Ebooks de historia, página 95 de 2229

Between the disintegration of the Liberal Party in 1915 and the election of Harold Wilsons Labour in 1964, Britain weathered a turbulent half-century including two world wars and many profound socio-political changes. What did not survive this tumult was Britains sea-based Empire, as the great land-based USA and USSR now assumed dominance. With customary wit, scholarship and wisdom Robert Blake guides the reader through Britains slow decline from the worlds premier power to a nation with no military commitments East of Suez: still important, wishing to see itself as a cut above the rest, but now effectively no better than third-ranking.[T]he most successful sections [are] the four brilliant chapters on the Second World War... But it is not only for these that The Decline of Power should be read. It is a fair-minded book... fluently, even racily written... Peter Pulzer, London Review of Books

The best one-volume study of Churchill yet available. David Cannadine, ObserverMagisterial. Vernon Bogdanor, New StatesmanA tour de force... A masterly chronicle of Churchill as a domestic figure rather than as the bulldog wartime leader, and one of the most subtle portraits of him as a politician. Addison revises the view of Churchill as uninterested and out of his depth in domestic affairs, painting instead a nuanced picture of a canny parliamentarian. Churchill changed parties twice but managed to accomplish the change, writes Addison, with exceptional dexterity, making it appear as if he were maintaining his principles while the parties changed theirs... Addisons most interesting assertion is that the rise of Hitler saved Churchill from drifting into right-wing irrelevance. Most impressively, Addison doesnt settle for easy classifications, admitting that Churchill... is a man of whom almost everything that can be said is true in part.Kirkus Review

Jan Marshs book is the best researched and fullest biography of Rossetti we have yet had. Fiona MacCarthy, New York Review of BooksAlthough never formally part of the Pre-Raphaelite poetic school, which included her brother Gabriel, William Morris, and Algernon Swinburne, Christina Rossetti has always been linked to it. [Jan Marsh] gives full attention to both the individual and her unique variety of fantastic and devotional poetry... Marsh delineates an appealing person while examining her adolescent nervous breakdown, abortive engagement to a lapsed Catholic painter, frustrated love for an absentminded scholar, and relationships with her devout but hearty sister, Maria, and with her brothers... The authors steady, sympathetic course through Rossettis divided life enables readers to delve into the intense and original self most fully expressed in her poetry.Kirkus Review

Keith Douglas was almost certainly the greatest poet of the Second World War. He was killed in Normandy three days after D-Day. He was only twenty-four. His short life was one of contradictions: the gifted artist and romantic, always in love with the wrong girl also enjoyed soldiering and was quick to volunteer at the beginning of the war. The brave and resourceful tank commander with the Sherwood Rangers in the Western Desert, in the campaign of which his Alemein to Zem Zem is the classic account, was also an outspoken critic of the military establishment and often in trouble with his superiors. There was always another side to Keith Douglas: difficult, even arrogant, he was at the same time, as Desmond Graham, observes in his original preface, generous, sensitive to the difficulties of others, remorselessly honest, energetic, and passionately, innocently open. Douglas made in his brief life some friends who never forgot him, and whose memories of him have contributed much to this book.For this biography, Desmond Graham had access to much private and unpublished material. From that, interviews, Keith Douglas own poems, letters and drawings emerges a definitive biography.An almost unqualified success . . . Mr Graham has used his material with great skill and tact. Roy FullerIt is difficult to imagine a better biography than this being written about Keith Douglas . . . Desmond Graham provides us with an astonishing amount of information. Stephen SpenderExtremely well-done . . It is written with authority and it will be standard. Peter LeviSumptuously evocative John Carey

Conquerors of Time celebrates 150 years of courage, energy, innovation, resourcefulness and grand ideas, from the late 17th century to the early 20th. Its about the seafarers, engineers, inventors and trailblazers who enabled the British to hold together a vast empire and the Americans to push their frontiers west.Some, such as Captain Cook and Robert Stephenson are famous. Others, like the makers of chromonometers, the collectors of tropical plants or the railway engineers who roughed it in the Canadian wilderness are less well-known. What they all had in common is a desire to understand the world and a determination to harness the forces of nature. Trevor Fishlocks brio and broad vision matches those of his subjects and makes for a rattling good read. Lawrence James, Daily MailFact-filled and highly evocative ... the sheer romance of the story is irresistible.Sunday Telegraph

