Catastrophe 1914: Europe Goes to War

by Max Hastings Narrated by Simon Vance

Overview

From the acclaimed military historian, a new history of the outbreak of World War I: the dramatic stretch from the breakdown of diplomacy to the battles-the Marne, Ypres, Tannenberg-that marked the frenzied first year before the war bogged down in the trenches.

In Catastrophe 1914, Max Hastings gives us a conflict different from the familiar one of barbed wire, mud and futility. He traces the path to war, making clear why Germany and Austria-Hungary were primarily to blame, and describes the gripping first clashes in the West, where the French army marched into action in uniforms of red and blue with flags flying and bands playing. In August, four days after the French suffered 27,000 men dead in a single day, the British fought an extraordinary holding action against oncoming Germans, one of the last of its kind in history. In October, at terrible cost the British held the allied line against massive German assaults in the first battle of Ypres. Hastings also re-creates the lesser-known battles on the Eastern Front, brutal struggles in Serbia, East Prussia and Galicia, where the Germans, Austrians, Russians and Serbs inflicted three million casualties upon one another by Christmas. 

As he has done in his celebrated, award-winning works on World War II, Hastings gives us frank assessments of generals and political leaders and masterly analyses of the political currents that led the continent to war. He argues passionately against the contention that the war was not worth the cost, maintaining that Germany's defeat was vital to the freedom of Europe. Throughout we encounter statesmen, generals, peasants, housewives and private soldiers of seven nations in Hastings's accustomed blend of top-down and bottom-up accounts: generals dismounting to lead troops in bayonet charges over 1,500 feet of open ground; farmers who at first decried the requisition of their horses; infantry men engaged in a haggard retreat, sleeping four hours a night in their haste. This is a vivid new portrait of how a continent became embroiled in war and what befell millions of men and women in a conflict that would change everything.

Editorial Reviews

The New York Times Book Review - Max Boot

…Max Hastings does an excellent job of assembling a chronicle of the war's first few months, from August to December 1914…He does not break new historiographical ground, but rather skillfully marshals evidence assembled by several generations of scholars into a highly readable narrative that should—but won't—be the last word on the subject…Catastrophe 1914 brilliantly shows how, within its first few months, World War I came to assume the dispiriting and bloody form it would hold for the next four years.

The New York Times - Hew Strachan

An outstanding historian of the Second World War, Max Hastings has made a victorious foray into a conflict with which he is less familiar. His fans will recognize the trademarks: trenchant and Olympian judgments that eschew quirkiness in their pursuit of common sense and that are supplemented by extensive quotations from lower-grade participants: the victims and workhorses of others' decisions…Catastrophe is a book written with an eye cocked to the Anglophone audience and its inherited half-truths about the war. By taking a pan-European perspective, Mr. Hastings punctures these with directness and brio.

From the Publisher

A New York Times Notable Book of 2013
A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Year

“Colossal. . . . The first five months of [WWI] have never been told with quite this much drama, sensitivity and poignant detail. . . . A worthy addition to the literature of [WWI]. . . . At a breathtaking pace, the reader is transported to battles in Belgium, France, Serbia, Poland and Prussia. . . . Hastings’s book is the perfect example of what a good journalist can add to the study of war. . . . We need authors like Hastings to remind us of how the best of human spirit can be squandered by the worst of human motive.”
—The Washington Post

“Catastrophe 1914 brilliantly shows how, within its first few months, World War I came to assume the dispiriting and bloody form it would hold for the next four years.”
—The New York Times Book Review
 
“Hastings is in top form. . . . A lively and opinionated account. . . . [Hastings’s] vivid rendering of the first months of a cataclysm that grows more distant with each passing year makes the book a worthy addition to the canon.”
—The Christian Science Monitor
 
“Absorbing and compulsively readable. . . . Superb. . . . Like an eagle soaring over this vast terrain, Hastings swoops in and out, spying broad features and telling details alike.”
—The Cleveland Plain Dealer

“[Hastings is] an outstanding historian . . . a victorious foray. . . . Tuchman has been supplanted.”
—The New York Times

“Hastings over the past two decades has become the contemporary premier historian of 20th-century war. . . . The real strength of this story is how Mr. Hastings portrays the principal characters, not as stereotyped tyrants, greedy empire builders or mindless militarists, but rather as very real human beings with as many flaws as virtues.”
—Washington Times

“Highly readable. . . . What makes this book really stand out is Mr. Hastings’ deliberate efforts to puncture what he labels the many myths and legends of the events of 1914. . . . His deep research, insightful analysis, and wonderful prose make this an excellent addition to his long library of titles.”
—New York Journal of Books

