral quandary if fewer of "us" died relative to "them." Had Bess wanted to get aggressive, he might have inquiredwhether Western air forces were justified in killing diousands of French and Italian civilians. It is very possible that more of them died from Allied bombs than British perished from German bombs. De Gaulle knew this, and never raised a protest. I find it almost incomprehensible that anyone would claim to discover moral ambiguity in World War II. As Herodotus reminds us, war is unnatural because fathers bury their sons. World War II was an obscene bloodbath that poisoned the hearts of everyone involved. The degradation of civilized life was all too obvious from one end of the northern hemisphere to the other. And it is a credit to die civilized nations of the Earth that many grew to regret both the pain inflicted on the vanquished and die means used to inflict that pain. This was particularly true as time began to blur the moral calamity that overcame the world during die war. In Samson's famous article in 1946 explaining the use of the atomic bomb, it is very clear that the wise old man knew, above all, that some of his countrymen would forget what the world looked like in 1945 and how people acted in 1945. I wish more historians of today understood Stimson's point. The general public in the West, however, does not seem to suffer any major ethical quandary concerning the war. The gut-wrenching argument that Bess sees inside the West concerning the conduct of World War II exists, in my view, between a small number of people in academics against the vast bulk of the population who may regret the violence of the war but do not question for a minute its necessity . Machiavelli, criticized by Bess, was quite right when describing a necessary war as a just war. If World War II was not necessary, no war has been. Eric Bergerudisprofessorof history atLincoln University . He is the authorof Fire in the Sky: The Air War in the South Pacific (Westview Press, 1999) andseveralother books about World WarII and the Vietnam War. Comments on Choices Under Fire Michael Kort In Choices UnderFire Michael Bess critiques key Allied decisions during World War II, offering assessments of what he sees as their moral complexities. The book has received extensive attention and favorable commentary because Bess is scrupulously fair-minded and judicious in examining the complicated evidence and conflicting arguments pertaining to these issues. He will make almost anyone who reads his book with an open mind consider at least a few of the choices he discusses in a new light, regardless of whether one ultimately agrees with him or not. It is appropriate that the longest chapter in Choices Under Fire concerns the most controversial American act of the war, the use of the atomic bomb against Japan in August 1945. Bess is convincingwhen he adheres to two standards that he accepts as essential in judging the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The first is the need to keep in mind that the...

A Public History of the Dividing Line: H. D., the Bomb, and the Roots of the Postmodern

This essay explores the entanglements of aesthetic discourse and public policy in the aftermath of America's dropping of the atom bomb. While H. D.'s ”Trilogy”, written in London during the German bombing, has been treated critically as a war poem, the major works that followed-especially ”Helen in Egypt” and ”Tribute to Freud”-offer a far more critical and more nuanced vision of the artist in wartime and in the aftermath of war. Poised at the historical turn from modernism to postmodernism, both works conduct provocative interventions into the literary canon and are suggestive of the complex dynamics of mid-20th-century American foreign policy and literary identity. Ostensibly a recasting of a lost pre-Homeric text, ”Helen in Egypt” anticipates the shift to a decisively postmodern lyricism, with its displaced subjectivity and lacunae and its implicit rethinking of the western literary canon. In its investigative tone and its insistence that modern war functions not as a rupture but as a continuity within literary and sociopolitical life, H. D.'s vision of the lyric has never been more relevant.

Francis Harry Compton Crick

Francis Harry Compton Crick

Heisenberg and the German bomb

Reviews of Copenhagen. By MICHAEL FRAYN. (Methuen Drama, 1998.) Pp. 116. UK£6.99 (pbk). ISBN 0 413 72490 5. Scope: play. Level: non-specialist. Also published by (Anchor Books, 2000.) Pp. 135. US$12.00 (pbk). ISBN 0 385 72079 3. Hitler’s Uranium Club: The Secret Recordings at Farm Hall. Annotated by JEREMY BERNSTEIN. (Copernicus Press, 2001.) Pp. xxx+384. US$20.00 (pbk). ISBN 0 387 95089 3. Scope: Text. Level: non-specialist.