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Twentieth century book of the dead

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This is one of those dreadful yet necessary reads. Elliot takes upon himself the unenviable task of attempting to place a number on the man-made dead for the first seventy-two years of the twentieth-century (not an easy task). A drawback to this book is that the information is somewhat incomplete considering the millions more who have been murdered in Africa and South East Asia during the past quarter-century. The dead he numbers, whom he calls the "nation of the dead," his phrase which attempts to personalize the deaths, consists of about 100 million persons. He estimates that 150 million would not be completely unreasonable (p.1), and this only takes into account up to 1972! Elliot imaginatively interweaves narrative and factual analysis. He creatively displays for his readers death through the eyes of World War I trench soldiers, Russian and Chinese peasants, a Jewish tailor, a small boy in Hiroshima, and a travelling "irregular" from Mexico (my favorite for its biting satire) who gets himself in many of the small skirmishes around the two World Wars. Mass death throughout the 20th century has taken a certain shape, a pyramid shape--what Elliot calls the "shape of violence" (p.29). Occupying the top of this pyramid are, quite surprisingly (since this means that they are least in number), the military deaths. Occupying the second tier are "semi-official" deaths (public terror, civil, guerrilla). The third tier contains "demographic violence," that violence which is, for a time, "as habitual amongst a massive section of the people as, say, the habit of buying bread" (p.32). These are the everyday deaths small in number locally (yet spread across a country of millions quickly add up) that lose their significance over time. The final two tiers, constituting the pyramid's base, are "immediate" and "long-term privation." He undoubtedly proves this pyramid thesis throughout the book in his various descriptions of "total war," an analysis which is most excellent. Elliot often resorts to sarcasm in the book, which is not always clear, but he does a splendid job of mocking modern historians and their "inevitable" Marxist abstractions. In part two of his book he offers a thorough study of the weapons of violence throughout the century. There are too many interesting details in this book to attempt to list them. I recommend it with the following two caveats: (1)"Twentieth Century Book of the Dead" is not written from a Christian worldview, so do not expect meaningful conclusions. (Elliot admits he is an existentialist (p. 10).) (2) There are a few vulgarities throughout the book.

Quote of the book: Concerning the most violent years in the history of mankind (1941-1944), Elliot writes, "It was as if someone was trying to prove that people are no good in any way at all" (p.73).

I came across this book about a decade ago, and snaffled a copy to stack on my stairs at home. It is dated, but nonetheless some of the core arguments remain as telling today as they did in the early 1970s - who speaks for the dead, and in particular, for those felled by state violence during the 20th century? It's all too easy to forget just how many were killed by state violence over the past few centuries, and all too easy to focus our imagination on nationalisms present, rather than the fictive but appealing nationalism Elliot proposes - a hypothetical nationalism of the dead. What would they say, if they had voice? What would they advocate, if they were able to speak from beyond the grave? And what would this nation, this felled but fervent nation, have to tell us? For one reader, at least, Elliot's contribution is a substantial one.

This groundbreaking volume is a bit dated but the conclusions it makes would undoubtedly remain the same. "Collateral damage" is far more deadly than direct fire in war and that unappealing truth needs to be understood by all who set about on that course. It is a sobering book, needed to counter the delirium of war fever.

This book compliments the Black Book of Communism by Harvard Press. We are not becoming more civilized but more sophisticated in our mass murder techniques as time progresses. The big lie that the communists (or any state) can bring about a utopian order shows that what this lie produces is hell on earth! With the advent of Obama and his Marxist vision for fundamentally changing America bodes ill for our future, especially in light of what this book shows follows on the heals of the progressive (Marxist) ideology of our Marxist president.The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression