Professor Jay M. Winter: The Lost Generation

Source of photo.

Related: Michael Neiberg - "The Outbreak of War in 1914: A New Look at an Old Problem."

Wikipedia:

Jay Murray Winter (born 28 May 1945) is an American historian. He is the Charles J. Stille Professor of History at Yale University, where he focuses his research on World War I and its impact on the 20th century. His other interests include remembrance of war in the 20th century, such as memorial and mourning sites, European population decline, the causes and institutions of war, British popular culture in the era of the First World War and the Armenian genocide of 1915.

Video Title: Jay M. Winter: The Lost Generation - LATE at the Museum. Source: aucklandmuseum. Date Published: May 9, 2011. Description:

Jay M. Winter, the Charles J. Stille Professor of History at Yale, is considered one of the world's foremost specialists on World War I and its impact on the 20th century. He delivered a lecture on the use of the phrase "The Lost Generation" and the language associated with the thousands of men who lost their lives -- how it is applied, and, in using it, what emotions are evoked, at Auckland Museum on 5 May.

"Many people have written about the extent to which Church attendance has gone down, religious convictions vary, multiply, fragment. But in my view churches are places of repose. But in many respects in our societies the sacred has moved out of the churches and is now known in museums and  memorials like this one where questions of moral significance are asked, as indeed has been the case since this site opened in 1929. And in many ways I think what we need to do is to appreciate the extent to which our own lives are explicable only in terms of the mixed, tragic, and profound history of the men who went to war in 1914 and who themselves used the term lost generation to describe who they were." - Professor Jay M. Winter.

"The question we have to ask about commemorating wars is simple, the answer is not. The question is how do we glorify and honour those who die in war without glorifying war itself. How do we do that?" - Professor Jay M. Winter.
 
"Those who died were perhaps the best of their generation. They were certainly perceived that way. As men of uncommon courage, of clarity of vision, of moral standing. And as such they stand to this day, independent of the miserable and in my view criminal war in which they give their lives. That is why it is necessary to glorify those who die in war without glorifying war itself. Because the sacrifice is much greater than the cause for which it was undertaken." - Professor Jay M. Winter. This is a beautiful statement.