Europe Books

As a London Underground enthusiast, I just couldn't resist what this book had to offer. The sections on the history of the Underground were very informative and easy to read.
But there's more to the book than that. I thoroughly enjoyed every page. The author's conversational (and often amusing) tone lend a lightness to a subject that could otherwise be very dull. The book runs the gamut of subjects--from the underground and now mostly mysterious Fleet to the high-speed cables of British Telecom. It's all there.
This book is an excellent resource for anyone doing research, and a great read if you're fascinated by things beneath the surface.

Except for Anglophiles and London Buffs most people's knowledge of the London Underground is limited to its use as a bomb shelter during the World War II Blitz. However, the Underground existed for centuries before WWII. Chapter 1 succinctly narrates the Underground during the Blitz, and concludes stating "....to understand the full complexity of what lies under London, we must begin with her subterranean rivers."

Chapter 2 notes "There are over a hundred miles of rivers in London, fed by over a hundred springs and wells....Hidden from view, recalled only in street names...." As early as 1463 a Royal Act ordered "The covering-in of the Walbook's middle and lower reaches" vaulting and paving it over. These rivers were covered over or diverted into tunnels. Many of the rivers underground became more sewers than rivers. The text also notes "There are several lost rivers under London referred to by London's chroniclers but impossible to trace."

The text devotes several chapters to the development of underground sewers, water systems, gas pipes, trains, and later telegraph, telephone and electricity systems. The text gives captivating accounts of several engineering problems that were confronted, how they were resolved together with thumbnail sketches of the engineers and managers involved. . Tunneling under the Thames River was a major venture taking fifteen years to complete. Most intriguing is the account of The London Hydraulic Power Company founded in 1871where "Raw water (untreated) water was pumped at a pressure of 400 pounds per square inch through the miles of pipes running beneath London, and was used to raise and lower cranes, operated lifts.... theatre safety curtains, wagon hoists, even hat hat-blocking presses...." Amazingly the company survived until the mid-1970s.

As telegraph lines were developed underground, the Post Office gained control of the telegraph system and later gained control of the telephone system which they tried to suppress. As electricity developed around a national grid, distribution moved underground and by WWII was operating as a national industry. After the dropping of the first atomic bomb, the British government considered operating from the underground but by the 1960s gave up plans to fighting and surviving a nuclear war from under London. The text notes that new water and electricity tunnels characterized the 1980s and early 1990s with "The biggest capital project under London in the last ten years has been the completion of the London Ring Water Main"

This is a fascinating book and the reader will be amazed by the extensive underground systems under London that are still in use today.

This is a fantastic history of what's underneath the ground of today's London. Blending history, geography, and engineering, this book describes the smothered streams and covered rivers, the water pipes and sewers, and the tunnels under the Thames.

A major section is devoted to the London Underground - the "Tube" - and its history. The Post Office's automated mail-handling railway is briefly touched on as well.

The role of London's underground spaces during wartime is reviewed including the underground factories and the Cabinet War Rooms of the Second World War.

The book is profusely illustrated with a heavy emphasis on contemporary cut-away and explanatory drawings. The pictures make the text come alive.

A really great book for the Anglophile or London-buff.

Having spent some time in London, and being a card-carrying historian, I was already aware of the hidden Fleet River, and the government bunkers from World War II, and (of course) the Underground itself. But I'd never heard of the Little Conduit beside St. Paul's, or the pneumatic postal railway, and the 1,500-mile network of 19th-century sewers (on which the metropolitan area still depends) never entered my mind. And I don't know how safe the pedestrian tunnels under the Thames would be these days, in any case. But the authors have done an amazing job tracing a number of "lost" rivers, and scores of independent water company pipelines, and assorted arsenals and crypts and tramways. And now I have a list for my next visit to London!

It's a great book if you're interested in this sort of thing. From the early beginnings of London's sewers to the modern day tube and postal networks, this book covers it all in a remarkably easy to read fashion. Of particular interest to me were the sections on Londons 'lost' rivers as well as the Underground, both covered in this book. Highly recommended.

Thomas B. Costain is one of the most readable of historians because he firstly draws on an awareness, gained in his years as a novelist, of the necessity on the part of a writer to above all reach out to his reader. An even greater praise might be this: Costain is also one of the most intelligent historians I've ever had the good fortune to read.

This is Costain's second volume in his well-rounded four-book history of England during the rule of its most storied dynasty, the Plantagenets. Here, in just under four-hundred pages, Costain concentrates on the events of the thirteenth-century reign of Henry III, who came to the throne in 1216, and who passed away forty-six years later in the autumn of 1272. Beginning his story during the regency of the great and good William Marshal, "right hand man" of four monarchs, and ending it shortly after Prince Edward's crushing of the baronial revolt led by Simon de Montfort, Costain makes the interesting case that the thirteenth-century was perhaps the grandest and most glorious if not in the whole of English history, then undeniably that in the era of the Plantagenets.

This was the first volume I've read so far in the quartet, but it won't be the last.

Costain gives his usual rousing treatment to a period not widely treated.

Costain's entire four-volume history of the Plantagenets, "The Pageant of England," is the reason I became a historian and history teacher. I had liked history before, but I'd never before read history that read like a novel. He brought these figures to life in a way that lit a fire that still burns brightly. In short, an excellent history, which I re-read every few years--especially The Magnificent Century!

