|
Showing 1 - 25 of
31 matches in All Departments
From the preeminent historian of 20th century Spain Paul Preston,
Architects of Terror is a new history of how paranoia, conspiracy
and anti-Semitism was used to justify the military coup of 1936 and
enabled the construction of a dictatorship built on violence and
persecution. It is the previously untold story of how antisemitic
beliefs were weaponised to justify and propagate the Franco
overthrow of liberal Spain. The Spanish military coup of 1936 was
launched to overturn the social and economic reforms of the
democratic Second Republic, and its educational and cultural
challenges to the established order. The consequent civil war was
fought in the interests of the landowners, industrialists, bankers,
clerics and army officers whose privileges were threatened.
However, a central justification for a war that took the lives of
around 500,000 Spaniards was that it was being fought to combat an
alleged scheme for world domination by a non-existent ‘Jewish-
Masonic-Bolshevik Conspiracy’. Despite the fact that Spain had
only a tiny minority of Jews and Freemasons, Franco and his inner
circle were ardent believers in this fabricated conspiracy and
spread the notion that the survival of Catholic Spain, as well, of
course, of the establishment ’ s economic interests, required the
total annihilation of Jews and Freemasons. Architects of Terror is
the story of how fake news, mendacity, corruption and nostalgia for
lost empire generated violence and hatred. The book presents vivid
portraits of the key ideologues who propagated the myth of the
Jewish-Masonic-Bolshevik Conspiracy and of the military figures who
implemented the atrocities that it justified. Among the convictions
shared by these individuals was their belief in the idea that
Freemasonry was responsible for Spain ’ s loss of empire and in
the factual veracity of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the
notorious fiction about the global domination of the Jews. This is
a history that reverberates in our own political moment
From the preeminent historian of 20th century Spain Paul Preston,
Architects of Terror is a new history of how paranoia, conspiracy
and anti-Semitism was used to justify the military coup of 1936 and
enabled the construction of a dictatorship built on violence and
persecution. It is the previously untold story of how antisemitic
beliefs were weaponised to justify and propagate the Franco
overthrow of liberal Spain. The Spanish military coup of 1936 was
launched to overturn the social and economic reforms of the
democratic Second Republic, and its educational and cultural
challenges to the established order. The consequent civil war was
fought in the interests of the landowners, industrialists, bankers,
clerics and army officers whose privileges were threatened.
However, a central justification for a war that took the lives of
around 500,000 Spaniards was that it was being fought to combat an
alleged scheme for world domination by a non-existent ‘Jewish-
Masonic-Bolshevik Conspiracy’. Despite the fact that Spain had
only a tiny minority of Jews and Freemasons, Franco and his inner
circle were ardent believers in this fabricated conspiracy and
spread the notion that the survival of Catholic Spain, as well, of
course, of the establishment ’ s economic interests, required the
total annihilation of Jews and Freemasons. Architects of Terror is
the story of how fake news, mendacity, corruption and nostalgia for
lost empire generated violence and hatred. The book presents vivid
portraits of the key ideologues who propagated the myth of the
Jewish-Masonic-Bolshevik Conspiracy and of the military figures who
implemented the atrocities that it justified. Among the convictions
shared by these individuals was their belief in the idea that
Freemasonry was responsible for Spain ’ s loss of empire and in
the factual veracity of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the
notorious fiction about the global domination of the Jews. This is
a history that reverberates in our own political moment
UPDATED EDITION A rousing and full-blooded account of the Spanish
Civil War and the rise to prominence of General Franco. No modern
conflict has inflamed the passions of both civilians and
intellectuals as much as the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39. Burned
into our collective historical consciousness, it not only
prefigured the imminent Second World War but also ushered in a new
and horrific form of warfare that would come to define the
twentieth century. At the same time it echoed the revolutionary
aspirations of millions of Europeans and Americans after the
painful years of the Great Depression. In this authoritative
history, Paul Preston vividly recounts the political ideals and
military horrors of the Spanish Civil War - including the
controversial bombing of Guernica - and tracks the emergence of
General Franco's brutal but extraordinarily durable fascist
dictatorship.
From the foremost historian of 20th century Spain, A People
Betrayed is the story of the devastating betrayal of Spain by its
political class, its military and its Church. This comprehensive
history of modern Spain chronicles the fomenting of violent social
division throughout the country by institutionalised corruption and
startling political incompetence. Most spectacularly during the
Primo de Rivera and Franco dictatorships, grotesque and shameless
corruption went hand-in-hand with inept policies that prolonged
Spain’s economic backwardness well into the 1950s. A People
Betrayed looks back to the years prior to 1923 when electoral
corruption excluded the masses from organized politics and gave
them a choice between apathetic acceptance and violent revolution.
Bitter social conflict, economic tensions and conflict between
centralist nationalism and regional independence movements then
exploded into the civil war of 1936-1939. It took the horrors of
that war and the dictatorship that followed to break the pattern.
The moderation shared by the progressive right and a chastened left
underlay a bloodless transition to democracy after 1975. Yet, as
before, corruption and political incompetence continued to have a
corrosive effect on political coexistence and social cohesion.
