''"The Good War": An Oral History of World War II'' (1984) is an

oral history Oral history is the collection and study of historical information about individuals, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews. These interviews are conducted with people wh ...

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

compiled by Studs Terkel. The work received the 1985

Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction The Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction is one of the seven American Pulitzer Prizes that are awarded annually for the "Letters, Drama, and Music" category. The award is given to a nonfiction book written by an American author and published duri ...

. ''"The Good War"'' consists of a series of interviews with various men and women from across the globe who directly experienced the events leading up to, including, and following the Second World War.

Chapters

The book's chapters and subchapters, with the names and topics of the subjects involved, are as follows:

Book One

*"Sunday Morning"—John Garcia, Ron Veenker, Dennis Keegan, Peter Ota, Mayor Tom Bradley, Yuriko Hohri, Frank Keegan *"A Chance Encounter"—Robert Rasmus, Richard M. (Red) Prendergast *"Tales of the Pacific" -- E. B. (Sledgehammer) Sledge, Maurice E. (Jack) Wilson, Robert Lekachman, Peter Bezich, Anton Bilek *"The Good ''Reuben James''"—Bill Bailey, David Milton *"Rosie"—Peggy Terry,

Pauline Kael Pauline Kael (; June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) was an American film critic who wrote for ''The New Yorker'' magazine from 1968 to 1991. Known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated and sharply focused" reviews, Kael's opinions oft ...

, Sarah Killingsworth, Evelyn Fraser, Dellie Hahne, Betty Basye Hutchinson *"Neighborhood Boys" -- Mike Royko, Mayor Tom Bradley, Paul Pisicano, Mickey Ruiz, Jack Short, Dempsey Travis, Don McFadden, Win Stracke, Johnny DeGrazio *"Reflections on Machismo"—John H. Abbott, Roger Tuttrup, Ted Allenby

Book Two

*"High Rank" -- Admiral Gene LaRocque, General William Buster *"The Bombers and The Bombed" --

John Ciardi John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second ...

, Akira Miuri,

John Kenneth Galbraith John Kenneth Galbraith (October 15, 1908 – April 29, 2006), also known as Ken Galbraith, was a Canadian-American economist, diplomat, public official, and intellectual. His books on economic topics were bestsellers from the 1950s through t ...

, Eddie Costello and Ursula Bender, Jean Wood *"Growing Up: Here and There"—John Baker, Sheril Cunning, Yasuko Kurachi Dower, Galatea Berger, Werner Burkhardt, Jean Bartlett, Oleg Tsakumov,

Marcel Ophuls Marcel Ophuls (; born 1 November 1927) is a German-French documentary film maker and former actor, best known for his films ''The Sorrow and the Pity'' and '' Hôtel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie''. Life and career Ophuls was bor ...

*"D-Day and All That"—Elliott Johnson, Joe Hanley, Charles A. Gates, Timuel Black, Rosemary Hanley, Dr. Alex Shulman, Frieda Wolf *"Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" --

Maxene Andrews The Andrews Sisters were an American close harmony singing group of the swing and boogie-woogie eras. The group consisted of three sisters: contralto LaVerne Sophia Andrews (July 6, 1911 – May 8, 1967), soprano Maxene Anglyn Andrews (January 3 ...

Book Three

*"Sudden Money"—Ray Wax, George C. Page, Lee Oremont, A Quiet Little Boom Town *"The Big Panjandrum"—Thomas G. (Tommy the Cork) Corcoran, James Rowe,

Hamilton Fish Hamilton Fish (August 3, 1808September 7, 1893) was an American politician who served as the 16th Governor of New York from 1849 to 1850, a United States Senator from New York from 1851 to 1857 and the 26th United States Secretary of State ...

Virginia Durr Virginia Foster Durr (August 6, 1903 – February 24, 1999) was an American civil rights activist and lobbyist. She was born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1903 to Dr. Sterling Foster, an Alabama Presbyterian minister, and Ann Patterson Foster. At 2 ...

, Joe Marcus, Joseph L. Rauh Jr., W. Averell Harriman, Earl B. Dickerson *"Flying High" -- Lowell Steward *"Up Front with Pen, Camera, and Mike" -- John Houseman,

Herman Kogan Herman Kogan (November 6, 1914 – March 8, 1989) was an American journalist who spent fifty years covering the city of Chicago, many with the ''Chicago Daily News'' and ''Chicago Sun-Times''. Kogan, a 1936 graduate of the University of Chicago ...