I have read this book so many times I have worn out my copy, in paperback. I would and do recommend the book to anyone anyone who wants to start learning the history of England and the Middle Ages. The Late Mr Costain brought the people to life, which was a rare gift, he also being a novelist knew how to tell a tale, both are great for generating an interest in history. He leaves a great foundation for a student to build a knowledge of history on.

I first read these books 20 years ago, and the opportunity to purchase them in a new edition is the thrill of the year for me. Costain makes the period come alive, with all its heroes, villains, and bystanders. While many of Costain's opinions and conclusions are somewhat dated by more recent research, there is no more delightful reading experience amongst modern histories of the middle ages.

The Making of the Middle Ages by RW Southern
When I asked for suggestions as to what I should read to expand my knowledge of the social history of the Middle Ages, a friend with a degree in Medieval History suggested Richard Southern's The Making of the Middle Ages. I was hoping for a fairly straightforward book about women, warfare, technology, medicine, what it was like to live in a Medieval town and so forth, and The Making of the Middle Ages is not that book. It is, nevertheless, a fascinating and well written volume, and well worth the time and money.
Southern limits his discussion to the period from the end of the 10th century to the beginning of the 13th century--from 972 to 1204 to be exact. The book is divided into five chapters: the first discusses the relationship between Europe and its neighbors--the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic countries. The general European perception of these countries, trade, the Crusades, and the transmission of knowledge all form parts of this chapter. The second chapter is on "The Bonds of Society"; in this chapter Southern treats the emergence of centralized government, serfdom, and the idea of knighthood. The third chapter deals with Christianity and society--the mingling of secular and sacred in the medieval church, the growth of power of the papacy, and monasticism. The fourth chapter is about intellectual and literary changes which took place during Southern's period, and the final chapter "From Epic to Romance" concerns the growing interest in mysticism, in the cult of the Virgin, and in more personal forms of piety. One of the most charming aspects of The Making of the Middle Ages is the astonishing diversity of the anecdotes that Southern relates to illustrate his points. Southern introduces us to a host of interesting and esoteric historical figures: the "nameless traveller" who carried the news of the death of Count Wilfred of Cerdana from Spain through France and into Germany; the elusive Prester John; the heroic Boethius who undertook the Herculean task of saving the entire corpus of Greek scholarship; and the virtually unknown Peter of Blois--poet, archdeacon, and correspondent--whose letters give us a glimpse into the life of a high-ranking ecclesiastical official, to list only a few. Southern also relates, with vigor and style, the history of the bloody and cynical Counts of Anjou and how they slowly and strategically consolidated and expanded their territorial holdings.
Southern's language is also amusing. This is not a dry textbook-style introduction to Medieval history--Southern allows himself to indulge in the colorful turns of phrase which impart so much pleasure to reading, but which have been so rigorously winnowed out of most scholarly and academic writing. My copy of The Making of the Middle Ages is full of underlined passages which are interesting for their writing as much as for their content. In the final chapter of the book ("From Epic to Romance"), Southern observes that "Chretien probes the heart, but it is the enamelled heart of the twelfth-century secular world, not yet made tender by the penetration of strong religious feeling." I don't know if I will ever have occasion to refer to the "enamelled heart of the twelfth century secular world," but I hope I will.
However, from the point of view of an interested layperson, The Making of the Middle Ages is a challenging read. Southern assumes a great deal of knowledge on the part of his reader, and many of the connections he draws are difficult to appreciate for someone who has only a tenuous grasp on Medieval history and who is struggling to assimilate the mass of information on which the author is drawing to support his points. Also, Southern's book has something in common with another book that I continue to enjoy each time I read it: Peter Brown's The World of Late Antiquity. Each time I open The World of Late Antiquity, I am again charmed by Brown's style and by the subtle connections that he draws. Yet as soon as I put it down, the details begin to slip away from me. I am afraid that The Making of the Middle Ages may have the same ephemeral effect on my understanding of the late 10th to the early 13th centuries, but I would nonetheless recommend it to anyone who has at least a Western-civ level of background knowledge to provide a jumping-off point from which to appreciate this book.

In just over 400 pages Mr. Southern manages to cover crucial 700 years of European history. What makes this book a standout study is the author's ability to integrate the demographic, economics, societal, artistic and pholosophic/religious development in a comprehensive picture, which is easy to follow and comprehend. While the book may be a little too narrowly focused for the casual reader, it is an excellent, rich in detail and perspective introduction to pre-Renaissance Europe.

The Making of the Middle Ages is a study of the period 972 to 1204. Before Southern wrote this book in 1952, the period has traditionally been called the High Middle Ages or the "Renaissance of the 12th Century". However Southern sees it as more than a Renaissance (usually thought of as a period of *re* discovery of classical texts and ideas), but also a period of *new* and original ideas and institutions. Southern says the period "had been overtaken by a creative spirit, which was not derived from the past, but nourished by a medley of influences both past and present." What is the "creative spirit"? According to Southern, it is Romanticism, which can be defined as a heightened sense of self-consciousness in perceiving the physical and natural world, both in the secular and spiritual.

