History Books

Book SynopsisOne of the most famous science books of our time, the phenomenal national bestseller that "buzzes with energy, anecdote and life. It almost makes you want to become a physicist" (Science Digest).Trade Review"A storyteller in the tradition of Mark Twain. Feynman proves once again that it is possible to laugh out loud and scratch your head at the same time." -- K. C. Cole - New York Times Book Review"Quintessential Feynman—funny, brilliant, bawdy…enormously entertaining." -- The New Yorker"Books like this are temptations—to give up reading and devote life to rereading…The book is a litmus paper: anyone who can read it without laughing out loud is bad crazy." -- Los Angeles Times Book Review"A chain reaction is not a bad analogy for Feynman’s life. From a critical mass of gray matter it goes off in all directions, producing both heat and light." -- Time"Feynman is legendary among his colleagues for his brilliance and his eccentricity…It’s not hard to smile all the way through." -- Newsweek

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Book SynopsisA groundbreaking account of Napoleon Bonaparte, Pope Pius VII, and the kidnapping that would forever divide church and stateTrade Review“We can now see clearly that industrialisation, secularism and the emergent nation-state spelt not the end of religious faith, but rather its transformation into a political force in its own right. . . . But it was the Catholic church and its response to the French Revolution that paved the way. To Kidnap a Pope tells the story of this epic struggle.”—Mark Mazower, Financial Times“Try Ambrogio A. Caiani’s To Kidnap a Pope: Napoleon and Pius VII. . . . It is the story of the struggle, fought with cunning, not force, between the forgotten Roman nobleman Barnaba Chiaramonti, who became Pope Pius VII, and the all-too-well-remembered Napoleon.”—Jonathan Sumption, Spectator, “Books of the Year”“Caiani leads the reader expertly through diplomatic and theological disputes, a dynastic marriage, international relations and war. He handles this complex narrative deftly, without too much assumption of prior knowledge.”—David Laven, Times Literary Supplement“Ambrogio A. Caiani tells the story of Napoleon’s second papal hostage-taking: an audacious 1809 plot to whisk Pius VII (1742–1823) from Rome in the dead of night and to break his stubborn resolve through physical isolation and intrusive surveillance. . . . Caiani’s unique contribution in this work is to have set aside traditional, partisan tellings of this tale as good versus evil, secular versus religious, or state versus church. Instead, this version, even-handed and detailed in its contextualisation, is about two charismatic leaders going mano a mano.”—Miles Pattenden, Australian Book Review“A marvelous account of one cause celebre.”—Michael Broers, GQ Magazine“In this enthralling study, Ambrogio Caiani gives a vivid account of the struggle between the two men, which would continue virtually unabated until Napoleon’s death on St Helena in 1821. He is commendably even-handed in his analysis, presenting it both as a personal tussle between two dogged opponents and as a clash between contrasting visions of the world: a Catholicism ever more drawn to counter-revolutionary reaction, and an emperor consciously pursuing his own brand of modernity.”—Alan Forrest, BBC History Magazine“Caiani relates this dramatic story in telling detail but never loses sight of the broader picture, and uses his archival discoveries to excellent effect. The result is both an exciting narrative and a fine work of scholarship, shedding new light on Napoleonic history and that of the modern Catholic Church.”—Munro Price, Literary Review“Caiani uses newfound research from the Vatican Archives and isn’t afraid to provide readers with the unusual conclusion that neither Napoleon nor Pope Pius emerge as the victor of the decade-long confrontation.”—Eleanor Longman-Rood, Reaction“Ambrogio Caiani has undertaken a serious reassessment of Pius VII’s kidnapping and imprisonment, an important episode in the nineteenth-century history of the papacy that was last examined by E. E. Y. Hales in 1962. Caiani provides us with a careful, detailed account of the turbulent relationship between the Pope and Napoleon, using new archival material which he unearthed in Italy, France and Britain. . . . This very readable and vivid account of the relationship between Pius VII and Napoleon is truly a work of fine scholarship.”—John Pollard, The Tablet“A scholarly monograph that reads like a thriller; and is a work of narrative history which ably threads ideas into the heart of its presentation.”—Alexander Faludy, Church Times“Brilliantly written, based on meticulous research in the archives and beautifully produced, it is a book that should be on the shelves of any serious Napoleonist as well as one that ought to be read with particular attention by those who continue to be mesmerized by visions of ‘Napoleon the Great.’”—Charles J. Esdaile, European History Quarterly“Caiani is excellent on the local and particular, and is especially good on the physical encounters between his two principals, which he recounts with colourfully telling detail. But his enthralling narrative widens out from the intertwined lives of the two men and their very contrasting entourages to illuminate international relations and the place of religion in the politics of the revolutionary and Napoleonic age.”—Colin Jones, French Studies“Ambrogio Caiani gives us a bold, provocative new assessment of the French Emperor and his relationship with the Catholic Church. In gripping, vivid prose, Caiani brings to life the struggle for power that would shape modern Europe. It all makes for a historical read which is both original and enjoyable.”—Antonia Fraser, author of Marie Antoinette“The decade-long struggle between Napoleon and Pope Pius VII is one of the great dramas of the revolutionary era, but remains little-known. Now, and for the first time in English, Ambrogio Caiani recounts this riveting story in full—and offers insight into one of the great conflicts that has shaped, and continues to shape, the modern world, the rivalry between religion and the state.”—Munro Price, author of Napoleon: The End of Glory“A riveting and compelling account of how the soft power of the Pope proved more durable than the military might of Napoleon.”—Tim Blanning, author of The Pursuit of Glory“An outstanding milestone. The relations between Napoleon and Pope Pius VII have never been examined in such detail before. Ambrogio Caiani takes Napoleon away from the battlefield to show him grappling with the Catholic Church, in what he admitted was the most difficult problem he ever faced. This beautifully written book will now be the essential guide to understanding why and how the greatest soldier of modern times failed to subdue a pope.”—William Doyle, author of The Oxford History of the French Revolution

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Book SynopsisIt is generally accepted that Queen Victoria reigned but did not rule. This couldn't be more wrong.

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Book SynopsisA beautiful book to record your family history, with space for family and individual records, ancestry charts, family traditions and achievements

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Book SynopsisPresents the history of Japan from c 8000 BC to the present day. This title covers a range of subjects, including geology, climate, agriculture, government and politics, culture, literature, media, foreign relations, imperialism, and industrialism.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations. Conventions Used. Acknowledgements. Preface. Maps. Introduction. Part I: Beginnings:. 1. Geology, Climate, and Biota. 2. From Origins to Agriculture. Part II: The Age of Dispersed Agriculturalists (400 BCE - 1250 CE):. 3. Political Consolidation to 671 CE. 4. Establishing the Ritsuryô Order (672-750). 5. Ritsuryô Adaptation and Decay (750-1250). 6. Classical Higher Culture (750-1250). Part III: The Age of Intensive Agriculture (1250-1890):. 7. The Centuries of Disorder (1250-1890). 8. Medieval Higher Culture (1250-1550). 9. Establishing the Bakuhan Order (1550-1700). 10. The Age of Growth (1590-1700). 11. Stasis and Decay (1700-1850). 12. Crisis and Redirection (1800-1890). Part IV: The Age of Industrialism: Early Decades (1890-Present):. 13. Early Imperial Triumph (1890-1914). 14. Early Imperial Society and Culture. 15. Later Imperial Politics and Economy (1914-1945). 16. Later Imperial Society and Culture (1914-1945). 17. Drift to Disaster (1914-1945). 18. Entrepreneurial Japan: Politics and Economy (1945-1990). 19. Society and Environment (1945-1990). 20. The Culture of Entrepreneurial Japan (1945-1990). Epilogue: Japan Today and Tomorrow. Endnotes. Appendices. A. Tables I-X. B. Chinese Words: Wade-Giles & Pinyin Orthographies. C. Glossary of Japanese Terms. D. Supplemental. Readings. Index

