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Book SynopsisFor most of human history, states and regions were connected by long-distance commerce and war, yet they developed essentially separately. The century after 1750 marked a major shift. An Emerging Modern World, fourth in the six-volume series A History of the World, charts this transformative period outside the West.Trade ReviewErudite and expansive…An excellent resource for global historians. * Choice *The authors of this book all display not only the extraordinary range of erudition required to read, master, and summarize [world history] literature but a talent for synthesis and communication as well…The Harvard series in general and the volume under review in particular signal that world history has come of age. -- Patrick O’Brien * Journal of Modern History *

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Book SynopsisA “raw and honest” (Los Angeles Review of Books) memoir from the first Native American Poet Laureate of the United States.Trade Review"A saga about the survival of spirituality and creativity in the face of generations of racism, dispossession, and familial dysfunction…Fantastic, terrible and beautiful." -- Rebecca Steinitz - Boston Globe"Stirring…In her harrowing and ultimately hopeful story, Harjo allows the reader to know her intimately, and we are enriched by her honesty." -- Ms."A must-read for her fans and a fascinating door into her world for those new to her work." -- Elizabeth Wilkinson - Minneapolis Star Tribune"Gritty and mystical…Reads like a sacred prayer." -- San Francisco Chronicle"Exquisite…A must-read for anyone who appreciates the healing power of literature." -- Southwest"Blunt, moving…[Affirms and acclaims] the artistic impulse." -- Smithsonian"Dances into hard truth. [Harjo’s] fine crafting of words and deft braiding of mythic visions throughout the text almost—almost—draw you past the truth of her personal story. That story is harsh and scary, mystical and loving, and, ultimately, triumphant and healing." -- Indian Country"Joy Harjo has always been able to see with more than her eyes. Her writing is a testament to this gift. Her memoir honors her own journey as well as those who fell along the wayside. Her hero’s journey is a gift for all those struggling to make their way." -- Sandra Cisneros"Joy Harjo is a giant-hearted, gorgeous, and glorious gift to the world. Her belief in art, in spirit, is so powerful, it can’t help but spill over to us—lucky readers. Wildly passionate and honest as a hound, Crazy Brave invites us into a whole new way of seeing—deeper, less cluttered, and vastly more courageous than our own. It’s a book for people who want to re-fall in love with the world." -- Pam Houston

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Book SynopsisOne of the most profound philosophical problems is the nature of mind and its relationship to the body. A Brief Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind provides an introduction, written in clear language, to the various theories of the mind-body relationship, as well as a host of related philosophical discussions about mind and consciousness.The central theories, such as Cartesian Dualism, parallelism, epiphenomenalism, and supervenience among others, are presented in historical order. Their claims, their strengths and weaknesses, and how they ultimately relate to one another and to other philosophical questions are explored objectively, allowing readers to decide for themselves which theories are best.Trade Review“Neil Campbell’s latest book is a terrific introduction to contemporary philosophical approaches to the mind-body problem. He clearly maps out the landscape of ontological theories and concisely explains the central arguments for and against each position. Campbell goes out of his way to introduce core philosophical notions and techniques of general application, so that even readers with a limited background in philosophy can understand his explanations.” — Thomas W. Polger, University of Cincinnati “This book offers an exceptionally lucid survey of the central positions on the mind-body problem and the challenges each of them faces with respect to the problems of mental causation, phenomenal consciousness, and intentional content. Complex concepts and issues are explained in a concise and incisive way without sacrifice of accuracy, and conflicting positions are given evenly sympathetic treatment. All in all this is an excellent introduction to the philosophy of mind.” — Ausonio Marras, University of Western Ontario“In this refreshingly non-polemical survey of the major theories of mind, Campbell manages to be rigorous without being overly technical. While moving swiftly through the topics, he also shows excellent judgment in knowing exactly when to pause to go into more detail. The philosophical terms are helpfully and carefully defined throughout, and there is always an example just where one is needed.” — Amy Kind, Claremont McKenna CollegeTable of ContentsPrefaceIntroductionChapter 1: DualismChapter 2: BehaviourismChapter 3: Type Identity TheoryChapter 4: FunctionalismChapter 5: Anomalous MonismChapter 6: Eliminative MaterialismChapter 7: SupervenienceChapter 8: Mental ContentChapter 9: The Problem of QualiaIndex

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Book SynopsisThis international bestseller plumbs archives in the former Soviet bloc to reveal the actual, practical accomplishments of Communism around the world: terror, torture, famine, mass deportations, and massacres. The authors show how and why, wherever the ideology of Communism was established, it quickly led to crime, terror, and repression.Trade ReviewAn 800-page compendium of the crimes of Communist regimes worldwide, recorded and analyzed in ghastly detail by a team of scholars. The facts and figures, some of them well known, others newly confirmed in hitherto inaccessible archives, are irrefutable. The myth of the well-intentioned founders--the good czar Lenin betrayed by his evil heirs--has been laid to rest for good. No one will any longer be able to claim ignorance or uncertainty about the criminal nature of Communism, and those who had begun to forget will be forced to remember anew. -- Tony Judt * New York Times *When The Black Book of Communism appeared in Europe in 1997 detailing communism's crimes, it created a furor. Scrupulously documented and soberly written by several historians, it is a masterful work. It is, in fact, a reckoning. With this translation by Jonathan Murphy and Mark Kramer, English-language readers may now see for themselves what all the commotion was about. -- Jacob Heilbrunn * Wall Street Journal *The Black Book of Communism, which is finally appearing in English, is an extraordinary and almost unspeakably chilling book. It is a major study that deepens our understanding of communism and poses a philosophical and political challenge that cannot be ignored. The book's central argument, copiously documented and repeated in upwards of a dozen different essays, is that the history of communism should be read above all as the history of an all-out assault on society by a series of conspiratorial cliques led by cruel dictators (Lenin, Stalin, Mao Zedong, Kim II Sung, Pol Pot, and dozens of imitators) who were murderously drunk on their own ideology and power...Courtois and his collaborators have performed a signal service by gathering in one volume a global history of communism's crimes from the Soviet Union to China, from the satellite countries of Eastern-Europe to Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and North Korea, and to a lesser degree in Latin America and Africa...The Black Book is enormously impressive and utterly convincing. -- Michael Scammell * New Republic *To the extent that the book has a literary style, it is that of the recording angel; this is the body count of a colossal, wholly failed social, economic, political and psychological experiment. It is a criminal indictment, and it rightly reads like one. -- Alan Ryan * New York Times Book Review *Most sensible adults are aware of communism's human toll in the Soviet Union and elsewhere--the forced starvations in the Ukraine, the Great Purge of the 1930s, the Gulag, the insanity of China's Great Cultural Revolution, Pol Pot's murder of one in every seven Cambodians, Fidel Castro's firing squads and prisons. All these horrors are now brought together in what the French scholar Martin Mali, in his foreword, calls a 'balance sheet of our current knowledge of communism's human costs, archivally based where possible and elsewhere drawing on the best available secondary evidence'...The book is all the more damning because each of the contributing scholars is either a former communist or close fellow traveler...That The Black Book infuriated the French left is a sure mark of its intrinsic worth. -- Joseph C. Goulden * Washington Times *The Black Book is a groundbreaking effort by a group of French scholars to document the human costs of Communism in the 20th century. Its publication caused a sensation in France when it was first released in 1997, but Americans were not able to see for themselves what the furor was all about until October 1999, when Harvard University Press finally released an English translation. It was worth the wait. Taking advantage of many newly available archives in former Communist states, the authors (many of them former Communists themselves) have meticulously recorded the crimes, terror and repression inflicted by Communist regimes across the world. It is a powerful work. -- Mark A. Thiessen * National Review *The authors of The Black Book of Communism are part of a welcome change in the moral-philosophical landscape in Paris, and one hopes elsewhere, as a result of which liberal and left-of-center intellectuals, scholars and politicians judge the crimes of communist regimes with the same severity they've applied to those of Nazism and fascism. -- Jeffrey Herf * Washington Post Book World *Arguing with the passion of former believers, [the contributors] charge that communism was a criminal system. They all make the case well. * Foreign Affairs *Now The Black Book of Communism is available in English, thanks to a stellar edition from Harvard University Press that appeared late last year, with an excellent introduction by Martin Malia, professor of history at the University of California, Berkeley. -- Stephen Goode * Insight *This black book has been a best seller across Europe. It details all the misery inflicted by Communism throughout the world: 25 million dead in the Soviet Union, 65 million in China, 1.7 million in Cambodia...Not a pleasant book, a necessary one. -- David Sexton * Evening Standard *A sober and balanced piece of work. [The Black Book of Communism] is particularly good on the origins of the Soviet police state under Lenin and on Stalin's Great Terror. It should be read by anyone who still has illusions that the Bolshevik revolution was a good thing--and anyone who believes that something worthwhile was lost when the Berliners destroyed the Wall 10 years ago. -- Paul Anderson * The Tribune *A serious, scholarly history of Communist crimes in the Soviet Union, Eastern and Western Europe, China, North Korea, Cambodia, Vietnam, Africa, and Latin America...The Black Book does indeed surpass many of its predecessors in conveying the grand scale of the Communist tragedy, thanks to its authors' extensive use of the newly opened archives of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. -- Anne Applebaum * Weekly Standard *A generally even-toned and informative book, and one that will serve as a healthy dose of medication for those still afflicted by a wish to treat the Bolshevik revolution as a mistake, however monumental, or something that 'had to happen'...The Black Book's guiding purpose is to cut through the dense tissue of apologetics that has been deployed in the communist interest, both those devised in the thick of repression and those added after the collapse. -- Ben Webb * New Times *The Black Book of Communism] consists of scholarly yet readable (and superbly translated) essays, some based on recently opened Soviet archives, and covers the communist revolutions in Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America, including Cuba...The Black Book [is] a most important volume of contemporary history produced by a group of French Sovietologists...On finishing this magnificent volume, it is impossible not to see that in three-quarters of a century Soviet communism had left nothing behind except death and destruction. -- Arnold Beichman * Weekend Post *The heart of the Black Book is a compilation and description--in mesmerizing objective prose-- of the slaughters visited upon populations around the world by communist dictators in the 20th century...The Black Book is an elegantly simple and valuable record of a time many would like to forget--but will have to deal with. -- John Omicinski * Scottsdale Tribune *I can't think of any book that would be more important for Americans to read. If you are going to read only one book this year, make it The Black Book of Communism. This is an 800-page history of the terror, repression and killings of communism stretching from the Bolshevik Revolution to the present. Written by scholars who are ex-communists or former fellow travelers, the book establishes beyond doubt that communism is the greatest crime against humanity in the 20th century. -- Charley Reese * The Sentine *An important scholarly achievement of exhaustive breadth based on new archival material from the Stalin era...This impressive and important book is well worth the price. -- Zachary T. Irwin * Library Journal *A unique attempt by French historians--as important in its way as the works of Solzhenitsyn--to chronicle the crimes of communism wherever it has attained power in the world. Not the least remarkable thing about this book is that this is the first time such a study has been made. For the cumulative toll of victims of communist rule, estimated by the authors at between 85 and 100 million, dwarfs even the crimes of the Nazis...A devastating and important book, already hailed in Europe, and the more harrowing for its sobriety. * Kirkus Reviews *In France, this damning reckoning of communism's worldwide legacy was a bestseller that sparked passionate arguments among intellectuals of the Left. Courtois, along with the other distinguished French and European contributors, delivers a fact-based, mostly Russia-centered wallop that will be hard to refute: town burnings, mass deportations, property seizures, family separations, mass murders, planned famines--all chillingly documented from conception to implementation. * Publishers Weekly *In the end, the Black Book's body counts--necessary as they are--are less important than the soul-destroying connections between Marxist idealism and the violence committed in its name. -- Lawrence Osborne * salon.com *The publishing sensation in France this winter (1999) has been an austere academic tome, Le Livre Noir du Communisme, detailing Communism's crimes from Russia in 1917 to Afghanistan in 1989...[The Black Book of Communism] gives a balance sheet of our present knowledge of Communism's human costs, archivally based where possible, and otherwise drawing on the best secondary works, and with due allowance for the difficulties of quantification. Yet austere though this inventory is, its cumulative impact is overwhelming. At the same time, the book advances a number of important analytical points. -- Martin Malia * Times Literary Supplement *Table of Contents* Foreword: The Uses of Atrocity Martin Malia * Introduction: The Crimes of Communism Stephane Courtois I. A State against Its People: Violence, Repression, and Terror in the Soviet Union Nicolas Werth * Paradoxes and Misunderstandings Surrounding the October Revolution * The Iron Fist of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat * The Red Terror * The Dirty War * From Tambov to the Great Famine * From the Truce to the Great Turning Point * Forced Collectivization and Dekulakization * The Great Famine * Socially Foreign Elements and the Cycles of Repression * The Great Terror (1936 -1938) * The Empire of the Camps * The Other Side of Victory * Apogee and Crisis in the Gulag System * The Last Conspiracy * The Exit from Stalinism Conclusion II. Word Revolution, Civil War, and Terror Stephane Courtois, Jean-Louis Panne, and Remi Kauffer * The Comintern in Action Stephane Courtois and Jean-Louis Panne * The Shadow of the NKVD in Spain Stephane Courtois and Jean-Louis Panne * Communism and Terrorism Remi Kauffer III. The Other Europe: Victim of Communism Andrzej Paczkowski and Karel Bartoek * Poland, the "Enemy Nation" Andrzej Paczkowski * Central and Southeastern Europe Karel Bartoek IV. Communism in Asia: Between Reeducation and Massacre Jean-Louis Margolin and Pierre Rigoulot Introduction * China: A Long March into Night Jean-Louis Margolin * Crimes, Terror, and Secrecy in North Korea Pierre Rigoulot * Vietnam and Laos: The Impasse of War Communism Jean-Louis Margolin * Cambodia: The Country of Disconcerting Crimes Jean-Louis Margolin Conclusion Select Bibliography for Asia V. The Third World Pascal Fontaine, Yves Santamaria, and Sylvain Boulouque * Communism in Latin America Pascal Fontaine * Afrocommunism: Ethiopia, Angola, and Mozambique Yves Santamaria * Communism in Afghanistan Sylvain Boulouque Conclusion: Why? Stephane Courtois * Notes * Index * About the Authors

