Books : Audio CDs : History : This Sceptered Isle

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Books : Audio CDs : History : This Sceptered Isle

• This Sceptred Isle: The Black Prince to Henry VIII 1327-1547 Vol 3 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: Julius Caesar to William the Conqueror 55BC-1087 v.1: Julius Caesar to William the Conqueror 55BC-1087 Vol 1 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Making of the Nation 1087-1327 v.2: The Making of the Nation 1087-1327 Vol 2 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: Elizabeth I to Cromwell 1547-1660 Vol 4 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: Nelson, Wellington and Napoleon 1792-1815 Vol 8 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle, Empire Box Set (BBC Audio)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Age of Revolutions 1760-1792 v.7: The Age of Revolutions 1760-1792 Vol 7 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Age of Victoria 1837-1901 Vol 10 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: Regency and Reform 1815-1837 Vol 9 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The First British Empire 1702-1760 v.6: The First British Empire 1702-1760 Vol 6 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Twentieth Century (15 CD Boxed Set)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: Restoration and Glorious Revolution 1660-1702 v.5: Restoration and Glorious Revolution 1660-1702 Vol 5 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Twentieth Century Vol 1 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Twentieth Century Vol 3 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Twentieth Century Vol 5 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: 1876-1947 v. 3: Empire: 1876-1947 v. 3 (BBC Audio)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: 1155-1783 v. 1: Empire: 1155-1783 v. 1 (Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: The Twentieth Century Vol 2 (BBC Radio Collection)

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: 1783-1876 v. 2: Empire: 1783-1876 v. 2

  Christopher Lee

  
  
   

• This Sceptred Isle: Dynasties: Britain's Most Powerful Families Vol 3 (BBC Radio Collection)

  
  This Sceptred Isle: The Dynasties is Christopher Lee's third book on British history taken from BBC Radio 4 series. The first was a bracing gallop through the centuries from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria, the second a more leisurely chronicle of the country in the 20th century. Both were solidly traditional in their commitment to narrative and to the decisive impact of great men (and, occasionally, great women) on events. This third book on the country's most powerful families necessarily makes even clearer Lee's belief that the story of the nation is to be found in the actions of great individuals. From the Godwines of late Anglo-Saxon England through the Mortimers of medieval warfare and the Cecils of Tudor politicking to the Churchills and Russells of more modern times, he traces the stories of 15 power-broking families in a series of self-contained chapters. The book has its faults. Because many of the families coincided in the times of their greatness, the reader gets some of the same stories (from the Glorious Revolution, for example) told again and again beyond the point where repetition seems valuable. There are too many paragraphs outlining aristocratic genealogy in the sort of detail that only those who read Burke's Peerage for pleasure will find enjoyable. But Lee's narrative skill, his sense of character and gift for choosing the stories to best illustrate it, all combine to produce a book that conveys vividly, and often brilliantly, the power that a handful of families have wielded in British history. --Nick Rennison