History: specific events & topics
Showing all 14 results
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A monstrous commotion
£10.99A monstrous commotion
‘A Monstrous Commotion’ delves deep into the depths of the Loch Ness phenomenon, one of the iconic scientific mysteries of the last 100 years. The legend of the ‘water horse’ in Loch Ness and other Scottish lakes is ancient, but reports of the monster date from as recently as the 1930s, courtesy of a correspondent of the ‘Inverness Courier.’ Rather than debating the arguably unfathomable realities of what lies beneath these murky Scottish waters, Gareth Williams instead engages with the people who have dedicated themselves to unearthing the truth of the monster’s existence. He explores just what it is that drives these people to the point of obsession, and the ways in which their own quests have changed their lives, and the lives of others.
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Arise, England
£25.00Arise, England
Between 1199 and 1399, English politics was high drama. These two centuries witnessed savage political blood-letting – including civil war, deposition, the murder of kings and the ruthless execution of rebel lords – as well as international warfare, devastating national pandemic, economic crisis and the first major peasant uprising in English history. Arise, England uses the six Plantagenet kings who ruled during these two centuries to explore England’s emergent statehood. Drawing on original accounts and arresting new research, it draws resonances between government, international relations, and the abilities, egos and ambitions of political actors, then and now. Colourful and complicated, and by turns impressive and hateful, the six kings stride through the story; but arguably the greatest character is the emerging English state itself.
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France on trial
£12.99France on trial
Few images more shocked the French population during the Occupation than the photograph of Marshal Philippe Pétain – the great French hero of the First World War – shaking the hand of Hitler on 20th October 1940. In the radio speech after this meeting, Pétain said ‘It is I alone who will be judged by History.’ Five years later, in July 1945, the hour of judegment – if not yet the judgement of history – arrived. Pétain was brought before a specially created High Court to answer for his conduct between the signing of the armistice with Germany in June 1940 and the Liberation of France in August 1944. Julian Jackson uses Pétain’s three-week trial as a lens through which to examine the central crisis of twentieth-century French history.
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Jack and Eve
£22.00Jack and Eve
Vera Holme, known as Jack, left a career as a jobbing actress to become Emmeline Pankhurst’s chauffeur and mechanic. Evelina Haverfield was a classic beauty, the daughter of a Scottish baron and fourteen years older than Jack. They met in 1909, fell in love, lived together, and became public faces of the suffragette movement, enduring prison and doing everything they could for the cause. The First World War paused the suffragettes’ campaign and Jack and Eve enrolled in the Scottish Women’s Hospital Service and soon found themselves in Serbia. Eve set up and ran hospitals for allied soldiers in appalling conditions, while Jack became an ambulance driver, travelling along dirt tracks under bombardment to collect the wounded from the front lines. Together, they carved radical new paths, demonstrating that women could do anything men could do.
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Jack and Eve
£10.99Jack and Eve
Vera Holme, known as Jack, left a career as a jobbing actress to become Emmeline Pankhurst’s chauffeur and mechanic. Evelina Haverfield was a classic beauty, the daughter of a Scottish baron and fourteen years older than Jack. They met in 1909, fell in love, lived together, and became public faces of the suffragette movement, enduring prison and doing everything they could for the cause. The First World War paused the suffragettes’ campaign and Jack and Eve enrolled in the Scottish Women’s Hospital Service and soon found themselves in Serbia. Eve set up and ran hospitals for allied soldiers in appalling conditions, while Jack became an ambulance driver, travelling along dirt tracks under bombardment to collect the wounded from the front lines. Together, they carved radical new paths, demonstrating that women could do anything men could do.
£10.99 -
Kingmaker
£25.00Kingmaker
When Pamela Churchill Harriman died in 1997, the obituaries that followed were scathing – and often downright sexist. Written off as a social climber, her glamorous social life and infamous erotic adventures overshadowed her true legacy. Much of what she did behind the scenes to shape the twentieth century, on both sides of the Atlantic, remained invisible. That is, until now: with a wealth of fresh research, Sonia Purnell unveils for the first time the full, spectacular story of how Harriman left an indelible mark on the world today. There is practically no-one in twentieth-century politics, culture and fashion whose lives she did not touch.
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The Illuminated Window
£30.00The Illuminated Window
A wide-ranging, beautifully illustrated history of stained-glass installations.
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The last tsar
£25.00The last tsar
When Tsar Nicholas II fell from power in 1917, Imperial Russia faced a series of overlapping crises, from war to social unrest. Though Nicholas’s life is often described as tragic, it was not fate that doomed the Romanovs – it was poor leadership and a blinkered faith in autocracy. Hasegawa narrates how Nicholas’s resistance to reform doomed the monarchy. Encompassing the captivating personalities of the era, the book untangles the struggle by Russia’s aristocratic, military, and legislative elite to reform the monarchy. By rejecting compromise, Nicholas undermined his supporters at crucial moments. His blunders cleared the way for all-out civil war and the eventual rise of the Soviet Union. The book uncovers how Nicholas II stumbled into revolution, taking his family, the Romanov dynasty, and the whole Russian Empire down with him.
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The Mexican revolution
£8.99The Mexican revolution
The Mexican Revolution was a ‘great’ revolution, decisive for Mexico, important within Latin America, and comparable to the other major revolutions of modern history. Alan Knight offers a succinct account of the period, from the initial uprising against Porfirio Dìaz and the ensuing decade of civil war, to the enduring legacy of the Revolution.
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The royal palaces
£25.00The royal palaces
Royal expert and TV historian Kate Williams lets you in on the secrets of The Royal Palaces in this exploration of regal residences, past and present.
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The secret lives of numbers
£12.99The secret lives of numbers
From building rockets to the handheld technology that governs our day-to-day lives, we are all in debt to the mathematical geniuses of the past. But the history of mathematics is warped; it looks like a sixteenth-century map that enlarges Europe at the expense of Africa, Asia and the Americas. This book introduces readers to a new group of mathematical boundary-smashers, those who have been erased by history because of their race, gender or nationality. Kitagawa and Revell bring to vivid life the stories and struggles of mathematicians from every continent: from the brilliant Arabic scholars of the ninth century ‘House of Wisdom’; to the pioneering African-American mathematicians of the twentieth century; the first female mathematics professor (from Russia); and the ‘lady computers’ around the world who revolutionised our knowledge of the night sky.
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The Shortest History of Music
£14.99 -
The Victorians at Christmas
£24.99