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Book SynopsisOld English Lives of Saints, a series composed in the 990s by the Benedictine monk Aelfric, portrays an array of saints—including virgin martyrs, kings, soldiers, and bishops—whose examples modeled courageous faith, self-sacrifice, and individual and collective resistance at a turbulent time when England was under severe Viking attack.Trade ReviewBoth the first complete edition and the first complete translation of the Lives of Saints in 120 years…This is a stellar work in all respects…The translation is exceptionally elegant, accurate, and idiomatic…The volumes are not only well suited to classroom use but indeed constitute the new and definitive leading edition. -- P. S. Langeslag * Anglia *Filled with deep learning, energy, and good sense. Although the editors wear their learning lightly, these three volumes are the product of extensive knowledge and erudition. Scholars of all levels, as well as generalists interested in the early medieval past, will find much to admire in this accomplished and elegant edition. -- Stacy S. Klein * Medieval Review *

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Book SynopsisIn 1739 Bordeaux’s Royal Academy of Sciences held an essay contest seeking answers to a pressing question: What was the cause of Africans’ black skin? Published here for the first time and translated into English, these early documents of scientific racism lay bare the Enlightenment origins of the phantom of racial hierarchy.Trade ReviewAn invaluable historical example of the creation of a scientific conception of race that is unlikely to disappear anytime soon. * Washington Post *Curran and Gates have done admirable work…There is an elegant preface [and] a thorough contextual introduction…As soon as one starts to read the essays collected in this book, one cannot avoid the impression that one has entered an alien intellectual world. It seems more medieval than modern. -- John Samuel Harpham * Chronicle of Higher Education *A book worth reading and contemplating to understand the genesis of our current racial and indeed racist society, with its intersectional forms of minoritization, exclusion, exploitation, and violence…Reading this book does more than reveal ‘the master’s tools.’ Thankfully, it offers us a chance to come together in shared knowledge and, if we so choose, in a shared mission: to break the chains of an abominable history and continue paving the way to a better future. -- Christy Pichichero * Public Books *The sixteen essays submitted for the essay prize remained, untouched, in the Bordeaux archives. They have now been recovered, translated, contextualized and published with a thoughtful and informative introduction by Henry Louis Gates and Andrew Curran, who discuss the city, the academy and ways of reading the range of bizarre explanations offered for black skin and hair…Putting together the Bordeaux texts, Gates and Curran argue, helps us to understand the emergence of the concept of race. -- Catherine Hall * London Review of Books *A fascinating look into the eighteenth-century invention of the concept of race. * Foreword Reviews *The essays, the various editorial materials, and the excellent notes make this collection of great use to any scholar interested in this topic. Clearly presented with both rigor and sensitivity, this collection would also be a welcome addition to undergraduate or graduate classes. -- Mary McAlpin * Early American Literature *Insightful and instructive…The nineteen essays edited by Gates and Curran remind us that eighteenth-century Europeans extracted multiple messages from nature, which has no voice of its own. The legacy of the Enlightenment includes ‘scientific’ arguments about inferiority based on differences in race, sex, and more, as well as unfulfilled aspirations for equality and humanity. -- Jeffrey Merrick * New Perspectives on the Eighteenth Century *The roots of the false science behind race and the spread of virulent racism run in parallel. The essays collected in Who’s Black and Why? show that race is a hierarchical form of classification…[The book] has enhanced my appreciation for the tragic absurdity of racial hierarchies. -- Darryl Lorenzo Wellington * Santa Fe Reporter *An important collection of documents on scientific racism. * Kirkus Reviews *Eye-opening…A fascinating, if disturbing, window onto the origins of racism. * Publishers Weekly *In 1741 the Royal Academy of Bordeaux (a city of slave-trading wealth) sought the essence of human Blackness: in the climate, in the blood, in the bile, in the semen, in Divine Providence and the curse of Ham, in the size of the pores, or in ‘tubes’ in the skin. Now, after some 300 years of frustrating searches, definitive answers still elude us. Who’s Black and Why? reveals how prestigious natural scientists once sought physical explanations, in vain, for a social identity that continues to carry enormous significance to this day. -- Nell Irvin Painter, author of The History of White PeopleThe eighteenth-century essays published for the first time in Who’s Black and Why? contain a world of ideas—theories, inventions, and fantasies—about what blackness is, and what it means. To read them is to witness European intellectuals, in the age of the Atlantic slave trade, struggling, one after another, to justify atrocity. -- Jill Lepore, author of These TruthsAn indispensable book for anyone who is interested in the origins of racism. In this essential volume, Gates and Curran reveal how science itself played a major role in the construction of race during the eighteenth century. -- David Diop, author of the Booker Prize–winning At Night All Blood Is BlackThere is nothing inevitable about modern understandings of race. Gates and Curran have given us unprecedented access to forgotten eighteenth-century conversations that established a moral and intellectual basis for enslaving Black people. This extraordinary book reveals how Europeans learned to think about groups of people as profoundly different from each other simply based on their ancestry. It also provides an important lesson for those who study human variation in our own time. To what extent are we vulnerable to the same intellectual traps? -- David Reich, author of Who We Are and How We Got HereThe essays translated—and brilliantly contextualized—in this book provide a window into how European thinkers in the eighteenth century struggled with the legacy of religious ideas about human difference as they began to shape a new scientific understanding of race. They give us a fascinating insight into the early stages of the Enlightenment, reminding us that, whatever we owe to this period, we live now in a radically different intellectual world. -- Kwame Anthony Appiah, author of The Lies That BindIn Who’s Black and Why? Henry Louis Gates and Andrew Curran do the work of archival historians, and to a very available end: making us understand—through documents at times appalling, at times appallingly comic—a subject all too often hived off to abstractions, that is, how we construct a racial group, and how we come to treat as truths what we know to be inventions. An invaluable historical study, with all too many applications today. -- Adam Gopnik, author of A Thousand Small SanitiesWho’s Black and Why? is essential reading for all who want to undo and repair the harm caused by the entanglement of notions of racial difference and the injustices such differences have been used to sustain. -- Evelynn Hammonds, author of The Nature of Difference

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Book SynopsisTo those who claim we are now living in a totalitarian, fascist, Hindu Rashtra, one must ask: What kind of a Hindu Rashtra is this where a billion-strong Hindus have been, through our parliament, through our courts, our education system, and our constitution, reduced to not just second-class but, rather, eighth-class citizens? What kind of Hindu Rashtra is this where Ram Navami, Hanuman Jayanti, Durga pooja processions, and even Garba celebrations, are attacked and stoned with impunity? What kind of Hindu Rashtra is this where a sitting Prime minister says minorities have the first right to resources? What kind of Hindu Rashtra is this where Hindus are forced to be refugees in their own land, where one can settle 40,000 Rohingya Muslims but not 700,000 Kashmiri Hindus

