Format: ebook
Published: October 8th, 2020
Age: Adult
Genre: Non-Fiction – History
Goodreads
Rating: 4/5 Stars
In Blitz Spirit, Becky Brown has assembled a series of extracts from the Mass Observation project, which tasked ordinary people with writing dairies immediately prior to and during the war years. It’s worth noting that Brown’s bibliography at the end shows there’s a few books that do a similar thing from the same source, some focusing on one diarist while others focus on different aspects – Brown, however, has gone for more of an overview, collecting these extracts together in chronological order, snapshotting the general mood of a nation during unprecedented times.
It’s very easy to draw parallels with these extracts with the covid lockdowns, and the general state of emergency that started in late 2019/2020. Talks of rationing and the way some ‘pay’ their way out of it, complaints about what the government is allowing to be sold, and among this the story of helping others, a real sense of community and an ‘we’re all in this together’ mood. The extracts are short, maybe a couple of paragraphs at most, but it’s enough for the timeline and a general sense, rather than going too in-depth. Another quite handy aspect of the book is the context – Brown breaks the extracts up into six month blocks, providing context at the start of each chapter as to what was happening at the time and what the diarists are reacting to.
It’s a really great insight into the mood of the nation, and it’s hard not to feel connected to these people and their various circumstances, to laugh with them at times at humorous moments and emphasise with their darker ones. It makes the social history of World War II really accessible, too. It’s a really intriguing book, and definitely hope I can come across more of the Mass Observation work in the future.
Reading Challenge
Avengers Challenge!
Prompt: Captain America – the First Avenger – WWII book or something set in the 1930s or 1940s
Progress: 3/6 Completed
Unwrapping Words 