It was with the publication of "Making" that decades of subsequent research into the period has focused on Romanticism as the primary creative movement that helped propel European culture from a backwater throughout the early middle ages to a leading civilization by 1500. The Virgin Cult, courtly love, the Arthurian tradition, the origins of Gothic architecture, are just a few of the peculiar institutions and ideas that have been re-examined from a Romantic viewpoint. And it is for that reason "Making" is so often classified as one of the most important medieval history books of the 20th century. Further, it was groundbreaking stylistically because it legitimized speculative and imaginative cultural history, which has found many imitators, such as Peter Brown (The World of Late Antiquity) and Robin Lane Fox (Pagans and Christians). It's influence on generation or two of Medieval scholars can not be over-estimated and it still remains one of those classic books every medieval student is familiar with.

Although "Making" is accessible and readable by anyone, the books intent as described above is subtle and nuanced, in particular outside of the "state of the art" of medievalism in 1952 which saw the 12th century as a Renaissance at best, or a "dark age" at worst. This was a revolutionary and groundbreaking book for its day and is as interesting today for historiographical reasons, some of the actual content has since been refuted. Literary speaking, it is well written and delightful. It does contain interesting anecdotes about the period, but this is not a survey text and those looking for a introduction to the Middle Ages may be disappointed if not bedazzled.

An acknolwedged classic of european history, R.W. Southern's "The Middle Ages" focuses on the period between 900 and 1200 A.D. His geopgraphic focus is mostly northern france, with some asides to Germany, Italy, Southern France and England. His main thesis is the idea that this period saw the emergence of a personal devotion to faith via monasticism that in turn prefigured the rise of invdividual identity in western culture.

No small accomplishment, that thesis, and no small accomplishment this book. Southern's style of writing is charming and concise. You don't get the thesis till the last chapter, but the preceding chapters are entertaining, enjoyable reading.

The author who turned me on to this book was the recently deceased Norman F. Cantor in his dishy "The Making of the Middle Ages", which I also recommend for any one who is reading on this subject outside the academy. Cantor's main point was to show how the empire building mind set of the "Annales" school of the history of the middle ages (which concentrates its focus on the role of the peasant in the society of the middle ages), had deprived other "schools" of much needed oxygen. Well, he didn't put it that way exactly, but that's what he said.

Cantor, of course, studied under Southern, so the bias is there. None the less, having read several books from the Annales school and none from Southern and his progeny, I would have to say that the two compliment one another (and Southern cites Marc Bloch, the much revered founder of Annales school).

So read this book if you want to learn more about the history of the middle ages and the growth of invdividualism in the west. You won't be dissapointed.

This is the brilliant book that made Richard Southern's reputation as one of the finest medieval historians. Everything that the two earlier reviewers have said is true and needn't be repeated. The bottom line is this: if you are very interested in the subject, and have already read about it to some extent, then you must read this book. It is astonishly rich in ideas -- almost too much so; and many of the observations that Southern makes in a seemingly casual way can give such blinding insight that you may find yourself stopping for several minutes at a time just to marvel at what you've read.

One the other hand, this book is for serious students of history (it was originally devised for a college course). Those casually interested in finding out "what happened" in the middle ages will find it boring and useless.

You need to have been an apprentice historian in the mid-sixties to appreciate the impact this book had on Europeanists. I was thirty-one years old in 1967. I had taught history in high school for eight years and picked up a master's in history at NYU, and I was starting my Ph. D. program in history at Yale, concentrating on early modern European history, and within that specialty, on medieval and early modern political theory. (Later, when I taught college, my specialty course was on Machiavelli, More, Erasmus and Guicciardini.)

Braudel had just published the second edition of his masterpiece. The book had been significantly rewritten and was about a third longer than the original edition. But it was available only in French, which I read well but exceedingly slowly. The first edition --but not the second-- had been translated into Spanish, my preferred second language, so I swotted the Spanish first edition for orals. Reading it in a foreign language, it was too much in a limited amount of time to absorb and integrate with what I already knew about the times. I more or less flubbed the Braudel question in my orals. (In contrast, I did a killer job responding to a question about Ernst Kantorowicz's The King's Two Bodies: A Study in Medieval Political Liturgy.)

Later, teaching a winter term course in college, I assigned the by-then-published English translation of Braudel's second edition to my students, giving myself --at long last-- an opportunity to read it in my native tongue. I was floored! The masterful use of maps and graphs to show hitherto unnoticed trends in history, the wealth of illustrative detail, the scope of his view! Of all the masterworks of the first two generations of Annales historians --Bloch and Febvre, Braudel's other works, Le Roy Ladurie, Aries, Duby, etc.-- Mediterranean is still the undisputed masterpiece on early modern European economic and social history.

I have been keenly interested in world history for nearly 20 years. I read, on average, 30 non-fiction historical accounts per annum. With rare exception, I have always felt up to the task of both completion and comprehension. Braudel is an entirely different animal. What Braudel has presented in the form of 16th-century Mediterranean history is formidable, innovative, and exhausting.

Braudel's narrative weaves itself through overlays of historical strata that demand as much from the reader as any contemporary written history available. His is not a mere linear schedule of cause and effect, but a finely crafted history of regional parallels which render the methodology as thought provoking as the content.

Fully one-fourth of the book is devoted to economics in such painstaking detail that, while the specialist may revel, the layman may grow foggy, uninterested, and, unfortunately, bored. But, this does not detract from the overall value of Braudel's effort. The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World is a singular achievement in written history which offers the reader a vantage point that I have yet to find elsewhere. 5 stars.

