The History Book Thread! looks like I need to set up space for a Nazi shelf

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > The History Book Thread! looks like I need to set up space for a Nazi shelf

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algebra testes: Mar 5, 2011; Lipstick Apathy

SuppressdPuberty93 posted:

A Savage War is a military history of the American Civil War and also probably the best management book I have ever read.

I have bought this, thank you for the recommendation.

# ? Feb 1, 2021 12:21

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# ? Apr 25, 2024 10:25

Minenfeld!: Aug 21, 2012

RadicalTranslation posted:

Can you give a run-down on exactly what the hell it is? It's a nightmare to navigate through. I'm assuming it's not a forum right?

So, it's divided into networks by topic with different contributors and such. Each network has its own review section and discussions. It is something of a nightmare to navigate at first glance.

# ? Feb 2, 2021 01:05

StrixNebulosa: Feb 14, 2012; You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
But most of all, you cheated BABA

Cannot find an ebook edition of The Hellenistic World and the Coming of Rome by Gruen so I trundle to alibris and pick up a used copy, making sure to get the isbn number right for the one volume edition

Gets the mail some weeks later

It's volume 2 of the two book set. :sigh:

I swear I don't have this problem when I buy fiction, only nonfiction! And it seems that more nonfiction books don't have ebooks available - I'm going to have to pick up the Mystery of King Arthur by Elizabeth Jenkins as a physical book as well.

# ? Feb 2, 2021 20:19

Koramei: Nov 11, 2011; I have three regrets
The first is to be born in Joseon.

SubG posted:

In 1997 Foote said that if the Civil War was fought today he'd fight for the Confederacy:

I guess you can try triangulating something in the exact semantics of what constitutes the Lost Cause mythology--because Foote clearly doesn't buy into all of the nonsense a lot of unsophisticated Lost Causers buy into--but he's manifestly sympathetic to the Confederacy, and he absolutely romanticised the Confederacy and the antebellum South. Which is why his name finds itself in the mouths of shitheels weeping over Confederate monuments.

This isn't some we-can't-judge-from-this-historical-distance thing. The first volume of The Civil War: A Narrative was published in 1958. So I guess if you really want to hand-wring your way into exculpating his veneration of the Confederacy you might be able to scratch out some "man of his times" nonsense there. The second volume was published 1963, in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement. And the third volume wasn't published until 1974. And then he became a minor celebrity in the '90s after the Burns documentary. And his views do not appear to have evolved in the near four decades between when the first volume was published and when he blithely announced he'd take up arms for the Confederacy if the opportunity were to present itself.

"The Confederates fought for some substantially good things." Any time you have trouble figuring out what to think of Shelby loving Foote, just meditate on the fact that he said that in 1997 after devoting literally decades to Civil War history.

my hot take is that all scholarship done before 1980 is bad

e: whoops I thought this was the Military History thread but the point stands

# ? Feb 2, 2021 22:07

StrixNebulosa: Feb 14, 2012; You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
But most of all, you cheated BABA

Koramei posted:

my hot take is that all scholarship done before 1980 is bad

e: whoops I thought this was the Military History thread but the point stands

What precisely changed in 1980? Why that date?

# ? Feb 2, 2021 22:11

Koramei: Nov 11, 2011; I have three regrets
The first is to be born in Joseon.

You're assuming a more thorough justification than the "wow people were still saying this in the 1970s?" reaction I get from time to time, but if I have to justify my needlessly sweeping statement, I'm gonna ascribe it to postmodernism having taken hold of the mainstream by around that point.

Also purely coincidentally it's the time that my interest, Korean studies, became an actual thing.

# ? Feb 2, 2021 22:20

9-Volt Assault: Jan 27, 2007; Beter twee tetten in de hand dan tien op de vlucht.

Koramei posted:

my hot take is that all scholarship done before 1980 is bad

e: whoops I thought this was the Military History thread but the point stands

The rule of thumb I got taught in university is that anything older than 20 years is to be read with caution. It�s not that older books are necessarily wrong or bad, they�re just outdated more often than not (depending on the field).

For example, I wouldn�t read a book about the Etruscans that was written in the 1980s because they had absolutely no clue besides �they were really mysterious and obsessed with the dead�, but in Roman history there are plenty of good books written in that same decade.

# ? Feb 2, 2021 22:22

MeatwadIsGod: Sep 30, 2004; Foretold by Gyromancy

I still read the hell out of the Durants because I haven't found any contemporary historians that have their flourish

# ? Feb 2, 2021 22:53

Grand Fromage: Jan 30, 2006; L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?

I hate when I get an interest in something and the last comprehensive work in English was in like 1925. I still read it since :shrug:

but it's annoying.

