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Summary
Summary
When the Great War ended in 1918, the West was broken. Religious faith, patriotism, and the belief in human progress had all been called into question by the mass carnage experienced by both sides. Shell shocked and traumatized, the West faced a world it no longer recognized: the old order had collapsed, replaced by an age of machines. The world hurtled forward on gears and crankshafts, and terrifying new ideologies arose from the wreckage of past belief.
In Fracture , critically acclaimed historian Philipp Blom argues that in the aftermath of World War I, citizens of the West directed their energies inwards, launching into hedonistic, aesthetic, and intellectual adventures of self-discovery. It was a period of both bitter disillusionment and visionary progress. From Surrealism to Oswald Spengler's The Decline of the West ; from Fritz Lang's Metropolis to theoretical physics, and from Art Deco to Jazz and the Charleston dance, artists, scientists, and philosophers grappled with the question of how to live and what to believe in a broken age. Morbid symptoms emerged simultaneously from the decay of World War I: progress and innovation were everywhere met with increasing racism and xenophobia. America closed its borders to European refugees and turned away from the desperate poverty caused by the Great Depression. On both sides of the Atlantic, disenchanted voters flocked to Communism and fascism, forming political parties based on violence and revenge that presaged the horror of a new World War.
Vividly recreating this era of unparalleled ambition, artistry, and innovation, Blom captures the seismic shifts that defined the interwar period and continue to shape our world today.
Author Notes
Philipp Blom is the author of several award-winning books, including A Wicked Company , and The Vertigo Years , which has been made into a three-part television documentary. A frequent lecturer at European and American universities, he also contributes to international newspapers and hosts a radio show on Austrian national radio. Philipp Blom lives in Vienna.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
In the beginning of this thoughtful portrait of the interwar years, Blom (A Wicked Company) asks the central question that arose for so many everyday people: after the devastation of WWI, "What values were there left to live for?" Blom is thorough in documenting the many attempts to answer this question, from the noble to the insidious to the tragic. He adeptly roams across topics and locations, including the early stirrings of fascism when the Italian poet D'Annunzio marched on Fiume; H.G. Wells's scathing review of Fritz Lang's film Metropolis; the sickening activism of American eugenics enthusiasts; the wonders of Magnitogorsk, the "Magnet City" built in the Urals; and the growing risk of totalitarian regimes, such as Mussolini's, that pandered to the hopeless and the lost. Dread, paranoia, and anger pervade these stories, and Blom does not shy away from criticizing those who made matters worse, such as George Bernard Shaw, who proclaimed "there is no famine in the Ukraine" after a Soviet-chaperoned visit in the middle of the nightmarish Holodomor. Writing about postwar Vienna, Blom notes that "nobody felt at home," but he could be writing about almost anyone in that era, and this well-written account brings a refreshing clarity to such uncertain times. Illus. Agent: George Lucas, Inkwell Management. (Apr.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
Blom (A Wicked Company: The Forgotten Radicalism of the European Enlightenment, 2010, etc.) undertakes a massive work explaining the changes that took place in the years between the world wars.The author explains how World War I didn't really end; it was halted by mutual exhaustion, with one side economically weaker, only to be picked up again 30 years later. Blom extends his work regarding the prewar years as he chronicles the world's disastrous move toward modernity. In the years 1914 to 1918, machines began to truly overpower humans, killing first the elite and then the workingmen, leaving a generation changed forever. Some readers may find it difficult to follow the myriad threads the author strings together, but most will admire his ability to compare and contrast such events as the industrial revolution in Russia and the 1929 stock market crash. The 1920s saw the rise of the automotive industry, the consumer economy and even advertising. It was a time when the new fashions of Coco Chanel reflected the physical and sexual freedoms of the flappers, but it was not to last. The lower classes no longer demeaned themselves serving the rich; they looked for less-restrictive, better-paying jobs in the new technologies. The market crash collapsed what little economic recovery had occurred, and Prohibition and immigration laws illuminated the American culture wars. Modernity continued to upset social structures, moral norms and long-held traditions. Optimism was replaced by pessimism; art and science polarized communities; and cultural propaganda and oppression were rampant. The inexorable rise of Nazism and Fascism offered a Messianic sense of something greater than the individual. A book to be absorbed, marveled at and admired for the wide range of research linking events and thoughts. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Choice Review
Blom has written a provocative, sweeping social and cultural survey that is certain to become a standard reference and teaching resource. Many authors have examined this period, but Blom delivers fresh insights and shows how seemingly unimportant or insignificant events and developments dramatically influenced the events, culture, and social and intellectual perceptions of the 20th century. Building upon his earlier The Vertigo Years (CH, Nov'09, 47-1644), a somewhat controversial survey of the period from 1900 through 1914, Blom takes readers from the immediate aftermath of WW I through the cataclysmic events of the 1930s, handily organizing his book into the postwar years (1919-1928) and the prewar years (1929-1938). He devotes a chapter to each year, built around a seminal event, an individual, or a development. Along the way, he offers trenchant observations on politics, cultural mores, science, technology, military and security developments, economics, and social patterns. Blom's focus is upon Europe. Consequently, its imperial and global relations, particularly the continent's connections to the Americas, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, receive relatively little attention. Elegantly written and argued, this is an important book, deserving a wide readership. Summing Up: Essential. All levels/libraries. --Richard Paul Hallion, Hallion Associates
Library Journal Review
Many scholars view World Wars I and II as one conflict with a peaceful interlude. In his follow-up to The Vertigo Years: Change and Culture in the West 1900-1914, Blom argues that the 21 years separating the conflicts are more properly viewed as a continuation of the same war "by other means." By this, Blom intends that the early 20th century is a story of a great cultural clash between conservatism and modernism. The two world wars were brutal manifestations of that discord and the period in the middle was filled with relatively calm displays of that same conflict. Even so, these social tensions frequently exploded into violence across Europe and the United States during this time. Blom investigates some of the highlights of the era, such as the Russian Civil War, the rise of fascism, and the Great Depression, but he mostly looks at often neglected aspects of the age, such as the popularization of jazz, the Scopes Monkey Trial, and Europe's experimental artistic movements. VERDICT This historical account will be enjoyed by anyone with an interest in cultural analysis.-Michael Farrell, Reformed Theological Seminary, Orlando, FL (c) Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
