The genesis of this book was a desire to find out what were the effects on society of the most lethal disaster of recorded history - that is to say, of the Black Death of 1348-50, which killed an estimated one third of the population living between India and Iceland. A number of times throughout … Continue reading A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century | Barbara Tuchman #USAnon-fiction
Part of understanding what is happening in Ukraine right now, obviously involves understanding the shared and heavily intertwined history of Ukraine with Russia over time. After reading Sheila Fitzpatricks's great catch-up book, The Shortest History of the Soviet Union, I went back in time to the Russian Revolution, October (see below) followed by another shortest … Continue reading Understanding Ukraine Mini Reviews
1980 should have been a good year for the Soviet Union. Black Inc. has been publishing books in their Shortest History series since 2012. The Shortest History of the Soviet Union by Shelia Fitzpatrick is the sixth book to be published. My studies (at school and university) focused on Russian history leading up to and … Continue reading The Shortest History of the Soviet Union | Sheila Fitzpatrick | AWWhistory
Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany abdicated on 9 November 1918 and in the streets of Paris there was jubilation. One of the reasons I decided to pick up Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World at this point in history, was for the history. We are now 18 months into … Continue reading Pale Rider | Laura Spinney #USAnonfiction
Lauren Mackay has created a very appealing companion book, to have to hand, whilst reading Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall trilogy. I love beautifully produced and packaged books - this is definitely one. Now that I have reread and read all three Wolf Hall books, I suspect I will not need to read them again and … Continue reading Wolf Hall Companion | Lauren Mackay #AWWliterarycompanion
Sometimes you read a book, or discover an author, that opens up a new world to you. Or a world that you knew existed, but one that doesn't really intersect very often with your own every day, ordinary life. A Month in Siena by Hisham Matar was one such book and one such author. It's … Continue reading A Month in Siena | Hisham Matar #NonFiction
In my previous post, about The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, I referred to Heaney's poem about the bog man found in Denmark in the 1950's. To find out how Tollund Man and Achilles go together in my universe, you'll have to read the post.As always, though, I'm fascinated by the stories we tell … Continue reading Tollund Man by Seamus Heaney
From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage by Judith Brett was a surprise bestseller at work in the week leading up to the recent NSW state elections. I'll be curious to see if it has the same surge during the weeks leading up to our Federal elections in May.Brett has written a fascinating and informative book about … Continue reading From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage: How Australia Got Compulsory Voting by Judith Brett
Week 3: (Nov. 12 to 16) – Be The Expert/Ask the Expert/Become the Expert (Julie @ JulzReads): Three ways to join in this week! You can either share three or more books on a single topic that you have read and can recommend (be the expert), you can put the call out for good nonfiction … Continue reading Non-Fiction November – Week 3
I've had a peculiar day.People have been sharing their tales of woe and weirdness with me all day.Acquaintances, not quite strangers on the street, but close enough, sharing intimate, private details with me. I've been hugging people left, right and centre and listening to the most extraordinary stories.All of this weirdness got me thinking about … Continue reading The Ides of March
I had a rather unexpected, almost obsessive response to Jonathan Jones' installation at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney last year. It touched me in ways that I'm still finding hard to catch and define. My fascination kicked in at several levels: the fire the architecture the history the cultural aspect the loss the healing the … Continue reading barrangal dyara (skin and bones) Jonathan Jones
Dark Emu Black Seeds challenges the orthodoxy of how Australia was settled and what the settlers actually saw when they arrived. To the victor goes the spoils...as well as the right to write history their way. Reading E.H. Carr's What is History? during my first year at Uni was the first time I had cause … Continue reading Dark Emu Black Seeds: Agriculture or Accident? by Bruce Pascoe
The Australian Dream: Blood, History and Becoming by Stan Grant is the feature essay in Issue 64 (2016) of the Quarterly Essay.Journalist Stan Grant received a lot of unexpected publicity in 2016 when a speech he gave at the Sydney Recital Hall in 2015 about the Australian dream and what it actually looks like to the … Continue reading The Australian Dream: Blood, History and Becoming by Stan Grant
The plan was to reread Herodotus' The Histories in January/February along with Ruth @A Great Book Study.The reality however, turned out to be a little different.I knew I was going to be away for most of January, and as much as I wanted to take The Histories with me, I knew I wouldn't be able to … Continue reading Travels With Herodotus by Ryszard Kapuscinski
I first read The Histories at school.I was studying Ancient History and we were meant to read a handful of chapters in Herodotus that related to the topic we were focused on.But I fell in love. I couldn't get enough of this world and these people that I knew nothing about. I wanted to know … Continue reading The Histories by Herodotus – Readalong
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