Parker, Matthew

views updated

PARKER, Matthew

PERSONAL: Male. Education: Attended Oxford University.

ADDRESSES: Home—London, England. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Doubleday, 1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019.

CAREER: Author and editor.

WRITINGS:

The Battle of Britain, July-October, 1940: An OralHistory of Britain's Finest Hour, Hodder Headline (London, England), 2000.

Monte Cassino: The Hardest-fought Battle of WorldWar II, Hodder Headline (London, England), 2003, Doubleday (New York, NY), 2004.

SIDELIGHTS: Matthew Parker is an author and editor who specializes in the history of the twentieth century, particularly military history. His book Monte Cassino: The Hardest-fought Battle of World War II recounts the events of the winter of 1943-1944, during which Allied forces attempted to liberate southern Italy from Nazi occupation. In a review for the Economist, a contributor commented that the battle was "perhaps the most interesting campaign of all. It lasted six months, a quarter of a million soldiers died or were wounded, and probably it should never have been fought." The reviewer noted that Parker interviewed many surviving veterans of the battle, and also researched existing writings on the campaign. Jay Freeman, in a review for Booklist, called MonteCassino "an outstanding chronicle illustrating both valor and futility," while Library Journal contributor Jim Doyle remarked that the book serves "an outstanding example of military history." A contributor to Kirkus Reviews remarked that "the battle, Parker concludes, was disorganized, politicized, and needlessly bloody." Washington Post Book World contributor Jonathan Yardley, referring to what he viewed as the sentimentalized portrayal of World War II as popularized by Hollywood and the media at the turn of the twenty-first century, wrote that Monte Cassino serves as "a useful curative, or corrective, and it comes at the right moment: the ruffles and flourishes attendant to the sixtieth anniversary of D-Day, and the dedication of [the] World War II Memorial on the National Mall." Yardley went on to call Parker's work an "exemplary, heartbreaking book."