Alistair Horne

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Sir Alistair Allan Horne (born November 9, 1925) is a British historian of modern France. He is the son of Sir James Horne and Lady Auriol Horne (formerly Auriol Hay).

As a child during World War II, he was sent to live in the United States. He attended Millbrook School, where he befriended William F. Buckley, who remains a life-long friend. Horne served in the RAF in 1943–44 and with the Coldstream Guards from 1944–1947. After the war he served as aide to Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery. Horne worked as a foreign correspondent for The Daily Telegraph from 1952–1955.

Horne is one of Montgomery's leading defenders. He is also the biographer of his friend, Prime Minister Harold Macmillan.

[edit] Work

Return to Power: A Report on the New Germany. New York: Praeger, 1956.
The Land is Bright. 1958.
Canada and the Canadians. Toronto: Macmillan, 1961.
The Price of Glory: Verdun 1916. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1962.
The Fall of Paris: The Siege and the Commune, 1870-1. London: Macmillan, 1965.
To Lose a Battle: France 1940. London, Macmillan, 1969.

DEATH OF A GENERATION. Neuve Chapelle to Verdun and the Somme ((1970))

The Terrible Year: The Paris Commune, 1871. London, Macmillan, 1971.
Small Earthquake in Chile: A Visit to Allende's South America. London: Macmillan, 1972.
A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954-1962. London: Macmillan, 1977.
Napoleon, Master of Europe 1805-1807. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1979.
The French Army and Politics, 1870-1970. New York: Peter Bedrick Books, 1984.
Harold Macmillan. New York: Viking Press, 1988.
A Bundle from Britain. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1993.
Montgomery, David (co-author). Monty: The Lonely Leader, 1944-1945. New York: HarperCollins, 1994.
How Far from Austerlitz?: Napoleon, 1805-1815. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996.
Horne, A. (ed.).Telling Lives: From W.B. Yeats to Bruce Chatwin. London: Papermac, 2000.
Seven Ages of Paris. London: Macmillan, 2002.
The Age of Napoleon. New York: Modern Library, 2004.
La Belle France: A Short History. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005.

[edit] Quotes

(speaking of aerial combat in World War I) "Never since the Middle Ages and the invention of the longbow had the battlefields of Europe seen this kind of single combat. When the champions of either side met to fight spectacular duels in and out of the clouds, the rest of the war seemed forgotten; even the man in the trenches paused to watch, as the hosts of Greece and Troy stood by when Hector and Achilles fought." From The Price of Glory