Brian Grant Kent's Books

The Scourge of War

The Life of William Tecumseh Sherman

By: Brian Holden Reid

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Scourge of War

The Life of William Tecumseh Sherman

By: Brian Holden Reid

William Tecumseh Sherman, a West Point graduate and veteran of the Seminole War, became one of the best-known generals in the Civil War. His March to the Sea, which resulted in a devastated swath of the South from Atlanta to Savannah, cemented his place in history as the pioneer of total war. In The Scourge of War, preeminent military historian Brian Holden Reid offers a deeply researched life and times account of Sherman. By examining his childhood and education, his business ventures in California, his antebellum leadership of a military college in Louisiana, and numerous career false starts, Holden Reid shows how unlikely his exceptional Civil War career would seem. He also demonstrates how crucial his family was to his professional path, particularly his wife's intervention during the war. He analyzes Sherman's development as a battlefield commander and especially his crucial friendships with Henry W. Halleck and Ulysses S. Grant. In doing so, he details how Sherman overcame both his weaknesses as a leader and severe depression to mature as a military strategist. Central chapters narrate closely Sherman's battlefield career and the gradual lifting of his pessimism that the Union would be defeated. After the war, Sherman became a popular figure in the North and the founder of the school for officers at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, known as the "intellectual center of the army." Holden Reid argues that Sherman was not hostile to the South throughout his life and only in later years gained a reputation as a villain who practiced barbaric destruction, particularly as the neo-Confederate Lost Cause grew and he published one of the first personal accounts of the war. A definitive biography of a preeminent military figure by a renowned military historian, The Scourge of War is a masterful account of Sherman' life that fully recognizes his intellect, strategy, and actions during the Civil War.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

657

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0190079150

ISBN 13

9780190079154

No Ordinary College

A History of the University of Virginia's College at Wise

By: Brian Steel Wills

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

No Ordinary College

A History of the University of Virginia's College at Wise

By: Brian Steel Wills

You are making history today," the University of Virginia Extension Division agent Samuel Crockett observed to a gathering of students and faculty on September 15, 1954, in Wise, Virginia. The occasion was the opening convocation of what would become Clinch Valley College of the University of Virginia, and the 109 students assembled, many of whom were Korean War veterans or women, were indeed part of something quite special. People in Southwest Virginia and friends in Charlottesville--not the least being University of Virginia President Colgate W. Darden Jr.--had worked tirelessly to make this day possible. A snowbound discussion at the Colonial Inn in Wise had resulted in the conversion of the local County Poor Farm into the only branch of the University of Virginia. Since those humble beginnings, the College at Wise has flourished, growing from a two-year certificate-granting institution into a four-year baccalaureate-degree-granting college in the late 1960s. In 1999 the college completed a transition from Clinch Valley College to the University of Virginia's College at Wise. Having journeyed over uncertain ground with respect to its student population and its relationship with the University of Virginia, the College at Wise has in recent years boasted its highest historical student enrollments, garnered a national reputation as a public liberal arts college, and still operates as the university's only branch. Published for Wise's fiftieth anniversary in September 2004, Brian Steel Wills's history is essential reading for the college's alumni, faculty and administrators, and for anyone interested in a heroic chapter in the history of public higher education in Virginia.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

312

Publisher

University of Virginia Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0813922933

ISBN 13

9780813922935

A Government Out of Sight

The Mystery of National Authority in Nineteenth-Century America

By: Brian Balogh

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

A Government Out of Sight

The Mystery of National Authority in Nineteenth-Century America

By: Brian Balogh

A Government Out of Sight revises our understanding of the ways in which Americans turned to the national government throughout the nineteenth century.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

433

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0521820979

ISBN 13

9780521820974

Kent State: An American Tragedy

By: Brian VanDeMark

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Kent State: An American Tragedy

