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Books : History : Countries & Regions : Europe : Spain : General AAS
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After basking in the shallows of success that surrounded Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World, Mark Kurlansky turns his attentions to the people who first hunted it and in doing so may have discovered America before John Cabot could say Isparsortalderatu. In a sense The Basque History of the World is the natural successor to Cod, for it grows organically from that book's early chapters. It unfolds the dramatic tale of the Basques as they fight off the challenges of the Vikings, the Romans, the Muslims and, for centuries now, the Spanish; proudly defensive of the remote and rugged hills on the edge of the Pyrenees, where Shakespeare set Love's Labour's Lost and that echoes with their peculiar agglutinating tongue. They are possibly Europe's aborigines and their language, unlike any other, was reputed to originate from, variously, the Tower of Babel, Atlantis and even the Garden of Eden. What's for certain is that it has defined their being when all else has been taken from them and that today, emerging from the shadow of the Franco regime's persecution, Europe's oldest nation wants to be its newest state. Kurlansky's recipe is reassuringly and familiarly unorthodox: intermingled with a stirring narrative are maps, photographs, pieces of reportage, quirky facts and, of course, recipes--the Basques are justly proud of their fish--and bean-based cuisine, something Kurlansky is not slow to savour. Where Cod was not simply about a big fish in The Big Pond but embraced the thorny problem of global over-fishing, The Basque History of the World does not confine its scope to the two and a half million people living in the seven Basque provinces. It speaks of violently modern and pervasive issues such as the notion of nationhood, borders and identity, and does so in a slyly humorous yet always passionate way. Be warned: This is not insipid, literary chloroform. What the imperious Kurlansky has written is a magnificently personal and driven tribute to a people and culture that have spellbound him for years and will warm the cockles of your heart (before adding them to a Ttoro stew). --David Vincent
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Under Franco's regime, it was declared as gospel truth that Madrid and Old Castile were the spiritual and cultural heartland of Spain, and peripheral cities and cultures of the Iberian peninsula must bow to that truth. Barcelona, however--la gran encisera, "the great enchantress"--always saw things rather differently. The earliest area of Spain to be colonised by the Romans, the capital of Catalonia is fiercely independent, somehow Spanish and not-Spanish, and most mysteriously of all, has been at the forefront of modernity, especially modern art and architecture, ahead of any other European city you could name with the possible exception of Paris. It is this Barcelona that fascinates Robert Hughes most, and he in turn fascinates us with his enthusiasm and knowledge of the place. He thrillingly evokes the cosmopolitanism and openness of Barcelona--qualities, he says, that derive inevitably from its status as a great Mediterranean port. And he is brilliant on perhaps the most exciting modern architect of all, Antoni Gaudi, the creator of the (still unfinished) Church of La Sagrada Familia, now as much an icon of the city as the Opera House in Sydney or the Statue of Liberty in New York. -- Christopher Hart
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Mark Urban's The Man who Broke Napoleon's Codes is, strictly speaking, something of a misnomer as the book is actually as much a detailed and engaging history of Wellington's campaign in the Peninsular War between 1809 and 1813, as the story of George Scovell, the junior officer who was entrusted with handling all communications. The book is firmly rooted in the modern historical genre of the "small, previously un-regarded, footnote that made a difference", but where other authors have fleshed out the lives of their characters by imputing thoughts and imagining events, Urban has restricted himself to relying purely on documented evidence. This has the benefit of historical rigour, but it does sometimes mean that Scovell is a slightly shadowy character at times, someone whom the reader has to work hard to get to know. The portrait that emerges here is of an army riven by class warfare, in which the rich and the aristocratic bought commissions and dictated orders, while the lowborn and the un-moneyed made up the also-rans. Scovell fell firmly into the latter category. Beginning the Peninsular campaign as a lowly deputy assistant quarter-master general, through hard work and an intelligence superior to many of his seniors, he soon drew himself to Wellington's attention and was appointed head of communications. As the campaign progressed, Napoleon became aware that many of his messages were being intercepted, giving the British vital intelligence, so over time he devised a series of ever more complicated ciphers to escape detection. Urban is at his best during this particular narrative: unlike the story of the breaking of Enigma during World War Two which is still really only intelligible to post-graduate mathematicians despite the best efforts of popular historians to render it accessible, the Napoleonic ciphers do lend themselves to explanation, and it is to the author's credit that he makes the process so compelling. What's more, his conclusion that it was the information obtained from the broken ciphers, rather than astute command, that was critical to the campaign's success, and that Wellington's suppression of the truth was based in class, professional jealousy and self-aggrandisement is powerfully convincing. Plus ca change, as Napoleon might have said. --John Crace
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