Customer Reviews

At Ease: Navy Men of World War II

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Without a doubt this book will touch the memories and hearts of everyone who pauses to slowly peruse these casual photographs of men at sea in World War II. Without the overtones of trying to make a statement about the camaraderie that accompanies men off at war, these photographs simply follow a healthy group of sailors resting on board ship, working at their tasks, bonding in the bunk rooms and in play on the decks and the foc'sle. There is an obvious physical relationship that is transmitted in the gentlest ways, further proof that men together find the emotional and physical support so needed in the time of isolation from the world.

It is to Evan Bachner's credit that he shares this truly sensitive body of work with the public at a time when we all need to understand not only the plight of the men away at war today, but of the common threads of pansexuality that have never been a threat but only a solace in a world infected with prejudice. Grady Harp, December 2004

I absolutely "loved" this book from the first moment I picked it up and opened its first page. The photographs captivate a time when men could show affection without the worry of not being masculine enough. Thank you Evan Bachner for sharing your vision and putting together these marvellous photographs of this celebrated time in History. My dad was in the Navy during World War II and lived on a destroyer, and he has just recently started telling me some of "his" stories of being out at sea, sometimes for months at a time. I came across photographs years ago when I was just a young man of my dad and his ship-mates, and his photographs could easily been a part of this beautiful collection that Evan Bachner has displayed in "At Ease". I look forward to "At Ease,part Two."

Too often, when modern schoolchildren consider WW2, they see the parades of elderly veterans, stooped, wrinkled, bemedaled, but essentally OLD.

What the compiler of this book has managed to do is to collect a wide range of photo material, much of it of very high quality, which shows the young men who fought WW2 as they were then. That is, as young men. Slim, upright, happy, fit. Often little more than schoolboys themselves. In that regard, this book is reminiscent of Herbert List's book "Junge Manner".

I was so impressed with my book that I've ordered a second copy to be put into the library of the secondary school at which I'm a governor. WW2 seems to be popular in history lessons. Let the children of today see the youths of yesteday as they were at their prime.

In Evan Bachner's very imformative introduction to this extraordinary book, he tells of how a photograph of a soldier from World War II caught his eye in the Brooklyn Museum of Art in 1997. The photographer was someone he had never heard of before, Horace Bristol. Mr. Bachner in his dogged research discovered that the great photographer Edward J. Steichen had created the Naval Aviation Photographic Unit and then had assembled professional photographers in addition to Mr. Bristol who had made World War II photographs and ultimately printed over 15,000 images by the end of the war. Now seven years after Mr. Bachner's initial discovery, we have this stunning collection of over 150 beautifully composed, exposed and printed photographs by no less than the publisher of fine art books, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

Although there are a few photos of sailors working, for the most part these men are truly "at ease" as they sun themselves, exercise, swim, read, play games, write letters, horse around or just relax. Had Walt Whitman been alive during this era, he would have written paens to these men and their "love of comrades." There is a wonderful innocence about these photographs of men among friends. And we can all be glad that because of the order of President Truman a little later, that no photographer would ever again shoot black sailors in segregated sleeping quarters. (There are a few photographs here of black sailors relaxing together and only one shot of a black sailor and white sailor together.)

Surely this book will be on everyone's short list of best photography books of 2004. It's destined to become a classic.

If you have a dirty mind, I suppose you could read these pictures as soft porn. I read them differently. My dad served in both the Army and the Air Force during WWII and he had pictures not unlike these. It was a time when men, straight, gay, whatever, could express physical affection without being labeled, and without it being read as implicitly sexual. If the pictures selected for this calendar and the book have an agenda, it's to show some brief glimpses of a time when right wing sickos weren't dominating the media with their visions of evil in every human interaction outside the ones they approve of. This is a valuable document of a vanished time and the brave and beautiful men who lived in it.

As an historical reenactor, and daughter of a WWII Navy veteran, I am constantly on the outlook for books and information on the lesser known ideas and culture surrounding WWII. This book was a real eye opener! While the author is open about his sexuality and the pictures were no doubt hand picked with a certain agenda, they show a world of innocence that was unconcerned with homophobic ideas of how a man should or should not act. Being together for long periods of time in uncertain circumstances, deep friendships definitely form. Your buddy could be the one to save your life during an attack, or you might loose him in a split second from a torpedo. As a woman, I can imagine the close friendships that would form today under similar circumstances among women, and I imagine men during that time were not held back by all the macho ideas of today. A beautiful book with striking photography, this stands as an important contribution to understanding our father's and grandfather's lives during WWII.

I loved spending time with this book, not just because it was terrific eye candy, but because it unearthed a vision of life during World War II that hasn't really been seen in this kind of photographic detail. Evan Bachner did a terrific job compiling this book and his six years of work on it was well spent.

The photos in this wonderful book are vastly different from those that we normally see from the WW2 era. But that's exactly what is so compelling about them. All at once they're touching, erotic, and sexy. A must-have book for any photography collector.

It's great to see so many men lying around, playing together, touching each other without guilt, and in general being best friends. The photos are high quality with great composition. I wish there were more opportunities for men to be so At Ease with each other.

This is an excellent book and well worth the money. Each photo is a look back to a simpler time. I was a Photographer when I served in the Navy. The military has changed so much since these photos were taken. They would not pass muster in the military today. There is far too much of an atmosphere of political correctness.