United Kingdom Books

This is a very sweet collection of pictures. I like it for garden ideas for my cottage style home.

This is a wonderful book for the lover of the old English cottage painters of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It is filled with full colored pictures on every page of the paintings and describes life in these times. A great addition to anyone's library who is interested in these times and the painter's who so aptly captured a way of life long gone. Paintings by Allingham, Strachan, Stannard, Foster and others are included.

I originally bought this book for a college class I was taking; however, I have since read and re-read many parts of it again and again. It is deeply insightful and covers most of the "known" Victorian Women Poets and some you may not have heard of. There are chapters on Elizabeth Barrett Browning; Christina Rossetti; Felicia Hemans; Michael Field (Katherine Bradley and Edith Cooper); Alice Meynell; Charlotte Mew; Augusta Webster; and Letitia Elizabeth Landon. The author and scholar Angela Leighton provides historical background along with the poets' verse and how they combine and merge to make a whole. Leighton states in her Introduction, "women's poetry of the nineteenth century, much more than the novel, was written and read as part of a self-consciously female tradition."

Many of the greatest Victorian poets have been ignored or been paid lip serice by the canon, simply because they were women. This anthology seeks to correct that. A great starting point for anyone searching for research topics, this book is also wonderful just to have on hand for browsing. The editors give lengthy biographies of each poet and criticial interpretations of some the poems that have been included. This book is invaluable to anyone who is curious about what's been hidden all these years

In an even-handed examination of how mass media forms the boundaries of environmental issues, David Guantlett, with skill and clarity maneuvers through potentially difficult and theory-ladden "critical theory," incorporating a Herman/Chomsky (Manufacturing Consent) edge, examining the way television affects the way audiences frame the incredibly complicated and inter-penetrating social issues of environmental problems. Guantlett is not so much interested in whether the mass media is culpable of intensionally ignoring or avoiding environmental issues. Instead he discovers through a creative study that children audiences have internalized environmental problems and their solutions in a one-dimensional "narrative": the problem has been created by individuals and is to be then solved by individuals. So what's the problem with that? It seems clear enough that if there are environmental problems, they are nothing more that an accumulation and combination of individual lifestyle choices and subsequent actions. Right? Not so fast. Within this "individualistic" problem/solution framework, how do we account for and address instances of polluting industries that fall within government and legal regulations? Moreover, how do we address the environmentally problematic social institutions, such as the wide-spread car-centered transportation rubrics through an "individual" problem/solution framework? Is there not an equally complicit socio-political aspect to environmental issues? And why is this aspect, the environmentally comprimising social institutions, missing withing environmental news coverage? Guantlett's subltle, yet powerful analysis shows that the important "absent narrative" within television coverage of environmental issues is nothing as diabolical, cliche, or as simple as a conspiracy thoery, but rather the normal outcome of the workings of modern industial capitalism, corporate owned media, and thus an increasingly narrow ideological framework of acceptable media content. Guantlett's work is on the money - so to speak.

A worthwhile sidenote: anyone who can incorporate Horkheimer, Adorno, Marx, and Beavis and Butthead into a single chapter about mass media and society is a five-star book for that reason alone - enjoy!

In an even-handed examination of how mass media forms the boundaries of environmental issues, David Guantlett, with skill and clarity maneuvers through potentially difficult and theory-ladden "critical theory," incorporating a Herman/Chomsky (Manufacturing Consent) edge, examining the way television affects the way audiences frame the incredibly complicated and inter-penetrating social issues of environmental problems. Guantlett is not so much interested in whether the mass media is culpable of intensionally ignoring or avoiding environmental issues. Instead he discovers through a creative study that children audiences have internalized environmental problems and their solutions in a one-dimensional "narrative": the problem has been created by individuals and is to be then solved by individuals. So what's the problem with that? It seems clear enough that if there are environmental problems, they are nothing more that an accumulation and combination of individual lifestyle choices and subsequent actions. Right? Not so fast. Within this "individualistic" problem/solution framework, how do we account for and address instances of polluting industries that fall within government and legal regulations? Moreover, how do we address the environmentally problematic social institutions, such as the wide-spread car-centered transportation rubrics through an "individual" problem/solution framework? Is there not an equally complicit socio-political aspect to environmental issues? And why is this aspect, the environmentally comprimising social institutions, missing withing environmental news coverage? Guantlett's subltle, yet powerful analysis shows that the important "absent narrative" within television coverage of environmental issues is nothing as diabolical, cliche, or as simple as a conspiracy thoery, but rather the normal outcome of the workings of modern industial capitalism, corporate owned media, and thus an increasingly narrow ideological framework of acceptable media content. Guantlett's work is on the money - so to speak.

