One of my prized possessions is my 6 volume set of Winston Churchill's History of World War II. As a small child I would admire and read a set owned by my uncle.When I was in high school I bought a paperback edition and wrote my senior high paper on my favorite volume , "The Gathering Storm." As an adult I purchased the hardback edition and it sits on a shelf in our dinning room. Churchill wrote the history, out of office, after the war when the British people defeated him in the first post war election .The history became a best seller and for it he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953.Whenever I cannot find anything else to read I reread the history. It never grows old.
Tonight I watched the DVD documentary, "The History Channel Presents: Winston Churchill," and learned that he once told one of his researchers while working on the history:
Five wasted years, we have just been playing with the shadows of the past. What a waste! I could have done so much if I had been in office.
Even Churchill could , on occasion, be wrong.
UPDATE:
Just a reading of the titles of each of the 6 volumes stirs the imagination and brings those days to life.
First edition (hardcover) in six volumes
1.The Gathering Storm (1948)
2.Their Finest Hour (1949)
3.The Grand Alliance (1950)
4.The Hinge of Fate (1950)
5.Closing the Ring (1951)
6.Triumph and Tragedy (1953)
