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can you suggest any books that look into how WW1 veterans reacted in the impending run-up to ww2? Or names of people to look into. It doesn't have to be the entire focus of the book.

I am interested in both public reactions, public statements, but also private reactions, e.g. diaries. Aiming for contemporary recorded reactions rather than recollections, of what people's reactions were before WW2 became inevitable and still seemed avoidable. An example I've got already is Neville Chamberlain's diary letters but would like ordinary people's responses too, not just officials.

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    Sorry but book recommendations are off-topic on this site.
    – Steve Bird
    Commented Jun 21 at 22:24
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    Could you revise to "How did WWI veterans react to onset of WW2? " All answers should reference sources (and at a minimum, you could just fail to accept answers without sources.) We've found in the past that requests for sources generate more arguments than answers. A source that a Marxist historian finds excellent falls short for a feminist historian, and so on. Generally better to ask what you want to know, and rely on quality answers to be sourced. Good luck
    – MCW ♦
    Commented Jun 21 at 22:36
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    Just look for European males born between approx. 1870 and 1900 that wrote about the political development of the 1930s. The clear majority of them will have served in WW1.
    – ccprog
    Commented Jun 22 at 12:50

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I can suggest as starting point the letters exchanged by Marc Bloch with Lucien Febvre.

March Bloch, in at leas a couple of letters ask about the role of historian versus what was happening (first) and what his generation could have done (later - 1940):

“I belong to a generation that has a bad conscience. During last war, it was true, we returned very tired, and after four years of fighting, we had great haste to get back to the workbench, where we had allowed the tools of our various trades to become rusty. We wanted to make up for the lost work by working double. These are our excuses. I no longer believe that they are enough to make us innocent.”

All the letters are behind paywalls (except this little extract)

I know it may not be enough for a complete answer - but the citation wat too long for a comment

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