Disappointment can be salutary. In the 1955 election Michael Foot surprisingly lost his seat. Until then he had been a journalist, albeit a prolific and influential one. He now had more time on his hands. To both his father, Isaac Foot, and himself Jonathan Swift was a hero. His father, who believed writing to be the supreme vocation, now encouraged him to write a book on Swift. The result was The Pen and the Sword.Michael Foot concentrates on the crucial two years of 1710-11. In that time Swift published one of his most devastating polemics The Conduct of the Allies that tore into the Whig government and the Duke of Marlborough in particular. It is an important moment in English History: the pen and the sword fought a duel, and the pen proved the stronger of the two.First published in 1957 it was well and widely reviewed. Enthralling ... a fine piece of historical writing.Spectator An exciting story excellently narrated ... a lucid guide to one of the most complicated patterns of intrigue and manoeuvre that the eighteenth-century can provide ... intensely dramatic. Harold Nicolson, Observer

The Tree of Gernika: a Field Study of Modern War was published in 1938. It is G. L. Steers masterpiece. Martha Gellhorn famously wrote to Eleanor Roosevelt:You must read a book by a man names Steer: it is called The Tree of Gernika. It is about the fight of the Basques - hes the London Times man - and no better book has come out of the war and he says well all the things I have tried to say to you the times I saw you, after Spain. It is beautifully written and true, and few books are like that, and fewer still deal with war. Pleas get it.As Paul Preston says in his We Saw Spain Die, Martha Gellhorns judgement has more than stood the test of time.In his introduction, Nick Rankin writes.The Tree of Gernika tells how Euzkadi, the democratic republic that the Basques created in their green homeland by the Bay of Biscay, fought for freedom and decency in an atrocious civil war. After a year of struggle, blockaded by sea, bombed from the air, fighting against overwhelming odds in their own hill, the Basques in the end lost to Francos forces - but they lost honourably, without resorting to murder, torture and treachery.It was Steer who alerted the world to the destruction of Gernika (Basque spelling), Guernica (Spanish spelling). It was the most important dispatch of his life, run by both The Times and The New York Times. Nick Rankin rightly describes The Tree of Gernika as a masterpiece of narrative history and eyewitness reporting by someone close to the key events . . .

The 2004 report of the Hutton Inquiry created todays BBC. It cost the corporation its Chairman and Director General and seemed to many to usher in an age of self-doubt and caution. It was also the end of the most extraordinary experiment in news management Britain has ever seen - the decade of Alastair Campbell, Tony Blairs spin doctor, charged with delivering what Peter Mandelson described as New Labours mission to create the truth. But Lord Hutton condemned the BBC and its journalism without hearing a single word from the man who put the sexed up dossier story on the air: Today editor Kevin Marsh. Had Hutton done so, his conclusions would surely have been very different. Now outside the BBC, Marsh can tell for the first time the inside story of Andrew Gilligans notorious 6.07 broadcast on the Today programme. He explains how he was certain the story of the sexed up dossier was true, but also how Gilligans flawed reporting fatally damaged the BBCs case. And he tells of his growing disillusionment with the British medias aptitude and appetite for holding power to account - or even telling the truth. Stumbling Over Truth is an important book for anyone who wants to understand the toe-to-toe confrontations between Tony Blairs government and the BBC, and the fight to resist unremitting government attempts to manipulate the media.

Never far from centre stage, Edwina Currie falls comfortably into that category of celebrity you simply cannot ignore. Her first published diaries explosively revealed an affair with former Prime Minister John Major. This second volume, which begins in 1992 with her refusal to serve in Majors government, is no less revelatory about her colleagues, encounters with others in the public eye and, of course, her extraordinary career. Honest, compulsive and of the moment, this collection covers her life in Parliament up to the election of Blairs Labour government, but more importantly sees Edwinas emergence as a mainstay in the public imagination, first as a bestselling author, then as a commentator, broadcaster, presenter and performer. Shot through with her trademark effervescence and sense of fun, this volume of diaries documents one of the biggest characters in British public life at her saucy, scathing best.

