Search results for ""Author Charles J Esdaile""

The Spanish Civil War continues to attract attention as a brutal political and military struggle which foreshadowed the wider war across Europe that followed, and it has given rise to myths that have become commonplace since the war ended eighty years ago. Few of these myths are as potent as those associated with the International Brigades, the 45,000 volunteers from many countries who travelled to Spain to fight for the Second Republic. That is why this perceptive and original study by Charles Esdaile is so valuable. Using the recorded experience of the British Brigaders as well as primary research in the Spanish archives, he thoroughly re-examines the contribution they made to the war effort against the Nationalists of General Franco. During the war the Nationalists exaggerated the importance of the International Brigades in order to demonstrate the influence of the Communists on the Republic, and the Republicans portrayed them as part of the great crusade to defend democracy. Then, after the war, surviving Brigaders tended to overstate the part they played and the sacrifices they made. The one fact that nobody would dispute was the terrible losses sustained by the volunteers. This produced an impression that they were veritable men of iron who played a key part in the fighting and helped stave off the Nationalist victory until the eve of the Second World War. By concentrating in close detail on the major battles in which the British Brigaders took part, Charles Esdaile reassesses their impact and considers whether their performance on the battlefield justifies their reputation.

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This book is the first single volume history of modern Spain to appear in over 30 years. It describes Spain's emergence in the nineteenth century as the first modern post-imperial power and examines the vast social and economic changes which Spain witnessed during this period. In lucid and accessible prose, the author provides a gripping account of 131 years of politics, warfare and social conflict. Charles Esdaile places particular emphasis on crucial periods in the history of modern Spain. He shows how nineteenth century Spain was in many ways shaped by the Peninsular War of 1804-18, as the politicization of the army during this conflict cast a shadow over the century-long political struggle between liberalism and absolutism. Esdaile also demonstrates that the years between 1868 and 1874 were a watershed in the history of modern Spain. During this time the social and political changes of the century were consolidated and Spain emerged as a constitutional monarchy. Providing a riveting account of the events of the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39, this book shows that the result of the brutal struggle between the nationalists and republicans was the preservation of the social and economic order that had arisen in the nineteenth century. Blending analysis with narrative, Charles Esdaile allows the reader to understand nineteenth century Spain on its own terms and to see how the seeds of the civil war of 1936-39 were sown by the failure of liberalism in the previous century.

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Cavaliers and Roundheads are figures who appear in hundreds of English ghost stories. In this innovative account, Charles Esdaile argues that such tales are in reality folk memories of an episode of English history that was second only to the Black Death in terms of individual and collective suffering alike, and, further, that they reveal important truths about the way in which the conflict was represented: it is no surprise, then, to find that spectral Cavaliers are often romantic figures and revenant Roundheads grim ones full of menace. Yet, the book is no mere catalogue. On the contrary, rather than being discussed in a vacuum, the tales of haunting are rather set within a detailed regional history of the conflicts of 1642-1651 of a sort that has never yet been attempted, but is, for all that, badly needed.

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