
William, An Englishman
'William, An Englishman ' Summary
It has been perceived as anti-war, Hamilton's novel is actually an ardent and patriotic defense of the British war effort, with its most devastating critiques being against the home pacifist movement. Ridiculing English pacifists as being “self-centered,” Hamilton accuses them of walking “the pathways of the paradise of fools,” and of being unwilling and unable to recognize the necessity of war when it came. William Tully, the hapless protagonist of the story, goes through three distinct phases in his attitude toward war: 1.) naïve pacifism before the War; 2.) martial patriotism after the Germans kill his new bride; 3.) weary disillusion with his unappreciated role in the war effort. Though Tully does end up embittered against war in general, Hamilton never swerves from her dominant thesis that this disillusionment does not contradict the absolute rightness of the Allied war effort, a rightness justified by the implacable, inhuman menace of the German Empire. Just when the reader expects the story to turn against war in general, Hamilton assures us that Tully has not “drifted” back toward his “former” pacifism: “He hated the war as it affected himself, was weary of the war in general; all he longed for was its ending, which meant his release from imprisonment; but neither hatred nor weariness had blinded his eyes to the folly of that other blindness which had denied that war could be.”
Book Details
Authors

Cicely Hamilton
England
Cicely Mary Hamilton was an English actress, writer, journalist, suffragist and feminist, part of the struggle for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom. She is now best known for the feminist play H...
Books by Cicely HamiltonDownload eBooks
Listen/Download Audiobook
- Select Speed
Related books

Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant by Ulysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant's "Personal Memoirs" is a firsthand account of his experiences during the American Civil War. It covers his rise from Union general t...

Little Wars by H. G. Wells
Little Wars is a set of rules for playing with toy soldiers, written by English novelist H. G. Wells . The book, which had a full title of Little Wars...

Two Sides of a Question by May Sinclair
Two Sides of a Question, a collection of novellas by May Sinclair, explores the complexities of women's lives and their quest for freedom in Victorian...

Is War Diminishing? by Frederick Adams Woods
It argues that despite the many technological advancements of the modern world, war is not diminishing, but is instead becoming more frequent and more...

Xenophon's Anabasis by Xenophon
Anabasis is the most famous work of the Ancient Greek professional soldier and writer Xenophon. It narrates the expedition of a large army of Greek me...

The Incubator Baby by Ellis Parker Butler
What if a baby was raised in a sterile, scientific environment, devoid of human interaction? Marjorie Fielding is born prematurely and placed in an i...

Bachelors' Club by Israel Zangwill
In late 19th-century London, 'The Bachelors' Club' provides a haven for a select group of unmarried men who view marriage as an undesirable burden, pa...

St. Clair's Defeat 1791 by Anonymous
St. Clair's defeat, also known as the Battle of the Wabash, the Battle of Wabash River or the Battle of a Thousand Slain, was a battle fought on 4 Nov...

Yanks - A.E.F. (American Expeditionary Forces) Verse from WWI by Various
'Yanks - A.E.F. (American Expeditionary Forces) Verse from WWI by Various' is a collection of poetry written by American soldiers during the final nin...

Six Bad Husbands and Six Unhappy Wives by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
This collection of six short stories explores the complex and often unhappy nature of marriage. Each story delves into the lives of a different couple...
Reviews for William, An Englishman
No reviews posted or approved, yet...