History of an Autumn

by Christopher Morley

Genres: Nonfiction, World War II

81 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1938

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

American writer Christopher Darlington Morley founded the Saturday Review, from 1924 to 1940 edited it, and prolifically, most notably authored popular novels.

Christopher Morley, a journalist, essayist, and poet, also produced on stage for a few years and gave college lectures.

Reviews

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this slim book hoping it would be a novella, but it turned out to be essays composed in reaction to Chamberlain's averting of war in September of 1938. This makes the book sound like nonfiction, but the essays are meditative and rambling, and as much about the author's moods, his reading, and the weather, as any historical event. Chamberlain's meeting with Hitler is more of a starting point than the actual topic, although perhaps in an oblique way we might understand the times a little better from reading this Anglophile American's intellectual stream of consciousness. Topics touched lightly upon include: John Donne, Walt Whitman, the New England Hurricane of Sept. 21st of that year, the Dionne Quintuplets, a trip in a passenger plane to Chicago, The War of the Worlds Broadcast, Enid Bagnold (Morley had recently read The Squire), and Dorothy Sayers -- among many others.

It's a curious thing -- this book was out of date less than a year after it had been published, and yet Morley as he was writing it knew quite well that the conflict was only averted temporarily -- and that this postponement may or may not have been a good thing. But since it was averted, he takes the extra time of peace as a chance to take some deep breaths, metaphorically speaking. The overall tone is wistful and a bit elegiac. I liked it far more than I expected to.

[Faith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in 1938, this is a short collection of essays dealing with the approach of the Second World War. In it, Morley details the average person who doesn't realize war is on the horizon. He also argues for the creation of a place where war can be fought on a daily basis for those so inclined so as to keep the rest of the world from it.
Morley is sometimes sarcastic in his descriptions of everyday life on the eve of war, which makes his thoughtful sentences all the more interesting.

"So, with their usual hankering for simplification, men tried to blame worldwide stupidities as the fault of one man."
"Having failed, perhaps, to say what we mean, we struggle loyally to mean what we said."

[Stacie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fascinating window into a single person’s life and perspective during the autumn of 1938, with war temporarily averted (and WWII on the horizon). I did not know what I was getting into when I began this book (chosen based on the title and because I have enjoyed the author’s writing in the past), but I enjoyed it more than I would’ve expected had I known what it was about. I did have to look up quite a few things that he referenced that were unknown to me, based on how he referenced them, but that added to the enjoyment! This is a short book worth reading and considering.

[Gary Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating little book about how it felt to live in the days just before World War Two—but without the "benefit"* of what the world later learned.

*(if that's what you call our knowledge of the subject)