Book Description
A master historian's excavations into the past unearth a world that is unexpected and compelling.
George Washington was inaugurated as president in 1789 with one tooth in his mouth, a lower left bicuspid. The Father of His Country had sets of false teeth that were made of everything but wood, from elephant ivory and walrus tusk to the teeth of a fellow human. With characteristic learning and bracing insight, Robert Darnton shows us that the Enlightenment had false teeth also—that it was not the Father of Our Modern World, responsible for all its advances and transgressions. In restoring the Enlightenment to human scale, Darnton locates its real aims, ambitions, and significance. So too with the French Revolution, another icon of the eighteenth century, approached here through the gossip, songs, and broadsides that formed the political nervous system of Paris in the Old Regime. Figures we think we know—Voltaire, Jefferson, Rousseau, Condorcet, even historians themselves—emerge afresh in Darnton's hands, their vitality, if not their teeth, intact. 17 b/w illustrations.
Customer Reviews:
Enjoyable.......2006-01-09
The unconventional in the subtitle "An Unconventional Guide to the Eighteenth Century" is a little deceiving. This reader expected to find curiosities large and small, such as Mr. Washington's false teeth in an exegesis to show how different that century was from the ones we grew up in.
The unconventianility is really Mr. Darnton's insinuation of himself into the text with many allusions from the 18th century to ours. It's ok - it's a historian's sin he cheerily admits up front. So Paris's informal political communication networks of gossip, handbills, songs, subversive literature, et al. focuses on ... well ... the King's sex life. There's more to it than that, of course, but still, in all a lot like the internet and a certain recent president.
The last chapter, "The Skeletons in the Closet: How Historians Play God" is worth the price of admission.
Whatever.......2004-04-23
Anyone who teaches at Princeton shouldn't be allowed to publish a book with the words "false teeth" on the cover!
Kind of Bland.......2003-05-18
Robert Darnton's latest book consists of a series of assorted essays. Most are from the nineties, though one is from the eighties and one is a reworking of a chapter of his doctoral dissertation in the sixties. Darnton starts with a defense of the Enlightenmnet, then goes on to discuss information networks in ancien regime France ("the eighteenth century Internet.") He then goes on to discuss cosmpolitanism in 18th century Europe, Voltaire and Jefferson's differing ideas of happiness, Rousseau as an anthropologist, the debate in pre-1789 France over the nature of the United States, the Girondin leader Brissot and stock market speculation in the 1780s, and finally an autobiographical essay on his work in the archives and his research on Brissot.
The result is a work that is less successful and less interesting that Darnton's two previous collection of essays "The Great Cat Massacre" and "The Kiss of Lamourette." Only the essays on the Parisian Internet and the quarrel between Condorcet and Brissot on America show new scholarly research. We see some of Darnton's old themes: the communication of ideas, the quasi-pornographic Enlightenment Undergound, but little that is new. The essay on Rousseau is an intelligent, not unsympathetic discussion of his career which looks like it could be a good article for Harpers' (and where in fact it was published in the eighties). The discussion of cosmpolitanism seems superficially interesting: in the 18th century publishers spewed out French books from London to Amsterdam to Dresden. During the Seven Years War Laurence Sterne travelled around France without any concern that the French might object to his presence, while Voltaire personally congratulated Frederick the Great for his victories over Voltaire's king. But these facts tell us little that would not be already known to students of the eighteenth century. The same lack of insight hurts his essay on happiness.
The title essay in defence of the Enlightenment is definitely the most lively. Darnton criticizes those who accuse it of such sins as imperialism, Orientalism, Nihilism, Positivism, and Totalitarianism. He makes some good points but the result is not fully convincing. For a start, he is not fair to the criticism of Adorno and the Frankfurt School. They saw themselves not as the enemies of the Enlightenment but as critics, as its loyal opposition. Adorno himself several times stated that the only cure for the damage caused to the world by reason is more reason. So while it is true that in our day and age there are no alternative moral criteria than those set up in the Enlightenment, it is also, in Adorno's case, somewhat beside the point.
Another problem with the essay is a certain tendentiousness. It is all very well to point out Diderot's cosmopolitianism, Voltaire's campaigns against judicial murder and Abbe Raynal's defense of the Indians. It is vitally important to remember that the Counter-Enlightenment contributed far more to the evils of slavery, misogyny and anti-Semitism. But the failure of the Democratic Party to treat their fellow Americans of African descent with basic decency cannot be blamed on the heavy weight of the Habsburgs or the Holy Office of the Inquisition. Likewise, even if one is sympathetic to the Jacobins, one cannot disassociate the Enlightenment from Terror, as Darnton does, simply because Robespierre preferred Rousseau to the Encyclopediasts. And there is the other side of the Enlightenment. There is Hume's support of slavery and Kant's indulgence of racism. Helvetius can be horribly crass nor can Adam Smith be entirely exculpated from those who used "The Wealth of Nations" as an excuse to let people starve in famines. And where is Bentham? Bentham's crass philistinism, his plans for perfect prisons and his having his butler executed for stealing some silverware make him the perfect villian of "Discipline and Punish." He cannot be so easily ignored.