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Book SynopsisWith the Russian annexation of Crimea in March 2014 - 160 years after the Crimean War the peninsula has come to the geopolitical fore once more on the global stage. This book provides a comprehensive history of the region that until now has been missing, one that stretches from ancient times through to the present and which explores various aspects and inhabitants through the ages. Kerstin S. Jobst examines the complex history of the multi-ethnic and pluri-religious Crimea, and not only from a political perspective. Jobst deals with the manifold cultural and historical interdependencies that are central to the territory. The book presents myths and legends about the Crimea, as well as the various peoples for whom the Crimea was a settlement and transit area and who shaped the fate of the peninsula. These included Greek colonists, Eurasian nomads, Crimean Tatars, and others. A History of Crimea shows the importance of Crimea as a place of early Christianity, but also as a contac

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Book SynopsisTravis Zadeh revives the work of the thirteenth-century Persian scholar Qazwīnī, whose Wonders and Rarities was for centuries one of the most influential natural histories in the world. Inviting us to embrace anew Qazwīnī’s rationalized study of nature and magic, Zadeh dramatically revises the place of wonder in the history of Islamic thought.Trade ReviewAs Zadeh concludes, reformers and modernists have closed the rich and varied archive revealed in Wonders and Rarities…In this beautifully written and engaging text, Zadeh takes his readers back to the world of surprise and enchantment that preceded this closure. -- Malise Ruthven * Financial Times *The wonders and curiosities of the Islamic imagination await discovery by a new generation of readers in this superb and very enjoyable book by Travis Zadeh. -- Orhan Pamuk, winner of the Nobel Prize in LiteratureLike al-Qazwīnī himself, Travis Zadeh has written a deliciously baggy tome, full of delights and diversions in its tour of the cosmic horizons. This is a book to get lost in, whether one wants to or not. Zadeh describes the ʿAjaʾib al-Makhlūqāt as containing a ‘world within a book.’ In his own Wonders and Rarities, he has managed something similar himself. -- Nile Green * Los Angeles Review of Books *This book about a book, like the book it describes, is a rare and marvelous thing…In his passionate and erudite mission to restore Qazwini to centre stage, [Zadeh] has given readers a book filled with its own wonder and marvels. Like his hero, he well understands the most important thing: ‘What matters is a good story.’ -- Justin Marozzi * The Spectator *Wonders and Rarities has been studied by art historians in particular, but Travis Zadeh sets it in the context of wider Islamic thought…Indeed, he faces the mammoth task of mastering the same range of disciplines as Qazwini himself, from alchemy to botany, philosophy, theology and zoology. These feats are themselves worthy of wonder. -- Helen Pfeifer * London Review of Books *A study of the wondrous, marvelous, and strange in the Islamicate context…This book contributes to our understanding of an intellectually vibrant world full of wondrous anecdotes, magic, science, and poetry. * Reading Religion *A remarkable account of how a single text captivated readers for centuries, across the boundaries of language, religion, culture, and politics. Travis Zadeh’s engrossing study uncovers, with great erudition, the genesis and many afterlives of an extraordinary book, illuminating its continued power to inspire and amaze readers in our present day. -- Richard Ovenden, author of Burning the Books: A History of the Deliberate Destruction of KnowledgeA wide-ranging and enchanting study…Zadeh has traced the history of al-Qazwini’s books in the centuries after their author’s death, their abbreviations, expansions, imitations and glorious illustrations. -- Robert Irwin * Literary Review *A magnificent and essential book. Zadeh deftly illuminates centuries of occult and natural history, restoring Qazwīnī's place in this vast world of thought. The result is an astonishing work of Islamic intellectual and cultural history, one that delves deeply into the intricacies and the pleasures of wonder without the prism of orientalism. -- Rana Safvi, author of Shahjahanabad: The Living City of Old DelhiBeautifully written and deeply researched, this book explores the religious and intellectual importance of wonder in Islamic civilization through the study of a classic text. A must-read! -- Jamal J. Elias, author of Aisha’s Cushion: Religious Art, Perception, and Practice in Islam

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Book SynopsisPass down the powerful teachings of African oral tradition by adding this luxe illustrated volume of over 50 cultural folktales to your home library.In this captivating collection of folklore from African culture, discover the stories that have been passed down through generations and continue to teach valuable lessons today through their vibrant, illustrative language. With over 50 folktales, Roots and Legends celebrates the richness of African customs and life, and champions the importance of oral tradition, a practice that rose up through the dark times of slavery and oppression.Thoughtfully curated and richly illustrated, Roots and Legends features the wonder and educational lessons of cultural stories and figures such as: Why Spiders Are Always Found in the Corners of Ceilings How the Tortoise Got Its Shell Why the Sun and the Moon Live in the Sky How Mr. Lion Lost His Wool Brother Bear’s Big House Brer Rabbit and the Gold Mine Morning Sunrise Diddy-Wah-Diddy Uncle Monday A Ghost Story About an Aunt Farmer Mybrow and the Fairies And more! Divided into four sections (Why Things Are the Way They Are; Morals Taught through Animals Tales; Bearing Witness; and People with Unusual Powers) covering the spiritual nature of animals, people, the land and its sometimes spooky inhabitants, and more, each page is filled with timeless tales of heroes, tricksters, and everyday wisdom, and invites you to immerse yourself in the depth and beauty of African folklore.Featuring historic stories with a modern editorial review, this deluxe collectible edition includes original illustrations and an embellished, giftable package. A perfect choice for families interested in passing down African heritage through storytelling traditions, Roots and Legends will enchant readers of all ages through its beautifully illustrated and accessible collection of folklore.

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Book SynopsisToday John Hancock is known for his signature, but during the revolutionary era, he was famed for his pragmatic statesmanship. Brooke Barbier explores Hancock’s position as a revolutionary who nonetheless understood the value of compromise. By shunning political extremes, Hancock became hugely influential in the infant United States.Trade ReviewA concise and highly readable biography…[Hancock’s] legacy is very much worth our remembering. -- William Anthony Hay * Wall Street Journal *[An] approachable biography…American history buffs will enjoy the immersive portrait of Boston’s Revolutionary era. * Publishers Weekly *King Hancock is a vastly enjoyable work of popular history that wears its impressive scholarship lightly. It deftly explains the wider forces that unraveled the colonists’ close bonds with the mother country… The book also features an almost tactile account of what it was like to live in Boston in the eighteenth century. -- Marc M. Arkin * New Criterion *A terrific book. Barbier’s meticulous research sheds light on how one of the wealthiest men of his time made himself into a man of the people—a politician whose genuine capacity for sensing the popular mood commanded fierce loyalty, even as he clashed with both Loyalists and radical Patriots. John Hancock was an important figure, and this biography helps restore him to his proper place. -- Robert J. Allison, author of The American Revolution: A Very Short IntroductionBarbier has written a fine biography, carefully guiding readers through Hancock’s life, his political career, and the world around him. In our politically polarized times, this founding father’s legacy of political moderation is sure to resonate. -- Benjamin L. Carp, author of The Great New York Fire of 1776: A Lost Story of the American RevolutionIn this lively and insightful biography, Barbier illuminates John Hancock’s mastery of popular politics in an age of revolution. Drawing on a rich and profound knowledge of eighteenth-century Boston, she recovers the social world of a leader whose skills extended far beyond his celebrated penmanship. -- Alan Taylor, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of American Revolutions: A Continental History, 1750–1804An exuberant biography, well told and spirited. As we follow John Hancock through the turmoil that led to the Revolution, we see a man guided more by a desire to charm, entertain, and curry favor with both elites and ordinary people than by a rigid commitment to a specific politics or ideology. In Barbier’s hands Hancock’s life unfolds as dramatic theater. -- Sharon V. Salinger, author of Taverns and Drinking in Early AmericaHancock’s success might seem inevitable given his resources, his canny political sensibility, and just plain good fortune. Yet, as Ms. Barbier suggests, biography and history are contingent. What looks inescapable did not seem so to those who struggled to create a new country. -- Carl Rollyson * New York Sun *

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Book SynopsisThe Forest in modernist artThe fascination of the North is enduring: vast, impenetrable coniferous forests on the edge of the Arctic polar region, white summer nights, the long darkness of snowy winters and the famous Northern Lights exert a magical attraction. The Fondation Beyeler is dedicating an exhibition to this global phenomenon with landscape paintings from the late 19th and early 20th centuries from Scandinavia, Finland and Canada. In addition to works by famous painters such as Edvard Munch, Akseli Gallen-Kallela and Hilma af Klint, it also features paintings by artists who are highly respected in their home countries, but whounjustlyhave been virtually unknown in Central Europe until now. The Nordic pictorial worlds of Harald Sohlberg, Gustaf Fjæstad, Emily Carr, Tom Thomson and Prince Eugen of Sweden are finally being presented to a wide audience. Other artists represented in the exhibition and catalogue are Ivan Shishkin, Anna Boberg, Helmi Biese, Lawren S. Harris and J. E. H. Macdonald.

