Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life

From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life

by Jacques Barzun

Highly regarded here and abroad for some thirty works of cultural history and criticism, master historian Jacques Barzun has now set down in one continuous narrative the sum of his discoveries and conclusions about the whole of Western culture since 1500. In this account, Barzun describes what Western Man wrought from the Renaisance and Reformation down to the present in the double light of its own time and our... (more)

Age of Extremes

by E. J. Hobsbawm

THE AGE OF EXTREMES is eminent historian Eric Hobsbawm's personal vision of the twentieth century. Remarkable in its scope, and breathtaking in its depth of knowledge, this immensely rewarding book reviews the uniquely destructive and creative nature of the troubled twentieth century and makes challenging predicitions for the future.

Interview With HistoryOriana Fallaci

Interview With History

by Oriana Fallaci

Text: English, Italian (translation)

Most Evil: The Further Serial Murders of Dr. George Hodel

Most Evil: The Further Serial Murders of Dr. George Hodel

by Steve Hodel, Ralph Pezzullo

Twenty Years after shocking the world in Los Angeles, could Dr. George Hill Hodel have returned to terrorize California as the killer known as Zodiac? When veteran LAPD homicide detective Steve Hodel discovered that his late father had known the victim of the infamous Black Dahlia murder case in 1947 Los Angeles, the ensuing three-year investigation became the New York Times bestseller Black Dahlia Avenger... (more)

The Beautiful Days of My Youth: My Nine Months In Auschwitz (Edge Books)

The Beautiful Days of My Youth: My Nine Months In Auschwitz (Edge Books)

by Ana Novac

On scraps of paper hidden by friends and strangers until their dying moments, young Ana Novac kept a diary in Auschwitz, a testimony that deserves to become one of the most treasured books of our time.

The World in the Twentieth Century: From Empires to Nations

The World in the Twentieth Century: From Empires to Nations

by Daniel R. Brower

Designed as a comprehensive, chronological introduction to world history in the 20th century, this book presents the major political and economic changes that have reshaped global relations, and focuses on the forces leading to the collapse of empires and the resulting rise of nationalism throughout the world. It develops discussions around the central argument that the single most profound global transformation... (more)

Faustian Bargain: The Art World in Nazi Germany

Faustian Bargain: The Art World in Nazi Germany

by Jonathan Petropoulos

Nazi art looting has been the subject of enormous international attention in recent years, and the subject of two history bestsellers, Hector Feliciano's The Lost Museum and Lynn Nicholas's The Rape of Europa. But such books leave us wondering: What made thoughtful, educated, artistic men and women decide to put their talents in the service of a brutal and inhuman regime? This question is the starting point for... (more)

Pakistan- the Formative Phase 1857--1948

Pakistan- the Formative Phase 1857--1948

by Khalid B. Sayeed

Benedicte Grima asserts in this engrossing study, that performing these rituals of grief and suffering , the paxtun women are in no way less comparative then their male counterparts in revenge and killing.

Norah Lindsay: The Life and Art of a Garden Designer

Norah Lindsay: The Life and Art of a Garden Designer

by Allyson Hayward

The biography of a remarkable garden designer who hugely influenced the course of garden design and planting in the years between the two World Wars.

The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century

The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century

by Ross Alex

The scandal over modern music has not died down. While paintings by Pablo Picasso and Jackson Pollock sell for a hundred million dollars or more, shocking musical works from Stravinskys Rite of Spring onward still send ripples of unease through audiences. At the same time, the influence of modern music can be felt everywhere. Avant-garde sounds populate the soundtracks of Hollywood thrillers. Minimalist music has... (more)

Blood and Champagne: The Life and Times of Robert Capa

Blood and Champagne: The Life and Times of Robert Capa

by Alex Kershaw

A biography on the brilliant war photographer, from his early childhood in Hungary as Andre Friedmann to his self-invention as the great Robert Capa.

Seven Pillars of Wisdom : A Triumph

by T. E. Lawrence

Seven Pillars of Wisdom is the monumental work that assured T.E. Lawrence's place in history as "Lawrence of Arabia." Not only a consummate military history, but also a colorful epic and a lyrical exploration of the mind of a great man, this is one of the indisputable classics of 20th century English literature. Line drawings throughout.

Our Town: A Heartland Lynching, a Haunted Town, and the Hidden History of White America

Our Town: A Heartland Lynching, a Haunted Town, and the Hidden History of White America

by C. Carr

The brutal lynching of two young black men in Marion, Indiana, on August 7, 1930, cast a shadow over the town that still lingers. It is only one event in the long and complicated history of race relations in Marion, a history much ignored and considered by many to be best forgotten. But the lynching cannot be forgotten. It is too much a part of the fabric of Marion, too much ingrained even now in the minds of... (more)

On the Grand Trunk Road:: A Journey into South Asia

On the Grand Trunk Road:: A Journey into South Asia

by Steve Coll

In this travelogue, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist journeys through the tumultuous lands of South Asia--India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Afghanistan. 15,000 first printing.

Ivan and the Informer

by Myrna Grant

Ivan is still having problems. He refuses to join the Communist youth organisations and his classmates make fun of him because of it. Ivan is finding it difficult to make friends as the young people at school mock his faith. Boris tries to force him off the school hockey team, and his teacher tells him that Christians are not allowed to attend any university. Just when Ivan thinks it can't get any worse,... (more)

A Short History of the Twentieth Century

A Short History of the Twentieth Century

by Geoffrey Blainey

Most readers will find much that is new to them here, and sometimes material that refutes what they thought they knew. Blainey's analysis of the world's great religions alone justifies the book, but it is only part of a broad tapestry that ranges across the entire human experience.-William L. O'Neill

Gladys Aylward: The Little Woman

by Gladys Aylward

It tells of countless interventions of God in her daily life as she determined to do His will--at any cost.

Sophie Scholl and the White Rose

by Jud Newborn, Annette Dumbach

In the spring and summer of 1943, five young German students and one professor at the University of Munich crossed the threshold of toleration to enter the realms of resistance, danger and death. Protesting in the name of principles Hitler thought he had killed forever, Sophie Scholl and other members of the White Rose realized that the ‘Germanization’ Hitler sought to enforce was cruel and inhuman, and that... (more)

1914-1918 Voices and Images of the Great War

1914-1918 Voices and Images of the Great War

by Lyn MacDonald, Shirley Seaton

This book uses personal accounts and illustrations, mainly from the author's own archives, to cover all aspects of World War I-from departure of the Old Contemptibles to fight the Kaiser in 1914, young men eagerly enlisting, high hopes of 1915 that fizzled out at Gallipoli, to the bloody fields of Flanders. It runs through the battles of the Somme and Passchendaele to the coming of the Americans, fighting in the... (more)

The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger

The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger

by Marc Levinson

In April 1956, a refitted oil tanker carried fifty-eight shipping containers from Newark to Houston. From that modest beginning, container shipping developed into a huge industry that made the boom in global trade possible. The Box tells the dramatic story of the container's creation, the decade of struggle before it was widely adopted, and the sweeping economic consequences of the sharp fall in transportation... (more)

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Tags: 20th century history