University of Chicago Press, 2021 eISBN: 978-0-226-75328-7 | Cloth: 978-0-226-75314-0 Library of Congress Classification D806.R55 2021 Dewey Decimal Classification 940.547520973
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
ABOUT THIS BOOK Marching across occupied France in 1944, American GI Leroy Stewart had neither death nor glory on his mind: he was worried about his underwear, which was engaged in a relentless crawl of its own. Similar complaints of physical discomfort pervade infantrymen’s memories of the European theater, whether the soldiers were British, American, German, or French. Wet, freezing misery with no end in sight—this was life for millions of enlisted men during World War II.
Sheer Misery trains a humane and unsparing eye on the corporeal experiences of the soldiers who fought in Belgium, France, and Italy during the last two years of the war. In the horrendously unhygienic and often lethal conditions of the front line, their bodies broke down, stubbornly declaring their needs for warmth, rest, and good nutrition. Feet became too swollen to march, fingers too frozen to pull triggers; stomachs cramped, and diarrhea stained underwear and pants. Turning away from the accounts of high-level military strategy that dominate many WWII chronicles, acclaimed historian Mary Louise Roberts instead relies on diaries and letters to bring to life visceral sense memories like the moans of the “screaming meemies,” the acrid smell of cordite, and the shockingly mundane sight of rotting corpses. As Roberts writes, “For soldiers who fought, the war was above all about their bodies.”
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY Mary Louise Roberts is the WARF Distinguished Lucie Aubrac Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She is also the Charles Boal Ewing Chair in Military History at the United States Military Academy at West Point for the 2020-21 academic year. Her most recent books are What Soldiers Do and D-Day through French Eyes:.
REVIEWS
“Sheer Misery is a sheer masterpiece in a genre pioneered by the likes of John Keegan and Paul Fussell. Like them, Roberts writes not about commanders and their strategies but about ordinary soldiers and their sufferings. With a rare blend of warm empathy and cool detachment, she portrays war-fighting not as a romantic tale of guts, glory, and fame, but a wretched trial of tedium, pain, and fear. Gritty, intimate, and compelling, this book makes a major contribution to our understanding of the true character of warfare.”
— David M. Kennedy, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945
“Thoroughly researched and skillfully written, Sheer Misery is an extraordinary examination of how American, British, and German soldiers endured the rigors of combat and battled the forces of nature in the campaigns for Italy, France, and the Low Countries. Roberts thoroughly details the essence of fighting in nasty and brutish conditions, the struggle infantrymen faced to stay alive, and the impact of war on their bodies.”
— Peter Mansoor, author of The GI Offensive in Europe: The Triumph of American Infantry Divisions, 1941-1945
“A tightly focused, graphic illustration of the many ways that war is hell. . . . Roberts, a professor of history at the University of Wisconsin, pulls together brutal accounts from soldiers who participated in the “three campaigns [that] left high-water marks for infantry misery: the 1943-44 winter campaign in the Italian mountains, the summer 1944 battles in Normandy, and the 1944-45 winter battles in northwest Europe.” As the author shows with vivid detail, their trials went far beyond exposure to enemy action. . . . Roberts uses her sources to powerful effect, and the illustrations and photos, while sometimes disturbing, add to the narrative impact.”
— Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"An exceptional account of the common soldier's experience during war. The acclaimed historian delves into diaries and letters of enlisted Allied soldiers in Europe, to train her humane and unsparing eye on their corporeal hardship and misery."
— The Bookseller
“This accessible account, based on a solid foundation of primary and secondary sources, offers a fascinating window into the world of combat soldiers, shorn of nostalgia. A welcome purchase for libraries, and a must for readers interested in firsthand perspectives of World War II.”
— Library Journal
"[An] aptly titled and keenly insightful study of the experience of combat in the Second World War. . . Roberts is an uncommonly perceptive historian of culture, identity, and historically contingent sensibilities. . . . Roberts writes with sensitivity and empathy about common soldiers, and has delved deeply enough into their personal accounts to recreate their mental worlds."
— H-War
"In this concise study, Roberts does much to illuminate the responses of soldiers to the conditions of war. . . . Highly recommended."
— Choice
"[Roberts] vividly evokes the horrendous sights of battle, its awful sounds, smells, and feel. . . Her perceptive and enlightening book will reward careful reading by both scholars and general readers interested in the world of combat troops in Europe during the Second World War."
— Michigan War Studies Review
“Sheer Misery offers a vivid, visceral, and often gruesome picture of battlefield Europe through soldiers’ own words. It stands apart from most books about battle in World War II in that it does not delve deeply into grand strategies or tactics or even follow a close chronological narrative of the campaign. Roberts instead creates 'a somatic history of war' to reveal how the soldier’s body itself became a site of conflict. . . . Sheer Misery offers a compelling new perspective on battle in World War II and certainly sets aside any sanitized image of the infantryman’s experiences fighting across Western Europe.”
— Canadian Journal of History
"Wonderfully rich. . . The reader is given a vivid sense of what it was like to endure a bombardment, see a dead body for the first time or suffer a wound and its subsequent treatment. By focusing on the everyday misery of the unwashed men on the ground, this study provides a timely reminder that, in the words of another US General, ‘war is hell’."
