Frank Whittle: Invention of the Jet

The story the jet engine - symbol of heroic invention, government bureaucracy and British ingenuity - at least as told by Whittle himself, has been described as a Greek tragedy in the modern world. Andrew Nahum’s punchy account reassess the story, one romanticised as a modern fable of war, individual perseverance and Whitehall power politics.

Whittle’s innovative brilliance, his charm and charisma helped him recruit major support from the British government and the RAF for his ambitious idea. Yet at the very moment in 1943 when his invention was unveiled to the world (Britain has fighter with no propeller ran the Daily Express headline) his company, Power Jets, was forcibly nationalised.

Frank Whittle and the Invention of the Jet is a story of what pushing techno-science to its limits can achieve and of the human emotions and tragedies that this ambition can leave in its wake.