Harry's Last Stand: How the World My Generation Built Is Falling Down, and What We Can Do to Save It - Couverture rigide

In November 2013 91-year old Yorkshireman RAF veteran and ex-carpet salesman Harry Leslie Smith's Guardian article - 'This year, I will wear a poppy for the last time' - was shared almost 60,000 times on Facebook and started a huge debate. 'The sepia tone of November' he argued 'has become blood-soaked with paper poppies festooning the lapels of our politicians, newsreaders and business leaders ...I will no longer allow my obligation as a veteran to remember those who died in the great wars to be co-opted by current or former politicians to justify our folly in Iraq, our morally dubious war on terror and our elimination of one's right to privacy.' Harry's Last Stand brings his unique perspective to bear on NHS cutbacks, political corruption, food poverty, the lack of dignity in old age - and much more. As someone who lived through the depression of the 1930s, the terror of the Second World War and the post-1945 consensus, Harry here presents a lyrical, searing modern invective that shows what the past can teach us, and how the future is ours for the taking.

'A kind of epic poem, one that moves in circular fashion from passionate denunciation to intense autobiographical reflection ... should be required reading for every MP, peer, councillor, civil servant and commentator. The fury and sense of powerlessness that so many people feel at government policy beam out of every page.' Melissa Benn, Guardian 'Smith's unwavering will to turn things around makes for inspirational reading.' Big Issue North 'Mr Smith's is a rousing, earthy writing that's part Tony Harrison, part Dennis Skinner' NudgeMeNow.com 'This hymn of wrath against the toxic nexus of money and power in austerity UK from a Bradford pauper's son, excommunicated from the Catholic church for marrying an "enemy" woman in post-war Germany, is a compelling life-verdict.' Paul Routledge, The Tablet ---