[books 2012] Vanished Kingdoms
Feb. 25th, 2012 06:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
inulro12. Vanished Kingdoms - The History of Half-Forgotten Europe by Norman Davies
Potted histories of a tiny number of the states in Europe which no longer exist. Some really helpful - while I wouldn't say I thoroughly understand Burgundy, Savoy or Prussia, a lot of puzzle pieces have popped into place for me. Some kind of odd - the way Ireland evolved into the ROI from the Free State, is mainly a vehicle t Davies to speculate on the way that the UK will eventually die (because all states eventually do).
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nwhyte reviewed this a while ago and found more mistakes than I did, but he does know more about just about everything than I do! The one howler I spotted was such an outdated assessment of the Macpherson/Ossian gaelic poetry controversy that I had to look it up on Wikipedia to make sure the position hadn't changed since I was last studying that kind of thing.
Enormous, but well worth while. I just wish that I hadn't had to read the whole thing in three weeks, but there's a waiting list at the library so it couldn't be renewed. What I really wanted was more time with the bibliography, but on balance it's probably a good thing that I didn't come away with a bigger list of Things To Read.
Potted histories of a tiny number of the states in Europe which no longer exist. Some really helpful - while I wouldn't say I thoroughly understand Burgundy, Savoy or Prussia, a lot of puzzle pieces have popped into place for me. Some kind of odd - the way Ireland evolved into the ROI from the Free State, is mainly a vehicle t Davies to speculate on the way that the UK will eventually die (because all states eventually do).
nwhyte reviewed this a while ago and found more mistakes than I did, but he does know more about just about everything than I do! The one howler I spotted was such an outdated assessment of the Macpherson/Ossian gaelic poetry controversy that I had to look it up on Wikipedia to make sure the position hadn't changed since I was last studying that kind of thing.Enormous, but well worth while. I just wish that I hadn't had to read the whole thing in three weeks, but there's a waiting list at the library so it couldn't be renewed. What I really wanted was more time with the bibliography, but on balance it's probably a good thing that I didn't come away with a bigger list of Things To Read.
