Book Review: Eclipse
| Author | F. H. Soward |
| Date | 01 October 1946 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070204600100421 |
| Published date | 01 October 1946 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
Book
Reviews
Government,
to
put
the
worst
on
the
motives
of
the
British. In the
rather
undignified
scramble
between
Britain
and
America
in
1944
to
obtain
landing
rights
in
Spain
for
commercial
airlines, the
Americans
appear,
however,
to
have gained
the advantage.
Professor
Hayes
gives
no
indica-
tion
of
being
disturbed by the
repressive
character
of
the
Franco
rigime
which
the
"unreconstructed
Tory,"
Lord
Templewood,
has
publicly
con-
demned.
A
Catholic,
and
suspicious
of
the
materialistic
motives
of
those
who
do
not
see
eye
to eye
with
him, Professor
Hayes
is
critical
of
"ill-
informed,
selfishly
interested,
and
propagandist-directed" hostility
in
Britain
and America
to
General Franco's
regime.
He
is
opposed
to
economic
boycotts
and
"diplomatic
rupture"
as
a
means
of
hastening
Franco's
departure,
although
he
implies
that
these
would prove
effective;
he
fears
a
restoration
of
the
Republic would
lead
to
a
"dictatorship
of
the
proletariat."
He
advocates
instead
that
.the
United
States
should
con-
centrate
on
developing
Spain
as
a
market
for
its
goods.
London,
May
1946.
H.
F.
Grant
ECLIPSE.
By
Alan
Moorehead.
1945.
(London:
Hamish
Ham-
ilton.
Toronto:
Musson.
255
pp.
$4.00)
For
his
previous
books
on
the North African
campaigns
Alan
Moore-
head
was
enthusiastically
acclaimed
by
British
critics
as
one
of
the very
best
of
war
correspondents. ECLIPSE,
a
title
derived
from
the
code
name
given by
the
Allies
to
the
occupation
of
Germany,
will
add
to
the
author's
reputation,
although
less
emphasis
than
in
the
past
is
given
to
the
battle
narratives
in
which
the
author
excelled,
and
considerable
space
is
devoted
to
analyses
of
the
moods
of
the
European
peoples
he encountered.
Having
dismissed his
book
as
a
war
book,
a
history,
a
social
treatise,
or
a
novel,
Mr.
Moorehead
finally
describes
it
in
desperation
as
"a
com-
mentary,
possibly."
The
commentary
opens
with
the
author
and
two
of
his
colleagues
walking
up
the
road
to
Taormina
in
Eastern
Sicily
about the
middle
of
August,
1943.
It
ends
with
the
same
three
entering
Oslo
ahead
of
the
formal
mission
in
May,
1945,
to
the
exultant
"Hi-yah, Hi-yah,
Hi-yah"
of
the
Norwegians.
In
between
are
vignettes
of
Montgomery
delivering
pep
talks
to
his
troops
before
D-Day,
of
De
Gaulle
striding
towards
Notre
Dame
Cathedral
ignoring
the
snipers,
of
the
hated
Milice
making
"a
last
defiant
gesture
against
society,
the
instinct
of
the
gangster
at
bay,"
of
the
dreadful
slaughter
of
the
best
of
von
Kluge's
army
at
St.
Lambert,
and
the
horrible
conditions
at
Belsen
in
the
early
days
of
liberation.
Although
Moorehead
is
generally
favourable
to
Allied
strategy
and
to
its
tactical
execution
he
does
not
hesitate
to
indicate
dissent
or
disapproval when the
occasion
in
his
opinion
justified
it.
Thus
he
is
frankly
dubious
of
the value
of
prolonged Allied
offensive
in
Italy
and
thinks
that
the
Allies
"went
into
Europe
on
a
plan
that
was
distinctly
conservative and
lacking
in
imagination."'
He
reminds
us
that
for
months
after
the
Allied
landings with
the
merest fraction
of
the
equip-
385
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