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Book SynopsisMust the sins of America’s past poison its hope for the future? Lately the American Left, withdrawing into the halls of academe to rue the nation’s shame, has answered yes in word and deed. Rorty challenges this lost generation to understand its potential role in the tradition of democratic intellectual labor that began with Whitman and Dewey.Trade ReviewRichard Rorty [is] John Dewey’s ablest intellectual heir and one of the most influential philosophers alive… In lively prose, [Achieving Our Country] offers a pointed and necessary reminder that left academics have too often been content to talk to each other about the theory of hegemony while the right has been busy with the practice of it. If those criticized in the book dismiss it the way they brush aside the Blooms and D’Souzas of the world, an opportunity will be lost. Rorty invites a serious conversation about the purposes of intellectual work and the direction of left politics. I wouldn’t want him to have the last word, but the conversation should be joined. If it is conducted with the verve of Achieving Our Country, and if it shares Rorty’s genuine commitment to revitalizing the left as a national force, it will be a very good thing. * The Nation *Achieving Our Country is an appeal to American intellectuals to abandon the intransigent cynicism of the academic, cultural left and to return to the political ambitions of Emerson, Dewey, Herbert Croly and their allies. What Rorty has written—as deftly, amusingly and cleverly as he always writes—is a lay sermon for the untheological… [Americans] do not need to know what God wants but what we are capable of wanting and doing… [Rorty argues] that we would do better to try to improve the world than lament its fallen condition. On that he will carry with him a good many readers. -- Alan Ryan * New York Times Book Review *Richard Rorty is remarkable not just for being a gadfly to analytical philosophers, but for his immense reading, his lively prose and his obvious moral engagement with the issues… The conversation of philosophy would be much poorer without him… Achieving Our Country is a valuable addition to Rorty’s writings… He has things to say that are important and timely… They are said powerfully. -- Hilary Putnam * Times Literary Supplement *In his philosophically rigorous new book, Achieving Our Country, Richard Rorty raises a provocative if familiar question: Whatever happened to national pride in this country? …[and] he offers a persuasive analysis of why such pride has been lost. -- Christopher Lehmann-Haupt * New York Times *The heart of Achieving Our Country is Professor Rorty’s critique of the ‘cultural left.’ Barricaded in the university, this left has isolated itself, he asserts, from the bread-and-butter issues of economic equality and security and the practical political struggles that once occupied the reform tradition… Controversies are seeded like land mines in every paragraph of this short book. -- Peter Steinfels * New York Times *Richard Rorty’s Achieving Our Country is short, comprehensible and urges a civic and political agenda—the re-engagement of the Left… Rorty seeks to revive the vision of Walt Whitman and John Dewey, and what he sees as the real American Dream—a compassionate society held together by nothing more absolute than consensus and the belief that humane legal and economic agreements stand at the centre of democratic civilisation. -- Brian Eno * The Guardian *[In this] slim, elegantly written book…Rorty scolds other radical academics for abandoning pride in the nation’s democratic promise; in their obsession with ‘victim studies,’ he argues, they have neglected to inspire the ‘shared social hope’ that motivated every mass movement against injustice from the abolitionists to the voting rights campaign. -- Michael Kazin * Washington Post Book World *A succinct, stimulating, crisply written book… Rorty proposes a return to the liberal values that animated American reform movements for the first two-thirds of this century: from the long struggle of labor unions to obtain better conditions for workers, to the efforts of leaders like Woodrow Wilson, Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, and Lyndon Johnson to redistribute the nation’s wealth more equitably… Although Rorty is an academic philosopher, in this book, addressed to the general reader, he employs clear, vigorous language that makes reading a pleasure rather than a chore. -- Merle Rubin * Christian Science Monitor *Achieving Our Country criticizes academic theorists and reminds us that left-wing reformers in previous periods of American history either made their careers outside the university or, at least, developed strong links with the decidedly non-academic labor movement… Rorty’s distinction between a ‘cultural Left’ and a ‘reformist Left’ is useful. As Freud replaced Marx in the imagination of academic theorists, Rorty explains, a cultural left—one that ‘thinks more about stigma than about money, more about deep and hidden psychosexual motivations than about shallow and evident greed’—came into being. -- Alan Wolfe * The Chronicle of Higher Education *It is refreshing to find so hard-hitting a portrait of the contemporary academic Left in the work of one of its own. -- Peter Berkowitz * Commentary *On behalf of countless readers whose reaction to most left academic writing over the past two decades has increasingly been not so much either agreement or disagreement as an overpowering sense of So what?, the eminent philosopher Richard Rorty has composed a marvelous philippic against the entrenched irrelevance of much of the American left… Rorty’s most important insight is into the political worldview of the academic left: that it is essentially nonpolitical… He offers a withering comparison of the core beliefs of the current cultural left with those of one of its forebears, Walt Whitman. -- Harold Meyerson * Dissent *Mr. Rorty calls for a left which ‘dreams of achieving’ America, a patriotic left he recognises from the days of the New Deal and which he remembers from the early 1960s when, for example, people campaigned for civil-rights laws to make their country better. Where, he wonders, has such reformist pride gone? In place of ‘Marxist scholasticism’, Mr. Rorty wants a left which makes reducing inequalities part of a ‘civic religion’. Yet material differences are not the only sort of thing that bothers Mr. Rorty about the contemporary United States. On a communitarian note, he argues that the ‘civic religion’ he advocates should include commitment to shared values that rise above ethnic or minority loyalties. * The Economist *Rorty made us realise how much poorer we are if Jefferson, Emerson, Whitman, Thoreau, Stowe, Peirce, William James, Santayana and Dewey are not familiar landmarks in our intellectual scenery… If we [scoff] at Rorty’s patriotic American leftism, we may find that it sets off some doubts that will come back to haunt us. When we quibble over his interpretations of our favourite thinkers, are we not confirming his stereotype of left pedantry? When we sniff at him for keeping company with rightists and renegades, do we not bear out his idea of a Left that is keener on its own purity than on fighting for the poor? As we look down our noses at the etiolation of socialism in America, should we not reckon the costs and benefits of European mass movements, and reflect on the political history of the anti-Americanism that comes to us so easily? Before leftist subjects of Her Majesty get snooty about American democracy, we might stop and wonder whose interests are served by our unshakable optimism about the past. The unguarded naiveties of Achieving Our Country are not quite as negligent as they look, and the book may well turn out to be one of the first signs of a long-delayed breaking of the ice in socialist politics following the end of the Cold War. The fact that Rorty’s old-style American leftism is closer to British New Labour than to good old socialism may prove not that he is confused, but that it is time to reset our political chronometers. -- Jonathan Rée * London Review of Books *Politically progressive academics should consider carefully Rorty’s arguments… They pose important questions about American politics and public intellectual practice. -- Harvey Kaye * Times Higher Educational Supplement *There is much to be debated, much that will probably infuriate, in Rorty’s picture of contemporary Left intellectuals… Achieving Our Country is meant to be pointedly polemical, and Rorty…[has] succeeded at stirring up emotions as well as thoughts. -- Vincent J. Bertolini * American Literature *Richard Rorty is an inspirational writer who makes a valiant effort in this book to create an atmosphere of cooperation among those he characterizes as ‘the Reformist Left.’ He wants us to return to the ideals of John Dewey and Walt Whitman and achieve the greatness that is possible in a country of our wealth and dominance. -- Edward J. Bander * Bimonthly Review of Law Books *Rorty offers a resolute defense of pragmatic and reformist politics, coupled with a sophisticated rereading of the history of 20th-century American leftist thought. The result is a book that ends up reaffirming the great achievements of American left liberalism—strong unions, Social Security, and the principled regulation of corporate power—even as it illuminates the ways in which the cultural myopia of today’s academic left has placed those achievements in jeopardy… In his insistence that there is a great American tradition of leftist reform, and that this rendition can be reinvigorated only by a return to the idea of the nation, Rorty has constructed as humane and as hopeful a defense of patriotism as one can imagine. -- James Surowiecki * Boston Phoenix *A bracing tonic against the jejune profundities and the self-centered talking points by the far Right that find their way into the media. In sharply etched arguments Rorty weaves in philosophical and historical perspectives… His message isn’t one of resignation, rather of hope grounded in the Left’s potential for reinventing itself. He thinks it’s time for the Left to stop demonizing capitalist America and to develop once again a political program of its own. -- Terry Doran * Buffalo News *For many years now, Rorty has been one of the most important American pragmatists, defending the experimental modes of inquiry first propounded by John Dewey from both traditionalists and postmodernists… In Achieving Our Country, a brief but eloquent book, Rorty begs his academic colleagues to return to the real world. ‘I am nostalgic for the days,’ he writes, ‘when leftist professors concerned themselves with issues in real politics (such as the availability of health care to the poor and the need for strong labor unions) rather than with academic politics.’ -- Jefferson Decker * In These Times *Richard Rorty is considered by many to be America’s greatest living philosopher. That assessment is firmly supported in this short, profound, and lucid volume. In Achieving Our Country, Rorty does what many of us think philosophers ought to do, namely, lay a foundation and establish a framework within which we as individuals and as a society can conceptualize and fashion operational theories by which to live and prosper together… I can think of no more important book that I have read in recent years or one that I could more fervently recommend to the readers of this journal that Rorty’s Achieving Our Country. -- Thomas R. DeGregori * Journal of Economic Issues *‘Achieving our country’ (the phrase is culled from James Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time) isn’t just a redeemable aim, it’s what good radical politics has always been about. -- Gideon Calder * Radical Philosophy *Rorty’s new book urges a return to American liberalism’s days of hope, pride, and struggle within the system… Subtle without being dense, good-natured in its defiance of a whole spectrum of conventional wisdoms, Achieving Our Country is a rare book. It should be compulsory reading—if that weren’t contrary to all it stands for. -- Richard Lamb * The Reader's Catalog *A deeply considered diagnosis, a vital set of prophecies. * Publishers Weekly *[The] book contains criticism for the political left as earnestly constructive and thoughtfully formulated as any I have encountered…[Rorty’s] book is worth revisiting as the Democratic Party smarts from losses in recent special elections and considers how it might win back the House in the 2018 midterms. -- Conor Friedersdorf * The Atlantic *Table of ContentsAmerican National Pride: Whitman and Dewey The Eclipse of the Reformist Left A Cultural Left Appendixes Movements and Campaigns The Inspirational Value of Great Works of Literature Notes Acknowledgments Index

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Book SynopsisOmega has become the watchmaker with the highest name recognition in timekeeping for personal and sports events worldwide. If the father owned an Omega, so does the son. This important, color illustrated, new book presents, an illustrated description of all the watch movements manufactured by the Omega Watch Co. since the registration of its trademark in 1894. Over 400 watches are shown in 80 color and 334 black and white photographs. Started as a small watchmaker shop in Biel, Switzerland in 1848, the company expanded to Geneva and has made precision pocket and wristwatches including the world famous chronometer wristwatch Constellation, the diver's watch Seamaster, and the chronograph wristwatch Speedmaster Professional.

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Book SynopsisWe know more of Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 BC), lawyer, orator, politician and philosopher, than of any other Roman. Besides much else, his work conveys the turmoil of his time, and the part he played in a period that saw the rise and fall of Julius Caesar in a tottering republic.

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Book SynopsisA guide to the Greek and Roman Myths. It features a blend of stories, facts and quotations from ancient authors, and places ancient myths in a modern context, discussing the afterlives of the myths and the relevance of their messages. It includes factfiles on heroes and heroines and family trees of the gods.Trade Review'This new companion is at once a handy work of reference, an entertaining read and an attractive artefact, discreetly illustrated and tastefully laid out. A pleasure to consult' - Scotsman'For a perfect introduction to the stories of the Classical world, look no further. … Affordable, portable and accessible … thoroughly modern and approachable … Carefully researched, enjoyable, diverting and intriguing' - Reference ReviewsTable of ContentsIntroduction • 1. In the Beginning: From Chaos to Cosmos in Four Steps • 2. The Ages of Man 3. The Great Gods: The First Generation • 4. Olympus: The Next Generation • 5. Lesser Gods, Magical Creatures and Heroic Ancestors • 6. Heroes and their Quests • 7. The Golden Age of Mythology • 8. The Trojan War • 9. Going Home

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Book SynopsisAn endlessly entertaining portrait of the city of Amsterdam and the ideas that make it unique, by the author of the acclaimed Island at the Center of the World Tourists know Amsterdam as a picturesque city of low-slung brick houses lining tidy canals; student travelers know it for its legal brothels and hash bars; art lovers know it for Rembrandt''s glorious portraits. But the deeper history of Amsterdam, what makes it one of the most fascinating places on earth, is bound up in its unique geography-the constant battle of its citizens to keep the sea at bay and the democratic philosophy that this enduring struggle fostered. Amsterdam is the font of liberalism, in both its senses. Tolerance for free thinking and free love make it a place where, in the words of one of its mayors, craziness is a value. But the city also fostered the deeper meaning of liberalism, one that profoundly influenced America: political and economic freedom. Amsterdam was home not only to religious dissidents and radical thinkers but to the world''s first great global corporation. In this effortlessly erudite account, Russell Shorto traces the idiosyncratic evolution of Amsterdam, showing how such disparate elements as herring anatomy, naked Anabaptists parading through the streets, and an intimate gathering in a sixteenth-century wine-tasting room had a profound effect on Dutch-and world-history. Weaving in his own experiences of his adopted home, Shorto provides an ever-surprising, intellectually engaging story of Amsterdam.

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Book SynopsisThe Sunday Times Number 1 BestsellerA fabulous story, superbly told cannot be bettered' Max HastingsSome battles change nothing. Waterloo changed almost everything.'On the 18th June 1815 the armies of France, Britain and Prussia descended upon a quiet valley south of Brussels. In the previous three days the French army had beaten the British at Quatre-Bras and the Prussians at Ligny. The Allies were in retreat.The blood-soaked battle of Waterloo would become a landmark in European history, to be examined over and again, not least because until the evening of the 18th, the French army was close to prevailing on the battlefield.Now, brought to life by the celebrated novelist Bernard Cornwell, this is the chronicle of the four days leading up to the actual battle and a thrilling hour-by-hour account of that fateful day.In his first work of non-fiction, Cornwell combines his storytelling skills with a meticulously researched history to give a riveting account of every dramatic moment, froTrade ReviewPraise for Waterloo: ‘[…] An account that is both vivid and scholarly. Readers new to the Waterloo campaign could hope for no better introduction, and veterans will find fresh insights.’ Independent ‘Cornwell is excellent on the minutiae of tactics […] he offers narrative clarity, and a sure grip on personalities and period.’ Max Hastings, The Sunday Times ‘An excellent first foray into non-fiction, and proof that good narrative history is no different from fiction – it’s all about the story.’ Evening Standard ‘A gripping “fife and drum” account […] beautifully produced.’ Country Life Praise for Bernard Cornwell’s previous titles: ‘The best battle scenes of any writer I’ve ever read, past or present. Cornwell really makes history come alive.’ George R.R. Martin ‘Cornwell's narration is quite masterly and supremely well-researched.’ Observer

