politics , political science ) an absolutist ( one who is in favor of an absolute or autocratic government ) Nakamura, Hajime (1964). The Ways of Thinking of Eastern Peoples: India-China-Tibet-Japan. University of Hawaii Press. pp.53–57. ISBN 978-0-8248-0078-9. , Quote: "Thus the ultimate Absolute presumed by the Indians is not a personal god but an impersonal and metaphysical Principle. Here we can see the impersonal character of the Absolute in Indian thought. The inclination of grasping Absolute negatively necessarily leads (as Hegel would say) to the negation of the negative expression itself."

Oh, it's all here, folks: the foul, sludgy, shitty, rat-infested, murderous horror of the trenches and the complexities of human relationships in an era when anything more than a handshake between men would have elicited feelings of revulsion. Political, personal, powerful... a fiercely interrogative novel that asks not just what it means to be a man but also what it means to be a human being in the extreme circumstances of war. We're accustomed to the older generation looking down on the younger and telling them that they know nothing of the world. But things are rather out of kilter now, aren't they? It is your generation who understands the inhumanity of man, not ours. It's boys like you who have to live with what you have seen and what you have done. You've become the generation of response. While your elders can only look in your direction and wonder.” Tristan's narration shows that heroism and cowardice are intertwined to such a degree that it can be difficult to separate one from the other. Public opinion may count someone as a white-livered traitor. He may even be killed by his own side for being absolutist. But in fact, the guy is an intrepid man who is ready to defend his principles at any cost.Tristan is one of many until he meets Will Bancroft who shares the bunk next to his. They form a desperate friendship as reality sets in and War dictates their lives. Boyne allows us to see that there is a special link between these two men.....unexpected and almost unwilling in its early stages. What they both will experience at the hands of the Germans and at the hands of their own troops will weigh heavily on them. It will continue to escalate until it breaks with a powerful explosive finale. Years later, Tristan is carrying the letters Will had received from his beloved sister, Marian. She and Will were close and wrote to each other every day. Tristan, who is now a writer and publisher, travels to Norwich in September 2019, to meet Marian at a tea room. Tristan may consider himself a coward but reality is much more complicated. His confession proves this. He puts into words things that are extremely hard to put into words. Likely borrowed from Spanish absolutista, because the word was initially used for Spanish absolutists during the Ominous Decade. Equivalent to absoluut +‎ -ist.

The Absolutist is another wartime story, but this time it's the first world war. It depicts a relationship between two soldiers, Tristan Sadler and Will Bancroft, the latter of whom gravitates towards being the most extreme form of conscientious objector, refusing any role at all in the campaign: an absolutist. The story is narrated by Tristan, and we cut between his trepidatious visit to Will's older sister in Norwich in 1919, and his experience in the war. The book is neatly structured and effortlessly readable, perhaps by virtue of being too direct. Some moral ambiguity is imported by an enjoyably sensational finale, but I would have appreciated more along the way, and a slower burn – for the sake of greater eroticism – as the relationship between the principals begins during training at Aldershot. In 2012, I was awarded the Hennessy Literary ‘Hall of Fame’ Award for my body of work. I’ve also won 4 Irish Book Awards, and many international literary awards, including the Que Leer Award for Novel of the Year in Spain and the Gustav Heinemann Peace Prize in Germany. In 2015, I was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of East Anglia. A dazzlingly provocative narrative of the two millenia between Pericles and Louis XIV. Sunday Times English–Arabic English–Bengali English–Catalan English–Czech English–Danish English–Hindi English–Korean English–Malay English–Marathi English–Russian English–Tamil English–Telugu English–Thai English–Turkish English–Ukrainian English–VietnameseThe author draws the First World War’s trench warfare with a deft hand. We are in the trenches of Picardy, France. I don't think anything of it. What am I supposed to think? I know that men die—their numbers are reported in the newspapers every day. But they're just names, strings of letters printed together as news type. I don't know any of them. They don't mean much to me yet.