A worthwhile sidenote: anyone who can incorporate Horkheimer, Adorno, Marx, and Beavis and Butthead into a single chapter about mass media and society is a five-star book for that reason alone - enjoy!

Having the appearance of a coffee-table book, Mark Hussey's "Virginia Woolf: A To Z" belies a very serious and comprehensive book.

In addition to all the expected entries, the book includes photographs of the dust jackets of her works; an exhaustive (17 pages) of the works cited by the author; that list arranged alphabetically and topically; a most comprehensive topical list of entries; a comprehensive (8 charts) of genealogies (to include Leslie Stephen, Harriet Thackeray, Julia Prinsep (her mother), Leonard, Duncan Grant and Lytton Strachey, and Roger Fry; and, of course, a most excellent index.

If there is any question whether this is simply a showy coffee-table book or a serious work of scholarship, all one needs to do is read, not just glance, but actually read the 15 pages devoted to "The Waves."

I originally bought this book to add to my Virginia Woolf library, but I now realize what a treasure this book is. Highly, highly recommend it for all students of Woolf, whether novices or seasoned.

This book supplemented a course I took on the works of Woolf. It is filled with interesting background material and helpful character biographies. Hussey skillfully condensed volumes of biographical and critical work on Woolf into one, user-friendly manual.

Back in the mid to late 90's I had the pleasure of reading a new version of a book written by David Friedman called "The Machinery of Freedom" which was originally published in the 1970's. Friedman's book introduced me to anarcho-capitalist ideas and now, years later, thanks to David T. Beito and the Independent Institute "The Voluntary City" is published that confirms many of the thoughts and ideas Friedman wrote about in his treatsie. This book is a collection of policy pieces done by different authors that detail specific, real-life examples of free market alternatives to things like court systems and litigation, education, police, housing and welfare. Most of whom were provided by insurance plans people paid for on their own via insurance companies or by private, charitable organizations people belonged to while governments, by and large, stayed out of the way. One aspect of the book that was not pointed out was private fire departments. Prior to being run by governments, many fire departments were also privately run in which their funding came from insurance plans they particpated in that provided fire protection for their customers. It wasn't until after the civil war that municipalities started acquiring and operating them. Even today, governments are beginning to privatize or not provide many essentials since they are too costly to run. For example, in Arizona, Rural Metro Corporation has contracts to provide fire and ambulatory service for cities (like mine) and even counties that do not or cannot afford to provide it. Despite this one subject left out, I felt this book was very well done and I heartily recommend it to people who have doubts about anarcho-capitalist ideas or people who are looking for new, radical ideas to replace the monopolies governments have on services they presently provide.

You're not the only one that wonders whether the government that is supposed to guarantee your private property rights seems more interested in making sure your vinyl siding runs the same way as your neighbor's. This is the way of things in America today, where municipal governments segregate business from housing, then wonder why everyone thinks he has to own a car.

Enter the Voluntary City, a cogent and realistic analysis of how we got here, and whether we have actually improved things in doing it. There used to be sufficient housing (try to find the word "homeless" before the Carter presidency), and police that actually had to catch the bad guys (read about one police force that had a catch rate of over 90%), and the reasonable expectation that if you wanted to alter your property you could do so without groveling to the city fathers. We gave these things up in the hope that what we would get back would be better. But is it? Really?

You aren't the only one that wonders. This excellent book provides some answers to the question, and the impetus to take those answers out into the political world. We're doing it where I am.

