The Great War in Belgium and the Netherlands

This book addresses the many avenues that are still left unexplored when it comes to our understanding of the First World War in the Low Countries. With the ongoing the centenary of the Great War, many events have been organized in the United Kingdom to commemorate its military events, its socio-political consequences, and its cultural legacy. Of these events, very few have paid attention to the fates of Belgium or the Netherlands, even though it was the invasion of Belgium in August 1914 that was the catalyst for Great Britain declaring war. The occupation of Belgium had long-term consequences for its people, but much of the military and social history of the Western Front concentrates on northern France, and the Netherlands is largely forgotten as a nation affected by the First World War. By opening the field beyond the military and beyond the front, this collection explores the interdisciplinary and international nature of the Great War.

Auteur
Felicity Rash is Professorial Research Fellow in the School of Languages, Linguistics and Film at Queen Mary, University of London, UK.
Christophe Declercq is Senior Lecturer in Translation at the Centre for Translation Studies at University College London, UK, and Lecturer at University Leuven, Belgium.

Contenu
Chaper 1. When Neutrality cannot Protect against Belligerence: The Position of the Low Countries seen from Beyond Flanders Fields; Felicity Rash.Chapter 2. A Less-than-total Total War: Neutrality, Invasion, and the Stakes of War, 1914-1918; Sophie de Schaepdrijver.Chapter 3. The Flames of Louvain; John Williams.Chapter 4. Furies, Spies and Fallen Women: Gender in German Public Discourse about Belgium, 1914-1918; Sebastian Bischoff.Chapter 5.The Cultural Mobilization of Language and Race during the First World War: the Interaction between Dutch and Belgian Intellectuals in Response to the German Flamenpolitik; Tessa Lobbes.Chapter 6. Which Belgium after the War? German Academics dealing with the First World War and its Aftermath; Geneviève Warland.Chapter 7. Belgian Exile Press in Britain; Christophe Declercq.Chapter 8. Trapped in Occupied Brussels: Roberto J. Payró's war Experience, 1914-1915; Maria Inés Tato.Chapter 9. A Cambro-Belgian in the Great War: Frank Brangwyn as Artist and Activist; Hugh Dunthorne.Chapter 10. The Low Countries as Enemies, 1918-1920; Hubert van Tuyll.Chaper 11. Westfront Nieuwpoort: The (Collected) Memory of the Belgian Front; Karen Shelby.Index