Books that changed soldiers’ lives

I have often read stories about a book or books that changed someone’s life. I have seen articles that ask you to think about books that have changed your life. I have read many books that I liked a lot and some that I loved, and I recommend these to other people. But I never really thought of books as life-changing.

There is one book, however, that did affect how I think about books and their potential to change someone’s life. That book is “When Books Went to War” by Molly Guptill Manning. It tells the true story of a program that brought thousands of books to soldiers in World War II and how, in many cases, these books changed their lives. When I read it for the first time after it came out in 2014, I was really touched by it and I recommended it to my book clubs and to many of my customers, but I did not think of it as life-changing.

Over the years, as I continued to talk about this book and recommend it to others, I was called to read it again. When I read it a second time, it added an even deeper level of appreciation I have for the power of the written word. Of all the books I have reviewed for CityView, this is the one book that deserves a column all to itself.

In the early 1930s, Adolf Hitler and the Nazis were on the rise in Germany. Books that were seen as subversive were targeted for burning in a widespread campaign in 1933. On this side of the Atlantic, librarians and other Americans were outraged at the idea of book banning and burning. When America joined the war in 1941, they decided to make sure our soldiers fighting overseas had books to read and they joined together to collect books to send to the troops.

The Victory Book Campaign (VBC) had a goal of 10 million books and the books started pouring in. The goal was reached in 1942, but it became apparent that the donated books were not always the best — hardback books were too bulky for the troops to carry, and some were not what they wanted to read — like cookbooks! By 1943, the number of donations dwindled, and something needed to be done.

President Franklin Roosevelt and his administration realized that books could be ideological weapons. While Hitler wanted to destroy books because they were dangerous to his mission, we knew that books could bring comfort, knowledge, and escape to soldiers during World War II. They were a way to boost morale, provide intellectual stimulation, and keep the soldiers connected to the world they were fighting to protect. Roosevelt’s administration hatched a plan to ask American publishers to print specifically designed paperback books for the troops that would fit in their pockets.

The Council of Books in Wartime began working to meet this need. Over 1,300 titles of the Armed Services Editions (ASEs) were printed starting in 1943 and 122 million copies were distributed to our troops. A wide range of titles were published including classics, modern novels, mysteries, biographies, Westerns, and poetry.

In “When Books Went to War,” Manning describes many examples of the profound impact of these books. My favorite is the story of a 20-year-old Marine who is in the hospital after contracting malaria during the war. He is writing to Betty Smith, author of “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.” He tells her that he had been in combat the last two years, and it was hell. He is now reading her book for the third time, and it is helping him realize he can live again. In writing to her, it brings him inordinate comfort to bare his soul this way.

There are numerous books that went to war that found an audience and became more popular as a result. “The Great Gatsby” was not particularly well-received when it was first published, but when thousands of soldiers discovered it through the Armed Services Edition, it became a literary classic. Many other titles that were published as ASEs (they are all listed in the back of Manning’s book) are the classics we still read today.

The legacy of the ASEs continued after the war. Many soldiers developed a love of reading and continued this love after the war, and, thanks to the GI Bill, went off to college with a desire and passion for learning.

“Reading is an honor and a gift from a warrior or historian who, a decade or a thousand decades ago, set aside time towrite. He distilled a lifetime of campaigning in order to have a conversation with you. We have been fighting on thisplanet for 10,000 years. It would be idiotic and unethical to not take advantage of such accumulated experiences. …Any commander who claims he is ‘too busy to read’ is going to fill body bags with his troops as he learns the hardway.”

General Jim Mattis

I have always told people about books that I love, books that I think they might like to read, and now I can tell them about a book that in some ways did change my life. I loved “When Books Went to War” so much that I searched and found some Armed Service Edition copies. I was able to obtain five original, well-used copies that I have cherished and shown to people when I tell them about Manning’s book.

In my bookstore recently, I became so overwhelmed in telling the story of the ASE books to a soldier that I just gave him one. But you know, I still have four that I can show to others as I tell them about the book that truly changed my life.

Read CityView Magazine’s “The Military Issue” July e-edition here.