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Just finished John Farrell's (outstanding) one-volume biography of Nixon. I've already read Caro's LBJ series, and was interested in rounding out my biographies of figures from that era. Is there a standard biography of Bobby Kennedy, or one that's widely recognized as the best?
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# ? May 4, 2017 23:20 |
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# ? Jun 5, 2024 04:22 |
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Hey history goons, want to get madly depressed for just $2? Boy, does Amazon have the deal for you today!
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# ? May 6, 2017 19:08 |
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Jedi425 posted:Hey history goons, want to get madly depressed for just $2? Boy, does Amazon have the deal for you today! ooh, thanks. I've been meaning to get my own copy of that since forever.
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# ? May 6, 2017 20:51 |
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Jedi425 posted:Hey history goons, want to get madly depressed for just $2? Boy, does Amazon have the deal for you today! thats a amazing book, depressing a gently caress though, it has some "happier" parts(like that the world turning against Leopold slowly and forcing him to give it all up and the birth of international activist movements).
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# ? May 6, 2017 21:08 |
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Cross-posting this from the current European Politics thread in D&D: Afternoon, I've been trying to follow the French election recently and it made me realize I don't know anything about French politics. So I'm looking around for some book recommendations and I was hoping folks in here might be able to help. I'm looking for anything from the beginning of the 18th century to present, really, but stuff from the 20th century dealing with De Gaulle, Algeria, etc would be especially appreciated. I'd be interested in any book that is relatively comprehensive about its era, still current/reliable in its info (meaning hasn't been outdated by subsequent research or newer interpretations), and hopefully engaging to read without being too dry or academic. Thanks to anyone who can assist.
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# ? May 7, 2017 18:38 |
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A Savage War of Peace Comedy option: The Day of the Jackal (it's a good read forreal though)
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# ? May 8, 2017 01:11 |
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Is there a book on the American Revolutionary War written from a Loyalist perspective? Not necessarily detailing how the "other side" fought during the war itself, but a thorough argument against the revolution in general.
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# ? May 9, 2017 18:44 |
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I've not read it, but isn't that what Liberty's Exiles is about?
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# ? May 9, 2017 19:42 |
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Bandiet posted:Is there a book on the American Revolutionary War written from a Loyalist perspective? Not necessarily detailing how the "other side" fought during the war itself, but a thorough argument against the revolution in general. It's not quite what you're looking for, but The Men Who Lost America by Andrew O'Shaughnessy is a modern history of the Revolutionary War done from the perspective of the British and Loyalist side. It also takes a lot of examination of the many ways the authorities and loyalists tried to end things peacefully and why they didn't agree with the project of American independence in general.
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# ? May 9, 2017 20:09 |
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Dapper_Swindler posted:thats a amazing book, depressing a gently caress though, it has some "happier" parts(like that the world turning against Leopold slowly and forcing him to give it all up and the birth of international activist movements). Aside from the savagery of the colonizers, one of the worst things was how Leopold successfully sold the colonization to Europe as a humanitarian effort.
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# ? May 10, 2017 11:11 |
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snoremac posted:Aside from the savagery of the colonizers, one of the worst things was how Leopold successfully sold the colonization to Europe as a humanitarian effort. Also an early example of a "hands-off" management style.
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# ? May 10, 2017 17:58 |
nice
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# ? May 11, 2017 04:53 |
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I'm looking for some books that go into the history of Quebec and New France, basically Cartier & Champlain through the French & Indian War. I've got some family that was apparently involved in the early days of the colony and was interested in learning more about the period of French exploration and colonization before the British took over. Any recommendations?
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# ? May 13, 2017 18:44 |
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ulmont posted:Also an early example of a "hands-off" management style. God drat.
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# ? May 19, 2017 19:16 |
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I am looking for East Germany books, focusing on the government/society. Everything I've read suggests they took Stalinism and just went batshit with it but I don't know details. I've read Stasiland already.
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# ? May 20, 2017 10:32 |
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Anatomy of a Dictatorship by Mary Fulbrook.
