The War Speeches: a full set of seven Canadian first editions: Blood Sweat and Tears, The Unrelenting Struggle, The End of the Beginning, Onwards to Victory, The Dawn of Liberation, Victory, Secret Session Speeches.
Toronto: McClelland & Stewart Limited, 1941. First Canadian editions. Hardcover. This is a full set of jacketed Canadian first editions of British Prime Minister Winston S. Churchill’s war speeches. Between 1941 and 1946, Churchill's war speeches were published in seven individual volumes in British, U.S., and Canadian editions. The Canadian editions were published by McClelland and Stewart, Toronto. The size and appearance of these Canadian editions closely echoes their U.S. counterparts, though the dust jacket for the seventh and final volume is entirely different and all seven Canadian jackets specify the Canadian publisher at the spine heel. None of the Canadian first editions was reprinted and they are far more scarce than British or U.S. first editions, particularly in first printing dust jackets.
This set contains all very good plus or better volumes in very good or better dust jackets. All seven volumes have clean, bright, and tight contents with no internal spotting and no inscriptions. The only trace of spotting is confined to the fore edge of The End of the Beginning. Chipping to the dust jackets is minor, with the worst at the head of the spine of The Dawn of Liberation to a maximum depth of .375 inches. Blood Sweat and Tears has some chipping and tape reinforcement, but compensates with an unusually clean and totally unfaded spine. Note that Blood Sweat and Tears is the correct first edition, not the more common second Canadian edition.
During his long public life, Winston Churchill played many roles worthy of note - Member of Parliament for more than half a century, soldier and war correspondent, author of scores of books, ardent social reformer, combative cold warrior, Nobel Prize winner, painter. But Churchill's preeminence as a historical figure owes most to his indispensable leadership during the Second World War, when his soaring and defiant oratory sustained his countrymen and inspired the free world. Of Churchill, Edward R. Murrow said: "He mobilized the English language and sent it into battle." When Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953, it was partly “…for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values.”
Churchill's successor as Prime Minister and political opponent, Labor Party leader Clement Attlee, gave one of the most eloquent tributes to Churchill’s wartime oratory. On 16 August 1945, less than a month after his party defeated Churchill’s and Attlee took Churchill’s job at 10 Downing Street, Attlee praised Churchill in the House of Commons. "In the darkest and most dangerous hour of our history, this nation found... the man who expressed supremely the courage and determination never to yield which animated all the men and women of this country. In undying phrases he crystallized the unspoken feeling of all. ‘Words only,’ it might be said, but words at great moments of history are deeds."
Reference: Cohen A142.2, A172.3, A183.3, A194.3, A214.3, A223.3, A227.3; Woods/ICS A66(c.1), A89(c), A94(c), A101(c), A107(c), A112(c), A114(c); Langworth pages 206, 215, 220, 225, 230, 235, 251. Item #008105
Price: $1,050.00