Review Article: The First World War Imagined

ALFREDO BONADEO. Mark of the Beast: Death and Degradation in the Literature of the Great War. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1989. Pp. viii, 172. $19.00 (US)

SAMUEL HYNES. A War Imagined: The First World War and English Culture. London: Bodley Head, 1990. Pp. xii, 514. £20.00.     

The Impact of the First World War and the Polish-Soviet War on the ‘Culture of Suffering’ in Post-1914 Polish Fiction

ABSTRACT

Using Jeffrey C. Alexander’s theory of cultural trauma, this article focuses on the three major types of narratives of suffering which appeared in Polish fiction, after Poland regained political independence in 1918, outside the strong myth-creating narrative of the Polish Legions’ role in the war for independence. It argues that Polish post-1918 fiction developed these three major paths in the face of suffering inflicted on Polish lands, during WWI and Polish-Soviet War. These paths were to: 1) continue the narrative of Polish suffering within the framework of heroic, and selfless, sacrifice for Poland that has been well established since Romanticism; 2) present suffering as the universal fate of humanity outside the notion of national identity, due to the monstrosity of modern bureaucratic systems wherein human beings are treated as objects; and 3) present suffering as the result of modern warfare, but told outside of “patriotic phraseology” – thus suggesting a growing need as to finding a solution to national conflicts outside narrowly defined identities.     

走向世界的中国开发区

<正>随着改革开放的不断深入,中国经济与世界经济联系更为紧密,开发区作为对外开放的排头兵,与世界经济的关联度进一步增强,外向型经济受国际市场的影响也陡然增大。开发区是中国对外开放的重要"窗口"。推动开发区高水平的对外开放,不仅要在"引进来"上下功夫,也要在"走出去"上做好功课。北京经济技术开发区位于北京亦庄地区,是北京市唯一同时享受国家级经济技术开发区和国家高新技术产业园区双重优惠政策的国家级经济技术开发区。自1992年建设以来,开发区始终承     

The Patriot Game: Russia and the First World War

D.C.B. LTEVEN. Russia and the Origins of the First World War. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1984. Pp. 213. $25.00 (US); LEWIS H. SIEGELBAUM. The Politics of Industrial Mobilization in Russia, 1915–1917: A Study of the War-Industries Committees. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1984. Pp. xix, 312. $27.50 (US); WTLLIAM OLEASON. Alexander Guchkov and the End of the Russian Empire. Independence Square, Philadelphia: The American Philosophical Society, 1983 (Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, Volume 73, Part 3, 1983). Pp. 90. No price available.     

中国开发区的世界风采

<正>在中国着力推动新一轮高水平对外开放的背景下,开发区继续发挥开放型经济主力军作用,加快解决对外开放过程中面临的难题,推动开发区对外开放迈向新高度,进而把开发区建设成中国对外开放的新高地。当前世界经济深度调整,区域经济合作不断加强,投资便利化的进程在加快,全球供应链、产业链、价值链加速重构,任何一家企业都直接或间接地融入到全球产业分工的体系之中,企业     

The Cambridge history of the First World War

This massive study has been produced under the editorship of Professor Jay Winter of Yale University and the Editorial Committee of the International Research Centre of the Historial de la Grande Guerre, Péronne, Somme. It attempts a new interpretation of the First World War, based on its transnational and global impact. Some 43 contributions by a ‘transnational’ group of scholars provide a detailed and convincing account of the war, going well beyond more orthodox treatments which emphasize the strategy and tactics involved. In the first volume, Global war, Winter and his colleagues examine, for example, the spread of the conflict to distant continents, together with a discussion of the law of war, atrocities and genocide. Volume II covers the changing nature of the state as the war progressed, the role of armed forces, the sinews of war and the search for peace. Volume III analyses the war's impact on civil society in all its various guises during the conflict; hence we are offered scholarly treatment of, for example, private life, gender and cultural life. This bald summary does scant justice to a magisterial work, an essential resource for those —at schools and universities—who teach the history of the First World War and its impact on domestic and global developments. Of particular interest is the fine reproduction of photos and paintings and the annotated and detailed bibliographies attached to each volume. Winter and his colleagues deserve to be congratulated for providing both the scholar and the interested layperson with an exemplary treatment of an event, the significance of which still echoes down the years.     

The Provisioning Crisis during the First World War

Although the agricultural region of Voronezh Province did not experience a food supply crisis during the First World War and up to 1917, it did suffer from a prolonged provisioning crisis, the result of administrative problems and mistakes, that in turn contributed to popular unrest, both in the province and throughout the empire.