Very well-written, considering that this German critic (I see that he's also prepared Pallas guides to Southwest England, East Anglia, and the West Country as well as Oxford & Cambridge and, in German, "Schotsland.") has David Henry Wilson's solid (or transparent?) translation to filter his own personality and perspective through. Pallas Guides apparently are British, so this is the first one I've seen. They're tinged with the Blue Guides cultural sophistication, but with less local color re: the natural resources, architecture, and the historical nuts-and-bolts of the edifices. Instead, this book's laid out going from the southeastern border at Monmouth to go up the coast along Cardiff and Swansea with byways into the mining valleys, industrial archeology, fortified and later eccentric castles (Cardiff again!) and Roman ruins. Sager then follows the coast up to "Little England" at the tip of the peninsula, ending the half-loop around Fishguard.

Then, he circles within Mid-Wales and the Marches before starting again at the border to re-enter Wales along the Northern coast, gradually and thoughtfully considering the debate over jobs vs. scenery in Snowdonia, admiring the Menai bridge, explaining carefully the controversy over holiday homes vs. waiting lists for council homes in such former Welsh-speaking enclaves as Anglesey and Lleyn, and then concluding powerfully with R.S. Thomas' poem "Reservoirs" and the last fight against the tide of anglicization and tourism in the mountains.

Throughout, Sager knows well the contradictions as a German travel writer celebrating this compromised Principality (and he tells us precisely why the English designated it as such-- a fact I as an American had never understood before) within a kingdom. He fairly presents the demands of those wanting increased autonomy: economist Leopold Kohr, folksinger Dafydd Iwan, and Hay-on-Wye's bookseller Richard Booth among them. He also counters with an understanding of the appeal of rural Wales for incomers and visitors. He highlights in self-contained essays on such topics as the language debate, slate mining, Lord Bute and William Burgess' medievalism, the Romantic vogue for the picturesque, the Ladies of Llangollen, the demise of the chapels, Aberfan's disaster, and "The Manor House of Servants" at Erddig Park many lesser-known subjects (compared to most tour guides) deserving attention. Blaenau and Ffestiniog are treated as two daughters, one grey, one golden, competing for a suitor's eye. Paintings and décor gain as much scrutiny, if not more, than Eryri and Cader Idris.

One example of his scope: he considers "yr hen iaith," the ancient language, deftly. Sager suggests that the "problem has solidified into a kind of national monument: for some it is an ancient pedestal without a statue, and for others a statue looking for a base." (66) He wryly notes but three pages into his text that the dragon's tongue stands as the emblem of the Welsh Language Society (Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg). "The amputated tongue is as much a symbol of amputation as it is of language." (12) Sager's rather pessimistic about the viability of the tongue, and his own guidebook, as he well knows, contributes to the tension of Welsh heritage. It brings tourism, it creates jobs, it lures incomers. A few come to Nant Gwrtheyrn on Lleyn to learn Welsh; but they learn it in a village that lost all of its original, Welsh-speaking, families after the last granite quarry closed in the 1950s. Many more flood since then into the Lleyn peninsula for brief or permanent escape from English cities. (A sign of anglicization: I cannot include the proper Welsh circumflexion vowel mark for Lleyn into this review format!)

Somehow, Sager manages to move you along the Welsh itinerary steadily while pausing to share interviews and contexts without making it all sound like potted history or rambling erudition. Dylan Thomas, Saunders Lewis, the painter Richard Wilson, John Cowper Powys, Adelina Patti, Robert Owen, William Morgan, Gwen John, Mary Elizabeth Thompson, Eric Gill, Gwynfor Evans, George Borrow, and Arthur Clough all come alive in these pages. You may not know them all beforehand, but you will be interested in each one after you read his short but inviting introductions. He integrates further material into his the first sixty pages, taking on such icons as the Eisteddfod, the proliferation of castles, and rugby to illustrate deftly his own knowledge of how such items enrich our understanding of Welsh culture.

With Sager, you travel from your armchair. His simple but appropriate photo inserts enhance the presentation, and a supplement (I refer to the 3rd ed. 1998 rather than the latest 4th ed. 2002) specifies holidays, gives a short reading list, a small excursus on various tourist topics, and a small list of places to shop, sleep, drink, and sightsee. I do note no other than the two general road maps. This is one drawback; the visitor will need a much more detailed map, as the text like the maps remains largely "general" about exactly how to get to most of the places mentioned. This guide might best be employed in preliminary planning a trip, researching a place, or using it as I have, simply to get the sense of Wales-- albeit from afar.

