Antony Beevor
Sir Antony James Beevor, (born 14 December 1946) is a British military historian. He has published several popular historical works on the Second World War and the Spanish Civil War.
Early life
Born in Kensington, Beevor was educated at two ...
of the
battle
A battle is an occurrence of combat in warfare between opposing military units of any number or size. A war usually consists of multiple battles. In general, a battle is a military engagement that is well defined in duration, area, and force ...
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 World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
, as well as the events leading up to it. It was first published by
Viking Press
Viking Press (formally Viking Penguin, also listed as Viking Books) is an American publishing company owned by Penguin Random House. It was founded in New York City on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim and then acquir ...
Wolfson History Prize
The Wolfson History Prizes are literary awards given annually in the United Kingdom to promote and encourage standards of excellence in the writing of history for the general public. Prizes are given annually for two or three exceptional works ...
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa (german: link=no, Unternehmen Barbarossa; ) was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and many of its Axis allies, starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during the Second World War. The operation, code-named afte ...
, the German invasion of the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
in June 1941 and the subsequent drive into the Soviet Union. Its main focus is the
Battle of Stalingrad
The Battle of Stalingrad (23 August 19422 February 1943) was a major battle on the Eastern Front of World War II where Nazi Germany and its allies unsuccessfully fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad (later re ...
, in particular the period from the initial German attack to
Operation Uranus
Operation Uranus (russian: Опера́ция «Ура́н», Operatsiya "Uran") was the codename of the Soviet Red Army's 19–23 November 1942 strategic operation on the Eastern Front of World War II which led to the encirclement of Axi ...
and the Soviet victory. It details the subsequent battles and war crimes committed by both sides. The book ends with the defeat and surrender of the Germans in February 1943 and the beginning of the Soviet advance on Germany. Beevor returned to the subject with his 2002 book '' Berlin: The Downfall 1945''.
Publication
''Stalingrad'' was published in the
Philippines
The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no),
* bik, Republika kan Filipinas
* ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas
* cbk, República de Filipinas
* hil, Republ ...
under the title of ''Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege 1942-43'', and has been translated into 18 languages. The English
paperback
A paperback (softcover, softback) book is one with a thick paper or paperboard cover, and often held together with glue rather than stitches or staples. In contrast, hardcover (hardback) books are bound with cardboard covered with cloth, le ...
version was published by
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.The Telegraph'', notes that ''Stalingrad'' transformed both Beevor's reputation and that of military history, making it from something only for "retired colonels and armchair fantasists" into a "sleek, attention-grabbing subject" always on the bestseller lists. Lowe argues that "What made 'Stalingrad''so refreshing was the way that he combined academic rigour with a storyteller’s sensibility. While he always kept a grip on the view of the battle from above, his true skill was in describing the way it looked from below, from the point of view of the ordinary soldiers", with pacing and sense of character providing almost the readability of a novel.
Richard Bernstein, in ''
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 ...
'', writes that "the colossal scale of Stalingrad, the megalomania, the utter absurdity, the sheer magnitude of the carnage in what many military historians see as the turning point in the war, are marvelously captured". He concludes that ''Stalingrad'' is "a fantastic and sobering story, and it has been fully and authoritatively told in Mr. Beevor's book."
Wolfson History Prize
The Wolfson History Prizes are literary awards given annually in the United Kingdom to promote and encourage standards of excellence in the writing of history for the general public. Prizes are given annually for two or three exceptional works ...
In 2018, a Russian translation of the book was banned by Ukrainian authorities, among other books. Beevor said he was "dumbfounded" at the decision to ban the import of 30,000 copies of the book. The ban was due to a law passed in 2016 which bans books imported from Russia if they included "anti-Ukrainian" content. The
Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group
The Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group (KhPG) is one of the oldest and most active Ukrainian human rights organizations. As a legal entity, it was established in 1992, but it has been working as a human rights protection group in the Ukraini ...
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a United States government funded organization that broadcasts and reports news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Caucasus, and the Middle East where it says tha ...
that several paragraphs prevented the import of the books, citing a passage that purportedly said: "Ukrainian nationalists were tasked with shooting the children" so that they could "spare the feelings of SS Sonderkommando". He claimed that Beevor used
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (russian: Наро́дный комиссариа́т вну́тренних дел, Naródnyy komissariát vnútrennikh del, ), abbreviated NKVD ( ), was the interior ministry of the Soviet Union.
...
reports as the source and that they were "not aware of such facts being revised at the
Nuremberg tribunal
The Nuremberg trials were held by the Allies against representatives of the defeated Nazi Germany, for plotting and carrying out invasions of other countries, and other crimes, in World War II.
Between 1939 and 1945, Nazi Germany invaded ...
", also accusing Beevor of falling for a "provocation". In response, Beevor called the statement by Oliyinyk untrue and stated that he used anti-Nazi German officer Helmuth Groscurth, who was a witness of the atrocity and reported it to another officer, as a source. Beevor also demanded an apology from Oliyinyk.
A Ukrainian translator said there were "significant differences" between the Russian translation and the original English version, with the English text referring to "two police battalions" that participated in the Babi Yar massacre, while the Russian translation refers to "two battalions of Ukrainian nationalists", and another instance regarding the
1941 Bila Tserkva massacre
The Bila Tserkva massacre was the World War II mass murder of Jews, committed by the Nazi German '' Einsatzgruppe'' with the aid of Ukrainian auxiliaries, in Bila Tserkva, Soviet Ukraine, on August 21–22, 1941. When the Jewish adult populat ...
where "Ukrainian militiamen" was translated to "Ukrainian nationalists".In the context of World War II, "Ukrainian nationalists" usually means participants and supporters of
Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists
The Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists ( uk, Організація українських націоналістів, Orhanizatsiya ukrayins'kykh natsionalistiv, abbreviated OUN) was a Ukrainian ultranationalist political organization est ...
(OUN) or
Ukrainian Insurgent Army
The Ukrainian Insurgent Army ( uk, Українська повстанська армія, УПА, translit=Ukrayins'ka povstans'ka armiia, abbreviated UPA) was a Ukrainian nationalist paramilitary and later partisan formation. During Worl ...
(UPA). Beevor called the first translation from 1999 "flawed" and said that, regarding the second translation from 2015, he would be "very surprised if anything had been slipped in there on the Russian side or anything had been distorted, because they are extremely responsible publishers."The book came out in Russian in two translations:
* Бивор, Энтони. ''Сталинград''. / �ер. с англ. А. Жеребилова [и др. — Смоленск: Русич, 1999. — 445 с. —
* Бивор, Энтони. ''Сталинград''. / [пер. с англ. С. Саксина] — Москва: КоЛибри; Москва: Азбука-Аттикус, 2015. — 605 с. —
Popular culture
In the first series of the British Channel 4, Ch-4 TV comedy Peep Show (British TV series), ''Peep Show'' (2003), character Mark Corrigan ( David Mitchell) owns a copy of ''Stalingrad''. In an attempt to impress Toni, a neighbour he is trying to romance, he quotes facts he has learnt from Beevor's book. However, Mark is seen reading it throughout all nine seasons, implying that he has not actually finished the book in the 12 years that pass in the show.