It Is Bliss Here

An intriguing glimpse of a vanished military world: Myles Hildyard's letters home from World War II provide an unusual and frank memoir of the period.

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Myles Hildyard served as an officer during World War II. He saw action in Palestine, Crete, North Africa, Italy, the D-Day landings and finally Berlin in 1945. He fought and was captured at the battle of Crete, and then embarked on a dramatic escape from a German POW camp on Crete, across the Mediterranean to Turkey. During this time he wrote extensively of his experiences, mainly in letters home to his parents and his brother. The letters are wonderful historical documents, showing the spirit in which the war was fought: how, despite the tragedy and the despair and the bloodshed, these were days of great comradeship. As Myles says, they were the best of times and the worst of times. He had the opportunity to see some of the great archaeological and historical sights of Europe and North Africa; he was fit, tanned and young; and he made friendships which were to last a lifetime. For a time, Myles had a manservant (as many English officers did) called Whitaker, the man made famous by the book To War With Whitaker by the Countess of Ranfurly.
Within the letters one can also see a young man coming to terms with his sexuality and tussling with the moral and religious problems his sexuality and desires were imposing upon him. As a document of World War II, this book is invaluable; as a portrait of a young man in a hostile and rapidly changing world it is witty, profound and utterly captivating.