This colourful history tells the story of Cunards RMS Queen Mary, who along with her running mate Queen Elizabeth covered the transatlantic route from Southampton to New York via Cherbourg, the British answer to the German and French superliners. She was launched in May 1936 and immediately won the coveted Blue Riband, winning it again in 1938, before she served as a troopship in the war. She then carried on plying the Atlantic route with Queen Elizabeth until the jet age changed the world again and she was retired, now preserved as a floating museum and restaurant in Long Beach, California. Andrew Britton presents a wealth of unpublished photographic material and ephemera from his unparalleled collection to tell the story of this historic liner, including rare wartime views, shots of her grey ghost paintwork, unique behind the scenes photographs, from the air shots, interior views and a wide selection of menus, log books, timetables, tickets and much more besides. Even including captains invitations, this superlative book offers a captivating trip through the history of this great liner.

Mass Observation was founded by Tom Harrisson, Charles Madge and Humphrey Jennings in 1937. Its purpose was to create an anthropology of ourselves in other words, to study the everyday lives of ordin

Camille Saint-Saens began as a child prodigy and was acclaimed in his lifetime as the incarnation of French genius. His was one of the longest careers in musical history, stretching from the traditions of Beethoven to the innovations of the twentieth century, including one of the earliest film scores. As a virtuoso pianist he achieved international fame, while Liszt proclaimed him the worlds greatest organist. A prolific composer, there is much more to him than his best-known work, the witty Carnival of the Animals, of which he forbade performances in his lifetime. Among his most notable achievements are the opera Samson et Delila and the Organ Symphony, while the Danse Macabre, second piano concerto and first cello concerto remain much loved.As a young man, he supported the new music of Liszt, Wagner and Berlioz and introduced the symphonic poem into French music. He championed an up-and-coming generation of French composers, most notably Faure, and played a unique part in transforming French taste from grand opera and operetta to the classical forms of symphony and chamber music, at the same time reviving interest in the music of Bach and Rameau.His personal life was combative, tragic and surrounded by rumour: as a boy during the Revolution of 1848, serving as a National Guard in the war of 1870, and eventually becoming something of an icon of the Third Republic, used in diplomacy as a symbol of French culture.This fascinating book (Chatto & Windus 1999) places his long and controversial career in a turbulent period when music, no less than politics, was undergoing sensational and often stormy change.

As a lynchpin of Margaret Thatchers final Cabinet, David Waddington was at the heart of British politics at the passing of arguably the most defining government of the twentieth century. His memoirs are a testament to many years of loyal service to the Conservative Party, first as a determined constituency MP, then as a cajoling and shrewd Chief Whip, Home Secretary during the turbulent Strangeways prison riots, and finally as Leader of the Lords. These memoirs describe Lord Waddingtons varied life: from his adventurous childhood in Lancashire to an eventful stint in the army, including memorable postings to Hong Kong and Singapore, and a highly acclaimed career as a Queens Counsel - not to mention his time as Governor of Bermuda. Decoration, renown and public praise colour Lord Waddingtons life, but it is his humility and wry Lancastrian take on the world that impress most: a potent mix of intelligence, duty and a sense of humour courses through every page. In his Memoirs, David Waddington allows us to glimpse a period of huge importance in British political history while also making clear the roots and principles that propelled him so far.

Pearses skill as an orator is indisputable. His fiery idealism was one of the key motivators that brought the rebels to the GPO in 1916. This collection of his wrting showcases this skill, but also the complex philosophy that underpinned it.Ranging from his theories of education articulated in The Murder Machine (1912), through his orations on the great Fenian leaders of the past: Wolfe Tone, Emmet and ODonovan Rossa; to his writings on The Separtatist Idea, The Spiritual Nation and The Sovereign People in the months leading up to the rising; this is a crucial collection for the library of anyone with an interest in Irish history.