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Book SynopsisIn 2005 Michael Ignatieff left Harvard to lead Canada’s Liberal Party and by 2008 was poised to become Prime Minister. It never happened. He describes what he learned from his bruising defeat about compromise and the necessity of bridging differences in a pluralist society. A reflective, compelling account of modern politics as it really is.Trade ReviewI’ve never read a politician’s account of seeking and maintaining power that has quite the level of candor I found here—beginning with the admission that ‘there are few rewards for candor in politics.’ -- Barton Swaim * Wall Street Journal *Engagingly frank… Ignatieff has written an elegant, thoughtful, candid book explaining why he tried, and how he failed, to get to the top of the greasy pole. -- Peter Clarke * Financial Times *The best book about what it feels like to be a politician since Richard Ben Cramer’s What It Takes. -- David Brooks * New York Times *It is really a cautionary tale about the perils awaiting thoughtful men who are moved to act out the ancient dream of bringing bright ideas into the fog of political life… Fire and Ashes leaves one with a sense of loss and regret, not so much at Ignatieff’s failure at an enterprise that, by all accounts, including his own, was doomed from the outset. No, the regret one feels is for the gradual death of civility in politics that his book so vividly chronicles. -- Paul Wilson * New York Review of Books *[A] compelling and curiously moving account of [Ignatieff’s] traumatic experiences near the very summit of Canadian politics… Ignatieff wanted to win the top job the right way, with a clear electoral mandate. Yet part of the poignancy of this memoir comes from our subsequent knowledge, and his, that it was never going to happen… He reflects on this disaster with good grace and minimal self-pity—just enough to let us know how much it hurts… For a clear-eyed, sharply observed, mordant but ultimately hopeful account of contemporary politics this memoir is hard to beat. -- David Runciman * The Guardian *Reading Michael Ignatieff’s reflective and somewhat wistful book, stocked with practical and philosophical ruminations inspired by his temporary move from academia to Canadian politics, made me wish he had succeeded in becoming his country’s prime minister. Ignatieff’s constructive approach to politics, like his commitments to democracy and social justice, remains admirably untainted by the bitter experiences he describes. Yet his account makes clear why his noble adventure as leader of Canada’s Liberal Party ended in failure… Fire and Ashes provides a deeply thoughtful if sometimes elusive account of its author’s experiences as an intellectual in politics…He’s a teacher at heart and manages in Fire and Ashes to turn his irritation into an instructive lesson about the importance of ‘standing’ in politics. His analysis of whether a politician is given a hearing, or denied it by having his or her legitimacy undermined in advance, is the most important insight in his book… Perhaps it takes someone whom the voters have cast aside to offer a truly credible and heartfelt brief for democracy. -- E. J. Dionne, Jr. * Commonweal *Long after the details of the 2011 Canadian election are forgotten, anyone interested in democratic politics will be reading this book. As both an access-all-areas insider’s guide to the machinations of power and a powerful account of (and, just as fascinatingly, an example of) the weird psychology of ambition, it is a riveting read. -- Caspar Melville * New Humanist *[Ignatieff] has written not just a good book, but an extraordinary one. Fire and Ashes is a brilliant testament to the state of our politics, a cautionary tale about the perils, and pleasures, of political life and a must-read primer for anyone contemplating a political career. -- Robert Collison * Toronto Star *Michael Ignatieff chronicles why he entered political life, what it takes to be a successful politician, and what it feels like to fail miserably in the political arena… Ignatieff may not have been a wildly successful politician himself, but he is a terrific writer and a keen observer of politics. And this memoir about politics should be required reading for anyone who loves or cares about political life in Canada. -- Peter McKenna * Vancouver Sun *[Ignatieff] writes so eloquently in Fire and Ashes about the attributes needed to win in politics because he knows all too well that his lack of them meant that his return home was never fated to culminate in his becoming Canada’s 22nd prime minister. -- Stephen Holt * Canberra Times *Fire and Ashes is at times self-flagellating and self-exculpatory, frank and evasive. Above all, it attempts to extract meaning from failure. The tone is more sorrowful than angry. Ignatieff casts himself as a fount of hard-won political wisdom who, despite having endured a bruising political education, remains a champion of the democratic process. -- Evan R. Goldstein * Chronicle of Higher Education *Emotionally candid and humble, Ignatieff provides unadorned glimpses of political life, in which the art of dissimulation collides with the intellectual’s impulse for truth… Ignatieff’s elegant composition may be his finest since his biography of Isaiah Berlin in 1998. -- Shefa Siegel * Haaretz *[A] brutally frank and at times self-lacerating book… Ignatieff does have something important to teach us… In Fire and Ashes he presents a defense of politics that cannot be ignored. Rather than scorning politicians, it would be more sensible to lower our expectations of what politicians can hope to achieve. This is the true moral of the story that Ignatieff tells. -- John Gray * The Independent *[Ignatieff] describe the 35 days of his disastrous 2011 campaign as the happiest period of his political journey. Brave man. Most of us find fighting a losing campaign a truly awful experience. Having gone through this myself I could no more write about it than I would contemplate doing it all again. I would fear that my account would reek of self-pity, self-regard and self-justification. It is a measure of Ignatieff’s character that such sentiments rarely leak onto his pages. Overall, this is a brave and mostly convincing case for the young to consider a life in democratic politics. -- Chris Patten * The Tablet *Ignatieff offers a cautionary tale for public intellectuals who would be politicians. The Toronto native, currently a professor at the University of Toronto and Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, served as head of Canada’s Liberal Party until 2011, when he lost his own seat in the party’s worst showing in its history. Ignatieff had left Harvard in 2005 to enter Canadian politics and swiftly rose through the ranks to become leader of his party, on the cusp of becoming the next Prime Minister, only to face a huge electoral defeat and million-dollar campaign debt. Wised up to the rough and tumble of political life, he reflects on what he did right and wrong, and shows why getting elected, and then enacting reforms, is hard work… This thin volume could have easily been a vanity book, but it’s more than that. An erudite and civilized man, Ignatieff ends his tale with surprisingly upbeat advice to aspiring politicians. * Publishers Weekly *Michael Ignatieff is an extraordinary person. His memoir is a unique combination of learning, compassion, and wisdom brought to bear on the mess and grind of politics. He writes beautifully, and honestly. I know no book which gives a clearer sense of what it feels like to fight for a vision amidst the flaws and potential of our modern democracies. -- Rory Stewart, MP, author of The Places in BetweenThe shelves are full of memoirs written by successful politicians, painting their careers with the rosy glow of battles won. Michael Ignatieff tells a very different tale: of humility, self-discovery, and human connection. It is a book that plumbs the essence of politics, one that all voters and the leaders who would represent them should read. -- Anne-Marie Slaughter, Princeton UniversityA distinguished intellectual, writer, journalist, and academic gives up his library and his chair at Harvard to pursue a political career at the highest level and for six years he experiences the passion and the fever, the enthusiasm and the intrigue, the failure and the success of party politics in the vast Canadian scene. Six years after that immersion in political life, he goes back to his library, he does some thinking, and he offers us an exceptionally insightful and honest account of that adventure. This book is a compass that will help the reader find his or her way in the dizzying maze that politics has become in the great modern democracies. -- Mario Vargas LlosaThis book is fantastic. The insights into the realities of democratic politics are not only subtle and intelligent but I believe they are of extraordinary importance to anyone trying to understand the possibilities of democracy and the modern life of politics. -- Marc Stears, University of Oxford

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Book SynopsisCovering the origins, key features, and legacy of the Islamic tradition, the third edition of A New Introduction to Islam includes new material on Islam in the 21st century and discussions of the impact of historical ideas, literature, and movements on contemporary trends. Includes updated and rewritten chapters on the Qur'an and hadith literature that covers important new academic research Compares the practice of Islam in different Islamic countries, as well as acknowledging the differences within Islam as practiced in Europe Features study questions for each chapter and more illustrative material, charts, and excerpts from primary sources Table of ContentsList of Illustrations xi Preface to the Third Edition xv Source Acknowledgments xvii Part I The Formation of the Islamic Tradition 1 1 Islam in Global Perspective 3 The Problem of Defining Islam 3 Mapping the Islamic World 5 Arabs and Non-Arabs 9 Sunnis and Shiʿites 10 Islamic Ritual 11 What to Expect from This Book 14 Essential Resources for the Study of Islam 16 Questions for Study and Discussion 17 2 Arabia 19 Geography 19 Pre-Islamic Poetry 21 Arab Religion 25 Women in Pre-Islamic Arabia 27 Mecca and the Quraysh 28 The Gifts of the Arabs 31 Resources for Further Study 34 Questions for Study and Discussion 35 3 The Pre-Islamic Near East 37 Christianity in the Near East 39 Saints and Relics 45 Zoroastrianism 46 Judaism 47 Manichaeism 49 Mazdak 49 The Place of the Arabs in the Near East 50 Chronology of the Near East of Late Antiquity 52 Resources for Further Study 53 Questions for Study and Discussion 54 4 The Life of Muhammad 55 Prologue and Setting 56 Birth and Childhood 57 Early Adulthood 59 The Beginning of Revelation 61 Opposition 63 The Night Journey and Ascent to Heaven 65 The Hijra 66 The Battle of Badr 68 Confrontation with the Jews of Medina 69 The Battle of Uh. ud 70 The Peace of al-H. udaybiya and the Farewell Pilgrimage 72 Evaluation 73 Resources for Further Study 74 Questions for Study and Discussion 75 5 The Qur ʾan 77 The Qurʾan in Modern Imagination 77 The History of the Text 79 The Language of the Qurʾan 84 The Context of the Qurʾan 87 Jesus in the Qurʾan 88 The Qurʾan in Muslim Piety 90 The Eternity of the Qurʾan 91 The Inimitability of the Qurʾan 93 Interpreting the Qurʾan 94 Central Themes 95 Qurʾanic Narratives 96 Qurʾanic Law and the Problem of Abrogation 97 Women and Gender in the Qurʾan 98 Qurʾan, Sīra, and Hadith 99 Resources for Further Study 99 Questions for Study and Discussion 100 6 The Tradition Literature 103 The Science of Hadith 104 The Origins of the Hadith 108 In Quest of the Historical Muhammad 111 The Sīra and the Shaping of an Islamic Worldview 115 Resources for Further Study 119 Questions for Study and Discussion 120 Part II The Expansion of Islam 121 7 The Conquests 123 Psychological Impact 127 Archeological Data: The “Invisible” Conquests 129 Resources for Further Study 131 Questions for Study and Discussion 132 8 Religion of Empire 133 Early Arab Administration 134 Conversion to Islam 137 Leadership 138 The First Civil War 139 The Martyrdom of Ḥusayn 140 The Deputy of God 141 Personal Piety 142 The Dome of the Rock 144 The Constitution of Medina 149 Resources for Further Study 151 Questions for Study and Discussion 151 9 The Caliphate 153 Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ 153 The Shiʿite Vision 156 The ʿAbbasids 158 Twelvers 159 Ismāʿīlīs 160 Nizārī “Assassins” 161 Kharijites 163 The Sasanian Revival 164 Al-Māwardī and the Sunni Compromise 166 Resources for Further Study 169 Questions for Study and Discussion 170 Part III Islamic Institutions 171 10 Islamic Law 173 The Coffee Debate 173 Revelation and Reason 175 Qiyās 176 The Schools of Law 177 Islamic Law and the State 179 Ijmāʿ 180 The Uṣūl al-Fiqh 181 The Substance of the Law 183 Ritual Purity 184 Acts of Worship 185 Marriage and Divorce 186 The Origins of Islamic Law 189 Al-Shāfiʿī and Islamic Legal Theory 189 Resources for Further Study 192 Questions for Study and Discussion 193 11 Islamic Theology and Philosophy 195 Freedom and Determinism 196 God’s Attributes 198 Anthropomorphism 200 Faith and Works 200 Leadership 203 The Sunni Consensus 203 Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal 204 Al-Ashʿarī 205 Kalām 206 Al-Māturīdī and other Alternatives to Ashʿarite Kalām 208 Jewish and Christian Influences 209 The Challenge of Philosophy 210 Prophecy and Revelation in Islamic Philosophy 212 Philosophy and Mysticism 215 Resources for Further Study 216 Questions for Study and Discussion 217 12 Sufism 219 The Parliament of Birds 219 Stages on the Path 221 The Spiritual Master 223 Sufi Brotherhoods 224 Sufi Ritual 226 The Destination 229 Sufi Cosmology 230 Sufism in History: The Case of al-Ḥallāj 233 Beginnings to the Tenth Century 237 Classical Manuals and the Growth of Ṭarīqas 239 Resources for Further Study 241 Questions for Study and Discussion 242 Part IV Crisis and Renewal in Islamic History 243 13 Turks, Crusaders, and Mongols 245 The Saljūqs 245 Al-Ghazālī and the Sunni Revival 246 Slave Soldiers 248 The Crusades 250 The Mongols 254 The Impact of the Mongol Invasions 257 Resources for Further Study 261 Questions for Study and Discussion 262 14 Revival and Reform 263 The Ottoman, Safavid, and Mughal Empires 263 The Rise of European Power 266 The Religious Environment 267 The ʿUlamāʾ 267 Sufi Reformers 269 The Wahhabi Movement 274 Resources for Further Study 277 Questions for Study and Discussion 278 15 Islam and the West 279 Napoleon’s Invasion of Egypt 279 The Birth of Orientalism 282 Jihad Movements 284 Al-Afghānī 285 Sayyid Ahmad Khan and Aligarh 287 Resources for Further Study 289 Questions for Study and Discussion 289 16 The Turbulent Twentieth Century 291 The Abolition of the Caliphate 291 Nationalism 293 Secularism 295 Rashīd Riḍā and al-Manār 298 The Muslim Brotherhood 299 Jihad and Martyrdom 300 From Shariʿa to Secular Law and Back 302 Modern Qurʾan Interpretation 304 The Problem of Sunna 305 Ijtihād and Ijmāʿ 306 A New Kalām? 307 Muhammad ʿAbdūh 307 Muhammad Iqbal 309 Sufism and Modernity 311 The Modernist Moment 314 Resources for Further Study 315 Questions for Study and Discussion 315 17 Salafism 317 Café Salafis 317 Salafi Doctrine 319 The Ibn Taymiyya Connection 320 The Albanian Watchmaker’s Son 322 Salafi Apocalypse 324 Salafi Spring? 329 The Appeal of Salafism 331 Salafis and Sufis 332 Resources for Further Study 334 Questions for Study and Discussion 334 18 Islam in the Twenty-First Century 335 The Challenge of Pluralism 336 Islamic Liberalism 340 Islam in the West 342 Islamic Feminism 346 The Challenge of Islam 350 Questions for Study and Discussion 351 Glossary 353 Bibliography 367 Index 391

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Book SynopsisHistory writing at its glorious best.--The New York TimesA triumphant success. [Blanning] brings knowledge, expertise, sound judgment and a colorful narrative style.--The EconomistThe New York Times bestselling volume in the Penguin History of Europe seriesBetween the end of the Thirty Years' War and the Battle of Waterloo, Europe underwent an extraordinary transformatoin that saw five of the modern world's great revolutions--scientific, industrial, American, French, and romantic. In this much-admired addition to the monumental Penguin History of Europe series, Tim Blanning brilliantly investigates the forces that transformed Europe from a medieval society into a vigorous powerhose of the modern world. Blanning renders this vast subject immediate and absorbing by making fresh connections between the most mundane details of life and the major cultural, political, and technological transformations that birthed the modern age.

