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Ongoing Exhibition and Commemorations

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

The Library wishes a pleasant and meaningful Veterans' Day to all the veterans and veterans' families in our community. Our observance of the World War One centennial continues:

From the Western Front and Beyond: The Writings of World War One. The intimate, moving exhibition created by Head of Exhibitions Harriet Shapiro will be on display in the Peluso Family Exhibition Gallery through December 31. It marks the one hundredth anniversary of the first major war of the twentieth century, a war that left millions dead and ravaged the landscape of the Western and Eastern Fronts. Here at the Library, our collection evokes this unforgettable legacy in the writings and literature that came from the trenches and bloodstained battlefields. The exhibition is open both to members and nonmembers free of charge whenever the Library is open.

Recent Events. The Library was pleased to present author Richard Rubin on October 1 and TC Squared Theatre Company's The Great War Theatre Project on November 9.

Mr. Rubin spoke about his book The Last of the Doughboys: The Forgotten Generation and Their Forgotten World Warhighlighting the stories of the last survivors of the American Expeditionary Force, whom he interviewed over several years. Click here to watch streaming video of his lecture.

The Great War Theatre Project combined original texts from 1914-18 with remarkable period photographs and footage and original music for a moving evocation of the war and its legacy.

Actors in The Great War Theatre Project

New Additions to the Collection. Many major books on the Great War have appeared in the last eighteen months. We listed many of them in this previous post. Some new titles of note:

Winter, Jay, ed. | The Cambridge History of the First World War. This comprehensive three-volume set is international in scope and covers the military, political, social, economic, and cultural history of the Great War. 

Asquith, Margot | Margot Asquith's Great War Diary 1914-1916: The View from Downing Street. Margot Asquith was the wife of Prime Minister Herbert Henry Asquith. Excerpts from her diary provide a vivid behind-the-scenes picture of the wartime world at 10 Downing Street.

Baxter, John | Paris at the End of the World: The City of Light During the Great War, 1914-1918

Davidson, Andrew | A Doctor in the Great War: Unseen Photographs of Life in the Trenches. Medical Officer Fred Davidson clandestinely photographed life in the trenches from 1914 to 1915. Two hundred fifty surviving photographs are published here for the first time. 

Hynes, Samuel | The Unsubstantial Air: American Fliers in the First World WarHynes is a Professor of History at Princeton who served as a pilot in World War II. His latest is an intimate portrait of pilots at the dawn of aerial warfare.

King, Melanie | Secrets in a Dead Fish: The Spying Game in the First World War. Drawing on the memoirs of eight spies, King provides a vivid account of the clever, and often strange, modes of covert communication and tricks of the spying trade used during the war.

Walter, Peter | The First World War in Colour. More than 300 autochrome photographs culled from archives in Europe, the United States, and Australia.

Webb, Mike | From Downing Street to the Trenches: First-Hand Accounts from the Great War, 1914-1916. A varied collection of eyewitness accounts - letters, memoirs, diaries, and photographs - from those who lived through the war.

Many more resources about the Great War, its centennial, and other activities through the end of the year can be found at 1914.org.

Thanks to Head of Acquisitions Steven McGuirl for his contributions to this article.

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