Ways of War and Peace — Reading Companion

A Peace Activist’s Efforts Cut Short

The foreword introduces Miss Anna Eckstein, an American woman who “has devoted her life to the world's peace movement.” Austrian describes receiving a letter from Eckstein asking her to form local centers in Chicago for signing peace petitions. “I had not much more than read this letter and put the petitions away for safekeeping when the word came that the great war was declared.” This juxtaposition—peace work interrupted by war—becomes a recurring motif. Austrian calls it “the greatest of paradoxes” that Eckstein’s efforts “have failed for the time being, because monarchs and statesmen, goaded on by a foolish idea for stronger empires and more possessions, had thrown their nations against each other.” The language is blunt, assigning blame to leaders rather than abstract forces. The passage grounds the book’s argument in a specific, failed initiative, making the abstract concept of peace tangible through one woman’s thwarted campaign.

Women as Wartime Spartans

In the chapter “What the World-War Will Mean to Womankind,” Austrian argues that European women, though “the fewest … want war,” are “taught to believe that every man belongs to his country first and to his family afterwards.” She observes that German women are “natural or at least trained Spartans,” citing the Kaiserin and Crown Princess as exemplars. The Kaiserin, when asked what she would do while the Emperor was at the front, replied: “But stay at home and look after all my children; this means all the women and children in the land who need me.” Austrian reports that the Empress donated forty thousand dollars to the Red Cross and visited hospitals and markets to control food prices. The tone is admiring but critical: women are portrayed as resilient yet constrained by a system that demands sacrifice. Austrian’s use of direct quotation and specific detail—the dollar amount, the market visits—lends credibility to her portrait of royal women as active managers of the home front.

A Call for American Leadership

Austrian’s narrative shifts from observation to advocacy in her closing argument. She writes that “it was an American who made the peace palace a reality” and insists that “when the time comes for the stopping of this awful carnage and bloodshed, America must insist that every nation in the world shall lay down her arms and that they shall change their men-of-war into merchant marines for the benefit of mankind.” This appeal ties the peace movement to a concrete project—the Panama Canal—which she calls “the fulfillment” of that vision. The prose becomes urgent and declarative, moving away from reportage toward a direct call to action. The shift in pace from descriptive scenes to polemical conclusion mirrors the book’s structure: personal anecdote gives way to political argument. Austrian’s voice remains consistent—opinionated, engaged, and unafraid to assign responsibility—but the register rises, matching the gravity of her subject.

Ways of War and Peace is best read as a primary document of its moment: a witness account that blends journalism, memoir, and polemic. Austrian’s strength lies in her specific, named examples—Eckstein’s petitions, the Kaiserin’s Red Cross donation, the Crown Princess’s public appearances—which ground her broader arguments in observable detail. Readers should note the book’s rapid shifts between scenes of peace advocacy and war mobilization, and between reportage and editorializing. These changes in pace reflect the author’s own experience of a world turned upside down, and they give the text its distinctive, urgent character.