Which histories do you like the best? Any era.

So far, I've started to read Hart's "history of the second world war" and it seems great so far. Looking at the ToC/Index it's not as comprehensive as say the Churchill history collection but I like Hart's take to this point.

I also found Foote's Civil War histories to be great.

I'm just hobby historian so take that into account, I'm not formally educated on history much less any particular era.

Personally, anything but American and French history interests me. American history doesn't interest me because it's hyperbole, and rammed down Americans throats THROUGHOUT our school years, with very little attention paid to other important areas of history. French...Because I KNOW the outcome of all the wars they fought...Hell, even the red and blue are velcroed to their flag, for ease of surrender.

Quote from: shalvayez;290123Personally, anything but American and French history interests me. American history doesn't interest me because it's hyperbole, and rammed down Americans throats THROUGHOUT our school years, with very little attention paid to other important areas of history. French...Because I KNOW the outcome of all the wars they fought...Hell, even the red and blue are velcroed to their flag, for ease of surrender.

Well, it might be true that in the US we used to get a heavy dose of  US History (as it should be , IMO). Hyperbole? You find me any history without a large portion of hyperbole heaped  onto it. Of course there is hyperbole, history is mostly written by the winners and they naturally are going to overstate and inflate the parts of it that make them good.

The only difference between US History and the rest maybe that how much you personally know of them.

Quote from: Mcrow;290087Which histories do you like the best? Any era.

So far, I've started to read Hart's "history of the second world war" and it seems great so far. Looking at the ToC/Index it's not as comprehensive as say the Churchill history collection but I like Hart's take to this point.

I also found Foote's Civil War histories to be great.

I'm just hobby historian so take that into account, I'm not formally educated on history much less any particular era.

From a hobby perspective, WWII and the Civil War as well. I'd suggest An Army at Dawn by Rick Atkinson. It is the first in a 3 volume set on the evolution of the US military in WWII. The book had an interesting view into just how green the US was when it got into WWII.

I would somehow expect Americans to be taught their own history before anyone else's, though it's such a patriotic country I would expect a risk of it being a bit too gung ho.  Still, biased local history would hardly be a uniquely American issue, would it?  Many countries have that one.

How long can it take to study anyway?  It's not like you have that much of it.

Over in the UK incidentally, what I think you chaps refer to as the War of Independence we refer to as the American Revolution.  Similarly, the Great Mutiny in India apparently over there is referred to as the First Patriotic War or something of that sort (not sure I've got that quite right, that title, but the American war was one of independence, the Indian one is modern politicians placing an anachronistic meaning on a war that had quite different causes).

Anything by Christopher Hibbert tends to be fun, in terms of authors.  In terms of places, my interests run heavily to French and Italian history.  I'm weak on the 20th century, good on the 15th-19th (good for an ordinary punter, I'm not a history geek ultimately or a historian).

Don't get me started!

-clash

Quote from: flyingmice;290163Don't get me started!

-clash

You could give us a couple!??!

The last two history books I read, both of which Jong lent me, and were really well done, were a history of the Imjin War and another about the Cold War.

RPGPundit

Some I particularly like:

Feudal Society by Marc Bloch
The Waning of the Middle Ages by Johan Huizinga
The Heroic Age by H.M. Chadwick
History of the Goths by Herwig Wolfram
Iron-Age Societies by Lotte Hedeager

Its been a while since I read a regular "HIstory!" book. Although I tend to love reading them or used to. For the past 3 or 4 years on computer (and before by longhand and electric typewritewr) I have been trying to collate those "Today In History" bits that appear in the daily newspaper and put them in order.

Two years ago I discovered the website that papers grab those from.

Fun stuff.

When I worked at a college used textbook store 10 years ago I bought two or three history reference books for fun. This thread is making me want to read those again.

- Ed C.

At the moment, i'm enjoying re-reading Eric Christiansen's, The Northern Crusades.

'Inspired by the Pope's call for a holy war, Scandinavian rulers and German military monks conquered and settled Finland, Estonia and Prussia, before turning on the eastern empires of Orthodox Novgorod and pagan Lithuania. These 'Northern Crusades' are less celebrated than those in the Middle East, but they were also far more successful. Vast new territories became and remain Christian, while the central institutions of medieval Western Europe - churches, castles, manors, guilds, parliaments and feudal law codes - were introduced into a dark and inhospitable outer world.'

Battleground Berlin, by Kondrashev, Murphy and another guy. An impressive book on the spionage in Berlin right until the Wall was built. I got the tip from Malcolm Craig here, I think.

The period when the East India Company ruled India. While I'm at it the period of the Great Game in Central Asia between The British and Russian Empires.

Regards,
David R

Flashman

Quote from: Joshua Ford;290452Flashman

Fucking A.