This is an original and very timely contribution to the emergent field of mid-century studies. It offers extended new readings of such indisputably major figures as Elizabeth Bowen, Graham Greene, and George Orwell at the same time as it undertakes some important recoveries of the period's once-familiar names. This wide-ranging collection will be of interest to any reader hoping to understand better the rich and complex literature of twentieth-century Britain's most powerfully consequential decade.

Marina MacKay, Professor, St Peter's College, University of Oxford, UK

The 1940s brings together top scholars who illuminate the period's compelling myths and lost cultures, guiding us from literary lodestars like Elizabeth Bowen, George Orwell, and Graham Greene to such fascinating and neglected subjects as Royal Navy novels, women's fictions of genteel bohemia, and the exile literature of German and Austrian refugees from National Socialism.

Kristin Bluemel, Professor of English, Monmouth University, USA