From Dawn to Decadence - 1500 to the Present by Jacques Barzun

$25.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: very good

In From Dawn to Decadence master historian Jaques Barzun sets down in one continuous narrative the sum of his discoveries and conclusions about Western Culture since 1500. Professor Barzun intertwines penetrating analysis of wars, philosophy, science, manners, sex, religion, morals and art with witty an d lucid biographical portraits of major historical figures including Charles V, Descartes, Bacon, Shakespeare, Cromwell, Peter the Great, Defoe, Pascal, Florence Nightingale and James Joyce. He introduces characters and incidents with great literary style and grace, in turn bringing to the fore those that have been forgotten or obscured by time. The triumphs and defeats of five hundred years of Western culture form an inspiring saga. In compelling chapters such as "From Faust, Part I, to the 'Nude Descending a Staircase No 2'", 'The Artist Prophet and Jester', 'The View from Venice Around 1650', 'from London around 1715' and 'from Chicago Around 1895' he shows the recurrent role of great themes throughout history. Barzun describes the current age as decadent, but he also shows that such decadence is a normal and necessary condition before a new age of culture can flourish forth. Jaques Barzun may be considered to be the ultimate historian; only after a lifetime of separate studies covering a broad territory could a writer create with such ease the synthesis displayed in this magnificent volume. Born in France in 1907, Jacques Barzun is the author of thirty books and the recipient of the Gold Medal for Criticism from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, of which he was twice president. He lives in Texas. Hardback ...Show more

Microcosm - Portrait of a Central European City by Norman Davies & Roger Moorhouse

$25.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: very good

The Last Templar : The Tragedy of Jacques de Molay Last Grand Master of the Temple by Alain Demurger

$10.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: very good

A Pioneering investigation into the last days of the mighty Knights Templar and their last Grand Master by one of France

The Vanished Kingdom - Travels Through The History Of Prussia by James Charles Roy

$16.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

Twice in this century, Germany initiated wars of unimagined terror and destruction. In both cases, defense of the “Prussian” realm, the German homeland, was the perceived and vilified perpetrator. Few today understand with any precision what “Prussia” means, either geographically or nationalistically, b ut neither would they deny the psychic resonance of the single word. To most, it means unbridled aggression, the image of the goose-stepping Junker.But what was once Prussia is now a significant portion of Eastern Europe, a contested homeland first won by Christian knights of the Teutonic Order. For centuries thereafter its terrain has been crisscrossed by war and partitioned by barbed wire. In its final catastrophe of 1945, nearly two million German refugees fled the region as Russian armies broke the eastern front, perhaps the greatest dislocation of a civilian population at any time during World War II. With the Berlin Wall now a memory and the Soviet Union in a state of collapse, this remains a geography in shambles. Modern travelers can now, for the first time in decades, see and ponder for themselves what Prussia really was and now is.James Charles Roy and Amos Elon, two writers noted for their inquisitive natures, have gone to search through the rubble themselves. They intermingle present-day observations with moving vignettes from the German and Prussian past, sketching a portrait of the Europe we know today. The story is spiced with interviews and reminiscences, unforgettable in their sadness, of people looking back at a life now gone, a life full of turmoil and heartache, memories both fond and tragic. The final result: a far deeper understanding of the tattered lands of today's Eastern Europe. ...Show more

Betsy and the Emperor: The True Story of Napoleon, a Pretty Girl, a Regency Rake, and an Australian Colonial Misadventure by Anne Whitehead

$18.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: very good

After Napoleon was defeated at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, he was sent into exile on Saint Helena. He became an 'eagle in a cage', reduced from the most powerful figure in Europe to a prisoner on a rock in the South Atlantic. But the fallen emperor was charmed by the pretty teenage daughter of a loc al merchant, Betsy Balcombe...Anne Whitehead brings to life Napoleon's last years on Saint Helena, revealing the central role of the Balcombe family. She also lays to rest two centuries of speculation about Betsy's relationship with Napoleon...After Napoleon's death, Betsy travelled to Australia in 1823 with her father, who was appointed the first Colonial Treasurer of New South Wales. When the family lost their fortune, she returned to London and published a memoir which made her a celebrity...With her extraordinary connections to royalty and high society, Betsy Balcombe led a life worthy of a Regency romance, but she was always fighting for her independence. This new account reveals Napoleon at his most vulnerable, human and reflective, and a woman caught in some of the most dramatic events of her time. ...Show more