# ? Feb 2, 2021 23:00

StrixNebulosa: Feb 14, 2012; You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
But most of all, you cheated BABA

Koramei posted:

You're assuming a more thorough justification than the "wow people were still saying this in the 1970s?" reaction I get from time to time, but if I have to justify my needlessly sweeping statement, I'm gonna ascribe it to postmodernism having taken hold of the mainstream by around that point.

Also purely coincidentally it's the time that my interest, Korean studies, became an actual thing.

I like understanding the reasons behind sweeping statements, so thank you for answering! :shobon:

9-Volt Assault posted:

The rule of thumb I got taught in university is that anything older than 20 years is to be read with caution. It’s not that older books are necessarily wrong or bad, they’re just outdated more often than not (depending on the field).

For example, I wouldn’t read a book about the Etruscans that was written in the 1980s because they had absolutely no clue besides “they were really mysterious and obsessed with the dead”, but in Roman history there are plenty of good books written in that same decade.

I've been listening to Tides of History (podcast) and it's been mentioning some new science changing how we should view some of the ancient world as we can check DNA and genetics of communities and I bet that's going to shift some history books even more in the future, assuming the science holds up.

# ? Feb 3, 2021 01:46

Karenina: Jul 10, 2013

Good books on the history of antisemitism in the Russian Empire? Works that delve into the revolutionary/civil war period are fine, too, though not top priority.

# ? Feb 3, 2021 01:53

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Karenina posted:

Good books on the history of antisemitism in the Russian Empire? Works that delve into the revolutionary/civil war period are fine, too, though not top priority.

Its hardly a full scope thing, but "Pogrom: Kishinev and the Tilt of History" by Steven Zipperstein focuses on the Kishnev pogrom, the events leading up to it and the reactions to it.

# ? Feb 3, 2021 02:35

vyelkin: Jan 2, 2011

Karenina posted:

Good books on the history of antisemitism in the Russian Empire? Works that delve into the revolutionary/civil war period are fine, too, though not top priority.

I haven't read it, but there's a very recent book by one of the top scholars in the field: Laura Engelstein, The Resistible Rise of Antisemitism: Exemplary Cases from Russia, Ukraine, and Poland.

There are two good books on two famous cases of blood libel, one from the early 19th and one from the early 20th centuries: Eugene Avrutin, The Velizh Affair: Blood Libel in a Russian Town and Robert Weinberg, Blood Libel in Late Imperial Russia: The Ritual Murder Trial of Mendel Beilis.

If you decide you do want to go into the revolutionary/civil war period, the most recent work I know on the subject is Brendan McGeever, Antisemitism and the Russian Revolution which looks at how the Bolsheviks responded to antisemitism and pogroms during the civil war.

# ? Feb 3, 2021 02:45

Shimrra Jamaane: Aug 10, 2007; Obscure to all except those well-versed in Yuuzhan Vong lore.

Man I wasn�t aware of those comments by Foote in the 90s. Yikes.

# ? Feb 3, 2021 03:26

Ravel: Dec 23, 2009; There's no story

Is there a good book on Economic and Finance History (as opposed to history of economics as a discipline). Stuff that looks into unemployment, inflation, interest rates, exchange rates, and the policies and treaties that led to them? Maybe even regulatory history? It doesn't have to be global - a book on, say, 'Latin American debt crises in the 80s' or 'Kissinger and Saudi Treasury Bond purchases' would be just as interesting.

I've read a lot of memoirs and commentaries on the GFC so I'm interested in history pre-GFC. There's lots of books that go into detail about that crisis and its aftermath, but there's not really the same body of work for pre-2000 events (except When Genius Failed). I have a History of the Federal Reserve (from 1913 to 1987), which is enormous and excellent. I don't mind dry academic works.

# ? Feb 3, 2021 05:18

Chairman Capone: Dec 17, 2008

I read "The Currency of Socialism: Money and Political Culture in East Germany" by Jonathan Zatlin in grad school and found it to be really interesting.

# ? Feb 3, 2021 05:22

PawParole: Nov 16, 2019

give me a book about the French Revolution that isn�t written by Whigs or Conservatives.

like something that is pro-revolution, or at the very least less biased

# ? Feb 4, 2021 21:16

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

PawParole posted:

give me a book about the French Revolution that isn�t written by Whigs or Conservatives.

like something that is pro-revolution, or at the very least less biased

I assume you don't want Schama's Citizens. How about The Oxford History of the French Revolution?

# ? Feb 4, 2021 22:45

Chairman Capone: Dec 17, 2008

PawParole posted:

give me a book about the French Revolution that isn�t written by Whigs or Conservatives.

like something that is pro-revolution, or at the very least less biased

Just a few days ago there was a new (though abriged) English translation of Jean Jaur�s' A Socialist History of the French Revolution. The original work is from the first few years of the 1900s and was one of (maybe the?) first Marxist historical works on the Revolution as a whole.

