Spanning the colonial campaigns of the Victorian age to the War on Terror after 9/11, this study explores the role sport was perceived to have played in the lives and work of military personnel, and examines how sporting language and imagery were deployed to shape and reconfigure civilian society's understanding of conflict. From 1850 onwards war reportage - complemented and reinforced by a glut of campaign histories, memoirs, novels and films - helped create an imagined community in which sporting attributes and qualities were employed to give meaning and order to the chaos and misery of warfare. This work explores the evolution of the Victorian notion that playing-field and battlefield were connected and then moves on to investigate the challenges this belief faced in the twentieth century, as combat became, initially, industrialised in the age of total warfare and, subsequently, professionalised in the post-nuclear world. Such a longitudinal study allows, for the first time, new light to be shed on the continuities and shifts in the way the 'reality' of war was captured in the British popular imagination. Drawing together the disparate fields of sport and warfare, this book serves as a vital point of reference for anyone with an interest in the cultural, social or military history of modern Britain.

Spanning the colonial campaigns of the Victorian age to the War on Terror after 9/11, this study explores the role sport was perceived to have played in the lives and work of military personnel, and examines how sporting language and imagery were deployed to shape and reconfigure civilian society's understanding of conflict. From 1850 onwards war reportage - complemented and reinforced by a glut of campaign histories, memoirs, novels and films - helped create an imagined community in which sporting attributes and qualities were employed to give meaning and order to the chaos and misery of warfare. This work explores the evolution of the Victorian notion that playing-field and battlefield were connected and then moves on to investigate the challenges this belief faced in the twentieth century, as combat became, initially, industrialised in the age of total warfare and, subsequently, professionalised in the post-nuclear world. Such a longitudinal study allows, for the first time, new light to be shed on the continuities and shifts in the way the 'reality' of war was captured in the British popular imagination. Drawing together the disparate fields of sport and warfare, this book serves as a vital point of reference for anyone with an interest in the cultural, social or military history of modern Britain.

An Open Access edition of this book is available on the Liverpool University Press website and the OAPEN library. The experience of the South African War sharpened the desire to commemorate for a number of reasons. An increasingly literate public, a burgeoning populist press, an army reinforced by waves of volunteers and, to contemporaries at least, a shockingly high death toll embedded the war firmly in the national consciousness. In addition, with the fallen buried far from home those left behind required other forms of commemoration. For these reasons, the South African War was an important moment of transition in commemorative practice and foreshadowed the rituals of remembrance that engulfed Britain in the aftermath of the Great War. This work provides the first comprehensive survey of the memorialisation process in Britain in the aftermath of the South African War. The approach goes beyond the simple deconstruction of memorial iconography and, instead, looks at the often tortuous and lengthy gestation of remembrance sites, from the formation of committees to the raising of finance and debates over form. In the process both Edwardian Britain's sense of self and the contested memory of the conflict in South Africa are thrown into relief. In the concluding sections of the book the focus falls on other forms of remembrance sites, namely the multi-volume histories produced by the War Office and The Times, and the seminal television documentaries of Kenneth Griffith. Once again the approach goes beyond simple textual deconstruction to place the sources firmly in their wider context by exploring both production and reception. By uncovering the themes and myths that underpinned these interpretations of the war, shifting patterns in how the war was represented and conceived are revealed.

In this poetic analysis of the human response throughout the journey of life, Peter Donaldson unveils his examination of human behavior in various circumstances and in response to a variety of topics, including love, faith, politics, relationships, and black history. He offers this literary exposition of the nature of the human heart and the intriguing emotional reactions we express towards the obstacles, successes, and failures of life, hoping to leave readers refreshed by a complete showering of poetic utopia. Although largely influenced by a Christian perspective, the philosophical ideologies presented here aim to stimulate deep thoughts in the minds of both the believer and agnostic alike. "Symphony of the Heart" presents an expression of lyrical artistry that surveys a journey into the uncharted waters of faith and unbridled emotions. In the dialect of poetic lingo, Donaldson intends to spur discussions concerning the controversial issues of life with language creatively written in such an untailored fashion as to create a sentiment of tranquil literary bliss.