The Young Lions

By Irwin Shaw

Categories: Literature & Fiction

The Young Lions is a 1948 novel by Irwin Shaw about the Second World War. It was adapted into a 1958 film starring Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, and Dean Martin. The novel follows three soldiers from the late 1930s to the end of the war: Christian Diestl, an Austrian ski instructor who becomes a hardened Nazi soldier; Noah Ackerman, a young Jewish American facing anti-Semitism in the army; and Michael Whitacre, a Broadway stage manager. Their paths finally meet in Germany.

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