“My Heart Is a Piece of Stone”: Anxious Separations and Emotional Dislocations in British Correspondence from the Long Second World War

Abstract Historians who write about emotion in wartime focus mainly on the experiences of front-line soldiers and civilians under bombardment exposed to life-threatening events. However, Britain World War II, conscription, mobilization, evacuation inflicted hugely disruptive separations a large proportion population, emotions that they provoked have been under-examined. This paper excavates an unusually complete set letters written by British working-class couple between 1941 1946. Interpreting letter writing as technology self, it explores their letter-writing practices uses psychoanalytic theory comprehend anxieties document. Wartime postwar separation, enforced challenged aspirations companionate marital style added complexities pregnancy parenthood. The sickness hospitalization baby 1945–46, era before establishment National Health Service, introduced new dimension separation. Occurring at time when were even further apart geographically than during war itself only regular means connection, this trauma imposed massive and, particularly, maternal strain. By analyzing contextualizing increasingly fraught exchanges mother her own man front line, article throws light epistolary constructions anxious emotional dislocations long Second War.