Diarist Phyllis Warner found that she and fellow Londoners were surprised by their own resilience. “Finding we can take it is a great relief to most of us,” she wrote on September 22. “I think that each one of us was secretly afraid that he wouldn’t be able to, that he would rush shrieking to shelter, that his nerve would give, that he would in some way collapse, so that this has been a pleasant surprise.”

Author Erik Larson has found himself a useful and profitable niche, writing about famous characters and events in historical accounts that combine the actions of famous persons with the lives of ordinary people, to give us a many-faceted picture. The Splendid and the Vile is his account of London during the Blitz; mostly set in the crucial year of 1940. The spotlight is, naturally, on Winston Churchill and his closest circle – his cabinet ministers and department heads, and his family. But we also get to see events through the eyes of ordinary citizens. And from time to time he looks across the channel to see how Hitler and his henchmen – who couldn’t understand why Churchill repeatedly snubbed their “friendly” peace offers — reacted and responded.

And meanwhile, the ordinary public suffered, died, and (most of them) survived.

It was a harrowing time, and this is a harrowing book. But also fascinating, informative, and sometimes even darkly comic. Historical figures come alive through their own words. The great drama and surprise in the book is something neither Hitler, nor even Churchill, really foresaw – the amazing courage of the English people; what they were willing to endure to defend their civilization.

What troubled me most as I read was something not in the book – the knowledge that this epic crusade for western civilization would end in the abandonment of eastern Europe to Stalin. Plus the knowledge that the children and grandchildren of these brave people would happily accede to the demolition of that civilization in our time.

Still and all, The Splendid and the Vile is an excellent look at a pivotal point in history. Highly recommended.