Browse all reviews
The “New Man” in Radical Right Ideology and Practice, 1919-45 / eds. Jorge Dagnino, Matthew Feldman, Paul Stocker
Review Date: 24 April 2020
During the interwar period, the figure of the ‘New Man’ constituted a powerful symbol of the promise and potential of a thorough-going political and anthropological revitalisation of society, which could effectively counteract widely-perceived notions of crisis and decline in the aftermath of the Great War.
Martial Masculinities: Experiencing and Imagining the Military in the Long Nineteenth Century / eds. Anna Maria Barry, Joanne Begiato, Michael Brown
Review Date: 24 April 2020
This is an edited collection consisting of 11 articles, plus an introduction and an epilogue, about the role of martial masculinities in British society and culture from the French Revolution to the beginning of the Great War. It originated in a conference held at the University of Hull in 2015. The majority of the authors teach in either a History or an English department.
India and the Cold War / ed. Manu Bhagavan
Review Date: 17 April 2020
On page one of India and the Cold War, the collection’s editor, Professor Manu Bhagavan, claims that thoughts about the Cold War changed after the publication of Odd Arne Westad’s The Global Cold War (2005). Fifteen years after its initial printing, Westad’s opus still looms large for Cold War scholars.
Appeasing Hitler: Chamberlain, Churchill and the Road to War / Tim Bouverie
Review Date: 03 April 2020
Given that the shelves of those historians who specialise in the origins of the Second World War are figuratively groaning under the weight of works covering the topic of appeasement, it may come as a surprise to some when reading the preface to Appeasing Hitler that “while books on the Second World War have multiplied over the past 20 years, the build-up and causes of that…
Bibliography of the ‘Miracle of Dunkirk’ / Major J. Selby Bradford, Lieut.- Colonel Ewan Butler
Review Date: 03 April 2020
It is possible to talk today of a ‘public obsession with the Second World War’.(1) The preoccupation is one that generates lively academic debate. Yet bizarre though it may now seem, in 1950—just five years after the surrender of Germany and Japan—it was possible to write off the Second World War as ‘already but a memory’.
Founding Martyr: The Life and Death of Joseph Warren, the American Revolution’s Lost Hero / Christian Di Spigna
Review Date: 27 February 2020
A simple man from humble beginnings, Joseph Warren earned himself the titles of doctor, husband, father, author, leader, soldier, and martyr through his expressions of compassion and qualities of leadership. With a sense of moral righteousness, as well as deeply rooted personal motivations, Warren fought for American independence with both the pen and the sword.
Armies of Deliverance: A New History of the Civil War / Elizabeth R. Varon
Review Date: 27 February 2020
A renowned historian of the American Civil War era, Elizabeth R. Varon draws on her expertise in her new book Armies of Deliverance: A New History of the Civil War. It is both a comprehensive narrative of the Civil War and a new interpretation of northern war policy.
Imperial Twilight: the Opium War and the End of China’s Last Golden Age / Stephen R. Platt
Review Date: 23 January 2020
Chinese history for English readers is a quietly contested field: quiet because discussion and developments take place in the margins of the English-speaking world; and contested both because the market for trade books is growing and, more importantly, because new publications are offering ever more diverse and complex ways of seeing China. Two seminal events, the Opium War (1839-42) and the Cultural Revolution (1966-76), play an outsized role in attempts to introduce China to the world. Books on these events, especially on Mao and the Mao era, are more readily available than books on any others. The issue is not whether these two super events should receive less attention but rather whether new publications are challenging old prejudices in productive ways.
Military Society and the Court of Chivalry in the Age of the Hundred Years War / Philip J. Caudrey
Review Date: 23 January 2020
This interesting book is about heraldic identity which is ‘undeniably military’ In character and use. Several themes stand out.
Ypres: Great Battles / Stefan Goebel, Mark Connelly
Review Date: 10 October 2019
A Guide to the History of the SalientYpres! Langemarck! Dixmude! Passchendaele! Once sites of fierce First World War battles, these are now must-see stops on battlefield tours for the thousands of visitors who flock to West Flanders every year.