This book is a very detailed starting point for Renaisance fans. At its heart this is a socio-economic history. The clever inclusion of climate and geographic conditions presuasively explained why prosperous Capitalism grew in some regions while others remained stagnant. Chapter 5-"The Human Unit" was the most informative. Most facets of history are here for the reader to absorb. This is the type of book we all wished we had in school.

Braudel's text on the Mediterranean is considered one of the contemporary classics of historical writing, and I can see why. It sets out to convey a total history of the Mediterranean world in the latter half of the 16th century, but ranges over so much more territory in order to achieve this objective. Just as Jared Diamond builds a foundation on geography, climate, and local flora and fauna in _Guns, Germs , and Steel_, so does Braudel begin his history. However, he does not stop there, and moves on to cover social and economic history, and, in the second volume, deals with the more standard "history of events" typical of most historical literature. Do not skip the second volume, as the tapestry Braudel weaves is not complete without it. The text is very detailed, too detailed at points, but I believe this gives the reader confidence in the authority of the writer. Clearly Braudel has done exhaustive research. You, too, will be exhausted by the time you finish this magnum opus.

I have written a review of the first volume of Braudel's history of the Mediterranean, and here will only say that it is necessary to read this second volume in order to appreciate what Braudel began in the first volume. The second volume is the more typical "history of events", but as Braudel concludes -- and correctly so in my opinion -- the history of events is founded on geography, demographics, and social and economic history. Braudel builds this foundation in the first volume, and the two volumes must be read jointly in order to fully appreciate Braudel's astounding accomplishment.

It was late, raining and we were starved. We had just checked into our hotel in Verona and needed a good meal to put our spirits back on track. That's when we dug out our little red guide and found a 4 star restaurant within walking distance. Don't let the fact that it's all written in Italian put you off. I have no language skills and found it easy to use and quite indispensable. While it's difficult to have a truly bad meal in Italy, with this book it's amazingly simple to have a positively great one.

Although I am French, I have traveled extensively in Italy. I can say without a doubt say that the Michelin Red Guide Italia is absolutely the best guidebook available. The information is so extensive that even native Italians will find a wealth of information!

All aspects of a trip are covered including hotels, restaurants tourist attractions, road and city maps and suggested traveling routes, among other things.

Michelin didn't get its superior reputation for nothing! It is the most trusted name in travel guides. This guide is just another addition to its superb library.

If you want to stay in lovely out of the way places and eat in good restaurants, here's your book. Instead of relying on the canned list of chain hotels a travel agent has, and taking pot luck at tourist dining places, get a Michelin, make your reservations in advance (figure 4-6 weeks to be safe for any restaurant with a star rating), and you'll do very well for yourself. In my experience, anyplace that's listed at all is quite decent, at least; if a restaurant or hotel is highly rated it is superb. Vacationers looking for hotels should look for places marked in red, which means especially pleasant and peaceful; you'll arrive and say to yourself: "Oh, how lovely."

Hotel and restaurant listings are very extensive and very reliable, and the guide has maps of lots of cities and small towns you won't find anywhere else , with all of the places listed marked on them. Indispensable if you want to travel around and plan your own trip.

The Michelin tourist and motoring atlases (also excellent) mark all of the towns which are mentioned in the Red Guides, so when you're planning your trip once you know where you want to go you can look for places nearby to stay and dine.

Be AWARE that this guide is "written" in Italian -- but do NOT be intimidated by that fact. The essential information is (as in the case of all Michelin texts) conveyed by ideograms or other diagrams (maps, etc.), and the meanings are clearly explained in the multilingual bookmark which accompanies the guide. The information itself is the most accurate -- and most respected -- in the world. Consider that when deciding on how you're going to spend the thousands of US$ that your Italian vacation will cost.

I travel all over the continent and have always taken my Michelin guides with me. There is no better way to treat yourself the way you deserve to be treated. I like to travel in Italia since I have a home off the Amalfi Coast on the Isle of Capri, even though I am French. I live in Provence, the most spectacular place on this very earth, but I do like to see other wonderful places and dine on foreign foods. Italia is good for doing both of those pleasures.I like to fly most of the time, but then you do not get to see the sites close up. Flying is really for getting some place fast. But if you want to take your time and really see Italia, then you must have this Michelin guides in your possession. Since I am French, I don't know every place to go, so this guide always comes in very handy for me.

This is a fascinating account of the life and times of a millwright and his trade. Details on choosing a location for the mill, building the mill, and how the machinery to grind the grain worked puts the reader in the position as the millwright himself. This book is written as part history book, part informational, and even part journal, using fictional diary entries to give the reader a sense of the everyday life of a miller. A touch of drama is thrown in as we read of mill-workers who are injured and/or killed while on the job -
"1864 August 15: Mary McDonnell was drawn into the machinery by the belting today and lost her right arm below the elbow. I fear the heat will not help her recovery
August 17: Mary McDonnell died today, the infection having spread too quickly from her injury. I will send her wages on to her mother in Southbridge."
This book is supposedly written for children - I first discovered it in an elementary school library - but I find it more suitable for adults. I have found that many history books geared toward the younger set can have information not found in the more adult-oriented books. The Mill by David Macaulay is one of them. The illustrations themselves are very well done, and the details of running a mill is probably the best I have seen thus far.
Great reading about the lifeblood of a 19th century community.

