The Second World War (Paperback)

by John Keegan (Author)
Key Phrases: atomic weapons programme, motorised divisions, armoured division, Red Army, Soviet Union, Second World War (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
Analytical, concise, and coherent ... If you want to know how it happened, read Keegan’s thoughtful and elegant prose. -- Los Angeles Times Book Review

Boldly written and fair-minded. -- The New York Times Book Review

Review
Boldly written and fair-minded. (The New York Times Book Review) Analytical, concise, and coherent ... If you want to know how it happened, read Keegan’s thoughtful and elegant prose. (Los Angeles Times Book Review)

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 608 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (May 3, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0143035738
• ISBN-13: 978-0143035732
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.9 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #37,623 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

53 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Erudite, Scholarly and Analytic, July 25, 2006

By	Stephen B. Selbst (Old Greenwich, CT USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

John Keegan's World War II is a superb one volume history of the military aspects of World War II. There are three primary strenghts to Keegan's work: (1) his graceful style, which makes reading this work a pleasure, (2) his ability to use detail to illuminate broader themes, much like a talented newspaper reporter, and (3) the depth of his historical knowledge, which allows him to place the events and campaigns he is writing about into a broader and deeper context.

As other reviewers have noted, this is not the definitive shot-by-shot history of every battle. Rather, Keegan provides an overview, zeroing in on detail to make illustrative points; nevertheless he covers virtually every major theater of operations, including some peripheral ones. I don't regard his decision to summarize as a weakness; had he tried provide a more close-grained analysis, the book would have reached thousands of pages at the sacrifice of general readability. Keegan generously acknowledges, both in the text and in his notes, his reliance on narrower and more detailed explorations of many of his subjects and the notes contain many excellent suggestions for further reading.

Furthermore, to try to provide a day-by-day history of the war would have blunted the strength of his analysis and historical comparisons. And this is where Keegan truly excels, in helping the reader understand both Hitler and Nazism in the broader sweep of the aftermath of World War I, Bismarck and other European wars. Writing about Operation Barbarossa, Hitler's attempt to conquer Russia, for example, Keegan draws upon his knowledge of the campaigns of Frederick the Great and the Napoleonic wars. In discussing the Yugoslav partisan operations against the Nazis, Keegan makes the connection to Ottoman wars of independence fought by the Serbs. Other histories of World War II generally fail to provide the same measure of connected analysis, largely, I suspect, because their authors lack the depth of knowledge that Keegan has.

From the standpoint of an American reader, the book will appear to have something of a Euro-centric and British-centric feel, which is not surprising. Keegan was for many years a lecturer in military history at Sandhurst, the English equivalent of West Point. And for the English, World War II was overwhelmingly a European war. And for all his evident admiration for American efforts, it is clear that he regards Roosevelt as a mystifying and distant figure, and Eisenhower as a blunt but too-cool commander. If you think about Keegan's observations, his complaint appears to be that the American leaders weren't passionate enough, didn't hate the Nazis enough, a conclusion that is probably not shared by American scholars and readers.

But these quirks are also what makes this work so great: it is not simply a bland recitation of names and dates. It is writing infused with knowledge and a point of view, which is what makes this work so valuable.

33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Single Volume History of World War II, August 30, 2005

By	John Matlock "Gunny" (Winnemucca, NV) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Simply put, this is the best single volume history of the Second World War available. John Keegan was a Senior Lecturer at Sandhurst, the British equivalent of West Point. He produced a series of books on WW II and on other wars. This book is, in my opinion, his masterpiece.

The book is profusely illustrated, and the illustrations are carefully tied into the text. The text itself tells what happened and when, but is also expanded to cover what other activities might be going on at that time. It also relates how that particular incident ties into the rest of the war.

If there is any complaint you might make regarding this book, it would be that the war in the Pacific is not given as much coverage as the war against Germany. To be sure there are sections on the Pacific war, but they do not have nearly as many pages as the other.

John Keegan is a supurb writer and this book is excellent.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A most well-written history of the Second World War, October 31, 2005

By	K. Warr (Oklahoma City, Oklahoma United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

In his history of the Second World War, John Keegan manages to wrestle the global upheaval of 1939-1945 into a mere 608 pages. The concise, cohesive narrative arc of this work demonstrates not only Keegan's mastery of the endless particulars of the conflict that do not make their way into his description of it, but also his skill at plucking out of those myriad particulars those bits of information that are representative of the larger whole and arranging them into a compelling portrait of his subject.

Keegan's analysis is subtle, deft and administered with reverent restraint: where his hand is evident at all, it is almost always in the narrative structure, as in his treatment of the American and British bomber commands, rather than in the narrative itself.

The preceding notwithstanding, however, what may recommend this volume above all its many virtues is Keegan's mastery of the English language. It should surprise no one that a work of such depth and erudition is a "best-seller": Keegan's gift for language, coupled with his incisive analytical ability, make the causes, actors, events and outcomes of the Second World War accessible to all readers. The magnitude of this accomplishment cannot be overstated: the true gift of the pedagogue is his ability to play Prometheus, to grant his students, not entrée into the inner chambers of his subject, but rather passage through the door of first principles, giving them through that process enough knowledge to navigate their own way to a deeper understanding. What opens that door to understanding for Keegan's readers is his ability to communicate crucial and representative events effectively--in other words, his gift for storytelling. Keegan frames the war expertly, laying out its political, military and social dimensions like pieces on a tabletop battle map with great care and precision. The reader will likely put down this book with a sense of having engaged a great mind, and with a desire to peer more deeply into the events he has unfolded, if only partially, before him.