— History Today
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
1: The Senses
2: The Dirty Body
3: The Foot
4: The Wound
5: The Corpse
Acknowledgments
Notes Index
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
University of Chicago Press, 2021 eISBN: 978-0-226-75328-7 Cloth: 978-0-226-75314-0
Marching across occupied France in 1944, American GI Leroy Stewart had neither death nor glory on his mind: he was worried about his underwear, which was engaged in a relentless crawl of its own. Similar complaints of physical discomfort pervade infantrymen’s memories of the European theater, whether the soldiers were British, American, German, or French. Wet, freezing misery with no end in sight—this was life for millions of enlisted men during World War II.
Sheer Misery trains a humane and unsparing eye on the corporeal experiences of the soldiers who fought in Belgium, France, and Italy during the last two years of the war. In the horrendously unhygienic and often lethal conditions of the front line, their bodies broke down, stubbornly declaring their needs for warmth, rest, and good nutrition. Feet became too swollen to march, fingers too frozen to pull triggers; stomachs cramped, and diarrhea stained underwear and pants. Turning away from the accounts of high-level military strategy that dominate many WWII chronicles, acclaimed historian Mary Louise Roberts instead relies on diaries and letters to bring to life visceral sense memories like the moans of the “screaming meemies,” the acrid smell of cordite, and the shockingly mundane sight of rotting corpses. As Roberts writes, “For soldiers who fought, the war was above all about their bodies.”
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY Mary Louise Roberts is the WARF Distinguished Lucie Aubrac Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She is also the Charles Boal Ewing Chair in Military History at the United States Military Academy at West Point for the 2020-21 academic year. Her most recent books are What Soldiers Do and D-Day through French Eyes:.
REVIEWS
“Sheer Misery is a sheer masterpiece in a genre pioneered by the likes of John Keegan and Paul Fussell. Like them, Roberts writes not about commanders and their strategies but about ordinary soldiers and their sufferings. With a rare blend of warm empathy and cool detachment, she portrays war-fighting not as a romantic tale of guts, glory, and fame, but a wretched trial of tedium, pain, and fear. Gritty, intimate, and compelling, this book makes a major contribution to our understanding of the true character of warfare.”
— David M. Kennedy, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945
“Thoroughly researched and skillfully written, Sheer Misery is an extraordinary examination of how American, British, and German soldiers endured the rigors of combat and battled the forces of nature in the campaigns for Italy, France, and the Low Countries. Roberts thoroughly details the essence of fighting in nasty and brutish conditions, the struggle infantrymen faced to stay alive, and the impact of war on their bodies.”
— Peter Mansoor, author of The GI Offensive in Europe: The Triumph of American Infantry Divisions, 1941-1945
“A tightly focused, graphic illustration of the many ways that war is hell. . . . Roberts, a professor of history at the University of Wisconsin, pulls together brutal accounts from soldiers who participated in the “three campaigns [that] left high-water marks for infantry misery: the 1943-44 winter campaign in the Italian mountains, the summer 1944 battles in Normandy, and the 1944-45 winter battles in northwest Europe.” As the author shows with vivid detail, their trials went far beyond exposure to enemy action. . . . Roberts uses her sources to powerful effect, and the illustrations and photos, while sometimes disturbing, add to the narrative impact.”
— Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"An exceptional account of the common soldier's experience during war. The acclaimed historian delves into diaries and letters of enlisted Allied soldiers in Europe, to train her humane and unsparing eye on their corporeal hardship and misery."
— The Bookseller
“This accessible account, based on a solid foundation of primary and secondary sources, offers a fascinating window into the world of combat soldiers, shorn of nostalgia. A welcome purchase for libraries, and a must for readers interested in firsthand perspectives of World War II.”
— Library Journal
"[An] aptly titled and keenly insightful study of the experience of combat in the Second World War. . . Roberts is an uncommonly perceptive historian of culture, identity, and historically contingent sensibilities. . . . Roberts writes with sensitivity and empathy about common soldiers, and has delved deeply enough into their personal accounts to recreate their mental worlds."
— H-War
"In this concise study, Roberts does much to illuminate the responses of soldiers to the conditions of war. . . . Highly recommended."
— Choice
"[Roberts] vividly evokes the horrendous sights of battle, its awful sounds, smells, and feel. . . Her perceptive and enlightening book will reward careful reading by both scholars and general readers interested in the world of combat troops in Europe during the Second World War."
— Michigan War Studies Review
“Sheer Misery offers a vivid, visceral, and often gruesome picture of battlefield Europe through soldiers’ own words. It stands apart from most books about battle in World War II in that it does not delve deeply into grand strategies or tactics or even follow a close chronological narrative of the campaign. Roberts instead creates 'a somatic history of war' to reveal how the soldier’s body itself became a site of conflict. . . . Sheer Misery offers a compelling new perspective on battle in World War II and certainly sets aside any sanitized image of the infantryman’s experiences fighting across Western Europe.”
— Canadian Journal of History
"Wonderfully rich. . . The reader is given a vivid sense of what it was like to endure a bombardment, see a dead body for the first time or suffer a wound and its subsequent treatment. By focusing on the everyday misery of the unwashed men on the ground, this study provides a timely reminder that, in the words of another US General, ‘war is hell’."
— History Today
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
1: The Senses
2: The Dirty Body
3: The Foot
4: The Wound
5: The Corpse
Acknowledgments
Notes Index
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
It can take 2-3 weeks for requests to be filled.
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE