Showing titles in 19th Century

A Room of His Own sheds light on the mysterious ways of male associational culture as it examines such topics as fraternity, sophistication, nostalgia, social capital, celebrity, gossip, and male professionalism. The story of clubland (and the literature it generated) begins with Britain's military heroes home from the Napoleonic campaign and quickly turns to Dickens's and Thackeray's acrimonious Garrick Club Affair.

Philosophy for busy people. Listen to a succinct account of the philosophy of J.S. Mill in just one hour. John Stuart Mill is remembered today as the leading exponent of Utilitarianism, arguing that our aim in life must be the attainment of pleasure and the minimizing of pain for the majority of...

 The Enlightenment That Failed explores the growing rift between those Enlightenment trends and initiatives that appealed exclusively to elites and those aspiring to enlighten all of society by raising mankind's awareness, freedoms, and educational level generally. Jonathan I. Israel explains why the democratic and radical secularizing tendency of the Western Enlightenment, after gaining some notable successes during the revolutionary era (1775-1820) in numerous countries, especially in Europe, North America, and Spanish America, ultimately failed. 

Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (1821 - 1881) is considered one of the greatest Russian novelists of all time. He was a unique and brilliant man, whose life and energy comes through in his letters which he wrote to his close friends and family. These letters have become a classic and, along with his novels, have been translated into 170 languages.

No single invention epitomizes the Victorian era more than the black cast-iron range. Aware that the 21st-century has reduced it to a quaint relic, Ruth Goodman was determined to prove that the hot coal stove provided so much more than morning tea: It might even have kick-started the Industrial Revolution. Wielding the wit and passion seen in How to Be a Victorian, Goodman traces the tectonic shift from wood to coal in the mid-16th century - from sooty trials and errors during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I to the totally smog-clouded reign of Queen Victoria. 

Shawnee chief Tecumseh was a man destined for greatness - the son of a prominent war leader, he was supposedly born under a lucky shooting star. Charismatic, intelligent, handsome, he was both a fierce warrior and a savvy politician. In the first biography of Tecumseh in more than 20 years, Peter Cozzens thoroughly revises our understanding of this great leader and his movement, arguing that his overlooked younger brother Tenskwatwa, the 'Shawnee Prophet', was a crucial partner in Tecumseh's success. 

"Ambition is like the balloonist. To some extent, the rise is nice and he does enjoy a splendid view and a vast landscape. But when he rises more, vertigo occurs, the air becomes thin and the risk of a big fall increases." With this parable, the Austrian Archduke Maximilian of Hapsburg inadvertently predicted the destiny to which he would bravely ride, despite the warnings and the sweet talkers. In any case, he followed his heart's mandate. And Charlotte, the princess, was "one of the most cultured and beautiful" in Europe.

Two military setbacks, on a scale unprecedented in history, were required before the high tide of Napoleon's success began to ebb towards the final denouement of the Hundred Days and the famous Battle of Waterloo. The failed Russian invasion set the stage for the second defeat at Leipzig, which essentially sealed the fate of Napoleon's empire. The four-day Battle of Leipzig in October 1813, dubbed the "Battle of the Nations", essentially determined the course the Napoleonic Wars took from that moment forward.

« La Grande Famine irlandaise » est une exploration captivante de l'une des crises humanitaires les plus dévastatrices de l'histoire. Entre 1845 et 1852, l'Irlande a été ravagée par une famine catastrophique qui a coûté la vie à plus d'un million de personnes et forcé des millions d'autres à fuir leur patrie. Pourtant, il s'agissait bien plus que d'une tragédie due à des récoltes défaillantes ; c'était un creuset de résilience, façonné par la convergence d'une catastrophe naturelle, d'une négligence politique et des inégalités systémiques du régime colonial.

To get a sense of the kind of prestige that Claude Monet's reputation has within the art world, one need only learn that his Le Bassin Aux Nympheás (1919) - from his series of paintings featuring water lilies - sold for the equivalent of more than $70 million. This is an incredibly staggering price, especially considering that early in his life, Monet had been so poor and debt-ridden that some of his paintings were taken from him by creditors.