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Book SynopsisA companion volume to his bestselling Armageddon', Max Hastings' account of the battle for Japan is a masterful military history.Featuring the most remarkable cast of commanders the world has ever seen, the dramatic battle for Japan of 194445 was acted out across the vast stage of Asia: Imphal and Kohima, Leyte Gulf and Iwo Jima, Okinawa and the Soviet assault on Manchuria.In this gripping narrative, Max Hastings weaves together the complex strands of an epic war, exploring the military tactics behind some of the most triumphant and most horrific scenes of the twentieth century. The result is a masterpiece that balances the story of command decisions, rivalries and follies with the experiences of soldiers, sailors and airmen of all sides as only Max Hastings can.Trade Review‘A monumental achievement…compassionate but unsparing in its judgements.’ Sunday Times ‘An outstandingly gripping and authoritative account of the battle for Japan, and a monument to human bravery and savagery.’ Daily Telegraph ‘Absolutely excellent.’ John Simpson, Observer ‘Magisterial…it is truly cathartic to reach the end of the Second World War in Hastings’s company.’ The Times ‘Brilliantly though Hastings lays out the strategic context, his real talent lies in his account of the “terrible human experience” that it involved…This is a book for anyone who wants to understand what happened in half the world during one of the bloodiest periods of the blood-soaked 20th century.’ Spectator ‘Spectacular…Hastings makes important points about the war in the East that have been all too rarely heard…excellent…compelling…searingly powerful.’ Sunday Telegraph ‘As Hastings brilliantly describes, conditions for fighting men on both sides were appalling…the fire-bombing of Tokyo and the decision to drop the atomic bombs were influenced by the urge to 'get this business over with', but the argument, as Hastings explains so well with his usual exemplary judgement, is far more complex.’ Financial Times

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Book SynopsisIncluding letters from individuals to newspapers, institutions or leaders, this collection gives voice to the experiences, thoughts and feelings of ordinary Russian people - workers, peasants, soldiers - as expressed in their own words during the vast upheavals of 1917.Trade Review"Using a mixture of narrative and hitherto unpublished letters from workers, peasants and soldiers, Steinberg brings 1917 to life again... The result is utterly fascinating." Alison Rowat, Glasgow Herald; "This volume will be particularly useful as collateral reading for graduate and upper-division undergraduate students in history and Soviet studies." History: Reviews of New Books; "A wonderful achievement, a rare amalgam of excellent scholarship and original source materials." Ronald Grigor Suny, University of Chicago

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Book SynopsisAn illustration-packed new account of the powerful Royal Navy fleet that fought alongside the US Navy throughout the last year of the Pacific War.The British Pacific Fleet was the Royal Navy''s primary contribution to the direct defeat of Japan in 1945, and is among the most powerful fleets Britain has ever sent into action. With naval supremacy in home waters achieved by 1944, many of the best and most modern ships in the Royal Navy could be sent to the Pacific, including battleships, submarines, light forces, replenishment groups, and shore establishment. However, the main striking force was the fast carrier force.Illustrated throughout with dramatic new artwork, 3D diagrams, maps and archive photos, this book explains how the Royal Navy joined the Pacific carrier war, and how the fleet adopted the US Navy''s ruthlessly effective fast carrier doctrine. With ships optimized for short-range operations in the Atlantic and Mediterranean, the BPF had to rapidly adapt to the long-raTable of Contents(Subject to Confirmation) THE FLEET'S PURPOSE FLEET FIGHTING POWER The Ships Technical Factors HOW THE FLEET OPERATED Doctrine, Command, and Communication Intelligence and Deception Logistics and Facilities COMBAT AND ANALYSIS The Fleet in Combat Analysis FURTHER READING

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Book SynopsisTranslation of: Die Verwandlung der Welt.Trade ReviewJurgen Osterhammel, Winner of the 2017 Toynbee Prize, Toynbee Prize Foundation Jurgen Osterhammel, Winner of the 2012 Gerda Henkel Prize, of the Gerda Henkel Foundation One of Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2014 One of Bloomberg Businessweek's Best Books of 2014, chosen by Satiyajit Das One of Marginal Revolution.com's (Tyler Cowen) Best Non-Fiction Books of 2014 "Osterhammel has written one of the most important, consequential works of history to appear in the post-cold war era. It has, rightly, been called an instant classic... [T]his classic book should be indispensable reading for historians and for politically curious world citizens everywhere. It could make us better, more capacious citizens, more aware of the world we live in."--Fritz Stern, The New York Review of Books "A work of tremendous conceptual precision, breadth and insight, a masterpiece that sets a new benchmark for debates on the history of world society."--Benjamin Ziemann, Times Literary Supplement "[A] big book in every sense... An age of such panoramic creations deserves a chronicler with suitably panoramic inclinations. It has found a very able one in Jurgen Osterhammel."--Jeffrey Wasserstrom, Wall Street Journal "A milestone of German historical writing, one of the most important historical books of the last several decades... [A] mosaic-like portrait of an epoch."--Jurgen Kocka, Die Zeit "[W]eighty in every sense of the word... [A]n epic, masterly and sprawling mosaic of the age that built on, if only as reaction, foundations laid down by the Enlightenment... Osterhammel's compelling structuring brings home that the way we understand the world today is largely determined by institutions and innovations of the 19th century--and a peculiarly Eurocentric lens they provide. Alive to the potential for bias that this inevitably brings, the German historian has taken pains to create a genuinely world history of the age... [T]he rendering of such a mind-boggling tapestry of human experience is deft and accessible."--Ben Richardson, South China Morning Post "[A] 1165 pp. German Braudel-like take on the importance of the 19th century."--Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution "[V]ast, weighty, original, enthralling, exhausting and intimidating... [I]t is impossible to do it full and adequate justice, even in a lengthy review such as this. Part monster-piece, part masterpiece, its limitations are inescapably those of the global history genre... [I]t is a work of prodigious scholarship and astonishing authorial stamina; within the confines of the subject, it raises the study of global history to a new level of academic sophistication and geographical comprehensiveness; it abounds with memorable phrases and aphorisms, which betoken a lively and playful mind; and it offers wise and original insights about the many ways in which the 19th century made the world that we still, today, inhabit. If you only read one work of history this summer (and, believe me, it will take you all of a very long summer), then The Transformation of the World should definitely be it."--Sir David Cannadine, Financial Times "Massive ... interesting ... impressive... The coverage is in many respects much greater than that of Braudel, not only geographically but also conceptually... Osterhammel's ambition, industry and scale shows up the work of all-too-many other historians. Similar books should be produced for other centuries. Let us hope that British historians can rise to the challenge of writing them."--Jeremy Black, Standpoint "This superb study gives form to a global history that lasts from the late 18th well into the 20th century and it does so without oversimplifying. It is exhilarating to find a system builder with such a feeling for nuance and difference. The only study comparable is Christopher Bayly's The Birth of the Modern World. This thick, dense book will prove most useful for scholars; the history enthusiast will find there is no match for this resource. In it, there is much to appreciate."--Library Journal (starred review) "[A] work of panoramic scope and rare historical imagination."--Tony Barber, Financial Times "Jurgen Osterhammel's fine The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the Nineteenth Century ... swoops, shimmies and carves ellipses and spirals through the facts to give readers an insightful view of the nineteenth century in all its complexity and confusion. In a great work of scholarship, Professor Osterhammel ... and his able translator ... Patrick Camiller have fashioned a remarkable picture of the nineteenth century... [It] brings a new meaning to the term block buster."--Satyajit Das, naked capitalism "Jurgen Osterhammel's rich and thoughtful book The Transformation of the World, skillfully translated by Patrick Camiller, has the great virtue of addressing with careful attention what was and was not transformed over the 19th century."--Frederick Cooper, Public Books "Writing meaningfully about global history is ambitious at best, but this work on the 19th century succeeds... Nearly every page offers new insights about world history and specific countries' global contexts. This book is eminently suitable for advanced general readers and undergraduates and should be mandatory reading for all graduate students of modern history as a way to set their own specializations in a broader context."--Choice "There have been two massive history books published this year that deserve to be widely read. One is the English translation of The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the Nineteenth Century by the German historian Jurgen Osterhammel."--Christopher Sylvester, Financial Times "Professor Jurgen Osterhammel's fine book is anything but a linear recitation of events. Instead, it swoops, shimmies and carves ellipses and spirals through facts to give readers a remarkable picture of the 19th century, which has shaped much of the present world."--Satyajit Das, Bloomberg Businessweek "The patient reader who finishes this 1,000-page tour of the 19th century emerges with a richer, deeper grasp, a better sense of what is truly unique about the global village, and global Asia, of our own times. This is world history at its best."--John Delury, Global Asia "In this sweeping panorama, Osterhammel captures the dramatic shifts in how people lived and understood life during the nineteenth century... Osterhammel offers a rich 'global history' of the century, one that features the West prominently but avoids Eurocentrism with vivid portraits of non-Western peoples and societies."--Foreign Affairs "The Transformation of the World is lavishly reinforced with critical apparatus (that, too, must have been a labor of Hercules to translate--I honestly never expected to see this book in English), but by far its greatest attraction is the intelligence and more important the wisdom of its author. It's a towering achievement no serious reader should miss."--Steve Donoghue, Open Letters Monthly "The Transformation of the World stands as both an essential compendium of knowledge about human civilization on planet Earth in the nineteenth century and a unique monument of historical art."--Matthew Karp, Journal of American History "[A] colossal achievement... The Transformation of the World stands as both an essential compendium of knowledge about human civilization on planet Earth in the nineteenth century and a unique monument of historical art."--Matthew Karp, Journal of American History "A tome that the scholar who exults in original thought will fall in love with. It is a fascinating expose... This is definitely a book for my shelves, reinforced though they will have to be."--Ian Lipke, MediaCulture.org "Osterhammel has given us the densest and arguably the most closely reasoned volume yet on this period."--Patrick Manning, H-Net Reviews "The Transformation of the World is both a pleasure and a necessary education. The present reader, for one, found the book hard to put down--and not on account of its weight."--Mark Gamsa, European History QuarterlyTable of ContentsPreface xi Introduction xv PART ONE: APPROACHES I Memory and Self-Observation: The Perpetuation of the Nineteenth Century 3 1Visibility and Audibility 5 2Treasuries of Memory and Knowledge 7 3Observation, Description, Realism 17 4Numbers 25 5News 29 6Photography 39 II Time: When Was the Nineteenth Century? 45 1Chronology and the Coherence of the Age 45 2Calendar and Periodization 49 3Breaks and Transitions 52 4The Age of Revolution, Victorianism, Fin de Siecle 58 5Clocks and Acceleration 67 III Space: Where Was the Nineteenth Century? 77 1Space and Time 77 2Metageography: Naming Spaces 78 3Mental Maps: The Relativity of Spatial Perspective 86 4Spaces of Interaction: Land and Sea 94 5Ordering and Governing Space 104 6Territoriality, Diaspora, Borders 107 PART TWO: PANORAMAS IV Mobilities 117 1Magnitudes and Tendencies 117 2Population Disasters and the Demographic Transition 124 3The Legacy of Early Modern Migrations: Creoles and Slaves 128 4Penal Colony and Exile 133 5Ethnic Cleansing 139 6I nternal Migration and the Changing Slave Trade 144 7Migration and Capitalism 154 8Global Motives 164 V Living Standards: Risk and Security in Material Life 167 1The Standard of Living and the Quality of Life 167 2Life Expectancy and "Homo hygienicus" 170 3Medical Fears and Prevention 178 4Mobile Perils, Old and New 185 5Natural Disasters 197 6Famine 201 7Agricultural Revolutions 211 8Poverty and Wealth 216 9Globalized Consumption 226 VI Cities: European Models and Worldwide Creativity 241 1The City as Norm and Exception 241 2Urbanization and Urban Systems 249 3Between Deurbanization and Hypergrowth 256 4Specialized Cities, Universal Cities 264 5The Golden Age of Port Cities 275 6Colonial Cities, Treaty Ports, Imperial Metropolises 283 7Internal Spaces and Undergrounds 297 8Symbolism, Aesthetics, Planning 311 VII Frontiers: Subjugation of Space and Challenges to Nomadic Life 322 1Invasions and Frontier Processes 322 2The North American West 331 3South America and South Africa 347 4Eurasia 356 5Settler Colonialism 368 6The Conquest of Nature: Invasions of the Biosphere 375 VIII Imperial Systems and Nation-States: The Persistence of Empires 392 1Great-Power Politics and Imperial Expansion 392 2Paths to the Nation-State 403 3What Holds Empires Together? 419 4Empires: Typology and Comparisons 429 5Central and Marginal Cases 434 6Pax Britannica 450 7Living in Empires 461 IX International Orders, Wars, Transnational Movements: Between Two World Wars 469 1The Thorny Path to a Global System of States 469 2Spaces of Power and Hegemony 475 3Peaceful Europe, Wartorn Asia and Africa 483 4Diplomacy as Political Instrument and Intercultural Art 493 5Internationalisms and the Emergence of Universal Norms 505 X Revolutions: From Philadelphia via Nanjing to Saint Petersburg 514 1Revolutions--from Below, from Above, from Unexpected Directions 514 2The Revolutionary Atlantic 522 3The Great Turbulence in Midcentury 543 4Eurasian Revolutions, Fin de Siecle 558 XI The State: Minimal Government, Performances, and the Iron Cage 572 1Order and Communication: The State and the Political 572 2Reinventions of Monarchy 579 3Democracy 593 4Bureaucracies 605 5Mobilization and Discipline 616 6Self-Strengthening: The Politics of Peripheral Defensive 625 7State and Nationalism 629 PART THREE: THEMES XII Energy and Industry: Who Unbound Prometheus, When, and Where? 637 1Industrialization 638 2Energy Regimes: The Century of Coal 651 3Paths of Economic Development and Nondevelopment 658 4Capitalism 667 XIII Labor: The Physical Basis of Culture 673 1The Weight of Rural Labor 675 2Factory, Construction Site, Office 685 3Toward Emancipation: Slaves, Serfs, Peasants 697 4The Asymmetry of Wage Labor 706 XIV Networks: Extension, Density, Holes 710 1Communications 712 2Trade 724 3Money and Finance 730 XV Hierarchies: The Vertical Dimension of Social Space 744 1Is a Global Social History Possible? 744 2Aristocracies in (Moderate) Decline 750 3Bourgeois and Quasi-bourgeois 761 XVI Knowledge: Growth, Concentration, Distribution 779 1World Languages 781 2Literacy and Schooling 788 3The University as a Cultural Export from Europe 798 4Mobility and Translation 808 5Humanities and the Study of the Other 814 XVII Civilization and Exclusion 826 1The "Civilized World" and Its "Mission" 826 2Slave Emancipation and White Supremacy 837 3Antiforeignism and "Race War" 855 4Anti-Semitism 865 XVIII Religion 873 1Concepts of Religion and the Religious 873 2Secularization 880 3Religion and Empire 887 4Reform and Renewal 894 Conclusion: The Nineteenth Century in History 902 1Self-Diagnostics 902 2Modernity 904 3Again: The Beginning or End of a Century 906 4Five Characteristics of the Century 907 Abbreviations 921 Notes 923 Bibliography 1021 Index 1119