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Book SynopsisOnce sidelined from public memory, World War II is now a historical touchstone in China. Rana Mitter links reassessment of the war to China’s rising nationalism. At home, Chinese use the war to shape conflicted identities; abroad the war with Japan is now treated as a Chinese victory, a founding myth for a people destined to shape the global order.Trade ReviewOne of Britain’s foremost historians of modern China…A detailed and fascinating account of how the Chinese leadership’s strategy has evolved across eras—and how its recent overtures to regional and international audiences have corresponded to shifts in domestic education and internal propaganda about World War II…China’s Good War is at its most interesting when probing Beijing’s motives for undertaking such an ambitious retooling of its past in the first place. -- Howard W. French * Wall Street Journal *Excellent…[By] one of the world’s leading Sinologists…Allow[s] the reader—and the next US administration—to prepare for what China may do next. -- James Kynge * Financial Times *A timely insight into how memories and ideas about the second world war play a hugely important role in conceptualizations about the past and the present in contemporary China. -- Peter Frankopan * The Spectator *The range of evidence that Mitter marshals is impressive. The argument he makes about war, memory, and the international order is…original. * The Economist *Fascinating…An excellent guide to Chinese historiography…Mitter has written an important book that should serve to counter some of the cruder ways in which China is being misrepresented in the United States. -- Michael Burleigh * Literary Review *Illuminates the fraught and complex manner in which historical memory functions in modern China. -- Jonathan Chatwin * Los Angeles Review of Books *Insightful…Mitter opens a window into the legacy of China’s experience of World War II, showing how historical memory lives on in the present and contributes to the constant evolution of Chinese nationalism. In this deft, textured work of intellectual history, he introduces readers to the scholars, filmmakers, and propagandists who have sought to redefine China’s experience of the war…Yet Mitter does not shy away from exposing some of the political fictions that the CCP imposes on China’s past—to the detriment of its attempt to craft a persuasive narrative about China’s future. -- Jessica Chen Weiss * Foreign Affairs *Mitter’s most penetrating observations relate to how ordinary people have used contested memories of China’s good war to implicitly critique the Communist Party’s attacks on Chinese people…Shows how conversations about one proud part of China’s history are in fact conversations about more recent traumas. -- Jeremy Brown * Times Literary Supplement *A fascinating read that examines China’s growing nationalism with a longer lens than most. -- Alec Ash * The Wire China *Explains how Beijing once underplayed the war, but it has now become a keystone of its claims to legitimacy and to regional hegemony. -- James Palmer * Foreign Policy *Mitter chronicles the changing tides of official wartime narrative in China…China’s Good War is clear that national narratives are rarely based on historical scholarship, but rather on external politics. -- Paul French * South China Morning Post *An understanding of China today requires a grasp of its history through its own eyes, including the unfolding national narrative on the Second World War. Mitter confirms his status as one of the world’s leading sinologists in this lucid work as he explores fresh intellectual terrain, awakening us to China’s radically different perspectives on critical wartime events. This book will unsettle much received wisdom in the West on the war whose outcome determined much of the current global order. -- Kevin Rudd, former Prime Minister of Australia and President of the Asia Society Policy InstituteRana Mitter has been researching and teaching about China’s Second World War for well over two decades now…[He] writes extremely well, and the book is a pleasure to read…A good place to start for those who wish to better understand 21st-century China. -- Peter Gries * China Quarterly *A brilliant and profoundly researched work. Mitter demonstrates that alone among major combatant nations, China’s official historical narrative of World War II has undergone radical swings not just on the basic facts, but also on how memory serves (or not) to validate China’s governments. He provides timely and nuanced insights into how war memory today is deployed by both the Chinese government and the Chinese people. -- Richard B. Frank, author of Tower of Skulls: A History of the Asia-Pacific WarA breathtaking study of the relationship between history, nationalism, and collective memory by a China eager to assert its new moral and international standing in the world. In a sweeping yet detailed chronicle of the ways in which China is refashioning a new wartime narrative, Mitter provides extraordinary insights into the inner workings of its rise as a global power. For anyone interested in understanding how Chinese leaders are laying the groundwork for their claim as guarantor of the international order, this brilliant book is an absolute must-read. -- Sheila Miyoshi Jager, author of Brothers at War: The Unending Conflict in KoreaWritten with the flair we have come to expect from esteemed China historian Rana Mitter, China’s Good War provides indispensable and timely context for the upsurge in Chinese nationalism now remaking Sino–foreign relations. -- Karl Gerth, author of Unending Capitalism: How Consumerism Negated China’s Communist RevolutionMitter shows movingly what Chinese people sing about and weep about when they turn their minds to the devastating contours of the Second World War. Equally at home in provincial museums, internet chat rooms, and China’s foreign ministry, he is a sure guide to China’s ongoing reassessment of the war and postwar. His brilliant account shows how nation has replaced class in the moral narrative China has constructed to frame its national project. -- Jay Winter, author of War beyond Words: Languages of Remembrance from the Great War to the PresentAs China grows more powerful, the meaning of the war is changing. Rana Mitter argues that China’s reassessment of the World War II years is central to its newfound confidence abroad and to mounting nationalism at home. * Hindustan Times *Shows that the history of wartime China has been largely shaped by just one of its outcomes: the ascendancy of the Chinese Communist Party and the creation of a state that depends heavily on a certain sort of history for its legitimacy. -- Antonia Finnane * Inside Story *So timely and valuable. -- John Darwin Van Fleet * Asian Review of Books *His informative analysis of China’s reinterpretations of World War II offers an insight for different audiences to acquaint with China’s domestic dynamics and international ambition…We all need to keep Mitter’s message in mind: China’s revisionist interpretation of World War II is shaping its new national identity and internationalism. -- Catherine Chang * Chinese Historical Studies *Will appeal to many in the general public, as well as to scholars of contemporary China and international relations. -- Norton Wheeler * China Information *The first full-length history of China’s changing memory of World War II and its impact on the construction of China’s domestic and international identity…Provides an important starting point for both popular interest in and future research on China’s emerging reconceptualization of World War II and its domestic and international implications. -- Edward A. McCord * Journal of Chinese Military History *A great starting point to get to know the alternative narratives taking hold in China’s revisionist efforts regarding the nation’s history. Readers will find the information Mitter provides crucial in navigating interactions with the increasingly nationalistic country. -- Jiarui Wu * Journal of Chinese Political Science *

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Book SynopsisTraversing 2,500 years of global history, Ulbe Bosma shows how sugar, once a luxury reserved for Eastern emperors, stoked a mania in the West, transforming diets and ecosystems, destroying and creating cultures, and shaping the history of bondage and freedom. A major source of calories only since 1900, sugar has suddenly revolutionized our world.Trade ReviewA tour de force of global history…Bosma has turned the humble sugar crystal into a mighty prism for understanding aspects of global history and the world in which we live. -- Dinyar Patel * Los Angeles Review of Books *The World of Sugar shows the globalized tangle of interests that capitalism creates among consumers, producers, investors, labor, national governments, and transnational organizations…Sugar offers a bitter reminder of the enduring tensions between the complexity of national interests and the interests of capital. -- Bronwen Everill * Foreign Policy *One of the most accomplished longue durée case studies in the history of capitalism that we have, concerned not just with trade and consumption but with production also. At every turn it subverts both critiques and celebrations of capitalism, and our understanding of much else besides. It is an extraordinary achievement. -- David Edgerton * Literary Review *Sugar’s societal dominance is a recent development…Its history is both a story of progress and a bittersweet tale of ‘exploitation, racism, obesity, and environmental destruction’…[An] authoritative, highly readable study—the first to be truly global. -- Andrew Robinson * Nature *Bosma lucidly depicts how a commodity that is challenging to cultivate and devoid of nutritional value was central to the development of European imperialism, transatlantic slavery, the Industrial Revolution, economic protectionism, and the postcolonial politics and environmental degradation of the Global South. Bosma’s wide-ranging accounting is full of eye-opening insights…This is a comprehensive and alarming look at how one commodity changed the world. * Publishers Weekly *Bosma revisits the technical innovations, economic arrangements, and pains of a world submitting to the joy and addictiveness of sugar. His insights into the present are all the more resounding. -- Julien Damon * L'Express *Bosma traces how sugar has fundamentally ‘changed how we feed ourselves’…The ubiquity of sugar, writes Bosma, tells us about progress but also reveals a darker story of human exploitation. -- Sudipta Datta * The Hindu *Takes you on a journey of discovery—the journey of sugar itself, which has gone from relative obscurity to becoming an indispensable part of modern diet, causing untold harm in the process. * BooksFirst *Covers the history of the sweet stuff, first produced in granulated form in the 6th century BC, but not a huge commodity until more than two millennia later. This is…a reckoning with sugar. -- Sophie Roell * Five Books *A comprehensive 2,500-year examination of sugar’s history and its profound impact on society and the environment. Ulbe Bosma traces sugar’s journey from a luxury good in ancient India to a ubiquitous ingredient in our diets today, underscoring its role in fostering health issues and environmental crises. Bosma highlights how sugar has altered cultures and shaped political policies, laying bare the significant risks this commonplace commodity poses. * Food Tank *Ulbe Bosma’s history of sugar is also a case study of global capitalism over the centuries, colonial wars, and the deadly slave trade that made the industry possible…An interesting account of how sugar seeped into the global digestive system. -- Cameron Woodhead and Steven Carroll * Sydney Morning Herald *An important new contribution to the literature on the history of sugar. Many of the shadows of sugar are dark, they spread over the entire world, and they are very, very, long. -- Robert Ackrill * H-Diplo *The world history of sugar and the world history of capitalism are tightly linked to one another. Ulbe Bosma, in this first truly global account of a most crucial commodity, takes us to the fields of Indian peasants, the countinghouses of Chinese merchants, the monopolizing efforts of New York industrialists, and the rebellions of enslaved sugar workers in Cuba to chart how something as mundane as sugar came to play a crucial role in the making of the world we inhabit today. Attentive to local specificities as much as to Earth-spanning connections, to culture and capital, power and poverty, this book is global history at its best. -- Sven Beckert, author of Empire of Cotton: A Global HistorySugar may play a unique role in the slow-motion tragedy that is the worldwide epidemic of obesity and diabetes. The World of Sugar is a remarkably researched, comprehensive, and indispensable book for everyone who wishes to understand how sugar and the sugar industry have shaped the world in which we live. -- Gary Taubes, author of The Case Against SugarHow is it that a chemical that has no nutritional value, that is inherently poisonous, that is responsible for morbidity and mortality, and that is breaking the health care budget of every developed and developing country is the seminal thread running through human history for the last 3,000 years? The World of Sugar narrates the critical events that made sugar the dominant force in world politics from antiquity to our own era. In this magisterial history, Bosma offers a much-needed cautionary tale about how addiction leads to societal downfall. As we watch newer addictions destroy the climate and Earth’s inhabitants, we would all do well to learn the hard lessons of sugar. -- Robert Lustig, author of Metabolical: The Lure and the Lies of Processed Food, Nutrition, and Modern MedicineThe World of Sugar is compelling, deeply researched, and globe-spanning. Bosma puts sugar at the heart of global capitalism; he shows how the quest for sweetness has driven slavery, violence, and massive ecological destruction. This is a timely and impressive book that illuminates some of our most urgent contemporary debates. -- Sunil Amrith, author of Unruly Waters: How Mountain Rivers and Monsoons Have Shaped South Asia’s HistorySugar got the modern world moving in a way few other commodities did. Revealing the bitter downside of sweetness, Bosma gives us a spectacular narrative that deftly weaves in all of sugar’s stories: labor and consumption, power and trade, science and technology. -- Jürgen Osterhammel, author of The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the Nineteenth Century

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Book SynopsisAn original, revolutionary new social and scientific history, examining the role that confinement has played in fostering and hindering epidemics

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Book Synopsis''A superbly revealing account of a dreadful and profoundly sad war'' ALASTAIR CAMPBELL''This extraordinary book gives us a unique insight into why and how Japan fought such an appalling war'' NICK HEWERA new perspective on Japan during the Asia-Pacific War, using remarkable first-hand Japanese source material.Even after eighty years since the end of a conflict that killed thirty-five million people, there remains deeply-felt bitterness and anger about the way the Asia-Pacific War was fought, especially by the Japanese. The war in the East stretched from Hawaii to India - with Japanese forces attacking Singapore, China and Malaysia, as well as bombing the north coast of Australia. The Allied forces, led by the US, waged an island-by-island counteroffensive that eventually saw the invasion of the Japanese homeland. Japan has been vilified for the countless examples of its cruelty to civilians and prisoners of war. These criticisms have led to a backlash in Japan, where many deny that the accusations are true. By going back to the origins of modern Japan, and by using only Japanese accounts, Japan''s War: Hirohito''s Holy War against the West offers a powerful account of the conflict and explains in detail why the Japanese conducted the war in the way that they did.

