Clio’s Warriors examines how the Canadian world war experience has been constructed and reconstructed over time. Tim Cook elucidates the role of historians in codifying the sacrifice and struggle of a generation as he discusses historical memory and writing, the creation of archives, and the war of reputations that followed each of the world wars on the battlefield. Only recently have military historians pushed the discipline to explore the impact of war on society. In analyzing where the practice of academic military history has come from and where it needs to go, Clio’s Warriors plays a vital role in the ongoing challenge of writing critical history.

TIM COOK is the Great War historian at the Canadian War Museum, as well as an adjunct professor at Carleton University. He is the author of five other books, including Shock Troops, which won the prestigious Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction in 2009. He was also awarded the Ottawa Book Award and the J.W. Dafoe Prize for At the Sharp End. Cook lives in Ottawa with his family.

Tim Cook's profile page

One particular slice of Canadian historiography, however, has never adequately been examined: our official military historians…This is a strange oversight…Cook’s Clio’s Warriors: Canadian Historians and the Writing of the World Wars attempts to fill that gap and does so admirably – in fact, does so much more than admirably. Even if we accept that no history can be definitive, a meritorious few are destined for long and productive lives and Clio’s Warriors stands high amongst that rank.

Literary Review of Canada, vol. 14, no. 9

One of the greatest elements for capturing the public’s attention about any given war is the historians themselves who write it… [Tim Cook] takes a unique look at this issue, which makes for a fascinating read for those looking to know the motivations behind Canada’s historians.

Esprit De Corps, Vol. 13, Iss. 5