Layout 8 - Winston Churchill

R E V I E W S“A1” RETURNS...Easton rendered a great service byreprinting three important multivolumeChurchill works. After FinestHour expressed disappointment withtheir 1989 version of The Second WorldWar (which did not use the definitivetext), they consulted us over The WorldCrisis and A History of the English-Speaking Peoples (1991-92) offprintingfrom first editions and including fullcolorreprints of fold-out maps. Then in2000, they reissued the DefinitiveEdition of Churchill’s 1952 collectedWar Speeches—which, like their WorldCrisis, cost far less than first editions,making the books particularly attractiveto scholars and libraries.We were not involved in Easton’sreprint of Churchill’s first book (CohenA1), but unlike their recent reprint ofMy African Journey (see page 55), it isnot an offprint of the Collected Worksedition, edited by the late Fred Woods.It does include Woods’s redrawn maps,and all of his footnotes—more than inChurchill’s original, although all ofWSC’s are included. But it lacks subjectsynopses following chapter heads, whichappear in every previous Malakand.For the 1974 Collected Works,Woods redrew many maps, eliminatingsome of the original fold-outs andchanging certain map locations. Textediting varied, but he was particularlyzealous with The River War. Names ofplaces were modernized, and there wereother textual revisions. One review commendedWoods, saying that Churchill“took little care” over his maps. Scholarsand bibliophiles thought otherwise.Tracking text sources for eachvolume of Collected Works for myConnoissseur’s Guide in 1998, I foundthat the Malakand was based on the1899 Silver Library text—a good choice.This was the first edition in whichChurchill had the opportunity tocorrect the errors of his uncle MoretonFrewen (aka “Mortal Ruin”), who editedthe 1898 original. Nevertheless, Woodsdid alter such words as “Karachi,” whichChurchill spelled “Kurrâchee.”On this volume it seems clear thatEaston reset Woods’s text, omitted thechapter synopses and renumberedWoods’s footnotes sequentially. Woods(and Easton) also omitted Churchill’simportant second edition preface. Butthere is no way to tell, short of a pageby-pagecomparison, how true to theSilver Library edition the text remains.More could have been done. Therecent and forthcoming ISI editions ofThoughts and Adventures and GreatContemporaries, edited by James Mullerand Paul Courtenay (FH 143: 44-45)are models of what a modern editionshould be. While Churchill’s text is leftin its original form, erudite new introductionsand profuse footnotes provideany needed corrections and tell us whathappened to people, places and thingsover the years since the first edition.The Malakand has had a new lifeof late with its relevant reflections onLEADING CHURCHILL MYTHS #20:Il carteggio Churchill-Mussolini allaluce del processo Guareschi (TheChurchill-Mussolini File in light ofthe Guareschi trial), by UbaldoGiuliani-Balestrino. Edizioni SettimoSigillo, Rome, 224 pp., €20 fromUnilibro, http://xrl.us/bh5vs6.For years conspiracy theorists have citedletters between Churchill and BenitoMussolini, in which Churchill makesvarious proposals for peace, and evenwarfare in that part of the world. (See“Coalition with Primitives 2010,” FH147: 22-23). But Easton provides nospecial introduction, although a loosesheet describes the book with no referenceto modern parallels.Presuming Easton’s text is essentiallyWoods’s, this is nothing more thana nicely bound version of the CollectedWorks edition. And, since this same textwas offprinted by Leo Cooper, W. W.Norton, Barnes & Noble and others,you don’t have to spend $79 to ownone. Just dial up www.bookfinder.comto browse among offerings priced as lowas $8.41. Still, if you wish to own thedefinitive text, consider acquiring areading copy of the 1901 Silver Libraryor 1916 Shilling Library editions. ,“Churchill Offered Peace and Security to Mussolini”PATRIZIO ROMANO GIANGRECOoffers to safeguard the “Duce of Fascism”from reprisals in the last days of WorldWar II. They date from just before Italyjoined the war to just before Mussolini,who had become head of Hitler’s puppetItalian Social Republic, and his mistressClara Petacci, were captured and executedby partisans in April 1945.A Petacci nephew in Arizona hasadded to the stew by publishing what hesays are her diaries. His introductionoffers yet another twist: Petacci, itclaims, was actually a British spy whosemission was to steal the Churchill lettersto protect the Prime Minister.Il carteggio Churchill-Mussolinidoesn’t even bother to illustrate thesubject letters, and is so poorly writtenand documented that it is scarcely credible.But it does present an opportunityto recap the whole sordid story.The title refers to the first appearanceof the “letters” in 1954, wheneditor Giovanni Guareschi publishedthem in his magazine Candido. Mr.Guareschi also published alleged 1944letters by Alcide De Gasperi (postwar________________________________________________________________________Mr. Giangreco is a Naples engineer whose assistance to FH dates back to issue #100, when heobtained in translation Luigi Barzini’s marvelous article on Churchill in the 1910 Dundee election.The author thanks Professor Andrew Martin Garvey of the Italian Army Officers’ College and theUniversity of Turin, for his helpful suggestions and advice in preparing this review.FINEST HOUR 149 / 52