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a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

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Book SynopsisA humane, thoughtful and yet clear-eyed history of people with learning disabilities.

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Book SynopsisSome ten thousand years ago, hunter-gatherers moving through a landscape newly emerged from the grip of the last Ice Age reached four islands on the western seaboard. The shores they landed on were deserted. After making camp, they struck out to hunt and explore. We know this because the evidence of their presence has been preserved down the millennia - in traces of flint and quartz, in charred fragments of grain and animal bone, in great heaped piles of ancient shellfish. The islands were Rum, Eigg, Canna and Muck - four distinctive shapes rising from the waters of the Inner Hebrides between Ardnamurchan and Skye. Collectively, they are known as the Small Isles.From those first moments on, people have been working these islands and using their resources, adapting each landscape to suit the changing needs of the communities they served. In this definitive new book, archaeologist John Hunter searches for the stories of the Small Isles in the evidence that survives - from the fragmentary physical remains of dwellings, defences, places of worship and monuments, to the records of early antiquarians, historians and travellers.This is a journey to rediscover communities that were erased by the mass migrations of the nineteenth century, and the rise of the Victorian sporting estate. Within a few generations cultural identity on the islands disappeared and a new order developed. Placenames were changed, buildings and structures abandoned, and traditions forgotten. The Small Isles became islands without memories.This comprehensive guide - illustrated with a wealth of photographs, maps and drawings - takes readers on a tour of both place and time. Crisscrossing the landscapes of four fascinating and evocative islands, it reveals traces of a forgotten past in everything that has been left behind.

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Book SynopsisA walking tour of Oxford and Cambridge, showing the main Reformation sites. Includes a Timeline, helpful introduction, and Appendices. It is a unique publication, giving users a good grasp of one of the most pivotal periods in English history.

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewMotadel describes the Mufti’s Nazi dealings vividly, but he also excels in unearthing other odious and fascinating characters… Impeccably researched and clearly written, [his] book will transform our understanding of the Nazi policies that were, Motadel writes, some ‘of the most vigorous attempts to politicize and instrumentalize Islam in modern history.’ -- Dominic Green * Wall Street Journal *[A] comprehensive and discerning history… Refresh[es] our understanding of Nazi Germany’s involvement with the Middle East and the wider Muslim world… [Motadel] offers a portrait of continuity in the West’s strategies for mobilizing Islam in wartime or for using Islam for its geopolitical ends—a history, on the whole, of continual failure… [A] sophisticated narrative. -- Steve Coll * New York Review of Books *Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is the first book to provide an in-depth study of this complex relationship, charting its twists and turns as Hitler’s paladins sought to bring Muslims onside. It is academically impeccable, drawing on a wealth of archival resources in a multitude of languages, yet it wears its erudition lightly. In the current climate, a subject such as this might be considered controversial. Motadel, however, is never less than resolutely serious and rigorous. The whiff of sensationalism never offends the nostrils… Motadel’s book is a brilliantly original study that achieves that rare feat of combining rigor with accessibility. Most impressively, in the hugely crowded field of the second world war and Nazi Germany, it manages to explore an area of profound significance that had previously been overlooked. -- Roger Moorhouse * Financial Times *Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a valuable ground-breaking work, energetically readable and unabashedly complicated… Through an extensive amount of research in some fairly recondite primary sources, Motadel tells the story of Nazi Germany’s interaction with its Muslim conquests and would-be conquests in greater detail and with greater skill than any English-language historian before him. He stresses the at first odd-seeming fact that when it came to dealing with Muslims, the Nazis were almost jarringly accommodating… At heart, Motadel’s revelatory book describes a mutual bafflement, and in that sense alone it’s perhaps prescient. Either way, Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is an indispensable enlargement of our understanding of the Second World War’s Eastern European theater. -- Steve Donoghue * Open Letters Monthly *Motadel’s treatment of an unsavory segment of modern Muslim history is as revealing as it is nuanced. Its strength lies not just in its erudite account of the Nazi perception of Islam but also in illustrating how the Allies used exactly the same tactics to rally Muslims against Hitler. With the specter of Isis haunting the world, it contains lessons from history we all need to learn. -- Ziauddin Sardar * The Independent *Thanks to David Motadel’s exhaustive scholarship we now have the first ‘comprehensive study of German policy towards Islam during the Second World War.’ In fact, it is even more than that, since it explores the roots of Nazi policy in Imperial Germany and the Great War and follows its tracks through the Weimar years into the Third Reich. -- David Cesarani * Literary Review *Hitler’s failed effort to put Muslim boots on the ground still stands as the most far-reaching Western attempt to use Islam to win a war. Such is the judgment of David Motadel, the author of a new, authoritative book, Islam and Nazi Germany’s War. Motadel’s detailed and fascinating explanation of how and why the Nazis failed to get Muslims on their side is a must-read for serious students of World War II, and it has an important message as well for our own policy in the Middle East. -- David Mikics * The Tablet *In offering an interesting and important account of Islam in Nazism’s war, Motadel reveals a little-known chapter in the conflict. This is a nuanced and sensitive account of a topic that is too important to ignore. -- Robert Gellately * Times Higher Education *Islam and Nazi Germany’s War by David Motadel…make[s] fascinating reading and highlight[s] the variety of ways in which the German state sought to subvert the Muslim soldiers’ professional loyalty to the Allied armies in the two wars… [Motadel] must be lauded for [his] painstaking research in producing [this] highly readable [volume] that include[s] relevant photographs as well. -- Muhammad Ali Siddiqi * Dawn *There’s one Nazi propaganda battle you don’t hear much about. Now, Motadel details Hitler’s efforts to promote himself as a backer of Islam. The Nazis saw the Muslim people as sharing common enemies, including the British Empire and Zionism. ‘The peoples of Islam will always be closer to us than, for example, France,’ Hitler said. But despite the Third Reich’s best efforts, the Islam–Nazi relationship remained tempestuous. A new look at how World War II profoundly changed the Middle East. -- Billy Heller * New York Post *Motadel’s Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a superb analysis of little-known but important facts about World War II. -- Herman J. Obermayer * Washington Times *Islam and Nazi Germany’s War by David Motadel is an important contribution to our understanding of the relationship of Nazi Germany to the Islamic world. -- Jack Fischel * Jewish Book World *This is an important book with a different view of the world war, superbly researched, and elegantly produced. -- Arnold Krammer * Journal of Military History *The importance of Motadel’s book is manifold… A strong work, providing anyone interested in the Nazi period and the role of Islam with a wealth of information and insight. -- Dmitry Shlapentokh * New Eastern Europe *Motadel’s book provides a vast panorama of the Third Reich’s Islampolitik and clearly presents various aspects of this policy and various questions that it raises. Motadel loves details, and the book sometimes reads like historical anthropology… More generally, this book is virtually exhaustive in its approach, and would therefore be hard to surpass… Motadel uses an impressive number of sources, including diverse secondary sources and archives. -- Xavier Bougarel * Southeast European and Black Sea Studies *Islam and Nazi Germany’s War offers food for thought. -- Robert M. Citino * World War II *Motadel is thorough, balanced in his judgments, and clear in exposition of the facts. Nazi attempts to instrumentalize Islam in the Arab world, the Caucasus, and the Balkans in order to foment rebellions in the empires of their enemies (Britain, USSR, and the U.S.) were unsuccessful. The recruitment of Muslim soldiers for the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS proved more fruitful, but despite great expenditure of funds and personnel, the Germans never attained their unrealistic goals. Beginning his account with the failed attempts to mobilize Muslims in WW I, Motadel details the reasons for Nazi failures in WW II… An outstanding contribution. -- R. S. Levy * Choice *David Motadel presents a deeply researched, finely written, and fascinating account of how the Nazis understood Islam and how they sought to mobilize, manipulate, and utilize it. There is no study quite like it, and it has much to teach not only to students of German history and Islamic studies, but also to those of international relations and geopolitics more broadly. -- Michael A. Reynolds, Princeton UniversityAn original contribution to the modern history of Islam, David Motadel’s book is a powerful and timely reminder of Western colonial efforts to manipulate and mobilize jihadist rhetoric in the service of empire. -- Robert D. Crews, Stanford UniversityDavid Motadel shows that the Nazi regime pushed a crude but fairly consistent anti-Orientalist line in order to forge a Muslim alliance. This went beyond the coincidence of shared enmities against the British, the Bolsheviks and the Jews, and promised to open up a true partnership based on shared key values: obedience to the leader, belief in the family and commitment to a holy war. Mastering this complex story and showing it from radically contrasting points of view is a remarkable achievement. -- Nicholas Stargardt, University of OxfordIslam and Nazi Germany’s War will surely become one of the most important books on international history as well as global intellectual history, demonstrating the sophistication and theoretical rigor of both fields. It not only provides the most comprehensive account of Nazi Germany’s engagement with Islam but also fascinating insights into the nature of modern Europe’s complex relationship with Muslim societies. It will reorient the way we think about the geopolitics of European Orientalism and will be compulsory reading for everyone interested in debates on Islam and the ‘West.’ -- Cemil Aydin, University of North Carolina at Chapel HillDavid Motadel’s book is erudite, thorough, and elegantly written. It will be the reference on its subject for a long time to come. -- Saul Friedlander, University of California, Los AngelesBased on remarkable research, David Motadel has written an outstanding book on an important topic, providing fascinating and original insights into Nazism’s attempts to win followers of Islam to support of Germany’s war. -- Sir Ian Kershaw, University of Sheffield

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Book SynopsisThis textbook examines Marxism’s enormous impact on the way historians approach their subject. Tackling current historiographical questions in an accessible way, the author offers a clear introduction to Marxist views of history, key Marxist historians and thinkers, and the relevance of Marxist theory and history to students’ own work. This is a concise, thorough overview of an important area of historiography. The second edition incorporates significant new developments in research, including Marxist contributions to the emergence of global, maritime and transnational history; the discovery of Marx’s ecologism and the historical critique of fossil capitalism as a source of environmental disaster; a reassessment of gender oppression through social reproduction theory; and the contribution of Marxism to debates on race, Eurocentrism and whiteness. Table of Contents1. Introduction2. Marxist History’s Wide Panorama3. Marx and Engels’s Conception of History4. The Historical Writings of Marx and Engels5. The Second Generation and the Philosophy and Writing of History6. ‘Rescuing the Poor Stockinger’: History from Below7. Marxism, Structuralism, Humanism8. Marxism and Postmodernism9. Conclusion