I close with an example (p. 75) of how efficiently yet skillfully constructed are Sager's entries. This is the very first town he describes. He combines the necessary detail with a narrative command of his subject, combined with a personal touch that expresses his interest in whatever he shows you. "Like an inverted funnel Monnow Street leads uphill from the bridge to the town centre: broad and roomy down below, where the markets were always held, but increasingly narrow as it climbs upward to where St Stephen's Gate used to stand. It's a perfectly normal street, with its old houses, shops and pubs, and all the usual small-town bustle-- but then suddenly it broadens out into an unexpected square that echoes with a distant heroism: Agincourt Square. And her our little town takes on a new and unforeseen greatness. A cue for the entrance of Harry Monmouth."

If you really want to know about Wales before you travel this is the guide for you. This is a book to be read and digested not just skimmed through. It is rich in history, art and literature. It gives a deep understanding of the people, the land and its culture. It is not a travel guide per se but will certainly inform your travels. This is not for the lets hit the high points crowd.

Read this for graduate history course in medieval history.
Clifford J. Rogers has written one of the best in depth histories of the military prowess of Edward III.
The British king who was primarily responsible for the longbows' success was Edward III, who reigned for fifty years. In order to gain a clear picture of why the longbow enjoyed its tactical success on the battlefield under the leadership of Edward III and his commanders, it is necessary to study Edward III's record regarding the logistics, recruiting, and training of the longbow men during the Hundred Years' War. The available records during the reign of Edward III, help to flesh out a really good understanding for historians concerning the lengths he went through to build Britain's first professional army using the longbow as its primary weapon.

Rogers delves into the logistical needs necessary to supply Edward III's invasion force. The requirement on localities to provide longbow men with weapons was very demanding. Edward III made great strides to take on the fiscal responsibility of equipping his army. This actually provided him with two advantages--that of quality control of weaponry, and reducing manufacturing cost through economy of scale. One example of how enormous a task it was to prepare for war comes from the armory records at the Tower of London. In 1359, the clerk of the armory is ordered to put bowyers (longbow makers), and fletchers (arrow makers), to work for the king, under penalty of imprisonment if necessary, if they were non-cooperative. Between 1353 and 1360, the armory added to its stores, 15,300 bows, 4,000 bow staves, and 24,000 sheaves of arrows. Each sheave contained twenty-four arrows; thus, this order equates to 576,000 arrows in all. In March 1345, 15 Sheriffs were issued orders to supply the Tower armory with, "3,000 bows, 8,400 sheaves of arrows and 20,000 bowstrings." By looking at supply records leading up to the battle of Crecy, Rogers was able to surmise several important factors about the supply of arrows. Each longbow man had an allotment of 60 arrows for the battle. The average arrow weighs 4 oz., so to supply 7,500 longbow men it took nearly a half-million arrows weighing 55 tons. This supply was easily transportable in some 60 one-ton carts from the port to the army. These figures can cast little doubt on the fact that the king was constantly writing back to England throughout his campaign in France ordering more supply of arrows and bowstrings. These facts about arrow supply gives one a good picture of just one facet of the monumental logistical, organizational, and planning skills necessary to support Edward III's invasion force of about 15,000 men crossing in ships numbering some 700 to 1,000.