Sparkling with vivid portraits of politicians and army officers,
some corrupt and others clean, recounting the triumphs and
disasters of Kings Alfonso XIII and Juan Carlos, A People Betrayed
unravels the mystery of why both right and left have been unable or
unwilling to deal with corruption and the pernicious clash between
Spanish centralist nationalism and regional desires for
independence.
The Triumph of Democracy in Spain tells a gripping story of the
tortuous creation of Spain's constitutional monarchy. The book
provides an authoritative account of the tribulations of the forces
of progress, beginning in 1969 with the disintegration of Franco's
dictatorship and ending with the remarkable Socialist election
victory in 1982.
Series Information: Routledge/Canada Blanch Studies in Contemporary Spain
The role of the Spanish Right in the course of the twentieth-century has been a neglected area of academic study. The Politics of Revenge redresses this providing a succinct and disturbing account. eBook available with sample pages: 0203400372
This classic text is made newly available in a substantially revised and updated second edition.
This collection of essays constitutes a magnificent monument to
recent scholarship on the Second Republic and the Civil War. It is
indispensable for a full understanding of the period.' - Raymond
Carr
While 20th-century Spain has been dominated by right-wing forces
historians have, until now, paid little critical attention to the
Spanish Right, concentrating instead on the Civil War and the
earlier anarchist revolution. "The Politics of Revenge" seeks to
redress this balance in a disturbing account of how the Right
seized power through that civil war and then maintained a cruel and
corrupt dictatorship. Apart from a brief interval for the Second
Republic between 1931 and 1936, the Right prevailed in modern Spain
until 1977 when the current democratic regime came to power. On
occasions when the Right's domination was challenged by popular
democratic forces, the challengers were met with violence. Paul
Preston examines the course of the Spanish Civil War (1936-9) and
focuses on the army officers and Falangists who fought it and who
struggled to reimpose the hegemony of the right. Their success
resulted in 40 years of dictatorship under Franco which wreaked
revenge on the defeated Left. This book provides an original
account of the Spanish Right in its authoritarian, fascist and
military forms and presents a highly readable analysis of a
ruthless political scene.
The Triumph of Democracy in Spain tells a gripping story of the
tortuous creation of Spain's constitutional monarchy. The book
provides an authoritative account of the tribulations of the forces
of progress, beginning in 1969 with the disintegration of Franco's
dictatorship and ending with the remarkable Socialist election
victory in 1982.
Selected as the Sunday Times History Book of the Year for 2012,
this is a meticulous work of scholarship from the foremost
historian of 20th-century Spain. The culmination of more than a
decade of research, 'The Spanish Holocaust' seeks to reflect the
intense horrors visited upon Spain during its ferocious civil war,
the consequences of which still reverberate bitterly today. The
brutal, murderous persecution of Spaniards between 1936 and 1945 is
a truth that should have been told long ago. Paul Preston here
offers the first comprehensive picture of what he terms "the
Spanish Holocaust": mass extra-judicial murder of some 200,000
victims, cursory military trials, torture, the systematic abuse of
women and children, sweeping imprisonment, the horrors of exile.
Those culpable for crimes committed on both sides of the Civil War
are named; their victims identified. 'The Spanish Holocaust'
illuminates one of the darkest, least-known eras of modern European
history.
In 1940, Daily Telegraph correspondent Henry Buckley published his
eyewitness account of his experiences reporting form the Spanish
Civil War. The copies of the book, stored in a warehouse in London,
were destroyed during the Blitz and only a handful of copies of his
unique chronicle were saved. Now, eighty years after its first
publication, this exceptional eyewitness account of the war is
republished with a new introduction by acclaimed scholar Paul
Preston. The Life and Death of the Spanish Republic is a unique
account of Spanish politics throughout the Second Republic, from
its foundation of 14 April 1931 to its defeat at the end of March
1939. It combines personal recollections of meetings with the great
politicians of the day and intimate accounts of dramatic events
with a deep understanding of Spain - its people, politics and
culture. Providing a fascinating portrait of a crucial decade of
contemporary Spanish history and based on an abundance of the
witness material, this important book is one of the most enduring
records of the Second Republic and is therefore essential reading
for anyone interested in the Spanish Civil War.
Told for the first time in English, Paul Preston's new book tells
the story of a preventable tragedy that cost many thousands of
lives and ruined tens of thousands more at the end of the Spanish
Civil War. This is the story of an avoidable humanitarian tragedy
that cost many thousands of lives and ruined tens of thousands
more. On 5 March 1939, the eternally malcontent Colonel Segismundo
Casado launched a military coup against the government of Juan
Negrin. To fulfil his ambition to go down in history as the man who
ended the Spanish Civil War, he claimed that Negrin was the puppet
of Moscow and that a coup was imminent to establish a Communist
dictatorship. Instead his action ensured the Republic ended in
catastrophe and shame. Paul Preston, the leading historian of
twentieth-century Spain, tells this shocking story for the first
time in English. It is a harrowing tale of how the flawed decisions
of politicans can lead to tragedy.