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Book SynopsisModern Japan is not only responding to threats from North Korea and China but is also reevaluating its dependence on the United States, Sheila Smith shows. No longer convinced they can rely on Americans to defend their country, Tokyo's political leaders are now confronting the possibility that they may need to prepare the nation's military for war.Trade ReviewTimely and useful…Japan’s armed forces remain limited in size and in the operations that they can conduct, and have never, since 1945, engaged in combat. Nor has the country seriously debated equipping them with nuclear weapons. Now, however, North Korean and Chinese military initiatives, along with uncertain American attitudes toward the alliance with Japan, threaten to change all this. -- Michael Mandelbaum * American Interest *Washington’s relationship with Tokyo is generally considered the most important of the United States’ 70-odd alliances. In this intimately knowledgeable book, Smith shows how that alliance looks to the Japanese: increasingly unreliable. -- Andrew J. Nathan * Foreign Affairs *The must-read book for anyone who seeks foundational knowledge of what is arguably the most important military alliance in the world…A highly readable and richly detailed account of Japan’s rearmament and the politics surrounding it…Likely to grow even timelier as tensions in East Asia ratchet up. -- Jason Morgan * Journal of American–East Asian Relations *A well-written and comprehensive overview of postwar Japan’s security evolution…Deserves to be read by policy makers interested in Japanese security and to be added to the syllabi of undergraduate and postgraduate programs on East Asian security and Japanese international relations. -- Giulio Pugliese * Monumenta Nipponica *Smith masterfully traces the interplay of Japan’s military heritage, politics, national sentiment, threats, and alliance with the United States in the formation and development of the Self-Defense Force. Even experts will find new information and insights in her account. As she makes clear, the SDF is a work in progress, and this book provides a welcome guide to its possible future path. -- Admiral Dennis Blair, U.S. Navy (Ret.), former Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Pacific CommandAt a time when the East Asian security environment is becoming ever more dangerous and unpredictable, Sheila Smith offers a timely guide to the choices facing Japan. This is an insightful and indispensable look at the evolution of Japan’s approach to national security and the consequential decisions it will face in the future. -- James Steinberg, Syracuse UniversityAfter fighting a series of aggressive wars in the early twentieth century, Japan retreated from power politics and has remained reluctant to develop a military capability that matches its economic power. Will this change? The paradoxical transition from militarist aggression to pacifism and isolationism has been discussed before, but never with the clarity Sheila Smith displays in this important book. She shows that Japan will have some critical choices to make to maintain its security in the challenging geopolitics of the twenty-first century. -- Kiichi Fujiwara, University of TokyoWith keen insight and scholarly precision, Smith tells us why the Japanese public’s evolving attitude toward the use of military force is important to American security and the peace of northeast Asia. A must-read for U.S. policymakers responsible for Asia. -- J. Thomas Schieffer, former U.S. Ambassador to Japan

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Book SynopsisThis book describes the way in which landscape and landscape heritage have been – and still are – used to define national identities. It shows how national narratives use different types of landscapes. Some nations use nature as their main point of reference, partly to circumcise conflicts between different ethnic groups. Other nations use agrarian landscapes, that are often describes as timeless and ‘rooted’. Again other nations use history as a major sources for defining identities. In these cases, myths of origins, ‘Golden Ages’ or wars and conflicts deliver the materials for national narratives. The final section describes how nation states developed new urban as well as rural landscapes as national showpieces. As landscapes are an important but under-researched aspect of nation-building, this book fills a gap in the study of nationalism.Table of Contents1. Introduction.- 2 Terminology: landscape, heritage, identity and nationalism.- 3. Natural Landscapes.- 4. Timeless Agrarian Landscapes.- 5. Cultural Landscapes and Deep History.- 6. Landscapes of Glorious Times.- 7. Landscapes of Conflict and Trauma.- 8. New Landscapes.- 9. Concluding Remarks.

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Book SynopsisThis intellectual biography provides an organic framework for understanding Antonio Gramsci’s process of intellectual development, paying close attention to the historical and intellectual contexts out of which his views emerged. The Gramsci in Notebooks cannot fully account for the young director of L’Ordine Nuovo, or for the communist leader. Gramsci’s development did not occur under conditions of intellectual inflexibility, of absence of evolution. However, there is a strong thread connecting the “political Gramsci” with Gramsci as a “cultivated man.” The Sardinian intellectual’s life is marked by the drama of World War I, the first mass conflict in which the great scientific discoveries of the previous decades were applied on a large scale and in which millions of peasants and workers were slaughtered. In all of his theoretical formulations, this dual relation, which epitomizes the instrumental use of “simpletons” by ruling classes, goes beyond the military context of the trenches and becomes full-fledged in the fundamental relations of modern capitalist society. In contrast with this notion of social hierarchy, which is deemed natural and unchangeable, Gramsci constantly affirmed the need to overcome the historically determined rupture between intellectual and manual functions, due to which the existence of a priesthood or of a separate caste of specialists in politics and in knowledge is made necessary. It is not the specific professional activity (whether material or immaterial) that determines the essence of human nature: to Gramsci, “all men are philosophers.” In this passage from Notebooks, we find the condensed form of his idea of “human emancipation,” which is the historical need for an “intellectual and moral reform”: the subversion of traditional relations between rulers and ruled and the end of exploitation of man by man.Table of ContentsPART ONE – THE YOUNG REVOLUTIONARY 1. The premises of an uninterrupted discourse 2. Dialectics versus positivism: the young Gramsci’s philosophical background 3. Self-education and autonomy of producers 4. Lenin and the topicality of revolution 5. L’Ordine Nuovo 6. The origin and defeat of the Italian revolution 7. The party problem 8. Revolutionary reflux and reactionary offensive PART TWO – THE POLITICAL LEADER 1. The new Party 2. The Comintern and the “Italian case” 3. Toward a new majority 4. Gramsci leading the Party 5. Theoretical maturity between 1925 and 1926 6. The Congress of Lyon PART THREE – THE THEORETICIAN 1. From Sardinia’s contradictions to the sourther question 2. The Notebooks: the difficult beginnings of a “disinterested” work 3. Hegemonic relations, productive relations and the subaltern 4. Permanent transformism 5. Historical premises and congenital contradictions in Italian biography 6. “The old dies and the new cannot be born” 7. The double revision of Marxism and similarity with Lukács 8. Translatability and hegemony 9. The philosopher man and the tamed gorilla 10. Michels, the intellectuals and the issue of organization 11. The dismantling of the old schemes of political art EPILOGUE References

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Book SynopsisRotary International spreads America’s good news. The organization spent the interwar years convincing Main Street and the world at large that America’s promise lay in cooperation and service under capitalism, values that could knit the globe together. In the process, Brendan Goff argues, Rotary became an extension of US power.Trade ReviewThe book is luminous—beautifully written and smartly constructed—showcasing Goff’s thorough research and his skillful analysis of the evolving racial, gender, class, and religious norms that came into play as RI chapters spread throughout, and then out from, the United States. -- Lauren F. Turek * Journal of American History *Goff convincingly shows how Rotary drew on and contributed to imperial networks, even as Rotary’s ethos of apolitical service blinded Rotarians (both in the United States and abroad) to the imperial nature of U.S. power. This book deserves a wide audience. -- Christopher Endy * Diplomatic History *This far-ranging account of transnational networking reveals the Main Street, middle-class making of modern global capitalism. Goff is as attuned to the paradoxes of Rotary internationalism as he is to its place in the American Century. -- Kristin L. Hoganson, author of The Heartland: An American HistoryIn this innovative book, Goff uses the international history of the Rotary Club to chart the origins of the ‘American Century.’ Tracing Rotary’s remarkable, worldwide expansion in the first half of the twentieth century, he offers fresh insights on American global power and transnational civic engagement, cultural diplomacy and corporate capitalism. Filled with fascinating stories of Rotarians and their activities on Main Streets far and wide, this book deserves a broad readership. -- Julia F. Irwin, author of Making the World Safe: The American Red Cross and a Nation’s Humanitarian AwakeningImaginatively conceived and highly readable, this book tells the remarkable story of Rotary International’s campaign to expand from Chicago to the world at large. Goff makes an important contribution both to our understanding of Main Street America’s thinking about international trade and foreign policy, and of the business culture and voluntarism that Rotary promoted around the world. -- David C. Hammack, coauthor of A Versatile American Institution: The Changing Ideals and Realities of Philanthropic FoundationsIn Goff’s hands, we see the Rotarian as an advance agent of US power, a missionary for international capitalism, and an advocate of a business culture that shaped the twentieth-century world. Based on rich, diverse sources and told in a clear, compelling narrative, this remarkable book about how Rotarians crafted a ‘civic internationalism’ will be widely read. -- Christopher Capozzola, author of Bound by War: How the United States and the Philippines Built America’s First Pacific CenturyYou may not think you are interested in the Rotary International. But if you are interested in informal empire, globalism, or the overlap between internationalism and cultural diversity, you need to read this book. It turns out the Rotarians were not the small-minded, parochial Babbitts of Sinclair Lewis’s imagination. They were in fact internationalists whose language of cooperation, nonpartisan business professionalism, and human fellowship helped pave the way for American-style global capitalism…As the world today reembraces nationalism and stokes polarization, and as we face climate catastrophe and a pandemic, the thorny problems discussed in this book are at the heart of any attempt to renew an internationalist ethos of cooperation, service, and nonpartisanship. -- Jennifer Delton * Enterprise & Society *

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Book SynopsisTraces the roots of the Chinese empire's exceptional longevity and unparalleled political durability, and shows how lessons from the imperial past are relevant for China today. This book demonstrates that the empire survived and adjusted to a variety of domestic and external challenges through a peculiar combination of rigid ideological premises.Trade ReviewOne of Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2012 "A unique perspective, well presented in accessible language and backed up with extensive notes and bibliography, the work represents high-quality scholarship from broad-based social science at its best. It belongs in all college and university libraries."--Choice "Pines is successful in pointing out many critical characteristics of Chinese imperial system and political culture, not only the ideological but also the institutional and the practical, which are indeed highly relevant to the system's sustainability."--Hsiao-wen Cheng, Insight Turkey "[T]here is enough in this book to make it a valuable contribution to the study of empire and its legacies."--Brian Moloughney, Asian Studies Review "Moving between ideology and the real world, the author has gone far to deepen our understanding of the practical impact of traditional Chinese political culture on the empire. In so doing, he debunks various myths and stereotypes prevalent in both China and the West. This book is a good starting point for those who wish to provide a more comprehensive answer. It should be of interest to both students and scholars."--Jingbin Wang, H-Net Reviews "Professor Pines writes with the benefit of wide and deep reading that enables him to survey the intellectual, political, and social background against which kingdoms and then empires were founded, maintained, declined, and closed from the time of the Warring States until the modern age."--Michael Loewe, Journal of Chinese StudiesTable of ContentsAcknowledgments vi i Introduction 1 Chapter 1: The Ideal of "Great Unity" 11 Chapter 2: The Monarch 44 Chapter 3: The Literati 76 Chapter 4: Local Elite 104 Chapter 5: The People 134 Chapter 6: Imperial Political Culture in the Modern Age 162 Notes 185 Bibliography 209 Index 233

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Book SynopsisThis book brings together historians, anthropologists and archaeologists to rethink colonialism in a cross-sectional way, from ancient times to contemporary times. El libro “Repensar el colonialismo. Iberia, de colonia a potencia colonial” reúne historiadores, antropólogos y arqueólogos para repensar el colonialismo de una manera transversal, desde la época antigua hasta la época contemporánea. Desde el estudio de la cultura material y de fuentes escritas hasta el trabajo en archivos, los y las autoras analizan las imbricadas relaciones socioeconómicas, culturales y de poder existentes entre las comunidades colonizadoras y las colonizadas.