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# ? May 20, 2017 15:11 |
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If you don't mind a scholarly edited volume Dictatorship as Experience: towards a socio-cultural history of the GDR edited by Konrad h jarausch is a really solid starting point for wrapping your head around its many facets. It's too easy to just talk about it as either repressive dystopia or workers paradise, and the contributors do a good job of showing a really balanced picture that tries to make sense of it as part of the larger history of Germany. Edit: it's also a great kicking off point for further reading as most of the contributors have written a lot more in other places.
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# ? May 22, 2017 06:20 |
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Oh , and Naimark. the russians in germany:a history of the soviet zone of occupation is great for dealing with the period from 45 to 49. It's just the early years but he does a great job of showing how e Germany transitioned from the nazis to the ddr.
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# ? May 22, 2017 06:26 |
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Any recommendations on a good book on the history of France?
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# ? May 22, 2017 12:27 |
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bessantj posted:Any recommendations on a good book on the history of France? That's... quite a wide topic, there. I don't know of a good single-volume book in English that really covers the totality of French history. If I were asked to recommend a single work of French history for the non-specialist, I think I'd probably go with "Seven Ages of Paris" by Alistair Horne. Yeah, it focuses on Paris but you get a good sense of the entire country's flow through the seven focal periods Horne writes about in this work. And it's just such a wonderfully-written book. From there, pick whichever age interested you the most and then it gets easier to recommend books specific to those eras.
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# ? May 23, 2017 19:50 |
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I've got Kotkin on Stalin for now, so what are the most definitive books on Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, Engels, and Marx?
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# ? May 23, 2017 21:32 |
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Any recommendations on the history or development of civil aviation?
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# ? May 24, 2017 15:56 |
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Bolocko posted:I've got Kotkin on Stalin for now, so what are the most definitive books on Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, Engels, and Marx? That book mainly just retells Richard Pipes's account of the revolution albeit while giving a much fairer account of the absolutely screwed situation the Tsars had left Russia in, though Kotkin goes so in depth with his portrait of turn of the century geopolitics that Stalin isn't even mentioned for more than one hundred pages. As for suggesting single definitive books on those, hugely controversial, historical figures you're asking for something that doesn't exist. In Lenin's case though I would point you to the following three books: Lenin by Lars T Lih offers the most positive account of the man's life I think I've ever come across; Lenin: A Revolutionary Life by Christopher Read is a nicely neutral portrait of the man; and Ricard Pipes's The Unknown Lenin is a devastatingly brutal take down of his character.
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# ? May 24, 2017 18:46 |
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cloudchamber posted:As for suggesting single definitive books on those, hugely controversial, historical figures you're asking for something that doesn't exist. I figured as much, so multiple bios are fine. Thank you for the titles.
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# ? May 24, 2017 20:47 |
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Bolocko posted:I've got Kotkin on Stalin for now, so what are the most definitive books on Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, Engels, and Marx? For Trotsky, I'd recommend Isaac Deutscher's The Prophet. Deutscher had definite biases (he was a Polish exile in the UK and anti-Stalinist Marxist), but the work is massive, extensively researched, and he was the first academic to get access to the closed portions of Trotsky's archives.
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# ? May 25, 2017 15:32 |
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Robert Service's book on Trotsky is kind of a take down of the portrait Deutscher paints of him and worth getting as a balance if you're going to go through all three of Deutscher's adulatory volumes.
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# ? May 25, 2017 18:34 |
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There's definitely no such thing as a definitive take on Mao, but Mao: The Real Story by Alexander Pantsov and Steven Levine gives it the old college try. It's a little dry in places, though.
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# ? May 25, 2017 18:49 |
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smr posted:That's... quite a wide topic, there. I don't know of a good single-volume book in English that really covers the totality of French history. That's great thanks. I recently read Crown and Country and found parts of it quite interesting, if a little sycophantic, and was looking for the same for France.
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# ? May 25, 2017 19:55 |
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SomeMathGuy posted:Mao: The Real Story by Alexander Pantsov and Steven Levine And the hardcover new is 86% off on Amazon right now.
