To Conquer Hell: A Conversation (Intro)

This week I emailed Edward G. Lengel, author of To Conquer Hell: The Meuse-Argonne, 1918, and asked him if he’d be willing to engage with me in a conversation about the book. (Lengel will be appearing at the Virginia Festival of the Book this month in a panel titled “Finding the Story in History.”) In particular, I want to chat about his approach to story and to the vivid characters involved in this, the bloodiest battle in American history—characters like John Pershing, Billy Mitchell, George Marshall, George Patton, Harry Truman, Alvin York, and on and on. I also hope to get at some of the reasons behind the Meuse-Argonne’s virtual erasure from American popular memory (honestly, do you know anything about the battle? I didn’t) and whether that affected the book’s writing.

Thankfully, Dr. Lengel, who is a history professor at the University of Virginia, is game.

“I would be very happy to have an email discussion with you about the book,” he wrote me. “Yes, I anticipated and have met problems in overcoming the ‘long silence’ on World War I. Yet I suppose what has surprised me the most has not been simply the forgetfulness, but the actual resistance to discussing this war—a resistance that continues to this day. As I have heard from many quarters, Americans simply find this war too ugly to think about—and (forgive my cynicism) there is a sense that WWI has a low entertainment value. That says a lot about us as a people.

“So let the questions fly, and I’ll answer them as best I can.”

This is one in an occasional series about the Virginia Festival of the Book, to be held in Charlottesville, Virginia, on March 26–30, 2008, and sponsored by my employer, the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities.

Comments

[Elizabeth McCullough]

Sounds like it will be a great discussion. I have been curious about the "long silence" about WWI, particularly as it would seem to be a war with many lessons for the present day.

As a non-historian I figured the silence stemmed from the unpopularity of the war in the US at the time, and from the fact that there isn't any exciting television/film footage of WWI like there is from WWII and later.

I had not realized there was active resistance even among the "quarters" Dr. Lengel moves in. I look forward to reading more.

[Brendan Wolfe]

That idea of active resistance piqued my interest as well, Elizabeth. Opposition to the war may be one explanation, although it hasn't exactly curbed people's interest in Vietnam. Lack of film may be another, although you'd be surprised at how much is actually out there.

So I'll press Dr. Lengel on the matter and we'll see what he says. Thanks for reading!