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Book SynopsisUpending the conventional wisdom that Bretton Woods was the product of an amiable Anglo-American collaboration, this book shows that it was in reality part of a much more ambitious geopolitical agenda hatched within President Franklin D Roosevelt's Treasury and aimed at eliminating Britain as an economic and political rival.Trade ReviewWinner of the 2013 Spear's Book Award in Financial History Co-Winner of the 2014 Bronze Medal in Economics, Axiom Business Book Awards One of The Motley Fool's (John Reeves) 10 Great Books on American Economic History One of Financial Times (FT.com) Best History Books of 2013 One of Bloomberg News' Top Business Books of 2013 One of Kirkus Reviews' Best Nonfiction Books of the Year for 2013 in Business and Economics One of Bloomberg/Businessweek Best Books of 2013, as selected individually by Fredrik Erixon, Scott Minerd, Olli Rehn and Alan Greenspan Featured in The Sunday Times 2013 Holiday Roundup Shortlisted for the 2013 800-CEO-READ Business Book Awards in Finance & Economics Honorable Mention for the 2014 Arthur Ross Book Award, Council on Foreign Relations Shortlisted for the 2014 Lionel Gelber Prize, Lionel Gelber Foundation "The Battle of Bretton Woods should become the gold standard on its topic. The details are addictive."--Fred Andrews, New York Times "Steil, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, understands the economic issues at stake and has done meticulous research on the history. Every good story that has ever been told about the major actors involved and the happening itself is in his book, and a few more besides. For those who come fresh to the subject, and even for those who know most of it, it is an excellent and revealing account."--Robert Skidelsky, New York Review of Books "A superb history. Mr. Steil ... is a talented storyteller."--James Grant, Wall Street Journal "[A] masterful (and readable) account of American realpolitik and British delusion."--Andrew Hilton, Financial World "Steil's book, engaging and entertaining, perceptive and instructive, is a triumph of economic and diplomatic history. Everything is here: political chicanery, bureaucratic skulduggery, espionage, hard economic detail and the acid humour of men making history under pressure."--Tony Barber, Financial Times "This is a fantastic book. Gold and money, two of my favorite topics. It's also brilliantly insightful history, and a gripping spy thriller to boot."--Larry Kudlow, CNBC "[T]he author masterfully translates the arcana of competing theories of monetary policy, and a final chapter explains how, while some of the institutions created by Bretton Woods endure--the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund--many of the conference's assumptions were swiftly overtaken by the Marshall Plan. Throughout Steil's sharp discussion runs the intriguing subplot of White's career-long, secret relationship with Soviet intelligence. A vivid, highly informed portrayal of the personalities, politics and policies dominating 'the most important international gathering since the Paris Peace Conference of 1919.'"--Kirkus Reviews (starred review) "In his masterful account, The Battle of Bretton Woods, Steil situates the conference firmly in the tense, heightened atmosphere of the final months of World War II... Steil's book comes alive in his description of [Keynes' and White's] contrasting experiences at the conference."--Sam Knight, Bloomberg News "[H]ypnotically readable."--Peter Passell, Milken Institute Review "[T]hought provoking and well written."--Kathleen Burk, Literary Review "This is an excellent book... [It] also contains some explosive revelations about White's work as a Soviet spy, very well documented I might add."--Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution "If you think economics and finance are dry subjects at best, Steil's book offers a refreshing surprise. It's a political thriller in which the protagonists, one whom you think you know and one whom you probably don't, are much more intriguing (in both senses of the word) than they first appear."--Daniel Altman, Big Think "[I]n a new book explaining what really happened at Bretton Woods, Benn Steil shows that what happened in the mountains of New Hampshire that summer is not quite the story we have been told."--Neil Irwin, WashingtonPost.com "[Benn Steil's] new book The Battle of Bretton Woods is perhaps the most accessible study yet of a key moment in world economic history that nonetheless is poorly understood."--Kevin Carmichael, Globe & Mail "The clash between Keynes and White forms a central theme in Benn Steil's absorbing book, which should be required reading for anyone who wants to understand the not-so-special relationship between the US and Britain."--Geoffrey Owen, Standpoint Magazine "[F]ascinating... Steil ... spins the tale of how U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau, a close friend of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, allowed White, a little-known economist who wasn't even on the U.S. Treasury's regular payroll, to dominate the department's monetary and trade policies beginning in the 1930s."--John M. Barry, USA Today "[A] well-written, fascinating history of the Bretton Woods conference on the international monetary system in July 1941. The book is deep, well researched, and hard to put down. Benn Steil ... has produced a book that will help us to understand history, but also one we can use to contrast with the current international economic situation... This is a very good book."--John M. Mason, Seeking Alpha "I do hope the title of this riveting read does not put off readers who mistake Benn Steil's latest work for an arcane discussion of exchange rates, the gold standard and the stuff of debates in commons rooms. This book is more than that, much more. It is a tale of a battle of titans and of a war between nations, each intent on establishing the economic architecture that would ensure its postwar economic domination of world finance."--Irwin Stelzer, Sunday Times "[V]ivid personality portraits and a lively writing style."--Mike Foster, Financial News "[F]ascinating... [R]iveting... The Battle of Bretton Woods is chock-full of provocative and timely observations."--Glenn C. Altschuler, Tulsa World "President Obama would be wise to take it to Martha's Vineyard this summer."--John Tamny, Forbes.com "Benn Steil has just completed a fascinating book that looks at what really happened in the small New Hampshire town of Bretton Woods in 1944. Perhaps most surprising is that the real story that emerges isn't a tale of how 44 countries came together to rebuild the world. And the real story has different lessons for the 21st century than ambitious idealists might expect."--Andrew Sawers, Economia "[A] splendid book... If you want to understand the gold standard, the always-doomed dollar standard, why the IMF is in Washington, how the US deliberately humiliated Britain over debt before, during and after WWII as part of a very real currency war (but also out of genuine anti-colonial sentiment that the British never understood), this is the book for you... Every year publishers come out with a couple of purportedly serious books on FX, some by VIPs, and I read them all. This is the only one since Paul Volcker's Changing Fortunes in 1979 that is worth the price. It is non-partisan, well-written, thorough, and chock-full of the historical perspective that can so easily and so often get lost in the hurly-burly of the daily market."--Barbara Rockefeller, Harriman Intelligence blog "[A] provocative, lively and perceptive book that pulls together economics, politics, diplomacy and history and relates it to our current crisis."--Keith Simpson MP, Total Politics "This thorough, fascinating account of the international conference that culminated in the 1944 agreement to maintain stable exchange rates skillfully places it in its economic and geopolitical context... Steil not only recounts the intricacies of the deal making but also details the economic dimensions of Bretton Woods... With the help of 10 research assistants, Steil has tirelessly tracked down minute details of the Bretton Woods story and its epilogue... [Steil] offers excellent insight into the tribulations of the key players. He also tells the interesting tale of how, if not for the well-founded suspicions regarding Harry Dexter White's cooperation with Communist spies, the tradition of an American heading the World Bank and a European heading the IMF would have been reversed."--Financial Analysts Journal "Steil understands the economics at the heart of the tortuous negotiations, but he is also very good at explaining the politics, the power and the passions--the professional and personal rivalries--of the people at the negotiating table. He turns what could have been a dry account of economic accords into a thrilling story of ambition, drama, and intrigue."--Keith Richmond, Tribune Magazine, UK "[A] very well-written history, with lively personalities, [which] also serves as a great overview of the analytical issues in international monetary arrangements."--Diane Coyle, Enlightened Economist blog "Absorbing ... as an account of history-making at the highest level, this entertaining, informative, gossipy and, for the lay reader, often challenging book provides an excellent read."--Richard Steyn, Financial Mail "[A]n amazing true story ... highly entertaining."--Ian McMaster, Business Spotlight "An object lesson in how to make economic history at once entertaining and instructive."--Financial Times, "Books of the Year So Far" Summer Reading Guide "A valuable addition to the economic history literature."--Choice "It's always nice when you can combine outside reading for fun with something that is educational... [A] good read that is also good for you."--Daniel Shaviro, Jotwell "The book provides a terrifically written, gossipy account of the origins of Bretton Woods... Since the world spent several decades under the clumsy (and, to the U.S., costly) Bretton Woods regime, and since you sometimes hear people harkening back to that time as a golden age (which it surely was not), ... it is an important read for our day."--Dan Littman, Senior Payments Research Consultant and Economist, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland "Benn Steil [of the] Council on Foreign Relations has written a fascinating book on the two main architects behind the Bretton Woods system... Steil's book is an outstanding piece of political science research ... extremely well written and well documented... It is strongly recommended."--Morten Balling, SUERF Newsletter "Benn Steil's remarkable book ... is an account of how the IMF first came to be, back in the sleepy New Hampshire summer of 1944... The Battle of Bretton Woods is an essential volume in any understanding of John Maynard Keynes, who though now seven decades gone is as influential a mind as we may yet see in the twenty-first century."--Brian Domitrovic, Library of Law and Liberty blog "Steil's book ... shows how normally abstruse economic and diplomatic history can be made palatable and even alluring to the general reader."--Christopher Silvester, Spear's "[A] fascinating account of the developments leading up to the Bretton Woods conference and its immediate aftermath, from the point of view of the two main characters involved: John Maynard Keynes and Harry Dexter White. The book is based on extensive archive work, so often the participants speak for themselves, which makes for interesting reading."--Isaac Alfon, Central Banking Journal "The Battle of Bretton Woods sets forth in smooth prose and concise detail an authoritative narrative of the who-what-when-why of the great monetary conference of some 70 years ago. It is jam-packed with heady discussions... If we're fortunate, Benn Steil will deliver a follow-up."--Kevin R. Kosar, Weekly Standard "Individual persons are at the center of the story, which also comes loaded with tales of international intrigue, spycraft, and famous personalities. It's not just for history buffs and economics geeks."--Douglas French, Freeman, publication of the Foundation for Economic Education "Seduced by Keynes's rhetorical repudiation both of the 'austerity' implied by [promptly paying off Britain's war debts] and the 'temptation' of accepting a loan, the British shipped Keynes to Washington ... to seek 'justice', to wit, the third option. In his recent history of the period, Benn Steil deftly paints what ensued."--Patrick Honohan, Irish Times "[T]his thought-provoking book is about much more than the 1944 conference that established the architecture of the postwar international monetary system, leading to the establishment of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank."--Foreign Affairs "Benn Steil has crafted a fine history... Characterized by fine and entertaining writing, The Battle of Bretton Woods is economic and political history in engrossing detail."--Satyajit Das, Naked Capitalism "Benn Steil provides a well-researched and interesting account of the historic monetary conference... His efforts make for an enjoyable read... Steil is perhaps at his best when articulating how the Bretton Woods system differed from the classical gold standard--a difference that would ultimately lead to the failure of Bretton Woods... Steil's excellent book should serve as a gentle reminder of which monetary systems have worked well in the past--and which should not be repeated."--William J. Luther, SSRN's Economic History eJournal "An informed citizenry includes an understanding of our economy and how it is integrated into the global financial system. For this, it is important to start from the ... discussions that occurred among 44 nations in the idyllic and calm resort at Bretton Woods, N.H., in 1944. [Benn Steil's] new book details not only the meeting but the deep arguments between the British economist John Maynard Keynes and [American Treasury official] Harry Dexter White... This is a serious book of political economic history."--Cmdr. Youssef Aboul-Enein, DCMilitary "Benn Steil's book provides a fascinating account of the developments leading up to the Bretton Woods conference and its immediate aftermath, from the point of view of the two main characters involved: John Maynard Keynes and Harry Dexter White. The book is based on extensive archive work, so often the participants speak for themselves, which makes for interesting reading."--Isaac Alfon, Central Banking Journal "This masterful account dismantles the idyllic picture of the 1944 Bretton Woods international economic conference, situating it firmly in the tense atmosphere of the final months of World War II."--Laurie Muchnick, Bloomberg Top Business Books of 2013 "Steil's book is an object lesson in how to make economic history entertaining and instructive."--Tony Barber, Financial Times "Benn Steil not only produces the finest account of the conference that established the Pax Americana economic system after World War II, he does it with the skill of a novelist."--Jon Talton, SeattleTimes.com "[A] well-documented, engaging account of the Bretton Woods Conference... The material on Harry Dexter White is fascinating ... an essential reference [with] much to teach economic historians."--Joshua Hausman, Journal of Economic History "The Battle of Bretton Woods is a thorough and fascinating account of a historic event, skillfully placed in its economic and geopolitical context. [H]e offers excellent insight into the tribulations of the key players. He also tells the interesting tale of how, if not for the well-founded suspicions regarding Harry Dexter White's cooperation with Communist spies, the tradition of an American heading the World Bank and a European heading the IMF would have been reversed."--Martin S. Fridson, Financial Analysts Journal "Steil's book is essential reading for students of multilateralism, diplomacy, and international economic relations... It is also an excellent overview of the behind-the-scenes machinations that caused Britain to agree to the final document that placed America, and the dollar, at the top of the global financial pyramid... [O]f primary interest to most readers ... it is a fascinating and nuanced glimpse into the psychology of Second World War era economic espionage."--Marc D. Froese, International Journal "This story is well told. It is also well known... Steil is targeting a broader audience than scholars, however, and in that sense, this book is a success at recasting a surprisingly exciting story."--Thomas W. Zeiler, Register of the Kentucky Historical Society "Steil breathes new life and controversy into a familiar story by emphasizing the intellectual and political clash between John Maynard Keynes and Harry Dexter White."--James McAllister, H-Diplo/ISSF Roundtable "Steil rarely puts a foot wrong. His analysis of policies and personalities, however he has acquired his knowledge, reflects a sophisticated understanding of the inner workings of financial diplomacy."--Stephen Schuker, H-Diplo/ISSF Roundtable "[A]n ably crafted narrative."--Darel Paul, H-Diplo/ISSF Roundtable "[The book] is a welcome departure from less political, or more American-centric, accounts of Bretton Woods."--William Glenn Gray, H-Diplo/ISSF Roundtable "[T]his is a beautiful narrative of the making of Bretton Woods, based on serious archival research and with some nice old photos as illustrations."--Ivo Maes, History of Economic Ideas "The Battle of Bretton Woods is a remarkable work that embraces many disciplines: economic history, political economy and international relations. Benn Steil is able to merge the different perspectives from all these disciplines, taking the reader into both the political battle and the economic thinking."--Anna Missiaia, Financial History Review "A gripping account... John Le Carre meets international monetary history: this is clearly a different kind of page-turner."--Jayati Ghosh, Economic & Political Weekly "The Battle of Bretton Woods is a remarkable work that embraces many disciplines: history, economic history, political economy and international relations. Benn Steil is able to merge the different perspectives from all these disciplines, taking the reader into both the political battle and the economic thinking that took place at Bretton Woods."--Anna Missiaia, Financial History Review "Epic."--Ashok Rao, Vox "[E]ngaging and instructive ... Benn Steil has written a book full of historical insight and human color."--Robert L. Hetzel, Econ Focus "[A] good piece of historical investigation that will put an end to doubts as to whether White was in fact a Soviet agent."--Maria Cristina Marcuzzo, Economica "[A] thoughtful and well-researched addition to economic history."--Mark L. Wilson, Journal of Economic Issues "With extensive, original research, Benn Steil has rewritten the history of the conference. Steil reveals the illusions of its two central figures: John Maynard Keynes, the most famous economist of the twentieth century and a senior member of the British delegation, and Harry Dexter White, the little-known assistant secretary of the US Treasury, who almost singlehandedly ran the conference... A major contribution to economic, intellectual, and political history, which is accessible to a wide audience and presents an endlessly fascinating portrait of two complicated men."--Carl, Strikwerda, The Historian "Benn Steil's The Battle of Bretton Woods is a superb, carefully researched history that enables readers to view today and tomorrow from the vantage point of the past."--Robert B. Zoellick, International Economy "The Battle of Bretton Woods offers a tantalizing peek into another time of financial stress compounded by a world war... The chess match between White and Keynes is well worth the price of admission--the price of the book and the time it takes to read it."--Don R. Leet, American Economist "The Battle of Bretton Woods is a well-researched and excellently written book that is recommended for everyone interested in economic and diplomatic history."--Tobias Leeg, Political Studies ReviewTable of ContentsAcknowledgments ix Chapter 1: Introduction 1 Chapter 2: The World Comes to the White Mountains 9 Chapter 3: The Improbable Rise of Harry White 17 Chapter 4: Maynard Keynes and the Monetary Menace 61 Chapter 5: "The Most Unsordid Act" 99 Chapter 6: The Best-Laid Plans of White and Keynes 125 Chapter 7: Whitewash 155 Chapter 8: History Is Made 201 Chapter 9: Begging Like Fala 251 Chapter 10: Out with the Old Order, In with the New 293 Chapter 11: Epilogue 330 Appendix 1: Harry Dexter White Manuscript Photos 349 Appendix 2: Statement of Harry S. Truman on Harry Dexter White, 1953 351 Cast of Characters 355 Notes 371 References 407 Index 427

