Books by Harry Silman
A Cool Head in Hell: The Wartime Diaries of a British Doctor from Dunkirk to the Burma Railway
by Harry Silman & Jacqueline Passman (editor)
A Cool Head in Hell is a deeply moving book, partly because it's so understated. It's the diaries of Harry Silman, a doctor who enlisted in the British Army when World War II broke out and became a prisoner of war when Singapore surrendered. He ended up first in a prison camp at Changi and then, later, on the notorious Burma Railway, suffering unimaginable hardship as men dropped dead of illness, exhaustion, and malnutrition and once strong young men became skeletal frames of flesh.
The book was edited by his daughter, Jacqueline Passman, who does an amazing job of putting together diaries, letters and photos and explaining the context. Harry comes off as not only an unsung hero but also a wonderful, jaunty character. As Jackie writes of when she first read the diaries, "It was a shock for my sister, brother and me to find out what our father had actually been through, as he had made light of his wartime experiences, joking about the hardships and privations as if they were mere inconveniences."
Interviews where books by Harry Silman were recommended
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1
A Cool Head in Hell: The Wartime Diaries of a British Doctor from Dunkirk to the Burma Railway
by Harry Silman & Jacqueline Passman (editor) -
2
King of Kings: The Fall of the Shah, the 1979 Iranian Revolution and the Unmaking of the Modern Middle East
by Scott Anderson -
3
The First King of England: Æthelstan and the Birth of a Kingdom
by David Woodman -
4
The Mission: The CIA in the 21st Century
by Tim Weiner -
5
The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of the Modern World
by Selena Wisnom -
6
The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb
by Garrett Graff
New History Books
New History Books
It’s a golden age for historical writing, as well-researched and sometimes quite specialist books by historians are written in an engaging style for a broad audience. History books out in recent months range from ancient Assyria to the CIA in the 21st century.