I bought this for my son, who has always been intrigued by construction projects, but I have also enjoyed it quite a bit and learned a lot from it. One point I would make is that it is not quite as simple as some of Macaulay's other books, such as Castle and Cathedral. Whereas those books are easy for even a four-year-old to comprehend, Mill has a more involved story-line and will require more explaining from a parent. I would say that ideally it should be for older children for that reason. But, that doesn't change the fact that it's a great book, and of course the illustrations are amazing.

It is said that in the course of one long human lifetime, places like Ohio went from virgin wilderness to among the most industrialized regions on earth, but the "blueprint" for the Midwest's growth as a center of industry had its roots in the factory mills of New England. In Mill, the masterful David Macaulay uses direct storytelling, combined with his appealing pen and ink sketches, to bring to our comprehension the founding and operation of a nineteenth-century water-powered textile mill. His tale here takes a reader, young or old, through the development of the mill structure, an event reminiscent of a rural barn raising, into the day to day workings of this efficient industrial complex as it would have been at peak operation. More than just a place of labor, the mills of New England and elsewhere soon became the focal points of entire communities. As this book shows, if a local resident did not himself work at the mill, then one of his relatives, customers, or friends most certainly did. Macaulay pulls no punches, and shows that work in a mill was demanding, dangerous, and strenuous. There were long hours, sunup to sunset, every day except Sunday. David Macaulay also elicits true feeling from his readers as the story wraps around to the demise of the grand old mill, in a later age when industrial evolution makes its processes redundant. Mill may lack some of the grandeur of other Macaulay works such as Cathedral, Castle, or Pyramid, but it has a lot to teach almost anyone, and in this author's hands, learning is both spontaneous and enjoyable.

This is an important book. Written for children, it can be used just as effectively by adults to comprehend the beginnings of the industrial revolution in the United States. Learn and see how men tamed our rivers and how men, women and children were swallowed up in these great monuments to progress.

The illustrations are remakable. David Macaulay deftly describes and illustrates how the technology that made America a world industrial power came to the young new country and how American ingenuity improved it and made the nation into a world class economic juggernaut.

The author is a superb story teller, and anyone who would like to visualize the nature of mills and to understand the profound impact of this technology on our country should read it.

I highly recommend this great children's book to everyone.

Macaulay is an illustrator, architect, engineer, historian, economist, anthropologist and story-teller. He puts all of this knowledge and skill into Mill. It is a totally one-of-a-kind book that does not easily fall under any traditional category. It is often labeled as a "kids' book" because it has pictures and is relatively short. But very little of the educational content would be considered common knowledge for adults. It reads like a history text-book, a technical manual, and a novel all in one.

It is an epic, multi-generational story of a fictional New England town that is born out of the textile boom of the Industrial Revolution. You follow the cotton-milling and cloth-weaving operations of this town and its mills as they grow and expand, incorporate new technology, and endure the tides of fortune. Along the way, you get to learn all the details of the planning, the machinery, the construction, read excerpts from the characters' journals and watch the town slowly grow and change over time. In the end, this short book feels like a monumental journey and it will leave you not only satisfied but smarter too.

I've read most of Macaulay's books and this is probably the best.

Ms. Burleigh's Mirage is an excellent account of the invasion of Egypt by Napoleon's army, and the French intellectual Savants that accompanied the military on this ill-conceived and failed military expedition. The accounts of the physical trials, successes, and failures of the Savants is profoundly interesting.

Ms. Burleigh's depth of research on the subject was very good. She provides many detailed accounts and examples, taken from first hand journals, that provide the reader with first-hand accounts of a very trying period in French and Egyptian history.

For those interested in this period of colonial French history; interested in the Egyptian art, architecture and culture; and the practical application of 18th century science to the infancy of archaeology, this is a must read for you.

This is a terrific book. I highly recommend it to almost anyone. All you need is an interest in history or science or adventure or foreign affairs or botany or ancient Egypt. On many levels, this book is fun and informative. And it's all true. For flavor, it's like Indiana Jones meets Albert Einstein meets James Audubon. It's hard to put down.

The story concerns Napoleon's foray into Egypt in 1799. Ostensibly it was to expand scientific knowledge of this ancient and mysterious land. In reality, it was the start of the anticipated conquest and annexation of Egypt. As the British did with India (i.e., creating a far-east outpost), the French were hoping to do with Egypt. But things did not go exactly as planned.

In other books on the subject, the focus is on the military aspect of the expedition. About 50,000 soldiers and sailors accompanied Napoleon. In Mirage, the author (Nina Burleigh) focuses on the 151 scientists (or savants) who also accompanied him. Here, the savants are the "heroes." We learn of their trials, tribulations, and successes.

Each chapter concerns a different savant and their respective expertise: botany, math, medicine, engineering, art, etc. Through the eyes of learned gents, we learn about Egypt, the parochial views of 19th century Europe, and the folly of imperialism. It's a terrific perspective that is told in an easily accessible style.

Burleigh keeps up the suspense. She covers many academic fields but does not overwhelm a reader. It's a fun read and you can't help but learn. For example, she describes the savants' discoveries while stuck in desert sands. She puts discoveries in the context of the time and shows how some still apply, like Fourier's math work.

The only knock on the book, and it is minor, is that it lacks a map of the region. Readers should print one before starting the book.