Rogers has done outstanding work in publishing recruiting information from both primary sources and other historians' work to explain the methods necessary to fill the ranks with soldiers. Edward III refined the recruiting methods that his predecessors had in place to fight the Welsh and Scottish wars. Unlike his predecessors, who just wanted a lot of bodies, Edward III had his commissioners of array looking for particular skill sets such as longbow men and mounted archers. The two methods Edward III employed to build his army were commissioners of array and an increasingly popular program known as contracts of indenture. Though Edward III had hoped to raise 20,000 fighting men, most historians agreed he recruited about 15,000, which was no small feat for his day. The commissioners of array for each town or county usually numbered three to four men, who themselves would eventually go off to fight in the war. Each town or county would have a quota of men they were expected to raise and equip for war. Across the board, most of the towns and counties provided one-half to two-thirds of their quotas. The counties were largely responsible for recruiting longbow men on foot, and the towns had to supply a mix of both longbow men on foot and mounted longbow men. As a for instance, Kent was required to raise 280 men and Norfolk 200. In reality, the numbers of men actually going to war was somewhat less due to several factors. Some of the men would prove to be unfit for service when they appeared for muster. However, the record shows that there were complaints from commanders in the field about the condition and physique of soldiers sent to them. No doubt, undesirable men were recruited in order to help quota numbers. The granting of service exemptions was numerous usually accompanied by the applicant paying a fee to buy himself out of service. One such request shows an Otto de Halsale paying ₤4 for an exemption. Just like modern times, some men just simply did not show up for the muster call. It is interesting to note that the commissioners met with little resistance from town and country folk during the time of recruitment. The estimation among historians is that some 9,000 out of the 15,000 men that went ashore in Normandy were recruited through commissions of array. Unlike the French, who used many mercenaries from other countries, such as Italy, Edward III's army was recruited from men from the British Isles.

Rogers notes in his research that, "What commissions of array produced was quantity, not quality." Thus, an increasingly popular method of recruitment to fill the ranks was contracts of indentures. This system had nobles and bannerets (knights who were entitled to lead their own men into battle) raising their own troops, which they then hired out to the king, on a contractual basis. In addition to the normal pay, these men were often promised quarterly pay bonuses and shares from war booty. About 5,000 men were recruited in this fashion at the start of the invasion. Rogers research proved that, "The spread of the longbow into the north and west of England, which increasingly became the preferred recruiting ground for archers, was facilitated and sustained by prospects of employment and profit..." Rogers found that the indenture system grew during the conduct of the war. Many men who were brought to war under the array system, would sign an indenture contract after their term under the array system was completed. In fact, men would see which commanders had more battlefield success, and would clamor to sign on with the more successful commanders. No doubt, the lure of money was a motivating factor for these men. This meant that the indentured ranks were filling with war-hardened veterans, thus making them a formidable fighting force.

If any weapon system is to be a force multiplier and weapon of mass destruction on the battlefield, then it must have soldiers properly trained to employ it. The longbow is no exception to this rule. From the age of seven, English boys were practicing with their longbows. The longbow man was not a peasant who owed service or allegiance to a noble. Instead, he was a free man who was rightly paid for his services. These were strong muscular men with a robust build enabling them to pull a 125 lb. bow. Using a longbow was not an innate skill; it was honed and improved through years of training. The young bowmen were constantly under the watchful eye of veterans during training. The veterans knew how easy it was to fire at static targets, as opposed to an enemy knight bearing down on them mounted on a charging steed. "Over the course of hundreds of years it has been proven that the best manner of using a bow is to use the same force for every shot regardless of whether the target is close or far away." All archers were taught to find a spot on their face, usually the chin, that they would draw the bowstring to touch. This gave them the ability to standardize their draw and shot power. Longbow men held all their shots the same amount of time. As they gained experience, the time needed to prepare and aim their shot became shorter. In addition, the longbow men were armed with swords or axes as well, and often joined in the hand-to-hand combat as the battle progressed. "The whole history of English warfare from the middle of the twelfth century to the end of the fifteenth century proves that the flower of her infantry was the archers."

Edward III's strategic and tactical abilities were on full display during the Hundred Years' War. One of the most important tactical innovations that Edward III instituted to increase the fighting capability of the English army before the start of the Hundred Years' War was the introduction of mounted archers to its ranks. Mounted archers rode ponies for quick transport to the battlefield, and then they would dismount to shoot their longbows in battle. Undoubtedly, Edward III learned from the previous one hundred years of his predecessors' fighting the Scottish, that too many times the Scots outmaneuvered the English; thus, they escaped from having to fight a battle advantageous to the English. Edward III was going to do all he could to make sure that this did not happen to his army. Rogers' research shows muster records from 1334 listing mounted archers for the first time as part of Edward III's expedition into Scotland. This was Edward III's second largest campaign against an enemy during his reign. The expedition served as an excellent opportunity for Edward III and his army to prove their new tactics, which they would put to good use a dozen years later in France.