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Book SynopsisOriginally published in 1957, this classic work has guided generations of scholars through the arcane mysteries of medieval political theology. Throughout history, the notion of two bodies has permitted the post mortem continuity of monarch and monarchy, as epitomized by the statement, "The king is dead. Long live the king." In The King's Two BodieTrade Review"Professor Kantorowicz has written a great book, perhaps the most important work in the history of medieval political thought, surely the most spectacular, of the past several generations. Here, in superbly designed chapters based upon the best scholarship in every field even remotely concerned with the Middle Ages, is the development of the theory and symbolism of the early national states from the eleventh to the sixteenth centuries."--P. N. Riesenberg, American Political Science Review "Professor Ernst Kantorowicz has in this volume given us a monumental work of superb scholarship and profound learning, magnificently produced by Princeton University Press. Few, if any, contributions to the study of medieval thought comparable to this depth and width have been made for many years."--B. Chrimes, The Law Quarterly Review "There is one book that says it all. An old book, nearly a classic...This book, published in 1957, is titled The King's Two Bodies: A Study in Mediaeval Political Theology."--Bernard-Henri Levy, New RepublicTable of ContentsIntroduction to the Princeton Classics Edition ix Preface (1997) by William Chester Jordan xxv Preface xxxiii Introduction 3 I. The Problem: Plowden's Reports 7 II. The Shakespeare: King Richard II 24 III. Christ-centered Kingship 42 1. The Norman Anonymous 42 2. The Frontispiece of the Aachen Gospels 61 3. The Halo of Perpetuity 78 IV. Law-centered Kingship 87 1. From Litury to Legal Science 87 2. Frederick the Second 97 Pater et Filius Iustitiae 97 Iustitia Meciatrix 107 3. Bracton 143 Rex infra et supra Legem 143 Christus-Fiscus 164 V. Polity-Centered Kingship: Corpus Mysticum 193 1. Corpus Ecclesiae mysticum 194 2. Corpus Reipublicae mysticum 207 3. Pro patria mori 232 Patria religious and legal 232 Patriotic Propaganda 249 Rex et Patria 259 VI. On Continuity and Corporations 273 1. Continuity 273 Aevum 275 Perpetua Necessitas 284 2. Fictio Figura Veritatis 291 Imperium semper est 291 Universitas non moritur 302 VII. The King Never Dies 314 1. Dynastic Continuity 317 2. The Crown as Fiction 336 Corona visibilis et invisibilis 336 The Fiscal Crown 342 Inalienability 347 Crown and Universitas 358 The King and the Crown 364 The Crown a Minor 372 3. Dignitas non moritur 383 Phoenix 385 Corporational Symptoms in England 401 Le Roy est mort ... 409 Effigies 419 Rex Instrumentum Dignitatis 437 VII. Man-centered Kingship: Dante 451 IX. Epilogus 396 List of Illustrations 507 Illustrations following 512 Bibliography and Index 513 Addenda 568

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