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Book SynopsisDrawing on a wide range of unpublished material and observations gathered from his visit to Yugoslavia in 1999, Michael Parenti challenges mainstream media coverage of the war, uncovering hidden agendas behind the Western talk of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and democracy.Trade ReviewProminent social critic Parenti pens a fierce, elegantly constructed elegy not just for the lives sacrificed in the Balkan wars, but for concepts of national sovereignty and constitutionality, which appear to be lost to a corporate-sanctioned new world order. Extremely disturbing, but, for the brave, jolting and necessary reading. * Kirkus Reviews *Thought-provoking ... Parenti makes compelling points about biased media coverage of Serbia. * Publishers Weekly *

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Book SynopsisFor millennia, mankind has devised ingenious and diabolical means of inflicting pain on fellow human beings. This deplorable but seemingly universal trait has eaten away at mankind's very claim to civilisation. Despite how repugnant the practice of torture appears to us today, for at least 3,000 years it formed part of most legal codes throughout Europe and the Far East. The Big Book of Pain is an exploration of the systematic use throughout the ages of various means of punishment, torture, coercion and torment. It takes the reader into the Ancient Roman Coliseum, the medieval dungeon, the Inquisitional interrogation, the auto-da-fe, the witch-trial, and the worst of prisons. It is a shocking and compelling study of the shameful methods and motives of the torturer and the executioner, and of the heinous duty they have performed through the ages.

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Book SynopsisThe modern art market was born on a single night. On 15 October 1958 Sotheby's of Bond Street staged an event sale' of Impressionist paintings from the collection of an American banker, Erwin Goldschmidt: three Manets, two Cézannes, one Van Gogh and a Renoir. Movie stars and other celebrities attended in black tie and saw the seven lots go for 781,000 at the time the highest price for a single art sale.Overnight, London became the world centre of the art market and Sotheby's an international auction house. The event signalled a shift in power from dealers to auctioneers and pointed the way for Impressionist paintings to dominate the market for the next forty years. In this climate Sotheby's and Christie's became a great business duopoly as aggressive, dominant and competitive in the field of art sales as Pepsi and Coca-Cola were in soft drinks. The resulting expansion of the market was accompanied by rocketing prices, colourful scandals and legal dramas. Over the decades,

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Book SynopsisJames McPherson is Professor Emeritus of American History at Princeton University. Battle Cry of Freedom won the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction in 2003.Trade ReviewThe definitive study, meticulous in its scholarship and compulsive in its readability * Financial Times *McPherson is wonderfully lucid... Above all, everything is in a living relationship with everything else ... Omitting nothing important, whether military, political or economic, he yet manages to make everything he touches drive the narrative forward ... historical writing of the highest order * The New York Times *A distinguished contribution to American history ... He has succeeded brilliantly. He has written what will surely become the standard one-volume history of the great conflict which forged America as a united nation * Independent *Absolutely brilliant ... McPherson has fresh approaches to the war's background, the four years of struggle and the aftermath * Washington Post Book World *McPherson wears with equal ease the hats of biographer, economist, sociologist and military historian .. Probably the best single-volume history of America's Civil War yet written * Economist *Table of ContentsPrologue: from the halls of Montezuma. The United States of midcentury; Mexico will poison us; an empire for slavery; slavery, rum and Romanism; the crime against Kansas; mudsills and greasy mechanics for A. Lincoln; the revolution of 1860; the counterrevolution of 1861; facing both ways - the upper south's dilemma; amateurs go to war; farewell to the 90 Days' War; blockade and beachead - the Salt-Water War, 1861-1862; the River War in 1862; the sinews of war; Billy Yank's chickhominy blues; we must free the slaves or be ourselves subdued; carry me back to Old Virginny; John Bull's Virgina Reel; three rivers in winter, 1862-1863; fire in the rear; long remember - the summer of '63; Johnny Reb's Chattanooga Blues; when this cruel war is over; if it takes all summer; after four years of failure; we are going to be wiped off the Earth; South Carolina must be destroyed; we are all Americans. Epilogue: to the shoals of victory.

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Book SynopsisA magisterial history of South Africa, from the earliest known human inhabitation of the region to the present. It also includes a chapter chronicling the first presidential term of Mbeki and ending with the celebrations of the centenary of South Africa's ruling African National Congress in January 2012.Trade Review"Lynn Berat’s brilliant addition to Leonard Thompson’s superlative history takes the reader on a riveting tour of twenty-first century South Africa in all its triumph and tragedy."—Cindy Kaplan, Committed Artists of South Africa

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Book SynopsisOne of the world's leading authorities on war and international politics synthesizes the vast history of strategy's evolution in this consistently engaging and surprising account of how it came to pervade every aspect of life.Trade Review[Strategy: A History] elegantly synthesises strands of thought. * RUSI Journal *This is an epic undertaking, of considerable intellectual ambition. It displays the familiar Freedmanian virtues: clarity, economy, proficiency, sagacity a compound of deep immersion, practised exposition, and a certain practical wisdom in it... In strategy, everything is connected. Freedman shows us how. * The Guardian *To the best of my knowledge, this is the only book ever attempted on the entire historical and conceptual domain of strategy. Indeed, I am somewhat awestruck by the scope of the mission that Freedman set himself. ... Strategy is a very considerable, indeed monumental, product that no one else has had the temerity to attempt. * Colin Gray, International Affairs *A discursive account with many interesting passages ... There is much of interest in Freedman's book. * Jeremy Black, History Today *Arguably the best book ever written on strategy (in its widest sense). * Gerard DeGroot, Washington Post *Freedman offers a wide-ranging, scholarly and entertaining history of the concept. He ranges from David and Goliath to Peter Drucker, by way of Marx and Machiavelli - and emphasises the importance of responding flexibly to events. * Books of the Year, Financial Times *This is a book of startling scope, erudition and, more than anything, wisdom. * Janan Ganesh, Financial Times *Magisterial ... wide-ranging erudition and densely packed argument. * The Economist *[A] fascinating, at moments playful book. * Bruce Anderson, The Sunday Times *Freedman's writing is admirably lucid, and the breadth of his knowledge and scholarship astonishing...Both as a history of ideas and as a work of reference, it is invaluable Erudite, wise and illuminating, Strategy is a book to be savoured and treasured. * Sir David Goodall, The Tablet *This is an original and intriguing approach. * Richard Overy, Literary Review *[A] vast exploration of strategy that is difficult to read, full of surprises, and marked by unsurpassed erudition. It also is witty and reminds us that he in the world who knows most about strategy may be the one who is the most unimpressed with it. * Victor Davis Hanson, National Review *An ambitious and sprawling book ... With admirable candor, Freedman tells us that he received the contract for this book in (gulp!) 1994, and that he made a "number of false starts" with the manuscript. Considering the daunting scope of the subject, this is entirely understandable. Considering the wisdom and analytical brilliance he brings to bear on that subject, it's been well worth the wait. * The Daily Beast *Will surely become a standard reference in the discipline ... ambitious and impressive. * strategy+business.com *A marvelous grand tour of the meaning, implications, and consequences of strategic thinking through the ages and in multiple contexts. Freedman is a master of the subject and unsurpassed in his ability to unravel the twists and turns of strategic complexities and paradoxes. * Robert Jervis, Adlai E. Stevenson Professor of International Politics, Columbia University *Lawrence Freedman shows here why he is justly renowned as one of the world's leading thinkers about strategy, which he defines as the central art of getting more out of a situation than the starting balance of power would suggest. * Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Harvard University and author of The Future of Power *Erudite, wide-ranging, and covering an astonishing array of subjects relating to strategy. * Azar Gat, author of War in Human Civilization *Freedman's writing is admirably lucid, and the breadth of his knowledge and scholarship astonishing... Both as a history of ideas and as a work of reference, it is invaluable Erudite, wise and illuminating, Strategy is a book to be savoured and treasured, not least in its conclusion: that "in the end, all we can do is to act as if we can influence events. To do otherwise is to succumb to fatalism." * The Tablet *So erudite, so wide-ranging, and so knowledgeable ... impressive achievement. No single book on strategy is as intellectually intimidating; and none moves as easily as his does across time and space. * The World Today *Immensely learned and wide-ranging, beautifully written and full of insight ... a fine book. * Michael Williams, University of Hertfordshire *Table of ContentsDEDICATION ; PREFACE ; Part I ORIGINS ; 1 ORIGINS 1: EVOLUTION ; 2 ORIGINS 2: THE BIBLE ; 3 ORIGINS 3: THE GREEKS ; 4 SUN TZU AND MACHIAVELLI ; 5 SATAN'S STRATEGY ; Part II STRATEGIES OF FORCE ; 6 THE NEW SCIENCE OF STRATEGY ; 7 CLAUSEWITZ ; 8 THE FALSE SCIENCE ; 9 ANNIHILATION OR EXHAUSTION ; 10 BRAIN AND BRAWN ; 11 THE INDIRECT APPROACH ; 12 NUCLEAR GAMES ; 13 THE RATIONALITY OF IRRATIONALITY ; 14 GUERRILLA WARFARE ; 15 OBSERVATION AND ORIENTATION ; 16 THE REVOLUTION IN MILITARY AFFAIRS ; 17 THE MYTH OF THE MASTER STRATEGIST ; PART III STRATEGY FROM BELOW ; 18 MARX AND A STRATEGY FOR THE WORKING CLASS ; 19 HERZEN AND BAKUNIN ; 20 REVISIONISTS AND VANGUARDS ; 21 BUREAUCRATS, DEMOCRATS, and ELITES ; 22 FORMULAS, MYTHS, AND PROPAGANDA ; 23 THE POWER OF NONVIOLENCE ; 24 EXISTENTIAL STRATEGY ; 25 BLACK POWER AND WHITE ANGER ; 26 FRAMES, PARADIGMS, DISCOURSES, AND NARRATIVES ; 27 RACE, RELIGION, AND ELECTIONS ; PART IV STRATEGY FROM ABOVE ; 28 THE RISE OF THE MANAGEMENT CLASS ; 29 THE BUSINESS OF BUSINESS ; 30 MANAGEMENT STRATEGY ; 31 BUSINESS AS WAR ; 32 THE RISE OF ECONOMICS ; 33 RED QUEENS AND BLUE OCEANS ; 34 THE SOCIOLOGICAL CHALLENGE ; 35 DELIBERATE OR EMERGENT ; PART V theories of strategy ; 36 THE LIMITS OF RATIONAL CHOICE ; 37 BEYOND RATIONAL CHOICE ; 38 STORIES AND SCRIPTS ; 37 BEYOND RATIONAL CHOICE ; 38 STORIES AND SCRIPTS ; ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

