World War I Collection Spotlight - Biography and Memoir

The incredible true account of World War I in Africa and General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, the last undefeated German commander.

“Let me say straight out that if all military histories were as thrilling and well written as Robert Gaudi’s African Kaiser, I might give up reading fiction and literary bio­graphy… Gaudi writes with the flair of a latter-day Macaulay. He sets his scenes carefully

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Alvin C. York (1887--1964) -- devout Christian, conscientious objector, and reluctant hero of World War I -- is one of America's most famous and celebrated soldiers. Known to generations through Gary Cooper's Academy Award-winning portrayal in the 1941 film Sergeant York, York is credited with the capture of 132 German soldiers on October 8, 1918, in the Meuse-Argonne region of France -- a deed for which he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.At...

In the summer of 1914, three great empires dominated Europe: Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary. Four years later all had vanished in the chaos of World War I. One event precipitated the conflict, and at its heart was a tragic love story. When Austrian heir Archduke Franz Ferdinand married for love against the wishes of the emperor, he and his wife Sophie were humiliated and shunned, yet they remained devoted to each other and to their children....

"Publishing during the 100th Anniversary of World War I , an NYRB Classics Original. The budding young Hungarian artist Bela Zombory-Moldovan was abroad on vacation when World War I broke out in August 1914. Called up by the army, he soon found himself hundreds of miles away, advancing on Russian lines--or perhaps on his own lines--and facing relentless rifle and artillery fire. Badly wounded, he returned to normal life, which now struck him as unspeakably...

Imprisoned in a remote Turkish POW camp during World War I, having survived a two-month forced march and a terrifying shootout in the desert, two British officers, Harry Jones and Cedric Hill, join forces to bamboozle their iron-fisted captors. To stave off despair and boredom, Jones takes a handmade Ouija board and fakes elaborate séances for his fellow prisoners. Word gets around, and one day an Ottoman official approaches Jones with a query: Could...

When they met at a motorcycle club in 1912, Elsie Knocker was a 30-year-old motorcycling divorcee dressed in leathers, & Mairi Chisolm was a brilliant 18-year-old mechanic, living at home borrowing tools from her brother. Little did they know, theirs was to become one of the most extraordinary stories of the First World War.

"The story of three downed British airmen who mastermind an elaborate, rollicking escape from a WWI German POW camp"--

Godfather to Mussolini, national hero of Italy and the WWI irredentist movement, literary icon of Joyce and Pound, lover of actress Eleonora Duse: here is Lucy Hughes-Hallett’s extraordinary biography of Gabriele d’Annunzio, poet, bon vivant, harbinger of Italian fascism.
Gabriele d’Annunzio was Italy’s premier poet at a time when poetry mattered enough to trigger riots. A brilliant self-publicist in the first age of

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"English author Robert Graves says goodbye to England, family, friends, and a way of life."