The best essay in the final one as Darnton recounts how as an archival student he learned by accident that Brissot may have been a spy for the French police while Marat had not been guilty of theft and imprisoned in the 1770s. At times it is amusing: when he visited Orleans, the chief archivist, a man named Le Maire, offered to give him a tour of the city. Darnton's French was so bad then he thought the mayor of Orleans was personally welcoming him. But as it goes on it is a touching story of how Darnton found out incriminating facts about someone he had once admired and found that he was guilty of crude huckstering and self-deceit. These days it is easy for people to join the winning side and claim that they were just facing the hard truths. Darnton's essay shows the real ambiguities such self-righteous bluster hides.
Book Description
Topics include the French Revolution, the era of Napoleon, the Congress of Vienna, the Industrial Revolution, the impact of thought systems on the European world, the Concert of Europe, and the failure of the revolutions of 1848.
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- Paintings in Print
- celebrating florida
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Celebrating Florida: Works of Art from the Vickers Collection (Florida Sesquicentennial)
Manufacturer: University Press of Florida
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Art in Florida: 1564-1945
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ASIN: 0813014778 |
Book Description
Celebrating Florida presents for the first time a full-color collection of 66 important paintings, drawings, and prints of Florida-based art.
Featuring such artists as Winslow Homer, Louis Comfort Tiffany, George Inness, William Glackens, Martin Johnson Heade, Frank Shapleigh, and Herman Herzog, the book highlights some of the world's most significant artists, who came to Florida from 1823 to 1950 to capture the Sunshine State.
Essays by noted historians Wendell Garrett and Erik Robinson discuss the settlement of Florida and its birth as a state in 1845. Additional essays present an aesthetic, historical, social, and cultural overview of the significance of the art as well as biographical information about each artist.
Celebrating Florida is a Sesquicentennial publication, part of the celebration of 150 years of Florida statehood.
Customer Reviews:
Paintings in Print.......2000-01-19
This book delivers what it promises; it celebrates the labor of love that has resulted in the finest private collection of Florida art. Well produced and printed, Celebrating Florida catalogs the exhibition of the same title that the Daytona Beach Museum of Arts and Sciences had the foresight to curate. (I saw the exhibition there and was overwhelmed by the installation and the paintings.) The book's design concept, of utilizing informative essays, contextualizes the images for viewers to understand the necessities that inspired the artists while permitting the paintings to work their magic. The introductory essays set the stage for viewing period art and the interpretive entries accompanying each plate help viewers to consider the particular image. It is difficult for even a finely produced book to do justice to the exhibition that it archives, but author Gary Libby realized that the goal was not to compete with the show but instead to serve it. In deed, the book encourages dialog and a sense of personal exploration. Celebrating Florida is a first to demonstrate what many of us know, that the state really does have an artistic heritage and it opens the door for other surveys (like Mann's Art in Florida and Libby's Coast to Coast: The Contemporary Landscape in Florida). The Vickers have judicially amassed images of Florida which seep in to viewers' consciousness, defining Florida. Their passion elevates collecting to creativity. A must-have for Floridians and those interested in its past and meanings.
celebrating florida.......2000-01-01
I find that it is no more than a catalogue of a private collector's paintings with no idea or history of the art, why it was created, and what it may mean in the realm of art. It is a good collection, but not on view for the public. It is more of a personal vanity press item.
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The Columbia Guide to Modern Japanese History
Gary D. Allinson
Manufacturer: Columbia University Press
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0231111444 |
Book Description
Japan's transformation from an isolated society to a military empire and, after a crushing defeat in World War II, into one of the world's foremost economic powers is one of the most fascinating stories of modern history. Although much has been written about modern Japan, no reference book has analyzed its political, economic, social, and cultural history to render a holistic account of the sweeping changes Japan has undergone since 1850. Now, with The Columbia Guide to Modern Japanese History, Gary D. Allinson presents this much-needed learning resource for students of Japanese society and for lay readers seeking to better understand the economic powerhouse of East Asia during the 150 years that have catapulted it to international preeminence.
The Columbia Guide to Modern Japanese History is a unique work in which readers will find:
• a balanced narrative treating each facet of Japanese history -- political, social, economic, and cultural -- across four periods covering the years from 1850 to the present;
• an encyclopedia-style topical compendium including more than 150 entries on such key subjects as Japan's emperors, political leaders, business enterprises, social organizations, and leading writers;
• excerpts from important historical documents;
• a chronology and list of prime ministers, providing easy reference to important historical dates, periods, and people;
• an annotated guide to further research, including print, film, and electronic resources.
Readily accessible to all readers, Allinson's reference will be one that citizens, teachers, students, and academicians will consult often as they seek information on scores of topics. The Columbia Guide to Modern Japanese History will endure as a valuable reference and learning tool for many years to come.
