Grand unified books thread

[The Minsky Moment]

"...Norway seems to have been able to feed a population in excess of two million by the eleventh century"

We can assume the first McDonalds must been in Scotland, logically it would have spread to Norway soon after. With over 100 billion served, I think 2 million in Norway by the 11th century is within the realm of possibility.

[The Brain]

"...Norway seems to have been able to feed a population in excess of two million by the eleventh century"

We can assume the first McDonalds must been in Scotland, logically it would have spread to Norway soon after. With over 100 billion served, I think 2 million in Norway by the 11th century is within the realm of possibility.

Yeah. I may have been hasty.

[Threviel]

Norway was hit extremely hard by the black death, I seem to remember that its population did not recover to pre-plague levels until the 19th century. But 2 million sounds far too much.

Edit:
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rstb.2013.0384

Interesting on the population of Norway, around 150-200k around the viking age.

[mongers]

Is Trevor Royle' 'Civil War - The War of the Three Kingdoms' a good introduction/overview of the 'English Civil War' ?

[Sheilbh]

Not sure - I've not read it.

My go-to introduction/overview would be Austin Woolrych's Britain in Revolution (which takes a similar war of the three kingdoms view). I'd also recommend God's Fury, England's Fire which is focused on England but really good on the various bits of how the war was actually experienced/a bit more social history (within England) and also touches on gender, for example, while Woolrych is very much history from above.

Also I think there's been a modern (maybe post-Cold War? ) swing of pendulum towards political/religious analysis of the war. So it focuses on political decisions and religious motivations such as fear of papacy etc. Woolrych, in particular, punctures his book with "climacterics" or moments of just a few days when key decisions were taken and looks at those decisions and the actors very closely. I think it's probably worth as a refresher or contrast also having a look at one of the great 20th century histories that focus on the Marxist theory of the long-term economic forces and rise of the bourgeois as key and the sort of "English Revolution" theory/approach - from when the pendulum was back in the other direction Christopher Hill's God's Englishman is a really good read and gives a chunk of the politics/personal while still placing Cromwell in particular in an "English Revolution" context.

[mongers]

Not sure - I've not read it.

My go-to introduction/overview would be Austin Woolrych's Britain in Revolution (which takes a similar war of the three kingdoms view). I'd also recommend God's Fury, England's Fire which is focused on England but really good on the various bits of how the war was actually experienced/a bit more social history (within England) and also touches on gender, for example, while Woolrych is very much history from above.

Also I think there's been a modern (maybe post-Cold War? ) swing of pendulum towards political/religious analysis of the war. So it focuses on political decisions and religious motivations such as fear of papacy etc. Woolrych, in particular, punctures his book with "climacterics" or moments of just a few days when key decisions were taken and looks at those decisions and the actors very closely. I think it's probably worth as a refresher or contrast also having a look at one of the great 20th century histories that focus on the Marxist theory of the long-term economic forces and rise of the bourgeois as key and the sort of "English Revolution" theory/approach - from when the pendulum was back in the other direction Christopher Hill's God's Englishman is a really good read and gives a chunk of the politics/personal while still placing Cromwell in particular in an "English Revolution" context.

Thanks Shelf, I'll check those out.

I asked because I've just read it, but since it's my first book solely on the Civil Wars (  ) I was interested in Languish' opinion.
FWIW I found it a good, straight forward narrative history.

[Duque de Bragança]

FWIW these were the German covers. Looking up English versions, there seem to be various covers for some books.

Covers were redone for French versions as well, when they came back into fashion but these are the ones in my time. I was not much of a Loup Solitaire fan more Fighting Fantasy/Défis Fantastiques, Sorcery! for instance.
Two are not Lone Wolf/Loup Solitaire but that's the best picture I could find quickly.

[The Brain]

Finished 1066. There's an 8 page appendix dealing with the important question whether or not Harold was killed by an arrow in the eye. There is no explanation given why anyone should care.

[Savonarola]

I finished up Jorge Luis Borges's collection of short stories "Ficciones;" some of them were kind of dumb, but most were weird and wonderful.  Next up  "Gringo Viejo" by Carlos Fuentes.  ¡Viva Ambrose Bierce!

You know how Tolstoy just keeps going on and on about Anna Karenina's shoulders?  Fuentes manages to one up Tolstoy by giving us an in depth and lengthy description of "General" Tomas Arroyo's testicles.  (It would have been really edgy had he done that about Ambrose Bierce's...)

The book is set during the Mexican Revolution and gives a speculative account of Ambrose Bierce's fate (he's the titular Old Gringo.)  Fuentes does a decent job of making Bierce sound bitter, cynical and fatalistic.  One of the last letter's Bierce wrote (written in October of 1913) contains the lines:

"Goodbye—if you hear of my being stood up against a Mexican stone wall and shot to rags, please know that I think that a pretty good way to depart this life. It beats old age, disease, or falling down the cellar stairs. To be a Gringo in Mexico—ah, that is euthanasia."

In the book he dies from getting shot in the back and then is later "Executed" by firing squad.  That's speculation, Bierce wrote his last letter in December of 1913 and was last seen in Chihuahua in January of 1913; there's no reliable account of his death.  While Bierce is the most fun part of the book, it also deals with the corruption and failure of revolutionary ideals and the rocky relationship between the United States and Mexico.

Maybe it's a weird coincidence but many of the Latin American authors that I've read lived abroad when they were young.  Borges spent his teenage years in Switzerland; Fuentes's father was a diplomat so he lived all over; Isabela Allende father was also a diplomat, she was born in Lima.  The obvious exception is Gabriel Garcia Marquez who grew up in Aracataca, Colombia.  I've seen Aracataca, it's the sort of place where ice would indeed be viewed as the greatest miracle of the age.

Next up is El Hablador (The Storyteller) by Mario Vargas Llosa; following that pattern Vargas Llosa is Peruvian; his Grandfather was a diplomat and Mario Vargas Llosa spent some of his childhood in Bolivia.

[jimmy olsen]

Finished 1066. There's an 8 page appendix dealing with the important question whether or not Harold was killed by an arrow in the eye. There is no explanation given why anyone should care.

I care. What the fuck is that doing in the appendix? That discussion should be in the main text!

[The Brain]

Finished 1066. There's an 8 page appendix dealing with the important question whether or not Harold was killed by an arrow in the eye. There is no explanation given why anyone should care.

I care. What the fuck is that doing in the appendix? That discussion should be in the main text!

Yeah. I may have been hasty.

[The Brain]

Finished The Varangians: In God's Holy Fire, by Sverrir Jakobsson. Short work on the Varangians by an Icelandic professor. Reasonable brief summary of how Rus and Varangians are mentioned in written sources by Greeks, Muslims, Franks, Scandinavians etc. About halfway through it gets into High Middle Ages stuff and Icelandic saga details, I kind of skipped some parts there, the era is nice but my focus right now is the Viking Age. It's OK for what it is, and it's not like there's been a ton of books on the subject in English since Blöndal's classic work of the mid-20th century, but the reader should be aware that it is NOT in any way a comprehensive history of Rus and Varangians. There is some buzzword diarrhea in the introduction, but not too bad.

He makes a point of calling the Byzantine Empire the Roman Empire. I mean, sure fine, but I think many readers know the relevant history. And the book is published as part of New Approaches To Byzantine History And Culture. Maybe the author and the publisher should talk.

[Syt]

PSA:

[Eddie Teach]

Yeah. I may have been hasty.

That's what she said.

[The Brain]

Yeah. I may have been hasty.

That's what she said.

A woman is never late, nor is she early. She comes precisely when she means to.