Crécy was the sight of the first major battle of The Hundred Years' War and was a rousing success for the invading English army of Edward III. The battle, which took place on just two days in August of 1346, was emblematic of the tactical successes that the British enjoyed at the battles of Poitiers and Agincourt. "Crécy was fought upon principles learnt by experience in Scotland; after Crécy the same principles had to be perfected, but were not altered." According to Edward III's own account of the battle in a letter he wrote to Sir Thomas Lucy, the French army finally caught up with the English outside of the town of Crécy. Finding the wide-open terrain suitable for the tactics which the English wanted to employ, the king ordered the army to make a defensive stand there. Edward III deployed his army in three divisions; two were on the line facing toward the French on the high ground of the valley, thus, giving the longbow men excellent fields of fire. The right division was under the command of the Black Prince, and took the brunt of the fighting during the battle, while the Earl of Northampton commanded the left division. The third division was in reserve and was commanded by Edward III. The 4,000 longbow men were placed on the flanks of the two forward deployed divisions in wedges of 1,000 men each, and the cavalry was on the far flank of the longbow men. The English dug potholes in front of them on the battlefield to entrap the French cavalry.

King Philip VI of France arrived midday in front of the English and was pleased that he had finally caught up with them. In addition, he was surprised that the English were standing ready to fight and not trying to flee from the numerically superior French forces, consisting of a multinational force of some 60,000 men under arms. Outnumbering the English some four to one, King Philip VI felt over- confident that his cavalry, who contained much of the French nobility, was going to sweep the English off the field. Instead of allowing his army to rest from their arduous march, he unwisely gave orders, counter to the pleas of his allied commanders, to have his army prepare for an immediate attack on the English.

King Philip VI ordered his 15,000 Genoese crossbowmen to advance and engage the English. Still suffering from fatigue from their earlier march that day, they advanced on the English in a disorganized manner and fired their crossbows; however, they inflicted no casualties on the English since they were out of range. While the Genoese were reloading, the English longbow men let loose with a devastating flight of arrows, "...with such force and quickness, that it seemed as if it snowed." The English arrows had such a demoralizing effect on the Genoese crossbowmen that Froissart reports that the Genoese cut their crossbow strings or threw them down and started to retreat to the French lines. Philip VI, seeing the Genoese retreat pell-mell as an act of treason or at least cowardice, ordered his cavalry to run the "scoundrels" down. A general melee ensued, and as many Genoese ran towards the English to try to escape the carnage from the French cavalry, the cavalry, in its haste to slaughter the Genoese, rode within range of the English longbows. Once again, the English launched another shower of arrows striking the Genoese and French cavalry with murderous effect. Most of the cavalry were unhorsed, due to their own wounds and from their horses' wounds inflicted by the English arrows, or by the Genoese trying to defend themselves, or the English potholes tripped the horses. Regardless, the results were that most of the Genoese and French in the first attack lay dead on the slopes below the English--few survived and made their escape off the field. Charles of Bohemia, also known as the King of Germany, lay dead upon the field.

The French cavalry regrouped, and as fresh French cavalry just arrived on the field, the king's hotheaded brother, the Comte d'Alencon, ordered them to follow him on another charge towards the English. The bulk of the French cavalry rode towards the position defended by the Black Prince. His longbow men fired barbed arrows at long range, creating agonizing wounds to both knights and horses unlucky enough to be struck in unarmored portions of their flesh. As the cavalry came within 100 yards of the longbow men, they used an arrow tipped like a chisel, known as a bodkin, which easily penetrated chain mail and weaker areas of armor. Livingstone and Witzel estimate that the 2,000 English longbow men commanded by the Black Prince, shot about 16,000 bodkin tipped arrows at a flat trajectory in the last minute of the charge, which killed hundreds of the French nobility, including the reckless Comte d'Alencon.

