Keep Smiling Through: The Home Front, 1939-45

by Susan Briggs, Vera Lynn (introduction)

The present book is designed primarily to cater to the requirements of B.Com. students of Madras University. The unique feature of the book is that the Provisions of the General Principles of Law of Contracts,Special Kinds of Contracts and Sales of Goods Act,1930 are presented in a lucid style. Relevant case are cited at the appropriate places. Key Clear presentation of concepts-lucid writing style Appropriate real life examples and case laws Relevant tabular presentation and illustrations Numerous end-of-chapter exercises including short answer, long answer, essay type,choose the correct answer,fill in the blanks,true or false etc. About the V Balachandran Professor of Corporate Secretaryship, Faculty of Management, Alagappa University, Karaikudi. S Thothadri Lecturer in Corporate Secretaryship,The New College Chennai Table of Chapter 1. Nature and Formation of Contract Chapter 2. Offer and Acceptance Chapter 3. Consideration Chapter 4. Capacity of Parties Chapter 5. Free Consent Chapter 6. Legality of Object and Consideration Chapter 7. Void Agreements Chapter 8. Contingent and Quasi-Contracts Chapter 9. Performance of Contracts Chapter 10. Modes of Discharge of Contracts Chapter 11. Remedies for Breach of Contracts Chapter 12. Indemnity and Guarantee Chapter 13. Bailment and Pledge Chapter 14. Law of Agency Chapter 15. Formation of Contracts under the sale of Goods Act, 1930 Chapter 16. Transfer of Property and Rights of an Unpaid Selle

Genres: History, World War II

256 pages, Hardcover

First published September 4, 1975

Reviews

[Athena]

As important as I think this book is, I'm not giving it a star rating since the rating for the text would radically differ from the rating for the illustrations; the text is annoyingly flawed and caption layout/content is confusingly inconsistent. That said, this is an important book for mid-20th century history, particularly World War II history. The book is copiously illustrated and was probably intended as a sort of coffee-table book. There is an introductory note by British singer Vera Lynn, and each chapter is titled with a line from a Lynn song from the era and begins with a brief essay on the chapter topic followed by pertinent illustrations.

The biggest problem with the text, written in the late 60's/early 70's, is that the author assumes a particular level of general knowledge on the part of the reader, knowledge that would perhaps have been common for an English adult of the 1960s but is certainly not common either now or in the US. Significant persons often just appear either in the text or captions with no background detail or information ever given about them. Lord Beaverbrook, Lord Woolton, even "Lord" Haw Haw (a German propagandist): these are no longer commonly known persons and no book should require one to have ready access to Google in order to understand it. Similarly there are many acronyms that are never defined: ARP (Air Raid Precautions), AFS (Auxiliary Fire Service) and so on. Many of the captions repeat text from the chapter essay and there is no common structure to the layout of the captions. Many illustrations have no caption at all and there is no index.

With all that, why bother with the book? Simply put, Briggs collected an impressive array of primary illustration source material, the best I've yet found on this period. There are many photos from newspapers and individuals, there are British government posters, cigarette cards, diary pages, advertisements, contemporary drawings by artists, cartoons of the day, German propaganda flyers, London Transit Authority newsletters, ration books, and more. This book is an absolute treasure trove of images relating to civilian life in WWII England.

Books on the English Home Front are few and very far between, particularly in North America, so even with its flaws I'm very glad to have seen a copy of Home Front and highly recommend it to anyone interested in the period.

Content Topics:

Introduction
Separation
The Phoney War
Britain Taking It
Restrictions
Travel
The Allies In Britain
Food and Drink
The War Effort
Leisure
Dreams of the Future
Victory