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# ? May 26, 2017 06:56 |
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What are some good books on the Lewis & Clark expedition? From either the expedition itself or from the indigenous people's perspective?
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# ? May 26, 2017 15:57 |
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Danger posted:What are some good books on the Lewis & Clark expedition? From either the expedition itself or from the indigenous people's perspective? A friend's history professor father recommended Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose which I read about a year and a half ago and remember liking.
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# ? May 27, 2017 00:08 |
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Might be an odd request but I would love to have someone point me in the direction of something on the origins and distinctions of the different monastic orders. Can't seem to find anything much that isn't a £50 textbook!
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# ? May 30, 2017 22:26 |
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Behemuff posted:Might be an odd request but I would love to have someone point me in the direction of something on the origins and distinctions of the different monastic orders. Can't seem to find anything much that isn't a £50 textbook! Maybe not what you're looking for, but The Monks of War by Desmond Seward focuses on monastic military orders. It breaks them out by region, then by organization. It touches on the other orders some because the two groups were related. I read it years ago and remember enjoying it. They're Less academic and not totally focused on monasticism, but I also enjoyed Aristotle's Children (Rubenstein) and Sailing from Byzantium (Wells). They both deal the intellectual and social changes that late medieval monasticism was responding to and how the western and eastern churches dealt with it.
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# ? May 30, 2017 23:23 |
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I know this is pretty recent history but I'm looking for recs for a good book on the arab spring.
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# ? May 31, 2017 04:31 |
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Behemuff posted:Might be an odd request but I would love to have someone point me in the direction of something on the origins and distinctions of the different monastic orders. Can't seem to find anything much that isn't a £50 textbook! You may also want to ask this in the Christianity thread — https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3790923 — where we have goons who have once or are currently in discernment for Orders. Bolocko fucked around with this message at 06:19 on May 31, 2017 |
# ? May 31, 2017 06:17 |
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Behemuff posted:Might be an odd request but I would love to have someone point me in the direction of something on the origins and distinctions of the different monastic orders. Can't seem to find anything much that isn't a £50 textbook! It's a very broad book but " Christianity: The First 3000 Years" devotes a lot of time to monastic orders and their founders.
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# ? May 31, 2017 14:29 |
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Any good books onThe Velvet Revolution?
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# ? Jun 2, 2017 20:48 |
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Behemuff posted:Might be an odd request but I would love to have someone point me in the direction of something on the origins and distinctions of the different monastic orders. Can't seem to find anything much that isn't a £50 textbook! C.H. Lawrence's Medieval Monasticism: Forms of Religious Life in Western Europe in the Middle Ages is a pretty good introduction (though per it's name it's mostly about Medieval Western institutions). Emphasis is on the origins of monasticism, the Benedictine movement, the Cluniacs, the Cistercians, the Dominicans and the Franciscans. There's also stuff on hermits, the military orders, and nuns in generals, relations with the outside world, etc. BravestOfTheLamps fucked around with this message at 19:33 on Jun 3, 2017 |
# ? Jun 3, 2017 19:27 |
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:C.H. Lawrence's Medieval Monasticism: Forms of Religious Life in Western Europe in the Middle Ages Subvisual Haze posted:" Christianity: The First 3000 Years" Bolocko posted:You may also want to ask this in the Christianity thread — https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3790923 FingersMaloy posted:The Monks of War by Desmond Seward focuses on monastic military orders. Whoa, thanks for the great responses all! Looks like plenty to get me started
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# ? Jun 6, 2017 13:31 |
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# ? Jun 5, 2024 04:22 |
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I've trying to read a biography of each US President, and rather than start at the beginning I picked up mid-20th Century (Truman by McCullough, Eisenhower In War and Peace by Smith, An Unfinished Life by Dallek, LBJ by Dallek and The Arrogance of Power by Summers). Where do I go from here, as far as FDR and Gerald Ford biographies?
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# ? Jun 8, 2017 00:40 |