The primary accounts wax poetic about the skill and courage that the Black Prince and his men fought with as they fended off several waves of French attacks on that day and the next day as well. Geoffrey le Baker put it succinctly when writing about the sixteen-year-old Black Prince's baptism by fire in battle. "There he learnt that knightly skill which he later put to excellent use at the battle of Poitiers, where he captured the French king." Although heavily outnumbered, Edward III's longbow men were the force multiplier that garnered a stunning victory for the British over the French. Most estimates of the longbow tactics used in the battle state the over one-half million arrows fired by the English easily cut down the French cavalry. Thus, the longbow, and the brilliant way in which it was employed, was responsible for the lopsided casualty figures of the battle. Although casualty figures are somewhat unreliable, most sources put the French losses at one-third of the French nobility-about 12,000 men in all, against the English losses of 150 to 1,000 total. The mastery of the longbow men and the tactics they employed turned them into a weapon of mass destruction and a force multiplier. "They were some of the finest, most highly trained and militarily efficient troops that any nation ever put into the field of battle." The battle of Crécy taught all the armies of Europe that the longbow would reign as the supreme weapon in battle for the next 100 years.

Recommended reading for those interested in medieval history, and military history.

It's been a while since I've enjoyed a book as much as this one.

Clifford Rogers provides a detailed analysis of Edward III's campaigns from 1327 through 1360, including his early campaigns in Scotland, through the first invasions of France in The Hundred Years War. He does so in an effort to show that, contrary to what other authors have said, Edward III's campaigns in France were not dominated by an effort to simply devastate the countryside and so undermine the authority of the Valois Kings in France, but rather that he actively sought battles with the French in order to bring about swifter, more decisive conclusions to their conflicts.

While Rogers does not use this work to attempt to dispel the more general thesis that Medieval Military Commanders sought to avoid War at all costs, it certainly invites a re-examination of other campaigns to see how well that theory holds up. And for those who continue to hold the outdated view that medieval warfare was without detailed strategy, and that military commanders of the time were without understanding of comprehensive military strategy, this serves as yet another nail in that particular coffin.

Keep in mind that this work discusses the campaigns as a whole - with less emphasis on individual battles. If you are looking for detailed battlefield accounts, other works would be more profitable.

I won't provide a blow-by-blow outline of Rogers' narrative here. Instead I will note the most positive aspects of this work. First and foremost is the reliance on contemporary and near-contemporary sources. This work is copiously footnoted (and the footnotes are important - take time to read them) with accounts of chroniclers that accompanied the various armies, providing frequent evidence that Edward was actively seeking battle and was extremely disappointed when he couldn't bring the French to one.

Second, Rogers goes into great detail covering the political aspects of these campaigns. He discusses the Franco-Scottish alliance, Phillip VI's confiscation of some of Edward's continental holdings when he was a minor, Edward's rights to the Kingship of France, the Papal efforts toward peace and the various alliances that were formed and broken throughout the 33-year period, and the implications of all of these for the War.

Third, he takes time to explain the historiography of the studies of Edward's political campaigns and goes on to refute the findings of other authors that Edward sought to avoid battle at all costs. I won't swear that he has proven his case as this is not the medieval period I am most familiar with - however he has provided a great deal of evidence in support of his view.

Fourth, he also goes into great detail regarding logistics. He discusses the difficulties Edward had in raising money for the early stages of these wars, the role that finding food and water, and foraging for these while on campaign, played in the various campaigns, and how the vagaries of the ability to supply his force and, most of all to secure lines of retreat, played in how aggressively he tried to bring the French to battle.

My quibbles with this book are few and not of great relevance to its overall aim. First, several times Rogers offers that "The first duty of a good lord was to defend his vassals ..." p13. I am not altogether certain this is true. Quite often the first requirement of a good lord was, IMO, to retain an effective fighting force and the loyalties of his nobles. Now these two are related, but not necessarily the same. Second, I found less evidence for his repeated assertions that Edward III sought battle largely through his faith in "the judgement of God" whereby the victor on the field placed his faith that the army held in God's favor would win. I'm not saying this wasn't a primary focus of Edward - just that I found it less fully proven. Personally I feel that Edward's willingness to seek battle with a numerically superior French army was more due to his possession of a more experienced force, his possession of longbow archers for which France had no good answer and, most of all, his faith in his own ability as a commander.

