Darkest Hour: How Churchill Brought England Back from the Brink

“McCarten's pulse-pounding narrative transports the reader to those springtime weeks in 1940 when the fate of the world rested on the shoulders of Winston Churchill. A true story thrillingly told. Thoroughly researched and compulsively readable.”-Michael F. Bishop, Executive Director of the International Churchill Society

From the acclaimed novelist and screenwriter of The Theory of Everything comes a revelatory look at the period immediately following Winston Churchill's ascendancy to Prime Minister

“He was speaking to the nation, the world, and indeed to history....”

May, 1940. Britain is at war. The horrors of blitzkrieg have seen one western European democracy after another fall in rapid succession to Nazi boot and shell. Invasion seems mere hours away.

Just days after becoming Prime Minister, Winston Churchill must deal with this horror-as well as a skeptical King, a party plotting against him, and an unprepared public. Pen in hand and typist-secretary at the ready, how could he change the mood and shore up the will of a nervous people?

In this gripping day-by-day, often hour-by-hour account of how an often uncertain Churchill turned Britain around, the celebrated Bafta-winning writer Anthony McCarten exposes sides of the great man never seen before. He reveals how he practiced and re-wrote his key speeches, from `Blood, toil, tears and sweat' to `We shall fight on the beaches'; his consideration of a peace treaty with Nazi Germany, and his underappreciated role in the Dunkirk evacuation; and, above all, how 25 days helped make one man an icon.

Using new archive material, McCarten reveals the crucial behind-the-scenes moments that changed the course of history. It's a scarier-and more human-story than has ever been told.

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Darkest Hour: How Churchill Brought England Back from the Brink

“McCarten's pulse-pounding narrative transports the reader to those springtime weeks in 1940 when the fate of the world rested on the shoulders of Winston Churchill. A true story thrillingly told. Thoroughly researched and compulsively readable.”-Michael F. Bishop, Executive Director of the International Churchill Society

From the acclaimed novelist and screenwriter of The Theory of Everything comes a revelatory look at the period immediately following Winston Churchill's ascendancy to Prime Minister

“He was speaking to the nation, the world, and indeed to history....”

May, 1940. Britain is at war. The horrors of blitzkrieg have seen one western European democracy after another fall in rapid succession to Nazi boot and shell. Invasion seems mere hours away.

Just days after becoming Prime Minister, Winston Churchill must deal with this horror-as well as a skeptical King, a party plotting against him, and an unprepared public. Pen in hand and typist-secretary at the ready, how could he change the mood and shore up the will of a nervous people?

In this gripping day-by-day, often hour-by-hour account of how an often uncertain Churchill turned Britain around, the celebrated Bafta-winning writer Anthony McCarten exposes sides of the great man never seen before. He reveals how he practiced and re-wrote his key speeches, from `Blood, toil, tears and sweat' to `We shall fight on the beaches'; his consideration of a peace treaty with Nazi Germany, and his underappreciated role in the Dunkirk evacuation; and, above all, how 25 days helped make one man an icon.

Using new archive material, McCarten reveals the crucial behind-the-scenes moments that changed the course of history. It's a scarier-and more human-story than has ever been told.

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Darkest Hour: How Churchill Brought England Back from the Brink

Darkest Hour: How Churchill Brought England Back from the Brink

by Anthony McCarten

Narrated by John Lee

Unabridged — 6 hours, 34 minutes

Darkest Hour: How Churchill Brought England Back from the Brink

Darkest Hour: How Churchill Brought England Back from the Brink

by Anthony McCarten

Narrated by John Lee

Unabridged — 6 hours, 34 minutes

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Overview

“McCarten's pulse-pounding narrative transports the reader to those springtime weeks in 1940 when the fate of the world rested on the shoulders of Winston Churchill. A true story thrillingly told. Thoroughly researched and compulsively readable.”-Michael F. Bishop, Executive Director of the International Churchill Society

From the acclaimed novelist and screenwriter of The Theory of Everything comes a revelatory look at the period immediately following Winston Churchill's ascendancy to Prime Minister

“He was speaking to the nation, the world, and indeed to history....”

May, 1940. Britain is at war. The horrors of blitzkrieg have seen one western European democracy after another fall in rapid succession to Nazi boot and shell. Invasion seems mere hours away.

Just days after becoming Prime Minister, Winston Churchill must deal with this horror-as well as a skeptical King, a party plotting against him, and an unprepared public. Pen in hand and typist-secretary at the ready, how could he change the mood and shore up the will of a nervous people?

In this gripping day-by-day, often hour-by-hour account of how an often uncertain Churchill turned Britain around, the celebrated Bafta-winning writer Anthony McCarten exposes sides of the great man never seen before. He reveals how he practiced and re-wrote his key speeches, from `Blood, toil, tears and sweat' to `We shall fight on the beaches'; his consideration of a peace treaty with Nazi Germany, and his underappreciated role in the Dunkirk evacuation; and, above all, how 25 days helped make one man an icon.

Using new archive material, McCarten reveals the crucial behind-the-scenes moments that changed the course of history. It's a scarier-and more human-story than has ever been told.


Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

McCarten’s pulse-pounding narrative transports the reader to those springtime weeks in 1940 when the fate of the world rested on the shoulders of Winston Churchill.  Thoroughly researched and compulsively readable, The Darkest Hour is a true story thrillingly told.” Michael F. Bishop, Director of the National Churchill Library and Center and Executive Director of the International Churchill Society 

Michael F. Bishop

McCarten’s pulse-pounding narrative transports the reader to those springtime weeks in 1940 when the fate of the world rested on the shoulders of Winston Churchill.  Thoroughly researched and compulsively readable, The Darkest Hour is a true story thrillingly told.”

Kirkus Reviews

2017-09-13
On the forging of the wartime Winston Churchill, a figure iconic to this day, in the crucible of events that took place in the spring of 1940.That Churchill was a gifted writer and speechmaker is well-known; that he drank alcohol by the bucket is not news, either. In this work of popular history, a tie-in to a forthcoming film, screenwriter and novelist McCarten (Death of a Superhero, 2007, etc.) does venture a novel thesis along the way: that in May 1940, Churchill was prepared to strike a peace deal with Hitler, "as utterly repugnant as that idea might now seem." Admitting that the thesis is both conjectural and unpopular, the author buttresses it with an argument that seems reasonable, if one that academic historians would likely refute. In the end, of course, Churchill chose instead to stand and fight. McCarten does good service by showing how Churchill used his pen to advance Britain's cause; the author engages in a highly useful sort of rhetorical analysis that examines Churchill's use of repeated words, phrases, and motifs and his subtle reference to other classic addresses and essays: "In stark contrast to Hitler's egomaniacal speeches—which emphasized the word ‘I'—Churchill…knew the power of ‘We' when exhorting the British public to take up such a fearful struggle." McCarten sometimes seems to go a bridge too far, as with an invented dialogue between Churchill and Lord Halifax, but his reasoning is generally sound. His study is also timely given not just his own film, but also the recent release of Christopher Nolan's film Dunkirk, recounting a key event that led to Churchill's famous "We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets" speech, by which he aimed "to give voice to the people of Britain." Churchill succeeded admirably, and so, in the main, does McCarten.A fresh, readable look at events and players that, though well-known to history, deserve to be studied for some time to come.

Product Details

BN ID: 2940170268931
Publisher: HarperCollins
Publication date: 11/07/2017
Edition description: Unabridged
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