The race for Rome [Hardcover]

Dan Kurzman (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 488 pages
• Publisher: Doubleday; 1st edition (1975)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385065558
• ISBN-13: 978-0385065559
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,252,488 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Page Turning Popular History., October 28, 2006

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microfiche (Scarborough, ON Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Race for Rome (Paperback)

U.S. General Mark Clark took formal possession of Rome on the day the focus of the world centered on Normandy - June 6, 1944. Although the liberation of Rome from Nazi control was pushed off the top of the front pages by D-Day, it was a significant day to the soldiers and partisans who had fought and bled for it, to the Germans retreating northward, and to Pope Pius XII, who could now sleep comfortably, knowing that the Germans had not kidnapped him - the head of the Roman Catholic Church.

The race to be the first in Rome was too tantalizing, according to Kurzman. The Americans conniving to hold the British forces back. The French putting a toe across the city limits [to restore French honour], then pulling it out so as not to break their deal that General Clark would be first so he would acknowledge their help. The British getting bogged down and frustrated. The Germans not willing to admit defeat to themselves, and especially not to Hitler. The Fascists and Nazis torturing the partisans and the partisans sabotaging away but not trusting each other. Jews hiding among the nuns and priests or being rounded up like sheep for slaughter. The Pope, grieving this carnage but loth to intervene lest the Germans deport or depose him - and then where would the Church be?

All told with colour. The book is not a military history but a story of individuals caught up in the events. A boy holds off Germans attempting to destroy a bridge. An American war correspondent pursuading a lone sniper to surrender. An OSS agent who 'gets no respect' or radio parts from his Italian colleagues. A partisan undergoing torture by the Facist police. A German general who hopes that the Allies do head for Rome, so he can pull back and combine the two armies they have split.

The negotiations between the Pope, the priests of the German and Allied nations, the German commandant of Rome, the generals and the German, British and American ambassadors remind me of 'Is Paris Burning?' Like Paris, it was not so much the citizens but the art and architecture that were the bargaining chips.

All very interesting.