Though I normally don't read nonfiction, Mirage immediately drew me in with its vivid descriptions of this strange, historic expedition. Aptly titled, the book chronicles Napoleon's disastrous foray into Egypt in pursuit of some exotic, orientalist fantasy that never existed in reality. Aping Alexander, Napoleon took with him some of the best and most adventurous French intellectuals of the time. These scientists and academics, or "savants," become the core of the narrative -- distinct and eccentric characters that I followed with interest. Some of the situations the savants found themselves in were truly surreal -- but despite the hardships and suffering they endured during the journey, they were able to expand their fields of study -- and even discover the Rosetta Stone!

I knew very little about this expedition -- or this period in history -- but the book is enormously informative, with loads of facts as well as being entertaining, and in spite of myself I learned a lot! As I read I kept thinking of our current fiasco in Iraq, which seems to repeat in so many ways the arrogance and ignorance of Napoleon and his French soldiers. So the book is amazingly timely as well.

A great read and a well-written, fascinating book! I recommend it highly.

Nina Burleigh paints a vivid picture of the curious minds of the scientists who accompanied Napoleon to Egypt, a land beyond their imagination.

The scientists' desire to understand what they were seeing and to map, catalogue, paint--and in some ways, dominate--this exotic place feels real. Though the cast of characters is large, and occasionally unwieldy, the book draws fine portraits of individuals, many of whom are worthy of their own biographies. And Mirage projects a sense of excitement about learning that is contagious.

Many people have read about Napoleon's invasion of Egypt and of the many scientists and engineers who accompanied him. However, many history books usually allot but a few pages perhaps to this important event, which led, among other things, to the discovery of the Rosetta Stone. The author of this book has done an excellent job of focusing entirely on Napoleon's Egyptian campaign with particular emphasis on the many "savants" who were charged with studying and documenting this ancient land. The many hardships that they endured are vividly described, as are their relationships with the French military and the local inhabitants. The author's writing style is accessible, friendly, authoritative and most engaging, making this a work that is difficult to put down. This account indeed forms an excellent link between the decaying ruins of an ancient civilization and the birth of modern Egyptology. This is a book that can be enjoyed by everyone, but history buffs, particularly those with a fascination for Egypt, will likely relish it the most.

Amazingly helpful and pleasent! The CD would not play. I called and spoke to David, who suggested I download Java 1.5. - Plus he sent me FREE Venice vol.2.
I really love the CD - images and narration are just lovely: informative, knowledgeable, beautiful. I have been reading several books about Venice, & the Venetian ghetto - and the cd made it all come alive.

Museum Planet's incomparable "talking book" guides to Venice are the next best thing to being there, offering a beautiful visual tour through hundreds of color photos, a knowledgable guide, in depth histories of the monuments. The best possible preparation for a trip to Venice, and a welcome review later, when the magnificent sites and views are brought to life again. Great gift for anyone who loves Venice, and who doesn't?

A very usefull and interesting CD Rom with many excellent photo's.
Keep up the good work. Hope other European Cities follow soon.

My attention was directed to a review here where my name was used regarding

A product I had never seen. So I bought the two CD-ROMs published by

Museum Planet--'Museum Planet Venice' Volumes I & II They're fabulous! I'm

Jewish, so the information on the Venetian Ghetto was particularly

interesting to me. Actually all of it was great. So buy these disks. Also

you can visit my website michelvanrijn.com for the latest dirt on the art

world. I particularly like to out ex-convicts like Al Taubman and tax cheats

and smugglers. Really the site is quite exciting if I do say so myself. Just

click on "latest updates."

michel van rijn

Whether you're a casual traveler or an experienced tour guide, a beginning graduate student of art history or a tenured professor who specializes in Venetian art, you're going to be overwhelmed when you get to Venice. As you step aboard one of La Serenissima's water buses and ply your way down the Grand Canal, your mind begins to spin. Every palace you pass is imposing, exquisite, saturated with history. No matter how much you think you know, you will be trying to recall important information for each and every astonishingly beautiful building. You can leaf through a guide book. But a much better way is to pop these inexpensive cd's into your lap top and listen to David Brown talk you through the whole thing.

Museum Planet Presents: Venice, Italy (vols I & II) is better than the kind of "acoustaguide" you get in a museum, primarily because it is so much more informative.

Say you're planning a morning ramble that will take in Ss. Giovanni e Paolo and perhaps later on Santa Maria dei Frari. You will be bedazzled by what you see in these churches; at the same time, you'll be besieged by a virtual commotion of visual data. With Museum Planet, what had been a jumble becomes comprehensible and knowable. It takes a lifetime to know Venice. Here's where you start. It really is the next best thing to being there; and it changes what it means to be there.

Right from the top I will state that I do not agree 100% with everything outlined in Professor Boyd's book on my favorite Nabokavian literary work. But I do share Professor Boyd's love for Pale Fire, and reading this book increased my enjoyment and appreciation of the work immensely. This was clearly a labor of love and it is an easy read (not dry and stale) for anyone who had the slightest enjoyment in reading Nabokov's book.

Amazing! When reading this insomnia-inducing book my head kept spinning with the mirror-like mirages of Pale Fire and I felt that everything I trusted and relied on when first I read that book were crumbling around me.

I have read Pale Fire twice and still only feel that I am barely familiar with how the common household objects in the place Kinbote is housesitting helped to create that zany land of the north, Zembla.