Occultée par la vision littéraire antagoniste de La Case de l'oncle Tom et d'Autant en emporte le vent, la guerre de Sécession demeure méconnue. Elle fut pourtant un conflit majeur qui marque le passage de l'ère napoléonienne du combat, centré sur la bataille, à la "guerre totale" qu'elle annonce par ses pertes massives, la mobilisation des civils et l'innovation constante manifeste dans l'invention des cuirassés, des sous-marins, l'utilisation stratégique de chemins de fer ou le recours à la tranchée comme moyen de fixation de l'adversaire.

Il est Napoléon le Grand : après Austerlitz, qui peut arrêter l'Empereur des Français ? Il bouscule les Rois, à Iéna, à Friedland, à Wagram. Il conquiert les femmes. Marie Walewska, la Polonaise, et Marie-Louise, l'Autrichienne, la petite-nièce de Marie-Antoinette ! Son fils, le Roi de Rome, descend donc de l'Empereur d'Autriche. Quel parcours ! Napoléon, que nous suivons pas à pas, s'humanise. Amant impérieux de Marie Walewska et mari attentionné de Marie-Louise, il voudrait retenir l'histoire, ne pas avoir à engager le fer contre le Tsar. Mais il est emporté : "Et ainsi la guerre aura lieu malgré moi, malgré lui", confie-t-il.

Gateshead, April 1866. The Apprentice of Split Crow Lane takes the forgotten case of a child murder in 1866 as a springboard to delve deeply into the pysche of the Victorians. What Jane Housham finds in this exploration of guilt, sexual deviance and madness is a diagnosis that is still ripe for the challenging and a sentence that provokes even our liberal modern judgment.

Murder, manslaughter, suicide, mishap - the very public business of determining death in colonial Sydney. Murder in colonial Sydney was a surprisingly rare occurrence, so when it did happen it caused a great sensation. People flocked to the scene of the crime, to the coroner's court and to the...

Antarctica, the ice kingdom hosting the South Pole, looms large in the human imagination. The secrets of this vast frozen desert have long tempted explorers, but its brutal climate and glacial shores notoriously resist human intrusion. Land of Wondrous Cold tells a gripping story of the pioneering 19th-century voyages, when British, French, and American commanders raced to penetrate Antarctica’s glacial rim for unknown lands beyond. These intrepid Victorian explorers laid the foundation for our current understanding of Terra Australis Incognita.

A modern take on a classical icon: this “luminous book” (Susan Orlean, New York Times bestselling author of The Library Book) tells the story of when, where, and how Chopin composed his most famous work, uncovering many surprises along the way and showing how his innovative music still...

A gripping and wholly original account of the epic human tragedy that was the great Klondike Gold Rush of 1897-98. One hundred thousand men and women rushed heedlessly north to make their fortunes; very few did, but many thousands of them died in the attempt. In 1897, the United States was mired...

'They have left here today!' he calls to the others. When King puts his hand down above the ashes of the fire, it is to find it still hot. There is even a tiny flame flickering from the end of one log. They must have left just hours ago. MELBOURNE, 20 AUGUST 1860. In an ambitious quest to be the...

En las últimas décadas la investigación histórica se ha renovado mucho en la Argentina, con preguntas nuevas y aproximaciones mucho más ricas y diversas que antes. Y sin embargo esos trabajos no han conseguido, en general, abrirse paso en el sentido común más o menos compartido por la sociedad. Al contrario: siguen muy vigentes, en esa "agenda pública", discursos históricos moralizadores, que no se proponen comprender sino juzgar y que simplifican nuestra perspectiva con anacronismos y visiones épicas que dificultan nuestra posibilidad de entender ese pasado colectivo.

On June 25, 1876, Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer led the 7th U.S. Cavalry into the valley of the Little Bighorn. By sunset, Custer and five of his companies lay dead - killed in battle against Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. Through the passage of time, Custer’s last fight has come to overshadow the rest of his military career, which had its brilliant beginning in the American Civil War. Plucked from obscurity by Maj. Gen. George McClellan, Custer served as a staff officer through the early stages of the war.