Beyond this, the book is well-written, IMO it is fairly fast-paced and provides a great deal of detailed information. It provides an excellent new look at the Wars of Edward III in particular, and of Medieval Military Warfare in general.

This book won the 1985 Spring Book Award for Literature from the Scottish Arts Council, and one can see why. A wide-ranging, enthusiastic and scholarly work, it covers a great deal of ground with a surprising amount of detail for its size. Although some of the archaeological conclusions have changed in the intervening thirty years, this is still a good introduction to the period and good value for money. Topics include: Roman Britain, the Picts, St. Columba, Adomnan, Vikings, the orgins of medieval Scotland, and the conquest of the southern uplands.

The author shows an impressive ability to look at the larger picture while not losing sight of details, an ability which allows him to combine seeming isolated facts into interesting combinations. Whether or not you agree with all of his conclusions, you will find many that are thought-provoking. An example is his dating of the final collapse of the British kingdom of Rheged by the series of entries in the Irish Annals of Ulster regarding the presence of roving bands of British warriors in Ireland between 682 and 709. Highly recommended.

My B.A. degree dealt with the growth and development of Scottish Gaelic society and culture, and I used no book more than this one. It is challenging and accessible, and provides many reference materials such as chronological and geaneological tables. The bibilography is also outstanding. The book has been described as a 'galloping, rip-roaring' work and I wholly agree. Its greatest strength is its presentation of detailed arguements in a way which both makes a coherent point and invites further study. More than a survey, but not a specialist-only text by any means. Its counterpart for Irish history would be "The Course of Irish History" edited by T.W. Moody and F.X. Martin (Dublin: Mercier) 1994. Both are invaluable.

I watched the BBC reality show "The 1940s House" and that led me to this book. If you want a sample of how the women of Britian fed their families (and fed them well) during the shortages and other trials of WWII-check out this book. I've been trying the recipes over the last few months and they're....really good. I even hit the farmer's market and tried my hand at some of the canning recipes! They work! It's humbling to realize how these people had to adapt...imagine using your last onion in the fall and realizing there were no more until spring!!! I've actually added a few recipes to my collection of regular items - the vinegar cake is fabulous (use mini chocolate chips - not available in WWII but a great addition) and the Potato Jane has shown up more than once for dinner. I tried to live a week on the rations allowed at that time but my addiction to Diet Pepsi brought me to my knees I'm afraid. I've always been a big fan of 'cook from scratch' recipes and these recipes take it a step further...here's how to cook (sometimes) when you don't have the scratch!!! Inspiring and humbling I must say.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this informative and well set out collection of wartime recipes. My usual repertoire of family meals has now been extended to include such culinary delights as 'pigs in clover'(baked potatos stuffed with sausage meat on a bed of cabbage) and vinegar cake. Interspersed with advice on diet and wartime thriftiness it strikes an excellent balance between a recipe and history book. The author was herself an advisor to the government during the war years and is able to look back with both nostalgia and humour on what were pretty bleak years. The few illustrations and photographs are well chosen and compliment well the stodgy wartime propaganda and Marguerite Patten's own introduction to the book. The dual purpose of the British wartime government in promoting a good diet whilst maintaining moral and a sense of patriotism is well conveyed in this small volume.

Weird England is a light, enjoyable read. You don't have to be an Anglophile (like myself) to be vastly entertained by the unique content and pictures. It's written with an open, objective slant, letting the reader decide the merits of the many folk tales, superstitions, and ghost stories that lie within its pages.

Of the "Weird" series books that I've read, this is far and away the best. I think there are two reasons for that: 1) the book was written by the man who EDITED the books on the various parts of Weird America (and individual states), and he's a better writer/thinker than the usual writers and 2) England has been inhabited, heavily, for such a long time that it has greater depth of weirdness than we have here in dull young America!
Like the other "Weird" books, this one is heavy on photos and a little shy on explanations. The histories and explanations in this one, though, are more complete and satisfying than those in the ones on America and its states.
Topics include "art" created by obsessives in their own back yards; ghosts and hauntings; standing stones and ancient monuments; cemetery oddities; deserted towns and buildings; and much more.
You'll luv it!