I dont want to spoil some of the surprises in this book (Boyd has gone back on his stance of Shade being the author of both poem and commmentary which he supports in his biography of Nabokov). But let me just say that these surprises provoked me in the middle of long nights to exclaim "What is goint ON? " and pace around frantically.

A haunting question (and by the way the ghostly aspects of Pale Fire which i had only felt in a vague way are exposed by Boyd to be something richer than i would have ever imagined) is not only how much control Hazel Shade had over the commentary but also how much control Nabokov's playful shade is exerting upon Boyd. The reviewer below me is onto something.

Boyd brings to Pale Fire his thorough knowledge of Nabokov's other works - for example his thesis - anti-thesis description of chess in Speak Memory or that bizarre short story The Vane Sisters - and illustrates how they help to see into the mystery of some of Nab's more complex works.

After reading Pale Fire twice, I naively thought that i understood it (yes that Bodkin in the University was suspicious, and yes the existence of internation thug Gradus i had previosly questioned) but i was only approaching the intitial layerings of this beatifully layered world. Im not saying that i am necessarily convinced with all Boyd has to say, but he has dazzled me with his insights and made me fully realize that I am far from understanding fully this work of art. It is to Nabokov's supreme credit that he could create a world that seems as immense, varied, and impossible to appreciate fully enough as the one we live in everyday.

Obviously I must not be as big a Nabokov groupie as other Pale Fire enthusiasts, because when I read Pale Fire in a college seminar, most of us spent weeks admiring Nabokov's academic satire and what we then thought was a purposefully horrible poem. Now I feel somewhat shamed because Boyd seems to think the poem itself is great poetry -- I cringe because our class read out loud particularly funny lines and laughed at what a good "bad" poem Nabokov wrote. Maybe Boyd does miss some of the humor, but that is all he misses. I don't think he leaves one line, joke, pun, or obscure reference unexplained. I enjoyed the first few chapters more because they stuck to many of the more obvious discoveries Nabokov intended his readers to make. By the middle, Boyd had my head spinning with some of the leaps of analysis -- I was too confused to agree or disagree. But by the end, his overall surprises and theories come together and make sense. No matter what you make of Boyd's theory, I applaud the book for its emphasis on close reading and for its obvious love of this great writer. Nabokov is one of this century's best and deserves this kind of in-depth reading. In the final chapter, Boyd answers some of the criticisms about his theory (by Michael Wood, for instance, a Princeton prof) and almost ends up sounding like Kinbote for a moment in his defensiveness. This book is a true discovery for a devout reader because it shows how to read better and more closely, how to link (bobo-link) seemingly unrelated bits together. Hats off to a great work of Nabokov scholarship -- Boyd brought in lots of information from Nabokov's other works that proved to be quite important.

For Nabokov, nothing was ever as simple as it seemed. In fact, "simple" and "sincere" were two adjectives that he despised. While teaching at Wellesley College and later at Cornell, Nabokov would give a low mark to any student who used the words, "simple" and "sincere" in a paper.

Nabokov was a writer who celebrated the complexities in life. He looked for unexpected meanings in even the most banal details of existence and the test questions he set for his students were notoriously eccentric, e.g., Describe Madame Bovary's hairdo; What sort of paper covered the walls of Anna Karenina's bedroom? for Nabokov, God was a subtle being, but tremendously inventive and perhaps a little sly.

Nabokov believed that "the unraveling of a riddle is the purest and most basic act of the human mind." He probably would have loved this remarkable book, an attempt to unravel the riddles and hidden meanings Nabokov, himself, embedded in Pale Fire.

When Pale Fire first appeared in 1962, reviewers said, correctly, that it could be enjoyed without puzzling over its hidden meanings but that it obviously hid many levels of complexity. In a now-famous article, Mary McCarthy called Pale Fire "a jack-in-the-box, a Fabergé gem, a clockwork toy, a chess problem, an infernal machine, a trap to catch reviewers..." But she also thought it was a thing of perfect beauty, symmetry, strangeness, originality and moral truth.

Even on a first reading of Pale Fire, we understand that Nabokov is playing a most elaborate literary game. Kinbote is hilariously mad, and his efforts to interpret Shade's poem as a commentary on Zemblan events can be seen as a satire of imaginative academics.

But Nabokov also scattered less obvious clues throughout the book. McCarthy decided that the "real" author of the commentary was yet another Zemblan who is barely mentioned, V. Botkin. And there are those who believe that Nabokov is telling us that John Shade didn't die but simply wrote the commentary under the name of Kinbote as a way of disappearing.

Boyd now interprets Nabokov's intentions in yet another way. He believes that both the poem and the commentary were inspired from beyond the grave as well as by Shakespeare's many ghosts.

Nabokov's Pale Fire is a monument to a brilliant scholar's persistent love affair with a book and its author. For more than three decades now, Boyd has made Pale Fire, and Nabokov, his obsession, much in the way that Nabokov, himself, was obsessed with butterflies. In 1990 and 1991, Boyd published his excellent two-volume biography of Nabokov and established himself as the world's premier Nabokovian.

Pale Fire, however, remained central to this thinking. When Boyd was asked to discuss Pale Fire on the Electronic Nabokov Discussion Forum, he discovered that his own views about this remarkable and original book were changing. Those views form the heart and soul of his own vibrant and energetic work. Even if we do not agree with all of his theories (and anything, at this point, must remain only a theory) we have to admire his scrupulous intelligence and dedication.