“Hastings argues persuasively that the war’s opening phase had a unique character that merits closer study. . . . Hastings ends his deft narrative and analysis by observing that the price of German victory would have been European democracy itself. Those who died to prevent that victory—despite the catastrophic decisions of 1914—did not die in vain.”
—The Wall Street Journal

“Significant. . . . Hastings doesn’t mince words, and one of the chief pleasures of his very readable and engaging account is his mordant humor, and the precision with which he skewers his history’s many fools and mountebanks. . . . He is able to persuasively assess blame and responsibility.”
—The Dallas Morning News

“Does the world need another book on that dismal year? Absolutely, if it’s by Hastings. . . . Splendid . . . Readers accustomed to Hastings’ vivid battle descriptions, incisive anecdotes from all participants, and shrewd, often unsettling opinions will not be disappointed. Among the plethora of brilliant accounts of this period, this is one of the best.”
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“Hastings makes a very complicated story understandable in a way that few serious history books manage. An ideal entry into World War I history.”
—Library Journal

“Invites consideration as the best in his distinguished career, combining a perceptive analysis of the Great War’s beginnings with a vivid account of the period from August to September of the titular year.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Magnificent. . . . Hastings writes with an enviable grasp of pace and balance, as well as an acute eye for human detail. . . . Moving, provocative and utterly engrossing.”
—The Sunday Times (UK)

“[Hastings’s] position as Britain’s leading military historian is now unassailable . . . enormously impressive. . . . Magisterial. . . . This is a magnificent and deeply moving book, and with Max Hastings as our guide we are in the hands of a master.”
—The Telegraph (UK)

“A seamless, vivid and compelling narrative. . . . Hastings is a master of the pen portrait and the quirky fact . . . His greatness as a historian—never shown to better effect than in this excellent book—lies in his willingness to challenge entrenched opinion and say what needs to be said.
—London Evening Standard (UK)

“Compelling. . . . Told with an equal richness of detail and sure narrative sweep. . . . [A] formidably impressive book.”
—The Spectator (UK)

“Forcefully reasserts the thesis of German guilt in Catastrophe. . . . Magnificent. . . . A splendid read.”
—The Guardian (UK)

FEBRUARY 2014 - AudioFile

With a steady and authoritative voice, Simon Vance gives a splendid reading of Hastings’s overview of the causes of “The Great War,” as well as his account of its first six months. While this work is clearly a popular history, it’s more detailed than Tuchman’s GUNS OF AUGUST and brings out many facts that have been learned since her work was published. At the end of the work, the author also presents a rebuttal to those who claim it didn’t matter who won the war: He strongly defends the rightness of the cause of France, Great Britain, and their allies. Vance has a distinguished voice, and his delivery of this long and detailed work sounds effortless, making it well worth investing one’s time in listening. M.T.F. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews

2013-08-15
Does the world need another book on that dismal year? Absolutely, if it's by Hastings (Inferno: The World at War, 1939–1945, 2011, etc.). After many accounts of World War II, the veteran military historian tries his hand, with splendid results. Most readers will be familiar with many of the facts. When Austria mobilized to take revenge on Serbia for its role in the June 1914 murder of Archduke Ferdinand, Russia protested. Austria's ally, Germany, warned it to keep its hands off. Russia's response was only mildly threatening, but it wasn't mild enough for the pugnacious German general staff. Deciding war was inevitable, they convinced a dithering kaiser, and the dominoes fell. Who's to blame? Hastings loves Barbara Tuchman's 1962 classic The Guns of August but agrees that her verdict--everything got out of hand; it was no one's fault--is passé. Hastings shows modest respect for the German school, which blames Germany; historian Sean McMeekin, who emphasizes Russia's role; and even Niall Ferguson, who believes that Britain should have remained neutral. He concludes that national leaders (mediocrities all, with a few frank dimwits) focused with paranoid intensity on selfish interests, that stupidity trumped malevolence, and that German paranoia won by a nose. World War I historians deplore the slaughter at the Somme and Verdun, but these pale in comparison to the final months of 1914, when modern weapons mowed down armies who still marched in dense masses led by mounted officers with colors flying and bands playing. Readers accustomed to Hastings' vivid battle descriptions, incisive anecdotes from all participants, and shrewd, often unsettling opinions will not be disappointed. Among the plethora of brilliant accounts of this period, this is one of the best.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940178958735
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	12/01/2020
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

Introduction
(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "Catastrophe 1914"
by .
Copyright © 2014 Max Hastings.
Excerpted by permission of Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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