By: Brian VanDeMark

A definitive history of the fatal clash between Vietnam War protestors and the National Guard, illuminating its causes and lasting consequences. On May 4, 1970, at Kent State University in Ohio, political fires that had been burning across America during the 1960s exploded. Antiwar protesters wearing bell-bottom jeans and long hair hurled taunts and rocks at another group of young Americans—National Guardsmen sporting gas masks and rifles. At half past noon, violence unfolded with chaotic speed, as guardsmen—many of whom had joined the Guard to escape the draft—opened fire on the students. Two reductive narratives ensued: one, that lethal state violence targeted Americans who spoke their minds; the other, that law enforcement gave troublemakers the comeuppance they deserved. For over fifty years, little middle ground has been found due to incomplete and sometimes contradictory evidence. Kent State meticulously re-creates the divided cultural landscape of America during the Vietnam War and heightened popular anxieties around the country. On college campuses, teach-ins, sit-down strikes, and demonstrations exposed the growing rift between the left and the right. Many students opposed the war as unnecessary and unjust and were uneasy over poor and working-class kids drafted and sent to Vietnam in their place. Some developed a hatred for the military, the police, and everything associated with authority, while others resolved to uphold law and order at any cost. Focusing on the thirteen victims of the Kent State shooting and a painstaking reconstruction of the days surrounding it, historian Brian VanDeMark draws on crucial new research and interviews—including, for the first time, the perspective of guardsmen who were there. The result is a complete reckoning with the tragedy that marked the end of the sixties.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

289

Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company

Published Date

ISBN 10

1324066261

ISBN 13

9781324066262

British Imperialism and Australia, 1783–1833

An Economic History of Australasia

By: Brian Fitzpatrick

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

British Imperialism and Australia, 1783–1833

An Economic History of Australasia

By: Brian Fitzpatrick

British Imperialism and Australia (1939) looks at the early economic history of Australia, which towards the end of the period under review became an important field of British Imperial development. The establishment of a peasant economy in New South Wales was attempted half a world away from the imperial architects, but war with revolutionary France interrupted the transportation of convicts and poor freemen, and in doing so gave the scheme a character quite unlike that originally envisaged by Pitt and Sydney.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

398

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Published Date

ISBN 10

1000855503

ISBN 13

9781000855500

The Great Meadow

Farmers and the Land in Colonial Concord

By: Brian Donahue

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Great Meadow

Farmers and the Land in Colonial Concord

By: Brian Donahue

Employing precise geographical information system (GIS) mapping of land ownership and land use, Donahue describes how the land was settled and how mixed husbandry was developed in Concord. By reconstructing several farm neighborhoods and following them through many generations, he reveals a diverse sustainable farming system of tillage, orchards, pastures, hay meadows, and woodlots that required careful management of soil and water. Donahue concludes that ecological degradation came to Concord only later, when nineteenth-century economic and social forces undercut the environmental balance that earlier colonial farmers had nurtured."--BOOK JACKET.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

356

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300097514

ISBN 13

9780300097511

Talbot Mundy, Philosopher of Adventure

A Critical Biography

By: Brian Taves

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Talbot Mundy, Philosopher of Adventure

A Critical Biography

By: Brian Taves

This critical biography chronicles both the actual travels and the philosophical meanderings of Talbot Mundy, one of the pioneers of the fantasy and adventure genre. Less celebrated than his contemporaries Rudyard Kipling and Joseph Conrad, Mundy was no less gifted when it came to the literary portrayal of faraway lands. He was one of the first Western writers to show an appreciation of Eastern culture, and his writing became an outlet for his radical ideas on religion and philosophy. At the age of sixteen, Mundy left his native England to begin his life of adventure--a journey that took him from India to the Middle East to Tibet and finally to America, which became his adopted home. The American spirit of adventure matched Mundy's own, and it was here that he found a true audience for his work. This book explores Mundy's oeuvre--much of it set in exotic locales through which he himself had traveled--and considers both his novels and his lesser known writing, as well as his film and radio work. Books such as Rung Ho!, King-of the Khyber Rifles, Caves of Terror, Purple Pirate and Tros of Samothrace are discussed and placed within the framework of Mundy's life and philosophy. The final chapter evaluates the enduring value of his writings. Appendices include a comprehensive list of Mundy's works and a chronological listing by their original publication dates.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

312

Publisher

McFarland

Published Date

ISBN 10

078648442X

ISBN 13

9780786484423

America's Civil War

The Operational Battlefield, 1861-1863

By: Brian Holden Reid

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

America's Civil War

The Operational Battlefield, 1861-1863

By: Brian Holden Reid

Civil War historian Reid examines in depth the operational military history during the first three years of America's Civil War. In particular, he focuses on generalship, command decisions, strategy, and tactics, as well as the experiences of ordinary soldiers.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