Book Description
The Concise, Comprehensive Guide to the Modern Chinese Nation
This new single-volume reference on the modern Chinese nation deftly chronicles the broad expanse of Chinese history surveying not only this superpower’s complex culture and politics but the numerous societal revolutions that transformed a pre-industrial nation into a superpower. Here is an informative and fascinating account that begins with Imperial China and leads into the Opium War, the Taiping Uprising, the Civil War and the Communist Victory, Mao’s Socialist Transformation, and many other political, economic and social events critical to understanding modern China. Writing about the most current information gathered from years of study and research, Dr. E. Leung offers a fresh and compelling approach to the history of today’s China.
This handy pocket guide is the essential reference for any student or enthusiast of modern China.
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The Conservative Press in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century America: (Historical Guides to the World's Periodicals and Newspapers)
Manufacturer: Greenwood Press
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0313310432 |
Book Description
Selecting journals that speak for a very large number of topics addressed by the conservative press, this volume profiles selected conservative journals published since 1787. The conservative press has scarcely spoken with a single voice, whether the topics treated or even the time inhabited are the same or different. Yet, these journals testify to the persistent vigor and importance of conservatism. Together they provide a focused survey of the history of American conservative thought from the late 18th Century to the late 19th Century. Along with the companion volume covering the 20th Century conservative press, the book provides an important resource on conservative thought in America. Despite the disparities in conservative intellectual thought, the journals covered, even the more idiosyncratic and extreme, are connected by their core values of conservatism. The book is organized into sections reflecting these connections. The first section covers journals associated with Federal, Whig, or, in the Civil War era, Northern Democratic political interests. A later section includes journals sharing an attachment to Southern conservative values during the antebellum and Reconstruction periods. Two sections deal, respectively, with 19th Century Orthodox Protestant periodicals and 19th Century Catholic and Episcopal journals, and yet another section discusses journals united by a major focus on literary topics and cultural connections.
Book Description
More than 800 years ago, an Iraqi scholar, teacher, preacher, ascetic, pilgrim, ambassador, and counsellor to the 'Abbâsid caliph left his native Iraq and settled in Syria. 'Alî ibn Abî Bakr al-Harawî (d. 611/1215) came to serve Saladin (r. 564/1169-589/1193) and his sons as an advisor and an emissary to Christian rulers. Al-Harawî lived in an age in which the Jews and Christians of the Islamic world lived in relative peace and prosperity, even while Muslims were at war with the Crusaders. This period witnessed the spread of Sûfî orders, the construction of domed shrines, and the growth of pilgrimage activities throughout the Islamic world and Mediterranean. Al-Harawî's Kitâb al-ishârât ilâ ma'rifat al-ziyârât is the only known medieval pilgrimage guide for the Islamic world, North Africa, and the Mediterranean. This unique account is presented by Josef Meri in a meticulously annotated English translation along with the parallel Arabic text, and an accessible introduction that explores al-Harawî's life and times. Among the pilgrimage sites included are the Dome of the Rock and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the tombs of the Companions of the Prophet Muh'ammad in Medina, the shrine of the Prophet's cousin and son-in-law 'Alî at Najaf in Iraq and that of the Prophet Ezekiel outside Baghdad. Also mentioned are Jewish and Christian sites and the antiquities of ancient Egypt and Byzantium. A Lonely Wayfarer's Guide affords the reader a rare glimpse into the popular pietistic practices, rituals, and beliefs of the inhabitants of the medieval Mediterranean basin and the Islamic world in general. This guide testifies to the author's reverence for the holy places not just of Sunnî and Shî'î Muslims, but also those of Jews and Christians.
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On Exhibit: Victorians and Their Museums (Victorian Literature and Culture Series)
Barbara J. Black
Manufacturer: University of Virginia Press
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Binding: Hardcover
Museum of Modern Art
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ASIN: 0813918979 |
Book Description
Why did the Victorians collect with such a vengeance and exhibit in museums? Focusing on this key nineteenth-century enterprise, Barbara J. Black illuminates British culture of the period by examining the cultural power that this collecting and exhibiting possessed. Through its museums, she argues, Victorian London constructed itself as a world city.
Using the tools of cultural criticism, social history, and literary analysis, Black roots Victorian museum culture in key political events and cultural forces: British imperialism, exploration, and tourism; advances in science and changing attitudes about knowledge; the commitment to improved public taste through mass education; the growth of middle-class dominance and the resulting bourgeois fetishism and commodity culture; and the democratization of luxury engendered by the French and industrial revolutions. She covers a wide range of genres--from poetry to museum guidebooks to the triple-decker novel--and treats three London museums as case studies: Sir John Soane's house-museum, the Natural History Museum, and the exemplary South Kensington.
While On Exhibit provides a fascinating analysis of Victorian society, it also reminds us how modern the Victorians were--how, in crucial ways, our culture derives from the Victorian era. Forging connections among museums, urbanism, and modernity, Black provokes us to examine cultural imperialism and the costs and advantages of cultural consensus.
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GCSE History (GCSE Study Guide)
Peter Lane
Manufacturer: Letts Educational
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 1857583086 |
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GCSE Study Guide History (GCSE Study Guide)
Peter Lane
Manufacturer: Letts Educational
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 1857585836 |
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