Boyd does not disdain eccentric flights of imagination. Nor is he afraid of being thought of as obsessive. There was a sweet madness in Nabokov, and quite obviously, Boyd has assimilated some of it, all to the good.

Nabokov's Pale Fire is more than a wonderful book; it is also a labor of love of the highest order. It can only enhance your understanding and love of both Nabokov and Pale Fire, and perhaps give you some insight into Boyd, himself.

This book on Pale Fire is some of the best critical commentary on a great piece of literature I have ever read. Shattuck's study of Proust's novel and Stanely Fish's recent book on Milton also come to mind.

The readers who will benefit most from this book are those who love Pale Fire and are very familiar with it. The study is so good and so thorough, I worry about it spoiling the act of discovery in newcomers to the novel. I read Pale Fire only once before reading Boyd's study. Oddly enough, it almost made me ashamed because I DIDN'T follow my curiousity and see where the clues could lead me. Granted, I don't think I could have reached Browning from the "Papa pisses" reference in Pale Fire, but many other clues could have yielding satisfying discoveries.

Basically, I read Pale Fire as a "Level 1" reader: getting the jokes and appreciating the more obvious ironies about Charles Kinbote. But in this book, Boyd shows how Nabokov's novel can be seen as a super-complex, but coherent pattern of signs, signs blinking at us from the beyond.

I won't spoil any more for those readers who want to discover more about Pale Fire on their own. My only advise is to follow your curiousity!

If you have read more than a few books about the history of our world from 1930 to 1945 you may begin to have questions about the National Socialist Movement and the course and effects of its government of Germany. These are questions like:
- Was the National Socialist movement in Germany a unique event or was it a part of a larger historical process in the terrible 20th century?
- What was the relationship between the Nazi led government and the governance of the German economy?
- Was Hitler the author of all that happened in the Third Riech or was he an enabler of many things that were potentially present in Germany?
- What, exactly, was Hitler's role in the destruction of the European Jews?
- Was German(read Nazi?) foreign policy driven by a master plan for world conquest (or domination?) or improvised and opportunistic?
- Was the Third Reich a socially liberating event to the lower middle class or was it a reaffirmation of traditional hierarchy and power structure in another guise?
- What did German resistance to the National Socialist movement and government actually amount to?
- How is it possible to consider National Socialist genocide as part of a normal historical account?
- How is is possible to do objective and empathetic history in the face of the moral values of the Nazi movement and government?

If you find these questions significant and interesting, there is no better single book to read. Each of these questions is covered by Mr Kershaw more or less in two phases. First there is review of the schools of interpretation promulgated by various historians, most of them professional, and then the author makes his own judgement and evaluation of the contentions at hand. Of particular interest to me is the very thorough coverage of the views and controversies among German historians of the last sixty years as these are rarely reported in the US media. Mr Kershaw does not completely ignore the work of popular historians but it is clear that all the points of view they may have are in fact covered by the range of views among the academic community. The author's personal insights and judgements seem well considered and generally appropriate to me.

I think the only area these professional historians have trouble with is the area of the emotional and psychological appeal of the National Socialist movement to so many Germans. I think to really confront that confronts all of us to acknowledge that there may be a darker side within us that could be touched by the myth structure of racial homogeneity and purfication. Consideration of that question of good and evil is just
beyond the job description of a professional historian and belongs to the philosopher or theologian.

Of particular value, and only to be expected, is the extensive bibliography and the sometimes illuminating foot notes. The concerns of some reviewers about the dense terminology should be noted. Part of that seems to be the result of translating terms from German that come out as rather involved hyphenated words in English. On the other hand the issue is that some of the problems studied here are complex and the answers are not simple and ways of talking about them strech our vocabulary. Ultimately my view is that real knowledge and understanding sometimes involves hard work and digging through this text is work. So be ready to do that or don't bother.

If you have read a number of popular histories of the Nazi period, I recommend this book and The Art of the Third Reich (seperately reviewed) to grasp the tangible and intangible aspects of the terrible and instructive time.

This book does an excellent job of outlining the current historiography of the Nazi regime. It is really only meant for scholars and it is fairly dense even for them. Kershaw does a masterful job of capturing each of the debates and this is really a great book if you want to write about Nazi Germany but don't know what to focus on. It is still relevant even today and does a great job of outlining the current debates that need to be addressed by historians.

Kershaw is God. This book is the bible for any scholar of the Third Reich.

I first read Kershaw's Adolf Hitler: Hubris and Nemesis. I couldn't put it down. I then picked up Kershaw's The Hitler Myth. Also an excellent read. I then moved on to The Nazi Dictatorship and within the first 5 minutes I realized I was in over my head. I am a 38 year old lifelong student of WWII. I have been reading about WWII since I was a kid. And I have a Masters degree. Yet this book was way over my head. This book is a HEAVY read and in my opinion is probably meant for history scholars, not amateurs like me. I'm giving it 5 stars based on the aforementioned works by Kershaw and the assumption that this book is of the same quality. But I didn't read it.

This book is a collection of short and dense summaries of other prominent works written on Nazism. Thoroughly researched and contanining a wealth of information, Kershaw's work is a valuable introduction for any researcher or college student. However, I think the esoteric rhetoric and scholarly details makes it kind of hard to digest for the casual reader not familiar with German history.