Paths of glory

By Humphrey Cobb

Subjects: Fiction, war & military, Politics and government, World War, 1914-1918 in fiction, World War, 1914-1918, Fiction, general, Fiction, historical, general, Military discipline, Trials (Treason), World war, 1914-1918, fiction, Fiction, History, Mutiny, Fiction in English

Description: Familiar to many as the Stanley Kubrick film starring Kirk Douglas, *Paths of Glory* explores the perilous complications involved in what nations demand of their soldiers in wartime. Humphrey Cobb's protagonists are Frenchmen during the First World War whose nightmare in the trenches takes a new and terrible turn when they are ordered to assault a German position deemed all but invulnerable. When the attack fails, an inquiry into allegations of cowardice indicts a small handful of lower-ranked scapegoats whose trial exposes the farce of ordering ordinary men to risk their lives in an impossible cause. A chilling portrait of injustice, this novel offers insight into the tragedies of war in any age.