Brief Histories
2 total works
Western civilization began in the Middle East: Judaism and Christianity, as well as Islam, were born there. For over a millennium, the Islamic empires were ahead of the West in learning, technology and medicine, and were militarily far more powerful. It took another three hundred centuries for the West to catch up, and overtake, the Middle East.
Why does it seem different now? Why does Osama bin Laden see 1918, with the fall of the Ottoman Empire, as the year everything changed? These issues are explained in historical detail here, in a way that deliberately seeks to go behind the rhetoric to the roots of present conflicts. A Brief History of the Middle East is essential reading for an intelligent reader wanting to understand what one of the world's key regions is all about.
Fully updated with a new section on the Iraq Invasion of 2003, the question of Iran and the full context of the Isreali/Palestine conflict.
'A gem. Brief, authoritative and fair in its judgements - an intensely readable introduction to this most complex and fascinating man' - Graham Farmelo, award-winning author of The Strangest Man
A new and dynamic reappraisal of Winston Churchill, and his finest hour in 1940-1.
Who was Winston Churchill? Even fifity years after his death he is one of the most iconic figures in British history: as a young man he was a maverick journalist, his many positions in politics before 1940 marked him out as a courageous but foolhardy man.
Yet it is Churchill's record in war, which has recently been questioned, that confirms his genius as a military commander and national leader - someone who understood the dangers of Nazi Germany before 1939; someone uniquely capable to lead the empire through the turmoil of the Second World War. Catherwood argues that it was Churchill's stand in 1940-41 that saved Britain and only he was able to bring together the allies that eventually defeated Hitler in 1945.
Catherwood has produced a challenging yet accessible reassessment of the life and career of Winston Churchill, lion of British history and flawed hero.