In a remarkably vibrant narrative, Michael Stürmer blends highpolitics, social history, portraiture, and an unparalleled commandof military and economic developments to tell the story ofGermany’s breakneck rise from new nation to Continental superpower.It begins with the German military’s greatest triumph, theFranco-Prussian War, and then tracks the forces of unification,industrialization, colonization, and militarization as theycombined to propel Germany to become the force that fatallydestabilized Europe’s balance of power. Without The GermanEmpire ’s masterly rendering of this story, a full understandingof the roots of World War I and World War II is impossible.

The last quarter of the eighteenth century remains the mostpolitically creative era in American history, when a dedicatedgroup of men undertook a bold experiment in political ideals. Itwas a time of both triumphs and tragedies—all of which contributedto the shaping of our burgeoning nation. Ellis casts an incisiveeye on the gradual pace of the American Revolution and thecontributions of such luminaries as Washington, Jefferson, andMadison, and brilliantly analyzes the failures of the founders toadequately solve the problems of slavery and the treatment ofNative Americans. With accessible prose and stunning eloquence,Ellis delineates in American Creation an era of flawed greatness,at a time when understanding our origins is more important thanever.

Published when Theodore Roosevelt was only twenty-three yearsold, The Naval War of 1812 was immediately hailed as aliterary and scholarly triumph, and it is still considered thedefinitive book on the subject. It caused considerable controversyfor its bold refutation of earlier accounts of the war, but itsbrilliant analysis and balanced tone left critics floundering,changed the course of U.S. military history by renewing interest inour obsolete forces, and set the young author and political hopefulon a path to greatness. Roosevelt's inimitable style and robustnarrative make The Naval War of 1812 enthralling, illuminating, andutterly essential to every armchair historian.

Award-winning historian Deborah Lipstadt gives us acom?pelling reassessment of the groundbreaking trial that hasbecome a touchstone for judicial proceedings throughout the worldin which victims of genocide confront its perpetrators. The capture of SS Lieutenant Colonel Adolf Eich?mann by Israeliagents in Argentina in May of 1960 and his subsequent trial in TelAviv by an Israeli court electrified the world. The public debateit sparked on where, how, and by whom Nazi war criminals should bebrought to justice, and the international media cov?erage of thetrial itself, is recognized as a watershed moment in how thecivilized world in general and Ho?locaust survivors in particularfound the means to deal with the legacy of genocide on a scale thathad never been seen before. In The Eichmann Trial, award-winning historian Deborah Lipstadtgives us an overview of the trial and analyzes the dramatic effectthat the testimony of sur?vivors in a court of law—which was itselfnot without controversy—had o

"A magnificent book...a nonfiction masterpiece." -- New YorkTimes Book Review . The Nazi siege of Leningrad from 1941 to 1944was one of the most gruesome episodes of World War II. Nearly threemillion people endured it; just under half of them died. Fortwenty-five years the distinguished journalist and historianHarrison Salisbury pieced together this remarkable narrative ofvillainy and survival, in which the city had much to fear-from bothHitler and Stalin.

"In the spring of 1984, I went to the northwest of France, toNormandy, to prepare an NBC documentary on the fortieth anniversaryof D-Day, the massive and daring Allied invasion of Europe thatmarked the beginning of the end of Adolf Hitler's Third Reich.There, I underwent a life-changing experience. As I walked thebeaches with the American veterans who had returned for thisanniversary, men in their sixties and seventies, and listened totheir stories, I was deeply moved and profoundly grateful for allthey had done. Ten years later, I returned to Normandy for thefiftieth anniversary of the invasion, and by then I had come tounderstand what this generation of Americans meant to history. Itis, I believe, the greatest generation any society has everproduced." In this superb book, Tom Brokaw goes out into America, to tellthrough the stories of individual men and women the story of ageneration, America's citizen heroes and heroines who came of ageduring the Great Depression and the Second World War and went

This is a book aboutGermans and Jews, about power and money. It is a book focused onBismarck and Bleichroder, Junker and Jew, statesman and banker,collaborators for over thirty years. The setting is that of aGermany where two worlds clashed: the new world of capitalism andan earlier world with its ancient feudal ethos; gradually a new andbroadened elite emerged, and Bismarck's tie with Bleichroderepitomized that regrouping. It is the story of the founding of thenew German Empire, in whose midst a Jewish minority rose toembattled prominence.

Each year, the Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps selects onebook that he believes is both relevant and timeless for reading byall Marines. The Commandant's choice for 1993 was We Were SoldiersOnce . . . and Young. In November 1965, some 450 men of the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry,under the command of Lt. Col. Hal Moore, were dropped by helicopterinto a small clearing in the Ia Drang Valley. They were immediatelysurrounded by 2,000 North Vietnamese soldiers. Three days later,only two and a half miles away, a sister battalion was chopped topieces. Together, these actions at the landing zones X-Ray andAlbany constituted one of the most savage and significant battlesof the Vietnam War. How these men persevered--sacrificed themselves for theircomrades and never gave up--makes a vivid portrait of war at itsmost inspiring and devastating. General Moore and Joseph Galloway,the only journalist on the ground throughout the fighting, haveinterviewed hundreds of men who fought there, including the Nort

