Winston Churchill, Myth and Reality - by Richard M Langworth (Paperback)

About the Book

"This book uncovers myths surrounding Winston Churchill to reveal what he really said and did about many issues. Churchill had two personas--one that thought deeply about the nature of humanity, and one that helped to solve seemingly intractable problems. In his many decades in public life, he made mistakes, but his faults were eclipsed by his virtues"--

Book Synopsis

Winston Churchill, indispensable when liberty was in peril, died in 1965. Yet he is still accused of numerous sins, from alcoholism and racism to misogyny and warmongering. On the Internet, he simmers in a stew of imagined misdeeds--using poison gas, firebombing Dresden, causing the Bengal famine, and so on.

Drawing on the author's fifty years of research and writing on Churchill, this book uncovers scores of myths surrounding him--the popular and the obscure--to reveal what he really said and did about many issues. Churchill had two personas--one that thought deeply about the nature of humanity, and one that helped solve seemingly intractable problems. In his many decades in public life, he made mistakes, but his faults were well eclipsed by his virtues.

Review Quotes

"With close attention to detail and context, Langworth effectively demolishes many core myths repeatedly used to launch personal and political assaults against Churchill...the great value of the book is that it invites readers to put Churchill's decisions and actions into the context that surrounded them. A required addition to any collection on Churchill...essential"- Choice; "this book will be consulted by every person eager to find the truth about one 'Great Man' of history"-The International Churchill Society; "absolutely remarkable...both the work of a lifetime and a labor of love...unreservedly recommended...should also be required reading in all Schools of Journalism"-Cercles; "Langworth has taken Churchill out of the clutches of both the worshipful and the iconoclasts, thus giving him over to the appreciative...those who can look at him, warts and all."-Warren Kimball, Churchill & Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence; "No one knows more about Winston Churchill than Langworth, his vicar on earth. This superb book lays bare the lies, but also reveals new truths about The Greatest Englishman."-Andrew Roberts, New-York Historical Society; "Langworth, a lifelong student of Churchill, strips away the falsehoods that belittle the personality, the career and the greatness of this giant historical figure."-Paul Addison, University of Edinburgh.

About the Author

Richard M. Langworth founded in 1968 the Churchill Study Unit and its journal, Finest Hour, which he edited for 35 years. Since 2014 he has been Senior Fellow for the Churchill Project at Hillsdale College in Michigan. He lives in Moultonborough, New Hampshire, and Eleuthera, Bahamas.