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Book SynopsisFor some historians and biographers, Maximilien Robespierre (1758-94) was a great revolutionary martyr who succeeded in leading the French Republic to safety in the face of overwhelming military odds. This biography focuses on Robespierre's formative years and the development of an iron will in a frail boy conceived outside wedlock.Trade Review"Peter McPhee seeks to get under the skin and into the mind of Robespierre, juxtaposing personal and political factors in a gripping narrative. Robespierre emerges less as the man who ruined the Revolution than as a man the Revolution ruined—by the time of his death in 1794 he was an ailing exhausted husk very different from the bright-eyed, committed and courageous politician of 1789. McPhee's interpretation will surprise and intrigue in equal measure."—Colin Jones -- Colin Jones‘A wonderful, convincing study, splendidly analytical and evocative, and beautifully penned.’ - John Merriman, author of A History of Modern Europe and Dynamite Club: How a Bombing in Fin-de-siècle Paris Ignited the Age of Modern Terror -- John Merriman‘This book is a triumph: an important, open-minded and often moving account of Robespierre, that will stand as a very worthy successor to the previous great biographies. Peter McPhee’s lifetime of research on the French Revolution draws out the context within which Robespierre’s words and actions can be better understood, and his insights into Robespierre’s youth, and the way he changed, displays a real understanding of Robespierre’s psychology. A great and lasting achievement.’ - Marisa Linton, author of The Politics of Virtue in Enlightenment France -- Marisa Linton

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Book SynopsisEncompassing the period from Rome's founding in the eighth century BC through Justinian's rule in the sixth century AD, the author offers a distinctive perspective on the Romans and their civilization by employing fundamental Roman values as a lens through which to view both their rise and spectacular fall.Trade Review"In this survey of ancient Greek history and civilization, Martin skillfully blends social, cultural, political, and military data to create a panoramic view of the Greek world. Novices will find the work both comprehensible and entertaining."—Library Journal"Some 20 years after the success of his Ancient Greece: From Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times (Yale UP), Thomas R. Martin gives the same treatment to a potted history of Rome, with great success. . . . It is to the credit of the author that, even in a few pages, there seem to be no omissions of events, incidents or figures who helped shape the history of Rome. . . . It remains . . . an immensely readable and engaging history, which shows incredible breadth, given its brevity."—Geoff Lowsley, Minerva"Some 20 years after the success of his Ancient Greece: From Prehistoric to Hellenistic Times (Yale UP), Thomas R Martin gives the same treatment to a potted history of Rome, with great success. . . . It is to the credit of the author that, even in a few pages, there seem to be no omissions of events, incidents or figures who helped shape the history of Rome. . . . It remains . . . an immensely readable and engaging history, which shows incredible breadth, given its brevity."—Geoff Lowsley, Minerva

