Book Reviews - HistoryPick a book or just scroll at leisure.
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Norman Davies
Europe: A History
Once you've read J M Roberts' Penguin History of the World - should only take you an afternoon - read this book for a more detailed guide to the part of the world that is closest to home (if you're European). Like all history books, it taxes the memory somewhat, but it is interestingly written, and is a great aid for anyone wanting to make sense of the world as it is today.
Davies' method is somewhat quirky and can be irritating at times. I found his naming of chapters in Latin a little pretentious, and the interspersing of the main narrative with tangential insets (or "capsules" as he calls them) necessitates a good deal of to-ing and fro-ing and can be rather exhausting.
But these are minor quibbles: this is an excellent book that is good to go back to. It also includes gargantuan appendices.
The Isles: A History
A mere three years after 'Europe: A History' came this history of the British Isles by the same author.
Three years may sound a long time, but when you consider that Norman Davies is not a British historian (his specialism is eastern Europe), and therefore must have had to research this book pretty much from scratch, the phrase 'cash-in' inevitably springs to mind. And the suspicion of pecuniary motives is stengthened by the frequently shoddy writing and the even more frequently shoddy editing.
To take some examples of the latter: every index entry is two pages out; English translations are given or not given for old texts completely at random; there are at least five cross-references to 'page 00'; grammatical nonsense abounds such as 'were all been followed'. This is a book that apparently didn't go anywhere near a proof-reader but was booted briskly through a spellchecker so as to hit the shops in time for Christmas.
Not being a historian, I'm in no position to judge the accuracy of Davies' facts, but a Web search on reviews of the book yields a litany of errors. And Davies' acknowledgement that a specialist reader of a chapter advised him to 'jettison the lot' rings depressingly true. (On the basis of the general swaggering tone of the book, arrogance seems a more likely explanation than humility for this peculiar admission.)
But, perhaps annoyingly, it is still a very interesting and readable book. Disregarding the factual errors, Davies' overall judgments are perspicacious and often challenging. And the converse of his irritating flashness (he quotes in full Elton John's revolting rewritten version of 'Candle in the Wind' in an account of Princess Diana's funeral; padding? you decide) is a vigour and independence that makes for stimulating reading - even if (another symptom of the book's hasty execution) he is often elliptical and jumps too readily into analysis without appropriate exposition of facts.
In short, this is a flawed work that, in all honesty, Davies and - more so - his publisher Macmillan should be decidedly embarrassed about. It was a guaranteed bestseller on its publication, of course; but whether it stands the test of time will depend on whether writer or publisher is minded to thoroughly revise future editions.
Eric Hobsbawm
The Age of Capital 1848-1875
Eric Hobsbawm is an unreconstructed Marxist so one inevitably approaches his books with a degree of scepticism - both concerning the slant he places on events and as regards the general quality of his judgement.
To start with the former, this certainly isn't a wholly objective account of the 'golden years' of 19th-century capitalism. Hobsbawm does little to hide his toxic hatred of bourgeois values, and even where he approves of the liberal world's actions he is generally careful to ascribe them to as low motives as seem plausible. Thus he would have the abolition of slavery be due largely to the bourgeoisie's recognition of the model's inefficiency; such idealism as was involved he waters down to a sense of slavery as 'morally undesirable'. In Hobsbawm's world, pure motives are the almost exclusive preserve of the working class and, among the educated, Marxists.
Of course the lot of the working class in this period was undoubtedly, for the most part, appalling; and the smugness and hypocrisy of the middle classes of the period are attested facts. But Hobsbawm's persistent and deliberate reference to non-Western countries as 'victims' of capitalist imperialism, as though no good whatsoever devolved to them in terms of improved infrastructure and economic activity, seems disingenuous; the uncritical terms in which he speaks of Marx - almost recalling those of a lover - border on the sickening; and his professed distaste for the civic buildings of Victorian Britain seems more due to the values they sought to embody than to their architectural merits.
Yet, if the comments above make the book sound a failure, nothing could be further from the truth. For what is hard to comprehend in Hobsbawm is how an uncritical acceptance of a largely discredited ideology can sit alongside such brilliant general perspicuity. Most of the book's flaws involve use of loaded vocabulary; by making adjustments for this, one arrives at an amazingly comprehensive and coherent picture of this most dynamic of historical periods. The opening up of the American West, the Franco-Prussian War, the formation of organised labour movements, emigration, family life, arts and science - all these and more are discussed in depth and fitted convincingly into a general picture of the age. The sheer quantity of material Hobsbawn has digested and distilled, without ever losing sight of the wood for the trees, is hugely impressive and makes this book, despite its flaws, the first one that anybody wanting to know about the western world in the third quarter of the Nineteenth Century should reach for.
J M Roberts
The Penguin History of the World
I read this book back in 1996, and in trying to remember the faintest thing about it I am reminded why I was never any good at history (i.e. I can't remember the faintest thing about anything).
I do remember that it was an interesting, if not exactly easy, read. History is about the interplay of minute factual detail and broad, elusive tendencies. In trying to cram the history of the world into one volume, Roberts obviously has to play up the latter at the expense of the former, but it is a remarkable achievement that he still manages to produce a coherent narrative.
Roberts also wisely follows the main branches of history that have brought us to the world as we know it today. So don't come to this book looking for detailed analyses of the symbolism of Maori art. The bias is also, by Roberts' own admission, towards the development of Western culture. Although substantial sections are given over to the ancient cultures of China, India etc., they are smaller than the sophistication of these cultures might, in purely objective terms, appear to merit. Roberts' justification - and it is a valid one, I think - is that (a) he is a Westerner and cannot help but see history from a Western perspective and (b) the history of the world in the modern period, for better or worse, has largely been the history of the expansion of Western culture and values throughout the globe. I am pretty sure that Roberts is not making any claims to the inherent superiority of Western over other cultures.
To put it in a nutshell: if you only ever read one history book in your adult life, I reckon this should be it!
Keith Thomas
Man and the Natural World
Keith Thomas traces changes in the attitudes of the English to the natural world between 1500 and 1800. The principle thread is that as the country became gradually more urbanised, more affluent and (at least in intellectual circles) more secular, the medieval utilitarian view of nature became superseded by a more emotional and indulgent, but at the same time a more scientifically inquisitive stance.
The shift in the view of the natural world obtained at all levels, encompassing the increasing incidence of pet ownership, the emergence of the romantic taste for wild scenery, and the cataloguing of species of plants and animals for its own sake rather than merely for medicinal or culinary purposes. The book couldn't be more thorough or more wide-ranging, and while a somewhat dense read, it offers interesting historical perspectives on many modern attitudes to nature - that conservation is inherently desirable, for example, or that animals should be treated compassionately - which most of us (at least in Britain) now take for granted.