6 h. ago AP PHOTOS: 80 years after World War II, Germany is still searching for its fallen soldiers

In a forest near Berlin, the remains of 107 fallen Wehrmacht soldiers were ceremoniously interred last week. High school students placed white gerbera daisies on small black coffins, and then German soldiers lowered them respectfully into a large, freshly dug grave as a military band played a solemn tune.

Events

6 h. ago 80 years after World War II, Germany is still painstakingly searching for its fallen soldiers

A German organization is painstakingly searching for fallen German soldiers in order to identify them and rebury them, 80 years after World War II

Events

53 h. ago Survival and stoicism: stories of women born before the second world war

Christian Doyle’s series Quietly Getting On focuses on women in their late 80s and 90s, their memories of a wartime childhood and how they live nowAs a way of maintaining contact with my elderly neighbours during the Covid restrictions of 2020, we set up a project where each person held up a card showing the age they felt inside. From their life stories, a new idea formed in my mind.This is a generation of women who had experienced first-hand the impact of war on the domestic front, who had been evacuated to strangers across the country, not seeing their parents for months on end. Maybe these experiences created a different mindset; a resilience and stoicism, where the self is less important than being part of a community. Continue reading...

Events

60 h. ago Second World War veterans have memories of VE Day brought to life

Charity Blind Veterans UK released illustrations, stories and photographs which look to raise funds for war heroes living with sight loss.

Events

4 d. ago Question 7 by Richard Flanagan audiobook review – a bold memoir of life and near

History and autobiography are brilliantly intertwined as the Booker-winning author explores the choices and chance connections that shape our existenceAt the start of this boldly experimental memoir, the Booker prize-winning author Richard Flanagan visits the site of a Japanese labour camp where his late father was interned during the second world war and where he ends up awkwardly having his photo taken with a former guard, Mr Sato. The war ended weeks after the US launched an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, killing 60,000 people in less than a minute. That bomb also led to Flanagan’s father, then days from death, being freed, which in turn allowed him to father a child who would grow up to become a writer. “How many people need to die in order that you might read this book?” Flanagan asks.Question 7, named after a riddle posed by Chekhov, is a book about the connections and choices that shape our lives, for better or worse. Flanagan is the narrator, his reading by turns mournful, reflec...

Politics

6 d. ago Before and after: images by Sudan’s accidental war photographer show loss of everyday life

Mosab Abushama’s work is an attempt to spotlight what the destruction has meant for ordinary peopleWhen Mosab Abushama returned to his house in eastern Omdurman a year into the war in Sudan it was unrecognisable. Like the other buildings in his neighbourhood, the three-storey property he had shared with his extended family was pitted with bullet holes. Some of the walls had been blown through and the charred shells of burnt-out vehicles were scattered along the street. There was debris everywhere, and no water or electricity.“When we came back, everything had been stolen. There was nothing left – no furniture, no belongings, not even our clothes,” he says. Continue reading...

Culture

1 week ago Princess Royal to remember fallen soldiers during Gallipoli visit

Anne will also deliver a message from the King during her visit to north-west Turkey on the 110th anniversary of the ill-fated campaign.

Politics

2 w. ago The Edwardians: Age of Elegance; Cartier review – excess all areas

King’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace; V&A, London British royal history in the era of Fabergé, photography, empire, war and tiny waists is an expertly spangled soap opera. And a blockbuster Cartier show of jewels, maharajas and movie stars rises above the gossipThe future Edward VII looks out from a white marble bust at the start of The Edwardians: Age of Elegance. His eyes have a familiar exophthalmic bulge beneath heavy Saxe-Coburg lids. The sculptor has turned the prince’s head a fraction, to give him a flatteringly distant air of authority, but is otherwise faithful to the facts: Edward’s love of upturned wing collars, of informal jackets and the wide tie knot he popularised, known to this day as the Windsor.Edward (1841-1910) – Bertie, as he was familiarly known – was the eldest son of Prince Albert and Queen Victoria. She is said to have blamed the boy, or at least his chronic philandering, for her husband’s premature death. Prince of Wales until the age of almost 60, waiting...

Events

2 w. ago I fear I’m doing friendship wrong: why do we lose the art of just hanging out? | Carolin Würfel

Pre-planned lunch is fine but is rarely about true connection. Surely unstructured time with friends is betterThere’s a black and white image of the photographer and war correspondent Lee Miller and her friend Tanja Ramm. The two are having breakfast in bed at Miller’s studio in Paris, casually reading newspapers. Their faces are framed by untamed hair and they’re dressed in cotton shirts, with coffee cups in front of them. The image, captured in 1931, is quiet and intimate. They share a blanket, their arms touch. There’s no rush, no urgency. It’s a scene about love but, above all, it’s about friendship.When was the last time I lay in bed with a friend like that? For most of us, it was probably during school or university, when staying over or crashing at someone’s house was a regular occurrence – sometimes a necessity, but mostly just part of our routines. It kept us close. Staying in a friend’s room or apartment felt like being on an island – safe, cosy and fun. It was about whisp...

Politics