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Book SynopsisNo one in the twentieth century had a greater impact on world history than Deng Xiaoping. And no scholar is better qualified than Ezra Vogel to disentangle the contradictions embodied in the life and legacy of China's boldest strategist-the pragmatic, disciplined force behind China's radical economic, technological, and social transformation.Trade ReviewA masterful new history of China's reform era. It pieces together from interviews and memoirs perhaps the clearest account so far of the revolution that turned China from a totalitarian backwater led by one of the monsters of the 20th century into the power it has become today...Vogel has a monumental story to tell. His main argument is that Deng deserves a central place in the pantheon of 20th-century leaders. For he not only launched China's market-oriented economic reforms but also accomplished something that had eluded Chinese leaders for almost two centuries: the transformation of the world's oldest civilization into a modern nation...[An] illuminating book. -- John Pomfret * Washington Post *Ezra Vogel's new biography portrays Deng as not just the maker of modern China, but one of the most substantial figures in modern history...[A] meticulously researched book...Vogel knows China's elites extremely well, not least because of his years as an intelligence officer in East Asia for the Clinton administration. This book is bolstered by insider knowledge and outstanding sources, such as interviews with Deng's interpreters...The definitive account of Deng in any language. Vogel eloquently makes the case for Deng's crucial role in China's transformation from an impoverished and brutalized country into an economic and political superpower. * The Economist *A lively portrait of the man...Vogel provides a wealth of fascinating material, from vivid accounts of Deng's political and organizational skills in reviving the economy in the mid-1970s to his up-and-down relations with Vietnam and its leaders. The author also offers astute insights into the reformist roles played by Hua Guofeng, Mao's immediate successor after his 1976 death, and by two of Deng's own associates, both ultimately purged by him, Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang. The book is at its best in portraying the tense interplay of personal relations and ambition among Mao's many lieutenants. On the surface, lockstep Communist ideology prevailed during Mao's rule, but behind the walls of Zhongnanhai, Beijing's central leadership compound, the dual drive for self-preservation and advancement fed a kind of political nihilism. -- Howard French * Wall Street Journal *When Chinese historians are able one day to ply their subversive trade without control or censorship, their judgment will surely be that their country should revere Deng Xiaoping way above his predecessor Mao Zedong...Ezra Vogel's massive biography assembles the case for Deng (1904-97) with narrative skill and prodigious scholarship. -- Chris Patten * Financial Times *Vogel has gone to enormous lengths to document his subject...Vogel's painstaking research provides plenty of fascinating detail. The description of the period after Tiananmen, for example--when the octogenarian was forced to call on a lifetime's accumulated political wiles to defeat an attempt by conservatives to almost completely reverse his reforms--is eye-opening. The pages in which Deng effectively threatens to have then Communist Party Secretary Jiang Zemin dismissed unless he throws his support behind renewing the reform drive are very nearly worth the price of the book alone...On the ways through which Deng set about the enormous task of rebuilding the gutted economy, shattered by decades of turmoil under Mao Zedong, Vogel is exhaustive. -- Simon Elegant * Time *Ezra Vogel's encyclopedic Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China is the most exhaustive English retelling of Deng's life. Vogel, an emeritus professor at Harvard, seems to have interviewed or found the memoirs of nearly every person who spoke with Deng, and has painstakingly re-created a detailed and intimate chronology of Deng's roller-coaster career. -- Joshua Kurlantzick * The Nation *A virtue of Vogel's book is that it collects and organizes a huge amount of material on the struggles within the elite power circles in China over several decades. In these accounts we learn how Deng tried to protect his allies and how he sought to undermine his enemies; he fell, rose, fell again, then rose again to the pinnacle position in the second generation of the Communist dynasty. Vogel's materials will be very useful to students of elite power struggles in China. -- Fang Lizhi * New York Review of Books *One of the virtues of Vogel's analysis is that he understands the thinking of Deng's rivals as well as he does Deng's own...Deng was infatuated with everything he viewed as modern, and wanted China to have it all. By entering into Deng's vision, Vogel helps readers see how the person who forged the world's most successful example of modernizing authoritarianism believed that such a combination would work. -- Andrew J. Nathan * New Republic *[An] exhaustive biography...Vogel's book is an encyclopedic look at Deng's career. -- Clarissa Sebag-Montefiore * The Independent *Deng was perhaps the most intriguing leader that I met while traveling with Mr. Blumenthal and President Jimmy Carter. I had to wait another 30 years, however, before a definitive biography would be written about Deng, arguably the most globally transformational leader of the 20th century. This year Ezra Vogel delivered it with Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China. -- Richard W. Fisher * Wall Street Journal *Vogel, one of the world's preeminent Asia scholars, has produced the most comprehensive and authoritative account of Deng's career as a revolutionary, party leader, and architect of China's reform. Meticulously researched and highly readable, the book is not a typical biography. It does not dwell much on Deng's personal life. Instead, the focus of the book is Deng's unusual career trajectory, his unique style of rule, and the strategic choices he made during and after the Cultural Revolution...This book should be read by anyone who wants to understand the domestic and international dynamics that have led to China's rise as a great power. -- Yanzhong Huang * Foreign Affairs *If anybody still nurtures the illusion that Deng was a closet liberal, this book will bring them back to reality. For all the changes he championed and the vicissitudes of his life, the diminutive, blunt Deng has received much less biographical attention than Mao, which makes Ezra Vogel's huge account particularly welcome. The product of 10 years of work by a leading China scholar, it is essential reading for anybody who wants to understand the evolution of China to the status it occupies today. It offers an enormous compendium of material about the lifelong Communist whose story, even more than that of Mao, reflects the dramatically varying fortunes of his nation in the 20th century...Vogel is an admiring biographer who presents a treasure trove of new information that will delight modern China scholars for years to come. -- Jonathan Fenby * Times Higher Education *Deng [is] a fit subject for a weighty, probing and judicious biography, which is just what Ezra F. Vogel has produced...Vogel is the master of this complex material. He had access to many who knew and worked with Deng, including Jiang Zemin. Deng selected him as Party leader in 1989 to succeed Zhao Ziyang, who had been sacked and disgraced because of his opposition to the use of force in Tiananmen Square. Vogel also spoke to two of Deng's children. The documentary sources are copious and, in terms of access to material, this study is unlikely to be bettered until the Party opens its most sensitive archives--which could be a long wait. It is hard to disagree with much of what Vogel writes and there is much to admire, particularly his judicious contextualization of Deng's motives. -- Graham Hutchings * Literary Review *A major biography of the man who may turn out to have done more to transform the world than any other leader of the 20th century. Deng's market Leninism has massively increased China's wealth, while repressing democracy. Vogel's portrait is sympathetic, although not uncritical. * Financial Times *This is the most ambitious biography of Deng Xiaoping by a western scholar so far. Drawing on numerous Chinese sources, including the Deng family, it tells the story of a man who, the author says, may have had more impact on world history than anyone else in the 20th century...This is a monumental work, carried out in the author's retirement and intended to cap a distinguished career in Asian studies. His diligent use of official papers and his privileged access to members of the Chinese Communist elite make this biography of Deng Xiaoping the most complete we are likely to have under the present ruling order. -- Michael Sheridan * Hong Kong Economic Journal *Deng led a long and remarkable life, packed with drama and global significance, one that deserves to be dissected in detail. So we must be thankful to Harvard professor Ezra Vogel for devoting a large chunk of his academic career to compiling a prodigious biography, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China, the most ambitious account of the man so far. In writing this volume, Vogel has done an enormous amount of work. He appears to have absorbed the documents from every single Chinese Communist Party plenum since 1921...There have been several Deng biographies before this...but Vogel's can be regarded as the most comprehensive and informative of the lot...There's no question that Vogel has gone farther than anyone else to date in telling Deng's story. For that he is to be applauded; there is a whole hoard of valuable material here that we probably would not have gained otherwise. -- Christian Caryl * Foreign Policy *China scholars might think they have read enough about Deng Xiaoping. After all, at least three biographies of Deng were available prior to the release of this massive new book. But Vogel, one of the world's preeminent Asia scholars, has produced the most comprehensive and authoritative account of Deng's career as a revolutionary, party leader, and architect of China's reform. Meticulously researched and highly readable, the book is not a typical biography. It does not dwell much on Deng's personal life. Instead, the focus of the book is Deng's unusual career trajectory, his unique style of rule, and the strategic choices he made during and after the Cultural Revolution. Vogel considers the extent to which Deng fundamentally and irreversibly transformed China's society, governance, and relations with the outside world...This book should be read by anyone who wants to understand the domestic and international dynamics that have led to China's rise as a great power. -- Yanzhong Huang * Foreign Affairs *The big picture is the key to this book. Those hoping for hidden secrets and untold stories about Deng in Vogel's book will be disappointed. Comprehensive as it is, the book is not an expose. But it does ring with authority. The Harvard professor spent most of the 10 years lining up interviews with people who had first-hand experience of Deng. In the end he spoke to dozens, if not a hundred, of people who knew something about the man...As a result, his depiction of Deng is rich, balanced and colorful. Vogel portrays a Deng who is determined, resourceful, at times uncompromising and difficult, but always pragmatic...This is where the strength of Vogel's book lies. It is all about the grand historic view. And that is fitting: out of all of Deng's amazing qualities, it is his grasp of a broad perspective and his keen sense of history that enabled him to achieve what so many had deemed impossible. -- Chow Chung-yan * South China Morning Post *If you're going to read one book about modern China in the period after Mao, then this is the book you should read. Though the book is framed around the rise of Deng Xiaoping and his reforms that transformed China into an economic powerhouse, Ezra Vogel's compelling biography examines how China went from being a desperately poor country to certainly one of the two most important countries in the world today. -- Bill Gates * Gates Notes *From arguably the most important scholar of East Asia, this is an important book on the force behind China's transformation in the late twentieth century, whose full fruits are visible only today. Deng ordered the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown, but he was also the person most responsible for modernizing China and opening it to trade with the West. Again and again he survived threatening challenges in the Chinese political bureaucracy, to emerge at the top in the late 1970s. His role in subverting Chinese orthodoxy from the inside is comparable to that of Gorbachev with respect to the Soviet Union--and he deserves sustained attention such as this landmark book offers. -- Anis Shivani * Huffington Post *Not just a definitive biography of a world-class leader, but also the most authoritative and riveting account of the secretly contrived U.S.-Chinese strategic accommodation of 1978 and of how that in turn facilitated China's domestic transformation. -- Zbigniew BrzezinskiThis is an impressive and important biography of one of the most important men of the twentieth century. Deng Xiaoping transformed China economically, politically, and socially. One of the most significant achievements for his and my country was the establishment of diplomatic relations between us. The book provides an excellent account of this historic event. -- President Jimmy CarterVogel offers a nuanced portrait of China's great reform leader Deng Xiaoping and a shrewd analysis of the political maneuvers by which he made such a large mark on history. By entering deeply into Deng's vision for China, Vogel shows how the person who forged the world's most successful example of modernizing authoritarianism understood how such a system could work. And he shows how a major leader can steer a huge country in a new historical direction. A terrific accomplishment. -- Andrew J. Nathan, Columbia UniversityA multilayered study of change and adaptability. At the core is one man's response to the dangers of a complex revolution. Around him is the transformation of the largest political entity in history from rural disarray and helplessness to an industrial and manufacturing giant. In between are ambitious and bewildered people in search of leadership. Vogel has made Deng Xiaoping's vision convincing, the Chinese maze comprehensible, and even the bit actors come alive. -- Wang Gungwu, National University of SingaporeDeng Xiaoping's skill, vision, and courage in overcoming seemingly insuperable obstacles and guiding China onto the path of sustained economic development rank him with the great leaders of history. And yet, too little is known about the life and career of this extraordinary man. In this superbly researched and highly readable biography, Vogel has definitively filled this void. This fascinating book provides a host of insights into the factors that enabled Deng to triumph over repeated setbacks and lay the basis for China to regain the wealth and power that has eluded it for two centuries. -- J. Stapleton Roy, former U.S. Ambassador to ChinaDeng could be tough, but he was direct and engaged. He was a person we could do business with, and I liked him a lot. He played an extraordinary role, bringing the world's largest nation into the modern world. We are fortunate that Vogel, one of our foremost China scholars, has now brought the man alive in this uniquely researched biography. -- Brent ScowcroftA thorough picking-over of Deng Xiaoping's record and accomplishments, setting him firmly as the linchpin linking an antiquated authoritative thinking to modern growth and acceleration...Vogel meticulously considers all facets of this complex leader for an elucidating--and quite hefty--study. * Kirkus Reviews *[An] impressive and exhaustively researched biography...Vogel reminds readers that it was under this pragmatic politician's watch that the party made three moves that helped it outlast so many other Leninist organizations. -- Jeffrey Wasserstrom * Miller-McCune.com *This intensely researched doorstop delivers a step-by-step political biography of the man who gets most of the credit for China's spectacular rise to an economic juggernaut. Vogel recounts how Deng (1904–1997), a leading figure from the 1950s on, was banished when his preference for practicality over class struggle angered Mao Zedong during the disastrous 1969–1975 Cultural Revolution. Returning to power after Mao's 1976 death, he eliminated the anti-intellectualism and chaotic policy swings that characterized Mao's rule while opening the nation to Western ideas. The result was China's emergence as the world's most dynamic economy, with a free market but still with a disturbing absence of political freedom (he gives a nuanced analysis of the Tiananmen Square massacres)...Scholars will value it. * Publishers Weekly *If you want to understand China today, you must understand Deng Xiaoping (1904–97)...Deng shared Mao's ambition to make China a strong nation under party leadership, but he cannily built an unassailable position within the party to take it in new directions. Vogel interviewed dozens of leaders and China experts, as well as Deng's family, did exhaustive documentary research, and mines the scholarly literature (a good deal of it by his former students) to analyze Deng's initial success in building China's economy and international position, frustration in the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, and ultimate legacy...Massive but fascinating, this is highly recommended for those with a serious interest in modern China. Indispensable in understanding Deng, what he accomplished, and where he fell short. -- Charles W. Hayford * Library Journal *In an authoritative biography of Deng, Harvard sociologist Ezra F. Vogel, a renowned specialist on China and Japan who rose to international prominence in 1979 with the publication of Japan as Number One: Lessons for America, has attempted the difficult task of providing a comprehensive look at the experiences and influences that shaped this remarkable individual. He has succeeded superbly...Vogel's book provides extensive insights into how Deng was able to use his experience, his network of associations among China's aging revolutionaries, and the force of his personality to direct China's course, all while allowing others to hold the top government and party titles...For those of us who as U.S. government officials participated in or monitored many of the developments in China and in the bilateral relationship Vogel describes, he has illuminated events in ways that would have been invaluable to us had we had such a clear picture at the time. The transformation of China that Deng set in motion is likely to confront the United States with its most significant foreign-policy challenge over the next several decades. We are fortunate indeed that Vogel has written this timely and highly informative biography of Deng Xiaoping, which provides a wealth of insights into one of history's great leaders -- J. Stapleton Roy * Wilson Quarterly *Deng Xiaoping is one of the most influential men in modern history and here his dramatic story, one intertwined with elite intrigues in the Chinese Communist Party, is recounted in detail by one of the most eminent scholars of Asia...Regarding the debate over whether Deng was more despot than reformer, Ezra Vogel emphasizes the successful consequences of his economic reforms, but does not shy from criticizing his failures. The portrait that emerges is of a visionary authoritarian who helped his nation overcome the self-inflicted wounds of Mao Zedong and achieve enormous economic advances. -- Jeff Kingston * Japan Times *This monumental book, not so much biography as political history, is overdue. -- Rowan Callick * The Australian *As one of the foremost scholars of modern China, Vogel is an appropriate authority to pen such a thorough account of Deng Xiaoping's tumultuous journey from political exile to paramount leader of China. A detailed study into Deng's dedication to the Chinese establishment of the People's Republic, to his reemergence as unrivaled decision-maker of the Chinese people, the book details how Deng's policies continue to shape the nation, and how it will most likely require a number of generations before scholars can fully appreciate his impact. In capturing the most turbulent period in the modern 20th century in this 928-page tome, Vogel contributes an important piece to the historiography of Chinese history. -- A. Cho * Choice *[A] masterful biography. -- Arun Maira * Indian Express *

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Book SynopsisThe gripping memoir of a Moroccan human rights and women’s rights activist.Table of Contents Author's Dedication Translators' Introduction Chronology Chapter 1. Derb, the Secret Prison: "Or the Narrative of Suffering" Chapter 2. Chapter 3. Chapter 4. Chapter 5. Chapter 6. Behind the Walls of Ghbila: The Trip to Meknes Prison Chapter 7. Chapter 8. Chapter 9. Diary of a Hunger Striker: "Imposed Violence" Chapter 10. A Night's Sojourn in Laalou Prison Chapter 11. Trial Day Chapter 12. The Inseparable Twosome Chapter 13. An Incredible Visit Chapter 14. "The Minaret Collapsed and They Hanged the Barber" Chapter 15. Season of Spring, Life, and Happiness Chapter 16. A Prisoner Gives Birth to a Free Person Chapter 17. Ilham: Despairing Screams, Suppressed Grief Chapter 18. Shards of Time in the Life of a Woman Prisoner Chapter 19. The Autumn of a Life without Spring Chapter 20. The Prison House of the Woman Jailer in Sidi Kacem Chapter 21. The Prison that Was a Refuge after the Isolation in Police Stations: Testimony of Widad Bouab Chapter 22. The Police Station, Torture, Prison, and Torturers: Testimony of Latifa Jbabdi Notes

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Book SynopsisFrom Superman and Batman to the Fantastic Four and the X-Men, these pop-culture juggernauts, with their "powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men," thrilled readers and audiences. The author shows how creators turned to science fiction to convey the reality of the paranormal they experienced in their lives.Trade Review"Intriguing." (Times Literary Supplement) "The message is that we need to step backwards from our culture to see these hidden patterns, and in this endeavor Kripal provides new maps of the secret world of superpowers. To access these deep strata of reality and to achieve a measure of self-realisation, we need to embrace this strangeness and not be frightened of it.... Kripal has a lively style and a deep love of (perhaps reverence for) his subject matter." (Fortean Times)

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Book SynopsisA fully illustrated study of how the US-led half of the Normandy invasion fleet was composed, commanded, and how it fought, from D-Day until the fall of Cherbourg.The D-Day landings and their aftermath were among the most complex and important naval operations in history. With the target beaches divided into two areas of responsibility one US-commanded, one British this armada launched a month-long operation to first support the landings, then to protect, supply, and support the troops ashore, as they fought to expand their toehold in occupied Europe.In this book, illustrated throughout with 3D diagrams, photos, maps and dramatic artwork, naval historian Brian Lane Herder explains how the US Navy-led Western Task Force was built, and outlines its operations off Normandy during June 1944. It covers this multinational fleet's organization, assembly, and training, as well as the intelligence and logistics picture, and explores its actions that were so crucial t