The winner of Britain's prestigious Whitbread Prize and abestseller there for months, this wonderfully readable biographyoffers a rich, rollicking picture of late-eighteenth-centuryBritish aristocracy and the intimate story of a woman who for atime was its undisputed leader. Lady Georgiana Spencer was the great-great-great-great-aunt ofDiana, Princess of Wales, and was nearly as famous in her day. In1774, at the age of seventeen, Georgiana achieved immediatecelebrity by marrying one of England's richest and most influentialaristocrats, the Duke of Devonshire. Launched into a world ofwealth and power, she quickly became the queen of fashionablesociety, adored by the Prince of Wales, a dear friend ofMarie-Antoinette, and leader of the most important salon of hertime. Not content with the role of society hostess, she used herconnections to enter politics, eventually becoming more influentialthan most of the men who held office. Her good works and social exploits made her loved by themultitudes

In Patton, Montgomery, Rommel , one of Britain's mostaccomplished military scholars presents an unprecedented study ofthe land war in the North African and European theaters, as well astheir chief commanders—three men who also happened to be the mostcompelling dramatis personae of World War II. Beyond spellbinding depictions of pivotal confrontations at ElAlamein, Monte Cassino, and the Ardennes forest, author-scholarTerry Brighton illuminates the personal motivations and historicalevents that propelled the three men's careers: how Patton's,Montgomery's, and Rommel's Great War experiences helped to moldtheir style of command—and how, exactly, they managed to applytheir arguably megalomaniacal personalities (and hithertounrecognized political acumen and tact) to advance their careersand strategic vision. Opening new avenues of inquiry into the lives and careers of threemen widely profiled by scholars and popular historians alike,Brighton definitively answers numerous lingering and controversialquestion

In these essays, about a quarter of them previouslyunpublished, Eric Hobsbawm reflects upon the theory, practice anddevelopment of history and its relevance to the modern world. Thesewide-ranging papers reflect Professor Hobsbawm's lifelong concernwith the relations between past, present and future. They deal,among many other subjects, with the problems of writing history,its abuses and the historian's responsibilities; with the historyof society and 'history from below'; with Marx and currenthistorical trends or fashions; with Europe, the Russian Revolutionand the descent into a world-wide barbarism that, increasing formost of the twentieth century, threatens to destroy thecivilisation we have inherited from the European Enlightenment ofthe eighteenth century. These essays reveal a passionate belief inthe importance of studying history, as well as displaying theincisive analysis, the breadth of allusion and the distinctiveviewpoint for which this great historian is justly famous.

When the United States entered the Gilded Age after the CivilWar, argues cultural historian Christopher Benfey, the nation lostits philosophical moorings and looked eastward to “Old Japan,” withits seemingly untouched indigenous culture, for balance andperspective. Japan, meanwhile, was trying to reinvent itself as amore cosmopolitan, modern state, ultimately transforming itself, inthe course of twenty-five years, from a feudal backwater to aninternational power. This great wave of historical and culturalreciprocity between the two young nations, which intensified duringthe late 1800s, brought with it some larger-than-lifepersonalities, as the lure of unknown foreign cultures promptedpilgrimages back and forth across the Pacific. In The Great Wave, Benfey tells the story of the tightly knitgroup of nineteenth-century travelers—connoisseurs, collectors, andscientists—who dedicated themselves to exploring and preserving OldJapan. As Benfey writes, “A sense of urgency impelled them, forthe

For the first time in decades, here, in a single volume, is afresh look at the fabled Tudor dynasty, comprising some of the mostenigmatic figures ever to rule a country. Acclaimed historian G. J.Meyer reveals the flesh-and-bone reality in all its wildexcess. In 1485, young Henry Tudor, whose claim to the throne was so weakas to be almost laughable, crossed the English Channel from Franceat the head of a ragtag little army and took the crown from thefamily that had ruled England for almost four hundred years. Half acentury later his son, Henry VIII, desperate to rid himself of hisfirst wife in order to marry a second, launched a reign of terroraimed at taking powers no previous monarch had even dreamed ofpossessing. In the process he plunged his kingdom into generationsof division and disorder, creating a legacy of blood and betrayalthat would blight the lives of his children and the destiny of hiscountry. The boy king Edward VI, a fervent believer in reforming theEnglish church, died before

Based on remarkable new research, acclaimed historianAlexander Rose brings to life the true story of the spy ring thathelped America win the Revolutionary War. For the first time, Rosetakes us beyond the battlefront and deep into the shadowyunderworld of double agents and triple crosses, covert operationsand code breaking, and unmasks the courageous, flawed men whoinhabited this wilderness of mirrors—including the spymaster at theheart of it all. In the summer of 1778, with the war poised to turn in his favor,General George Washington desperately needed to know where theBritish would strike next. To that end, he unleashed his secretweapon: an unlikely ring of spies in New York charged withdiscovering the enemy’s battle plans and military strategy. Washington’s small band included a young Quaker torn betweenpolitical principle and family loyalty, a swashbuckling sailoraddicted to the perils of espionage, a hard-drinking barkeep, aYale-educated cavalryman and friend of the doomed Nathan

Here is the crucial summer of 1944 as seen by both sides, fromthe British spy, code-named “Garbo,” who successfully misled theNazis about the time and place of the D-day landings, to the poorplanning for action after the assault that forced the allies tofight for nine weeks “field to field, hedgerow to hedgerow.” Heretoo are the questionable command decisions of Montgomery,Eisenhower, and Bradley, the insatiable ego of Patton. Yet,fighting in some of the most miserable conditions of the war, theallied soldiers used ingenuity, resilience, and raw courage todrive the enemy from France in what John Keegan describes as “thebiggest disaster to hit the German army in the course of the war.”Normandy is an inspiring tribute to the common fighting men of fivenations who won the pivotal campaign that lead to peace andfreedom.