Blitzed - Drugs in Nazi Germany by Norman Ohler

$20.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: very good

'Extremely interesting ...a serious piece of scholarship, very well researched' Ian Kershaw The Nazis presented themselves as warriors against moral degeneracy. Yet, as Norman Ohler's gripping bestseller reveals, the entire Third Reich was permeated with drugs: cocaine, heroin, morphine and, most of all , methamphetamines, or crystal meth, used by everyone from factory workers to housewives, and crucial to troops' resilience - even partly explaining German victory in 1940. The promiscuous use of drugs at the very highest levels also impaired and confused decision-making, with Hitler and his entourage taking refuge in potentially lethal cocktails of stimulants administered by the physician Dr Morell as the war turned against Germany. While drugs cannot on their own explain the events of the Second World War or its outcome, Ohler shows, they change our understanding of it. Blitzed forms a crucial missing piece of the story. ...Show more

Churchill and Australia by Graham Freudenberg

$18.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: good-very good

Empire of Love - Histories of France and the Pacific by Matt K. Matsuda

$20.00 NZD

Category: Maori & Pacific | Reading Level: very good

In this broad-ranging survey of Paris, Tahiti, Indochina, Japan, New Caledonia, and the South Pacific generally, Matt Matsuda illustrates the fascinating interplay that shaped the imaginations of both colonizer and colonized. Drawing on a wealth of primary sources, Matsuda describes the constitution of a "French Pacific" through the eyes of Tahitian monarchs, Kanak warriors, French politicos and prisoners, Asian revolutionaries and Central American laborers, among others. He argues that French imperialism in the Pacific, both real and imagined, was registered most forcefully in languages of desire and love--for lost islands, promised wealth and riches, carnal and spiritual pleasures--and political affinities. Exploring the conflicting engagements with love for and against the empire in the Pacific, this book is an imaginative and ground-breaking work in global imperial and colonial histories, as well as Pacific histories. ...Show more

Conversations with Stalin by Milovan Djilas

$6.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: good

The Foundations of Early Modern Europe, 1460-1559 by Eugene F. Rice

$8.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Series: History of Modern Europe Ser. | Reading Level: good

Italian Ways: On and Off the Rails from Milan to Palermo by Tim Parks

$12.00 NZD

Category: Travel | Reading Level: very good

In Italian Ways, bestselling writer Tim Parks brings us a fresh portrait of Italy today through a wry account of his train journeys around the country. Whether describing his daily commute from Milan to Verona, his regular trips to Florence and Rome, or his occasional sojourns to Naples and Sicily, Park s uses his thirty years of amusing and maddening experiences on Italian trains to reveal what he calls the 'charmingly irritating dystopian paradise' of Italy. Through memorable encounters with ordinary Italians - conductors and ticket collectors, priests and prostitutes, scholars and lovers, gypsies and immigrants - Parks captures what makes Italian life distinctive. Italian Ways also explores how trains helped build Italy and how the railways reflect Italians' sense of themselves from Garibaldi to Mussolini to Berlusconi and beyond. Most of all, Italian Ways is an entertaining attempt to capture the essence of modern Italy. ...Show more

The Identity of France - Volume One: History and Environment and Volume Two: People and Production by Fernand Braudel

$20.00 NZD

Category: Europe | Reading Level: good-very good

This first of two volumes is a guided tour of France's provinces and cities and how they rose to prominence in different eras. The author examines the economical and social differences that are camouflaged under a deceptive appearance of national unity. 30 maps.