, Henry Hatfield, Alfred Duckett,

Milton Caniff Milton Arthur Paul Caniff (; February 28, 1907 – April 3, 1988) was an American cartoonist famous for the ''Terry and the Pirates'' and ''Steve Canyon'' comic strips. Biography Caniff was born in Hillsboro, Ohio. He was an Eagle Scout and a r ...

Garson Kanin Garson Kanin (November 24, 1912 – March 13, 1999) was an American writer and director of plays and films. Early life Garson Kanin was born in Rochester, New York; his family later relocated to Detroit then to New York City. He attended ...

, Bill Mauldin,

Richard Leacock Richard Leacock (18 July 192123 March 2011)
The Telegraph (Lon ...

Walter Rosenblum Walter A. Rosenblum (1919–2006) was an American photographer. He photographed the World War II D-Day landing at Normandy in 1944. He was the first Allied photographer to enter the liberated Dachau concentration camp. He received several militar ...

Book Four

*"Crime and Punishment"—Alvin (Tommy) Bridges, Joseph Small, Hans Gobler and James Sanders, Charlie Miller, Jacques Raboud, Walter and Olga Nowak, Erich Luth, Vitaly Korotich, Joseph Levine *"A Turning Point"—Joseph Polowsky, Galina Alexeyeva, Mikhail Nikolaevich Alexeyev, Viktor Andreyevich Kondratenko, Grigori Baklanov *"Chilly Winds" --

Telford Taylor Telford Taylor (February 24, 1908 – May 23, 1998) was an American lawyer and professor. Taylor was known for his role as lead counsel in the prosecution of war criminals after World War II, his opposition to McCarthyism in the 1950s, and his o ...

, Eileen Barth, Arno Mayer, Anthony Scariano, Erhard Dabringhaus, Irving Goff, Milton Wolff,

Hans Massaquoi Hans-Jürgen Massaquoi (January 19, 1926 – January 19, 2013) was a German-American journalist and author. He was born in Hamburg, Germany, to a German mother and a Liberian father of Vai ethnicity, the grandson of Momulu Massaquoi, the c ...

*"Is You Is or Is You Ain't My Baby?"—Philip Morrison, John H. Grove, Marnie Seymour, Bill Barney, Father George Zabelka, Hajimi Kito and Hideko Tamura (Tammy) Friedman, Victor Tolley, John Smitherman, Joseph Stasiak *"Remembrance of Things Past"—Nancy Arnot Harjan, Paul Edwards

Epilogue: Boom Babies and Other New People

*Nora Watson, Joachim Adler and Marlene Schmidt, Steve McConnell, Debbie Cooney, George Seymour, Street-Corner Kids

Critical reception

''The Good War'' met with positive reviews upon its publication in the fall of 1984. Loudon Wainwright, writing for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', stated in a review published on October 7, 1984, "Ten, 20, 30 years from now the best witnesses to World War II will be largely gone. But Presidents honoring them will surely have access to a copy of Studs Terkel's most recent exercise in memory harvesting, ''The Good War.'' It is hard to see how any reader now or then can fail to benefit from its 600 pages."

Gaddis Smith George Gaddis Smith (December 9, 1932 – December 2, 2022) was an American historian who was the Larned Professor Emeritus of History at Yale University and an expert on U.S. foreign relations and maritime history. Biography Born in Newark, New J ...

, in a capsule review in the journal '' Foreign Affairs'', claimed, "This book sustains Studs Terkel's reputation as the nation's foremost practitioner of the difficult (although seemingly simple) art of oral history." Kirkus Reviews assessment of the book, dated October 11, 1984, included the following: "In World War II memories, Terkel has found a great, untold story--with fore-shadowings of Vietnam and aftershocks of atomic warfare." In 1985, ''The Good War: An Oral History of World War Two'' won the

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...

for General Non-Fiction.

Subsequent influence

Max Brooks Maximillian Michael Brooks (born May 22, 1972) is an American actor and author. He is the son of comedy filmmaker Mel Brooks and actress Anne Bancroft. Much of Brooks's writing focuses on zombie stories. He is a senior fellow at the Modern War ...

has said that ''The Good War'' inspired him to write his novel ''

World War Z ''World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War'' is a 2006 zombie apocalyptic horror novel written by American author Max Brooks. The novel is broken into eight chapters: “Warnings”, “Blame”, “The Great Panic”, “Turning the Ti ...

''. Brooks stated: "It's an oral history of World War II I read when I was a teenager, and it's sat with me ever since. When I sat down to write ''World War Z'', I wanted it to be in the vein of an oral history."

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Good War, The Oral history books World War II memoirs History books about World War II Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction-winning works 1984 non-fiction books Pantheon Books books