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Book SynopsisNow with a new afterword that surveys the “North African Spring” uprisings that roiled the region from 2011 to 2013, this is the most comprehensive history of North Africa to date, with accessible, in-depth chapters covering the pre-Islamic period throughTrade Review"North Africa’s story from antiquity onward, Mr. Naylor shows, is one of turbulence, borrowings, exchanges, competition, and cooperation across all manner of barriers, by no means only cultural. . . . [This is] a solid history of a region with whose conflicts we—not to mention the Sahrawis and their neighbors—are fated to contend with for at least a few years still." * Wall Street Journal *"Naylor elegantly leads the reader through the maze of events that have shaped the history of a vast region at the crossroads of civilizations. . . . North Africa is a valuable introduction for students and the general public of an understudied part of the world." * Middle East Journal *"[This book succeeds] in its primary task of ‘locating’ North Africa’s place in the curriculum, and I anticipate that it will become the primary textbook for coursework in this emerging field. The general reader will also be well served by turning to it first for an English-language survey. . . . The specialist of the region . . . will appreciate it when sorting out the complexity of North Africa’s long history, a history few have mastered as well in print as Naylor." * Journal of African History *Table of Contents List of Maps A Note to the Reader Preface to First Edition Preface to Revised Edition Introduction 1. Ancient North Africa and Its Expansive Civilizations 2. Rome and North Africa 3. Medieval North Africa: From the Arrival of Islam to the Berber Empires 4. The Almoravid and the Almohad Empires and Their Successor States 5. Turkish Ascendance and Moroccan Independence 6. European Colonialism in North Africa 7. The Decolonization of North Africa 8. Post-Colonial and Contemporary North Africa: Egypt, Libya, and Tunisia 9. Post-Colonial and Contemporary North Africa: Algeria, Morocco, and Western Sahara Conclusion. The Peril and Promise of North Africa Afterword. The North African Spring Notes Glossary Bibliography Index

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Book Synopsis''A masterly account of this first wicked century of the Roman Empire'' Sunday Times''Holland does not just tell the story of the reign of the Julio-Claudian family. He knits the history of ancient Rome into his narrative - its founding myths, the fall of the republic, the religious superstitions - with a skill so dextrous you don''t notice the stitching. Dynasty is both a formidable effort to compile what we can know about the ancient world and a sensational story'' Observer''A witty and skilful storyteller... He recounts with pleasure his racy tales of psychopathic cruelty, incest, paedophilia, matricide, fratricide, assassination and depravity'' William Dalrymple, New Statesman''A wonderful, surging narrative... [for] anyone interested in history, politics or human nature - and it has never been better told'' Mail on SundayTHE TOP TEN SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLERTrade ReviewHolland's masterly account of this first wicked century of the Roman empire is, at its heart, a political analysis . . . the story he tells strides onwards across the landscape of grief and horror without pause or stutter . . . Holland is unshockable as he proceeds with breezy, clear-eyed analysis from one degrading display of cruelty and paranoia to the next . . . It is down to his skill as a storyteller that there's no difficulty in imagining that it might all happen again tomorrow * Sunday Times *Deft and skilful . . . Among the many virtues of Tom Holland's terrific history is that he does not shrink from seeing the Roman emperors for what they were: 'the west's primal examples of tyranny' . . . Dynasty is both a formidable effort to compile what we can know about the ancient world and a sensational story * Observer *This is a wonderful, surging narrative - a brilliant and meticulous synthesis of the ancient sources . . . This is a story that should be read by anyone interested in history, politics or human nature - and it has never been better told * Mail on Sunday *This is history in which fact and fiction overlap, rigorously researched and lightened with dashes of humour . . . first-rate ancient history and a compulsively good read * Daily Mail *A swaggering history of the dynastic house that Julius Caesar built. Nothing entertains like excess and the weird cruelties, bloody intrigues and eye-popping depravities of emperors Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero are queasily fascinating * Sunday Express *A witty and skilful storyteller . . . He recounts with pleasure his racy tales of psychopathic cruelty, incest, paedophilia, matricide, fratricide, assassination and depravity * New Statesman *Brilliant, terrifying and compelling * Observer *A thrilling book by one of the country's best popular historians . . . genuinely breathtaking * History Today *Holland has crafted a history of early Rome that has all the gripping detail and narrative momentum of a novel... he gives the reader a startlingly visceral sense of the violence and brutality and wretched excess of ancient Rome -- Michiko Kakutani * New York Times *[A] dramatic, intrigue-ridden, blood-and-guts tale of Rome's first line of emperors -- Peter Jones * The Times *Dynasty, like its companion volume Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic, is a fine example of narrative historical writing. Yet you could also read it as something else entirely: a meditation on the enduring power and possibilities of storytelling -- Richard Miles * Financial Times *Holland writes with all the excitement and immediacy of the gossip-mongers of Rome . . . One senses that if Tom Holland were emperor for the day he would give the crowd not only the bread and circuses but a jolly good education too -- Daisy Dunn * Evening Standard *A richly panoramic picture of Rome in the first century AD -- Allan Massie * Literary Review *Holland's Tacitean vision of the dynasty of Augustus makes for a very compelling read * Times Literary Supplement *Holland is at the top of his game, blending deep scholarly skill with real literary talent -- Dan Jones * Evening Standard *Thrilling, thunderous prose, fully equal to that of the great days of Thermopylae and Salamis * Wall Street Journal *Holland is perhaps Britain's most engrossing historical storyteller. He has a rare gift of combining academic respectability with a great knack as a narrator * Catholic Herald *This is great material, and Holland does it justice with a chiseled prose style and an eye for the luminous detail.... Holland is a master of narrative history. On the strength of Dynasty, he deserves a laurel wreath * Washington Post *A vivid account of five Roman emperors, emphasizing their vices and vicious behavior with less attention to the vast empire, which continued to prosper despite them * Kirkus *Dynasty has Holland's usual novelistic ability to bring a narrative alive, together with his extraordinary command of ancient sources * New York Times Book Review *

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Book SynopsisFrom war with the British to the enslavement of Indians, Ivermee uncovers the dark history of France's doomed imperial project in South Asia.

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Book Synopsis The final instalment of N.A.M. Rodger''s definitive, authoritative trilogy on Britain''s naval historyAt the end of the French and Napoleonic wars, British sea-power was at its apogee. But by 1840, as one contemporary commentator put it, the Admiralty was full of intellects becalmed in the smoke of Trafalgar'. How the Royal Navy reformed and reinvigorated itself in the course of the nineteenth century is just one thread in this magnificent book, which refuses to accept standard assumptions and analyses.All the great actions are here, from Navarino in 1827 (won by a daringly disobedient Admiral Codrington) to Jutland, D-Day, the Battle of the Atlantic and the battles in the Pacific in 1944/45 in concert with the US Navy. The development and strategic significance of submarine and navy air forces is superbly described, as are the rapid evolution of ships (from classic Nelsonic type, to hybrid steam/sail ships, then armour-clad and the fully armoured Dreadnoughts and beyond) and weapons. The social history of officers and men and sometimes women always a key part of the author's work, is not neglected.Rodger sets all this in the essential context of politics and geo-strategy. The character and importance of leading admirals Beatty, Fisher, Cunningham is assessed, together with the roles of other less famous but no less consequential figures. Based on a lifetime's learning, it is the culmination of one of the most significant British historical works in recent decades.Naval specialists will find much that is new here, and will be invigorated by the originality of Rodger's judgements; but everyone who is interested in the one of the central threads in British history will find it rewarding.

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Book SynopsisStephen Greenblatt is Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University. He is the author of fifteen books, including The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, which won the National Book Award and a Pulitzer Prize, as well as the New York Times bestseller Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare and the classic university text Renaissance Self-Fashioning. A prize-winning author and celebrated scholar, he has been studying, thinking and writing about Renaissance literature for his entire working life.Trade ReviewSuperbly readable... An exciting story, and Greenblatt tells it with his customary clarity and verve -- Robert Douglas-Fairhurst * Daily Telegraph *Superb history ... this concise, learned and fluently written book tells a remarkable story -- Charles Nicholl * Observer *Dazzling * Guardian *In this outstandingly constructed assessment of the birth of philosophical modernity, renowned Shakespeare scholar Greenblatt deftly transports reader to the dawn of the Renaissance...Readers from across the humanities will find this enthralling account irresistible * Library Journal *More wonderfully illuminating Renaissance history from a master scholar and historian (starred review) * Kirkus Reviews *

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Book SynopsisThe first authorized copy of this mysterious, much-speculated-upon, one-of-a-kind, centuries-old puzzleTrade Review“For the first time, a complete reproduction [of] The Voynich Manuscript, has been published, featuring essays exploring what is known about the book and extra-wide margins so readers can record their responses to its beguiling, beautiful strangeness.”—Nina MacLaughlin, Boston Globe“For people who like a good historical mystery, this first authorized publication of the fifteenth- or sixteenth-century Voynich Manuscript will fascinate.”—Rebecca Onion, Slate“Handsome and well-produced. . . This facsimile and the accompanying series of essays give a clear sense of the current state of knowledge on the manuscript and reveal the findings of new research.”—H. R. Woud Huysen, Times Literary Supplement“The Voynich MS has inspired generations of enthusiasts dedicated to deciphering it. . . . This beautiful facsimile will make it available for many more people to become enticed and entranced by it.”—David V. Barrett, Fortean Times“The Voynich Manuscript, a volume edited by the library’s curator Raymond Clemens, revivifies this tantalising artefact. . . . Wide margins are deliberately provided for readers’ notes on their own ideas. ‘Bonne chance!,’ writes Clemens. I’ll second that.”—Andrew Robinson, Nature“Perhaps studying these pages in the hope of unlocking secrets is to miss the point. It’s almost as though the book exists in order to make the inquiry into its existence possible.”—Jamie Martin, London Review of Books“As handsome a new book as you could own. This medieval beauty has it all: fold-out sections, delicate illustrations of plants, astrological charts, what look to be alchemical recipes. . . . But the main thing about it—the thing that makes publishing it so quixotic—is that it’s a book you can’t actually read. Nobody can.”—Sam Leith, Prospect“Sumptuous facsimile reproduction. . . . Jennifer Rampling’s judiciously skeptical essay . . . is a careful deconstruction of over-excited theories.”—Kathryn Murphy, Apollo“This new book, reproducing the entire Voynich Manuscript, is a godsend. While the essays offer valid clues to the manuscript’s age and relation to late medieval science, the manuscript itself stubbornly refuses to yield its secrets.”—Roger S. Wieck, Department of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts, Morgan Library & Museum“A book worthy of its subject in every way. Clemens and his collaborators have done an extraordinary job teasing out some of the secrets and wonders of the enigmatic Voynich Manuscript in ways that will make this volume an invaluable resource for many years to come.”—Bruce Holsinger, author of A Burnable Book“Many hands have held Voynich’s now-eponymous book over the centuries . . . yet none of them have managed convincingly to solve its mysteries.”—Deborah Harkness, from the Introduction

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Book SynopsisThe greatest conflict of antiquity, the struggle for supremacy between Rome and Carthage.The struggle between Rome and Carthage in the Punic Wars was arguably the greatest and most desperate conflict of antiquity. The forces involved and the casualties suffered by both sides were far greater than in any wars fought before the modern era, while the eventual outcome had far-reaching consequences for the history of the Western World, namely the ascendancy of Rome. An epic of war and battle, this is also the story of famous generals and leaders: Hannibal, Fabius Maximus, Scipio Africanus, and his grandson Scipio Aemilianus, who would finally bring down the walls of Carthage.

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Book SynopsisThe battle to keep the nation fed during the Second World War was waged by an army of workers on the land and the resourcefulness of the housewives on the Kitchen Front. The rationing of food, clothing and other substances played a big part in making sure that everyone had a fair share of whatever was available.In this fascinating book, Katherine Knight looks at how experiences of rationing varied between rich and poor, town and country, and how ingenuous cooks often made a meal from poor ingredients. Charting the developments of the rationing programme throughout the war and afterwards, Spuds, Spam and Eating for Victory documents the use of substitutions for luxury ingredients not available, resulting in delicacies such as carrot jam and oatmeal sausages. The introduction of Spam in America in the forties led to this canned spiced pork and ham becoming an iconic symbol of the worse period of shortage in the twentieth century.Seventy years after the outbreak of the Second World War, this book listens to some of the people who were young during the conflict share their memories, both sad and funny, of what it was like to eat for Victory.

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