Out of the social and economic turmoil of Europe in the 1930s, the
Popular Front emerged as the spearhead of the Left's bid to stop
Fascism in its tracks. Fifty years on from the birth of the Popular
Front, this edited collection assesses the impact of the idea of
bourgeois-proletarian alliance on the European Left as a whole. It
also examines the fate of the Popular Front governments, both in
France, which remained nominally "at peace", and in Spain, where
the bitter strife over social and economic reform erupted into open
civil war. Helen Graham is co-author of "The French and Spanish
Popular Fronts: Comparative Perspectives" and Paul Preston is
author of "The Coming of the Spanish Civil War, "The Spanish Civil
War" and co-author of "Spain, the EEC and NATO".
Out of the social and economic turmoil of Europe in the 1930s, the
Popular Front emerged as the spearhead of the left's bid to stop
fascism in its tracks. Fifty years on from the birth of the Popular
Front this edited collection assesses the impact of the idea of
bourgeois-proletarian alliance on the European left as a whole. It
also examines the fate of the Popular Front governments, both in
France, which remained nominally 'at peace', and in Spain, where
the bitter strife over social and economic reform erupted into open
civil war.
The life of the complex, ruthless adversary of General Franco,
whose life spanned much of Spain's turbulence in the 20th century.
From 1939 to 1975, the Spanish Communist Party, effectively lead
for two decades by Santiago Carrillo, was the most determined
opponent of General Franco's Nationalist regime. Admired by many on
the left as a revolutionary and a pillar of the anti-Franco
struggle and hated by others as a Stalinist gravedigger of the
revolution, Santiago Carrillo was arguably the dictator's most
consistent left-wing enemy. For many on the right, Carrillo was a
monster to be vilified as a mass murderer for his activities during
the Civil War. But his survival owed to certain qualities that he
had in abundance - a capacity for hard work, stamina and endurance,
writing and oratorical skills, intelligence and cunning - though
honesty and loyalty were not among them. One by one he turned on
those who helped him in his desire for advancement, revealing the
ruthless streak that he shared with Franco, and a zeal for
rewriting his past. Drawing on the numerous, continuously revised
accounts Carillo created of his life, and contrasting them with
those produced by his friends and enemies, Spain's greatest modern
historian Paul Preston unravels the legend of a devastating and
controversial figure at the heart of 20th century Spanish politics.
A brilliant new portrait of the Spanish Civil War from our greatest
historian of Spain. 'Anyone interested in Spain will want this
book.' Alan Massie, Daily Telegraph A bravura new interpretation of
the course, causes and characters of the Spanish Civil War, still
the twentieth century's bloodiest internal conflict. Analysis of
the Civil War has always focused on victors and vanquished, but
what of those who eschewed the struggle, those who stood apart from
the carnage and chaos? Was there a Third Way? Starting at the
extreme right of the political spectrum and moving across it to the
extreme left, using the emblematic lives of ten key individuals,
Preston builds up an astonishingly vivid picture of how the War
came to pass, and how those who started, suffered and stopped it
were coloured by the experience. Here are brilliant psychological
profiles of the communist firebrand La Pasionaria, of the canny
falangist Primo de Rivera, of the aloof intellectual
non-participant Salvador Madariaga, and of the enigma himself,
Generalissimo Franco. 'Comrades presents us with fascinating
portraits, case studies that illustrate variously nobility,
arrogance, self-delusion and evil. It remains difficult to
comprhend the passions that lead to civil war; but this book helps
us to understand.' Michael Portillo, Sunday Telegraph
'Magisterial ... As engagingly readable as a good novel' Observer
The definitive biography of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, from
the acclaimed historian Paul Preston. Francisco Franco was the
Caudillo of Spain, leading the Nationalists' brutal,
Fascist-sponsored victory over the Republican government in the
Spanish Civil War and ruling Spain as dictator from 1939 to 1975.
The biography presents a mass of new and unknown material about its
subject, the fruits of research in the archives of six countries
and a plethora of interviews with key figures.
The war in Spain and those who wrote at first hand of its horrors.
From 1936 to 1939 the eyes of the world were fixed on the
devastating Spanish conflict that drew both professional war
correspondents and great writers. Ernest Hemingway, John Dos
Passos, Josephine Herbst, Martha Gellhorn, W. H. Auden, Stephen
Spender, Kim Philby, George Orwell, Arthur Koestler, Cyril
Connolly, Andre Malraux, Antoine de Saint Exupery and others wrote
eloquently about the horrors they saw at first hand. Together with
many great and now largely forgotten journalists, they put their
lives on the line, discarding professionally dispassionate
approaches and keenly espousing the cause of the partisans. Facing
censorship, they fought to expose the complacency with which the
decision-makers of the West were appeasing Hitler and Mussolini.
Many campaigned for the lifting of non-intervention, revealing the
extent to which the Spanish Republic had been betrayed. Peter
Preston's exhilarating account illuminates the moment when war
correspondence came of age.
|
|