I'm sure it's dated now but it's an important work on its own.

# ? Feb 4, 2021 22:53

Shimrra Jamaane: Aug 10, 2007; Obscure to all except those well-versed in Yuuzhan Vong lore.

A New World Begins is the new definitive account.

But if for whatever reason you want a solely Marxist interpretation of the Revolution I would hope it�s just for historiography reasons because scholarship has moved beyond that.

# ? Feb 5, 2021 18:14

Sally: Jan 9, 2007; Don't post Small Dash!

i am reading history books again. Working on "Empire of the Summer Moon" because it was recommended to me a lot and because i don't actually know a ton about Comanche history aside from stereotypes in old westerns and whatever Cormac McCarthy mightve written.

# ? Feb 8, 2021 03:16

Karenina: Jul 10, 2013

Epicurius posted:

Its hardly a full scope thing, but "Pogrom: Kishinev and the Tilt of History" by Steven Zipperstein focuses on the Kishnev pogrom, the events leading up to it and the reactions to it.

vyelkin posted:

I haven't read it, but there's a very recent book by one of the top scholars in the field: Laura Engelstein, The Resistible Rise of Antisemitism: Exemplary Cases from Russia, Ukraine, and Poland.

There are two good books on two famous cases of blood libel, one from the early 19th and one from the early 20th centuries: Eugene Avrutin, The Velizh Affair: Blood Libel in a Russian Town and Robert Weinberg, Blood Libel in Late Imperial Russia: The Ritual Murder Trial of Mendel Beilis.

If you decide you do want to go into the revolutionary/civil war period, the most recent work I know on the subject is Brendan McGeever, Antisemitism and the Russian Revolution which looks at how the Bolsheviks responded to antisemitism and pogroms during the civil war.

Thanks!

# ? Feb 8, 2021 04:51

Strange Cares: Nov 22, 2007; ROYAL RAINBOW!

Anyone know a good biography of Diderot?

# ? Feb 9, 2021 02:07

Mr_Roke: Jan 1, 2014

Just finished Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztecs tonight and it was pretty drat great.

# ? Feb 19, 2021 05:27

SubG: Aug 19, 2004; It's a hard world for little things.

Is there a consensus best single volume on the War of the Spanish Succession?

# ? Mar 1, 2021 05:45

nessin: Feb 7, 2010

Anyone know of/can recommend any cultural history books focusing on east/southeast Asia? Ideally I'd like to see something which picks up a modern cultural trend and traces the history of how we got to where we are but honestly just anything going deep into something that isn't the high level political or military history of the region would be great.

# ? Mar 8, 2021 02:51

Koramei: Nov 11, 2011; I have three regrets
The first is to be born in Joseon.

I've never actually read it, but in terms of a general survey East Asia: A Cultural, Social, and Political History has been on my radar for a while. It's an undergrad textbook but for such a broad topic I'm not sure that's a bad thing, and while I don't know the other authors, James Palais was basically the preeminent western language historian of Korean history before his passing.
You might also look at Charles Holcombe's A History of East Asia: From the Origins of Civilization to the 21st Century; I haven't read this, but I've read his The Genesis of East Asia (covering up to the end of the first millennium) which was fine and he's a generally well regarded historian, so I imagine this will be too.

More narrowly focused on the philosophical bend to your question, Lost Modernities: China, Vietnam, Korea, and the Hazards of World History is basically about that transition from the perspective of the Confucian bureaucracies, which might be of interest. Tracing cultural trends back to premodern East Asia is gonna be kind of haphazard though; the sad reality is that they were pretty heavily broken by colonialism/modernization, or distorted in other ways in e.g. Japan.

# ? Mar 8, 2021 03:47

Grand Fromage: Jan 30, 2006; L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?

I've been notified I have four audible credits gathering dust so hit me with your favorite recent history books. Good pop history, academic is awful to listen to. I'm interested in most things but would prioritize ancient Mediterranean, pre-colonial Africa, pre-Columbian Americas, and East Asia at the moment.

# ? Mar 13, 2021 02:50

vyelkin: Jan 2, 2011

Grand Fromage posted:

I've been notified I have four audible credits gathering dust so hit me with your favorite recent history books. Good pop history, academic is awful to listen to. I'm interested in most things but would prioritize ancient Mediterranean, pre-colonial Africa, pre-Columbian Americas, and East Asia at the moment.

I'm most of the way through Vincent Bevins's The Jakarta Method which is depressing but good pop history about Indonesia and the Cold War.

