Book review: The Roses of No Man's Land by Lyn MacDonald
From when I was a child, I've always read a lot of books about WWII. It's not since the last few years however, due to (among others) tv-shows like Downton Abbey and movies like War Horse, I've become interested to know more and read more about WWI. The Roses of No Man's Land was recommended to me by persiflage_1 and I'm very grateful to her for this recommendation. It was a well-written, touching and very informative book and a good starting point for my WWI reading.
The Roses of No Man's Land is a chronicle of and a tribute to the nurses of WWI. Many of these volunteers came straight from middle- and upper class drawing rooms, where they had formerly filled their days with visits, music and getting changed. Yet in the face of the horrible circumstances behind the frontlines of WWI they showed endurance and supreme courage and brightened the day of many wounded soldier. They fought their own war, against death, disease and scanty supplies and in this way achieved a quiet but permanent revolution, by proving they were capable of anything. In this book they get the chance to tell their own story.
Lyn MacDonald, a well-known British military historian who has written more books about WWI, wrote this book in 1980, when many of the nurses, doctors and their patients were still alive. This book is therefore a first hand account and large parts of the text are taken directly from interviews, letters and diaries, interspersed with clarifying texts written by MacDonald herself. This makes the book easy to read and gives you the feeling you're getting very close to the subject.
The book is chronological and divided in four large parts (1914-1915, 1916, 1917 and 1918), but within these parts, chapters are devoted to defined subjects such as the development of plastic surgery, the discovery of safe blood transfusions, the different types of nurses etc. Chapters are of course also devoted to all the major battles of WWI, giving a very broad overview of the medical teams during the whole war. Though mainly focusing on the Western Front of the war, there are also some chapters about the battles in the Mediterranean and North-African region and the specific challenges this caused for the medical teams.
Despite the easily readable style of the book, the subject matter is harrowing and MacDonald does not abstain from very unpleasant details. If you're skittish when it comes to wounds and disease, this book might not be for you. The general tone of the book is however hopeful, showcasing bravery and development more than despair and awfulness. Whether this was directed by MacDonald or not, the interviews and letters from the WWI nurses and doctors speak by and large without bitterness, though honestly, about their experiences.
I was deeply impressed by the stories in this book. It is almost unbelievable now in 2012, how little medical expertise, equipment and medicines were available during the WWI era and yet how many the medical teams achieved with this. I have learned from this book what great leaps were taken in development and research during this period and what medical specialties owe their existence to the Great War. This book has once more reaffirmed to me the historical importance (on many levels) of WWI and made me want to read and learn more about this period. But above all that, the book has left me in awe of the many young women who left their comfortable homes to become nurses in overcrowded tents in the muddy fields of Belgium and France. Who worked in unimaginable circumstances, worked till they fell over from exhaustion and gained the necessary knowledge in daily practice and did all this with amazing energy and persistence.