Аннотация:This book explores the way in which the peoples of the United Kingdom – —England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland—went to war in 1914. It is the first fully documented study of UK public opinion at the time and successfully challenges the myth of British 'war enthusiasm'. It explores what people felt, and how they acted, in response to an unanticipated and unprecedented crisis. It is a history of both ordinary people and elite figures in extraordinary times. It demonstrates that describing the reactions of over 40 million British and Irish people to the outbreak of war in 1914 as either enthusiastic in the British case or disengaged in the Irish is over‐simplified and inadequate. A society as complex as the UK in the Edwardian era did not have a single, uniform reaction to such a major event as the outbreak of European war. Emotional reactions to the war were ambiguous and complex, and changed over time. By the end of 1914 the populations of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland had largely embraced the war. But the war had equally embraced them, and showed no signs of relinquishing its grip. In fact it would continue for another four years. However, the five months from August to December 1914 set the shape of much that was to follow. This book seeks to describe and explain that twenty‐week formative process.