# ? Mar 13, 2021 03:09

Grand Fromage: Jan 30, 2006; L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?

Let me clarify that recent history books means recent publish, not modern. Though Cold War is the one modern I'm into so I'll look that one up.

# ? Mar 13, 2021 03:32

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Grand Fromage posted:

I've been notified I have four audible credits gathering dust so hit me with your favorite recent history books. Good pop history, academic is awful to listen to. I'm interested in most things but would prioritize ancient Mediterranean, pre-colonial Africa, pre-Columbian Americas, and East Asia at the moment.

I've recommended it before, but I'll recommend it again (and sorry if it's too old for you), 2015's "Pagans: The End of Traditional Religion and the Rise of Christianity", by James O'Donnell, which is a look at paganism in the Roman Empire and the conversion to Christianity.

# ? Mar 13, 2021 04:15

Kaiser Schnitzel: Mar 29, 2006; Schnitzel mit uns

Grand Fromage posted:

I've been notified I have four audible credits gathering dust so hit me with your favorite recent history books. Good pop history, academic is awful to listen to. I'm interested in most things but would prioritize ancient Mediterranean, pre-colonial Africa, pre-Columbian Americas, and East Asia at the moment.

Not super recent (probably 15? Years old) but �A Splendid Exchange: How trade shaped the world� is good and touches on a lot of those areas.

# ? Mar 13, 2021 16:22

Grand Fromage: Jan 30, 2006; L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?

I return in search of East Germany. I've read Stasiland and have The People's State by Mary Fulbrook. Most of the stuff I find seems to be Berlin focused and I'm really looking for more about life in the DDR than Cold War politicking.

# ? Mar 26, 2021 21:48

Epicurius: Apr 10, 2010; College Slice

Grand Fromage posted:

I return in search of East Germany. I've read Stasiland and have The People's State by Mary Fulbrook. Most of the stuff I find seems to be Berlin focused and I'm really looking for more about life in the DDR than Cold War politicking.

Hester Vaizey's Born in the GDR is a series of profiles and interviews of former East Germans about their lives. You might want to check that out.

# ? Mar 28, 2021 07:41

Minenfeld!: Aug 21, 2012

vyelkin posted:

Yeah, I have The End of Tsarist Russia sitting on my bookshelf but I haven't actually read it myself, so I can't speak to that argument. I've enjoyed Lieven's other books in the past which is why I recommended it.

On administration and reforms, Lincoln has a book on the Great Reforms that might be interesting, but I haven't read it so can't say more than that about it. There's a really good book by Catherine Evtuhov that touches on these subjects as part of a comprehensive and frankly kinda brilliant look at a single province: Portrait of a Russian Province: Economy, Society, and Civilization in Nineteenth-Century Nizhnii Novgorod. There's also a book I like a lot looking at the soslovie (estate) system of legal categorization from the 18th century through 1917, Alison Smith's For the Common Good and Their Own Well-Being, which will speak to a specific issue of how the empire was actually administered and reformed over time.

...

I've read both Portrait of a Russian Province: Economy, Society, and Civilization in Nineteenth-Century Nizhnii Novgorod and Angel of Vengeance since your suggestions and found both to be excellent. Thank you for the suggestions.

# ? Apr 3, 2021 17:50

vyelkin: Jan 2, 2011

Minenfeld! posted:

I've read both Portrait of a Russian Province: Economy, Society, and Civilization in Nineteenth-Century Nizhnii Novgorod and Angel of Vengeance since your suggestions and found both to be excellent. Thank you for the suggestions.

Awesome, I'm glad to hear that!

# ? Apr 4, 2021 20:07

Dapper_Swindler: Feb 14, 2012; Im glad my instant dislike in you has been validated again and again.

whats a good book on the early church, preferably up to and including Nicia and maybe a little later.

# ? Apr 11, 2021 17:59

Fighting Trousers: May 17, 2011; Does this excite you, girl?

Christian Beginnings: From Nazareth to Nicaea by Geza Vermes may be what you're looking for.

# ? Apr 12, 2021 15:41

CrypticFox: Dec 19, 2019; "You are one of the most incompetent of tablet writers"

The Triumph of Christianity by Bart Ehrman is another good, readable, book on that topic, although its not a comprehensive history. As the title suggests, its focus is on the growth of the Church, but in order to discuss that it has to also touch on most of the other issues in the Early Church.

# ? Apr 14, 2021 07:07

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# ? Apr 25, 2024 10:25

bowser: Apr 7, 2007

What are some good books on the peopling of [various regions of] the world? I realize early Homo sapien migration would fall into pre-history but I'm hoping you folks can help!

# ? Apr 15, 2021 00:35

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > The History Book Thread! looks like I need to set up space for a Nazi shelf

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