==History==
__NOTOC__
{{newreview
|author=Peter Ackroyd
|title=Venice: Pure City
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=Among Peter Ackroyd's recent works are 'biographies' of London and of the river Thames. Now he gives similar treatment to Venice, basically a history but enlivened with his elegant, literary style, and what a previous reviewer has called his love of 'psychogeographical investigation'.x
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099422565</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Benedict Gummer
|summary=This book, and the BBC TV series which complements it, must confirm Andrew Marr's status as one of the most entertaining and compulsive historian-cum-presenters working today. His previous project, on postwar Britain, was hard to fault, and anyone who enjoyed that will certainly relish this.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230709427</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Patrick Casey and Richard I Hale
|title=For College, Club & Country - A History of Clifton Rugby Football Club
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=Clifton Rugby Football Club can proudly trace its history back to the very emergence of the sport of rugby union. Founded in September 1872, the same year that William Webb Ellis, who is reputed to have been the rebellious Rugby schoolboy who first ran with the ball, died. In reality, it is highly likely that the Webb Ellis story is something of a spin job on behalf of Rugby School, although it did mean that Rugby School was able to impose its rules on the game at a time when most public schools had their own rules for playing versions of the game.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312756</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Peter Gay
|title=Modernism: The Lure of Heresy - From Baudelaire to Beckett and Beyond
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=It is impossible not to be impressed by the sheer scope of cultural historian Peter Gay's 2007 study of Modernism, newly released in this paperback edition. He notes in the introduction that it is not a 'comprehensive history' but rather 'a study of its rise, triumphs, and decline'. What is remarkable though, is the attempt to include the whole gamut of artistic fields in this coherent study.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099441969</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=John Van der Kiste
|title=Jonathan Wild: Conman and Cutpurse
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=Born towards the end of the seventeenth century Jonathan Wild was to become the eighteenth century's most famous criminal, plying his trade in a rather curious fashion. He was born in Wolverhampton of parents described as ''mean but honest''. It seems likely that he first travelled to London as the servant of a lawyer where he was eventually to settle, leaving his wife and child to fend for themselves. It was whilst serving a term of imprisonment in Wood Street Compter that he mixed with the cream of London's criminal underclass and learned the rudiments of his trade.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848682190</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Bonnie Greer
|title=Obama Music
|rating=3
|genre=History
|summary=This is an interesting read, but unless I'm missing something, the focus of the book seems a little difficult to grasp. It's best if I start with the author's intentions as set out in her Prologue. It is a mixture of tales of her own life growing up on the South Side, she writes, interspersed with stories and observations about Obama, linking it with the music, musicians and music scene, past and present, including hip hop, country, classical, and rock'n'roll. All of these, she notes, were heard on the President's Inauguration Day. To them she adds the blues, gospel, soul and jazz of the South Side, when the people began to build the great institutions and great solidarity that enabled him to become the most powerful man on the planet.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906558248</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Ian Mortimer
|title=1415: Henry V's Year of Glory
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=The medieval, in fact time-honoured, view of King Henry V as one of England's greatest heroes was propagated though not originated by Shakespeare, and again more recently to some extent by Olivier's portrayal in film. At least one historian has called him ''the greatest man that ever ruled England''.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224079921</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Toby Lester
|title=The Fourth Part of the World: The Epic Story of History's Greatest Map
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=In 2003 a map was bought for $10 million, the highest price ever paid publicly for a historical document, by the Library of Congress, where it is now on permanent public display. No ordinary map, this is sometimes described as America's birth certificate. It is the sole survivor of a thousand copies printed early in the 16th century, and was discovered by accident in some archives in a German castle in 1901. The sale and story behind it intrigued Toby Lester so much that he was inspired to discover more, and this book is the result.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861978030</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Jenifer Roberts
|title=The Madness of Queen Maria: The Remarkable Life of Maria I of Portugal
|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=Born in 1734 in Lisbon, at that time the richest and most opulent city in Europe, Maria was destined to become the first female monarch in Portuguese history. Married to her uncle Infante Pedro, seventeen years her senior, she had six children (outliving all but one of them), and became Queen in 1777. A conscientious woman, she had the misfortune to be born in during the 'age of reason', when church and state were vying for supremacy. Instinctively a supporter of the old religion, with a humanitarian approach to state affairs, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine the Great, and wore her crown rather reluctantly.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Steven M Gillon
|title=The Kennedy Assassination: 24 Hours After
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=The assassination of President Kennedy came at a pivotal moment in my life and for more than forty years I've read most of what has been written about the event. It's been of variable quality, but the books fed the curiosity of people entranced by the charismatic young President who died so publicly. I'd come to the point of wondering if there was anything new to be said, but Stephen Gillom has looked at what happened from an unusual and largely overlooked angle – the first twenty four hours of Lyndon Johnson's Presidency.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>046501870X</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Stella Tillyard
|title=A Royal Affair: George III and His Troublesome Siblings
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=King George III was not the luckiest of English sovereigns. America, and then his sons, in that order, gave him no end of grief, and the last few years of his life were clouded by madness. It is thus often overlooked that, before these troubles arose to haunt this most conscientious monarch, he also had a thankless task in trying to control his siblings.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099428563</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Andy Beckett
|title=When the Lights Went Out: Britain in the Seventies
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=Having grown up during the era and followed the major news stories in the papers as they happened, I was fascinated to find everything (well, nearly everything) in the 500-page narrative that comprises this book. It was quite a rocky ride from the election of Edward Heath in June 1970 through the three-day week, record British inflation and the IMF rescue, industrial disputes and picket battles at Saltley and Grunwick, the Gay Liberation Front and the stirrings of the green movement, the rise of Arthur Scargill, and the discovery of North Sea oil. Then there was the survival of James Callaghan's minority administration despite the odds, and thanks largely to his adroit handling of the situation in keeping both Tony Benn and the Lib-Lab pact on board, followed by the winter of discontent, culminating in Thatcher at No 10.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>057122136X</amazonuk>
}}