A political adviser to the formidably intellectual Foreign Secretary Tony Crosland and to Prime Minister Jim Callaghan, and a senior journalist at The Times and The Economist, David Lipsey has been close to the heart of government for more than four decades. Providing a unique perspective on a period of great economic and political upheaval, In the Corridors of Power details such flashpoints as the 1976-77 IMF crisis, which saw Britain under a divided government hovering on the edge of national bankruptcy, and reveals why Jim Callaghan ducked an election in 1978 - and led Labour to disastrous defeat in 1979. But Lipsey is no one-dimensional policy nerd. Here we see a man who moves easily from the rarefied atmosphere at the core of government to the more down-to-earth pleasures of the greyhound track and the racecourse betting ring, while his enthusiasm for harness racing is such that he has regularly competed in the sport. It is often said that the very best political books come from those who observe from behind the scenes, rather than from the politicians in the front line. Here is a classic of the genre.

The Brothers War: Biafra and Nigeria was first published in 1972. In the UK it had the title The Nigerian Civil War. That is what it is about. In the early 1960s Nigeria looked set to be the major black African country. It seemed to be immune from the internecine struggles that bedevilled so many of the African states. The illusion of stability was shattered at the beginning of 1966. During the next four years the country suffered two bloody coups, a series of appalling massacres, and a protracted and savage civil war which claimed a million lives. This was a civil war on a par with the American and Spanish civil wars and like both those it was a desperate affair, fought to the bitter end by determined people who shared a common past and a common language.John de St. Jorre covered the conflict for the Observer. He was one of the few people to keep in touch with both sides. His account was objective and remains definitive.

From September 1939 until the last days of the war in 1945 Ireland was host to a constant flow of casualties from the Battle of the Atlantic. Irelands unique location, situated near the vital shipping lanes of the Western Approaches, placed the country in the immediate conflict zone once the war at sea began with the sinking of the British merchant liner Athenia on 3 September 1939, when 449 survivors were landed in Galway city.Neutral Shores follows the story of how many merchant navy ships during the war were attacked and sunk by German U-boats and FW200 bombers, and their surviving crews left adrift on the hostile Atlantic Ocean in a desperate struggle for survival.For the fortunate ones sanctuary was found along Irelands rugged Atlantic shores, where the local people took these men from the sea into their homes and cared for them without any consideration of their nationality or allegiances

From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.So said Winston Churchill in 1946. About to begin was Britains most expensive and turbulent periods of military history. This is the story of Britains Cold War, and it deals with all aspects of this chilling time when Britain could have been obliterated so easily by the unleashing of Russian Nuclear Weapons. The Cold War was like no other conflict yet experienced. It was more than a struggle between two superpowers, it was a war of ideologies, the Capitalistic West and the Communist East. The Cold War leached its way into every facet of British life to the extent it was not really considered a war at all. But a war it was. The period was punctuated by an arms race which pushed the world to the edge of destruction, as both East and West amassed arsenals of nuclear weapons far beyond what would be needed to destroy, quite literally, everything. So what part did Britain play in all this? Read on and find out!

The first edition of British Canals was published in 1950 and was much admired as a pioneering work in transport history. Joseph Boughey, with the advice of Charles Hadfield, has previously revised and updated the perennially popular material to reflect more recent changes. For this ninth edition, Joseph Boughey discusses the many new discoveries and advances in the world of canals around Britain, inevitably focussing on the twentieth century to a far greater extent than in any previous edition of this book, while still within the context of Hadfields original work.

Craig Summers had one of the most dangerous jobs in television. His task? Keeping adventurous celebrities alive. Summers was the BBCs security advisor through some of its most turbulent years. His job took him to war zones, scenes of natural disaster and big international sporting events - as well as on undercover operations involving child trafficking, football hooliganism and narcotics. Using his extensive military experience - he served with the British forces in both the Falklands War in 1982 and the Balkans conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina - he has been the right-hand man, confidant and enforcer to many adventurous celebrities, including Sir Ranulph Fiennes, Gary Lineker, John Simpson and Matthew Pinsent. In Bodyguard Summers talks extensively about these relationships, demonstrating how his knowledge and experience have been vital in keeping BBC casualties to a minimum. From Kabul, to Gaza, to Zimbabwe, Summers has escorted and protected some of our biggest stars through testing and hazardous conditions. These are the stories of some of the key events of our time, from the inside out.