Customer Reviews

Wars I Have Seen

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A careful reading of this - one of Stein's most accesible books - reveals an intimate portrait of what it was like to live under Nazi-occupied France and pass for a regular citizen. Descriptions of prisoners and bombs are jarringly juxtaposed with quotidian vignettes about bread, boots, watches, as well as ruminations of the American Civil War and England under Henry VIII and then Shakespeare.

What makes this kind of writing so exciting is that Stein does not decide for the reader what is important or not. She talks with the same intensity about private things and political catastrophes. When she worries about honey, her boots and other houselhold matters while thinking of prisoners on a train she shows exactly what one has to deal with in one's own privacy. One has to find ways to survive in such situations on a daily basis. Such is war. Her comparison of what is happening in her time with the England of Henry VIII, of Shakespeare, are an exciting accent on her approach of considering history as constantly repeating itself. These multiple strands of time and perspective make this book a must read for Stein admirers as well as for those interested in the history of Modernism.