504

Publisher

Prometheus Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1615921176

ISBN 13

9781615921171

They Call Me Killer

Tales from Junior Hockey's Legendary Hall-of-Fame Coach

By: Brian Kilrea,James Duthie

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

They Call Me Killer

Tales from Junior Hockey's Legendary Hall-of-Fame Coach

By: Brian Kilrea,James Duthie

An intimate, humorous look at Brian Kilrea's 60-year career in junior hockey With more wins than any coach in junior hockey history, and a personality as large as his winning record, Brian Kilrea is more than a hockey legend, he's one of the most beloved figures in the game. With veteran sportswriter, James Duthie, Kilrea gives fans a rink-side view of his twenty-nine plus seasons as head coach and now general manager of the Ottawa 67s. With stories and comments from famous NHLers who played for Killer, readers will get a taste of Kilrea's hardnosed coaching style, the gritty often humorous reality of his life as a coach, riding on buses and in the locker room, as well as the knowledge and dedication that has made him last so long. They Call Me Killer sheds light on Kilrea's early life as a centre for the Red Wings, what it was like to score the first-ever goal in the history of the L.A. Kings, and his two years with the New York Islanders. Loaded with anecdotes from a true hockey insider, the book offers fans an unvarnished look at the world of junior hockey—as it's played and lived, including its brutal practices, broken curfews, trades, and tirades. Details Kilrea's role as a coach for the Ottawa 67s, how they won the Memorial Cup twice, and how he's been a mentor to young stars of the future Includes anecdotes and interviews from coaches, trainers, and general managers, and NHLers like Bryan Trottier, Dennis Potvin, Mike Peca, Gary Roberts, Doug Wilson, Brian Campbell, Darren Pang, and many others Brian Kilrea was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2003 James Duthie is best known for his work on TSN's The NHL on TSN and his coverage of the World Junior Championships With a Foreword by lifelong friend, Don Cherry, They Call Me Killer is a fascinating, unforgettable look at the world of junior hockey and the man known as the most successful coach in junior hockey history.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

274

Publisher

John Wiley & Sons

Published Date

ISBN 10

1118096096

ISBN 13

9781118096093

Turbulent Foresters

A Landscape Biography of Ashdown Forest

By: Brian Short

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Turbulent Foresters

A Landscape Biography of Ashdown Forest

By: Brian Short

A richly detailed history of Ashdown Forest -- home of Winnie-the-Pooh.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

486

Publisher

Boydell & Brewer

Published Date

ISBN 10

1783277076

ISBN 13

9781783277070

Nelson's Victory

250 Years of War and Peace

By: Brian Lavery

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Nelson's Victory

250 Years of War and Peace

By: Brian Lavery

May 2015 sees the 250th anniversary of the launch of HMS Victory, the ship that is so closely associated with Nelson and his great victory at Trafalgar and which, still extant, has today become the embodiment of the great Age of Sail. Many books have been written about Victory but none like this, which tells the full story of the ship since she first took to the waters in May 1765. It contains many surprises that she was almost wrecked on her launch; that diplomacy conducted onboard her played a crucial role in provoking Napoleon's invasion of Russia in 1812; and that in 1914 Kaiser Wilhelm set the First World War in motion at a desk made from her timbers. The book also tells the story of Horatio Nelson, who was born a few weeks before his most famous ship was ordered, and whose career paralleled hers in many ways. It does not ignore the battle of Trafalgar, and indeed it offers new insights into the campaign which led up to it. But it says much more about the other lives of the ship, which at different times was a flagship, a fighting ship, a prison hospital ship, a training ship for officers and boys, a floating courtroom, a signal school in the early days of radio, tourist attraction and national icon. It looks at her through many eyes, including Queen Victoria, admirals, midshipmen and ordinary seamen, and Beatrix Potter who visited as a girl. It is simply a 'must-have' work for historians and enthusiasts, and a compelling new narrative for the general reader.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

435

Publisher

Seaforth Publishing

Published Date

ISBN 10

1473854946

ISBN 13

9781473854949

Building the Empire State

Political Economy in the Early Republic

By: Brian Phillips Murphy

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Building the Empire State

Political Economy in the Early Republic

By: Brian Phillips Murphy

Focusing on the state of New York, home to the first American banks, utilities, canals, and transportation infrastructure projects, Building the Empire State examines the origins of American capitalism by tracing how and why business corporations were first introduced into the economy of the early republic.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

304

Publisher

University of Pennsylvania Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0812247167

ISBN 13

9780812247169

Housing Politics in the United Kingdom

Power, Planning and Protest

By: Brian Lund

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Housing Politics in the United Kingdom

Power, Planning and Protest

By: Brian Lund

Affordable housing in the United Kingdom has become an ever more potent issue in recent years, as rapid population growth and a long-term lag in new housing construction have combined to making finding secure, affordable housing difficult for a broad range of people. This book uses insights from public choice theory, the new institutionalism, and social constructionism to lay bare the historically entrenched power relationships among markets, planners, and electoral politics that have made this problem seem so intractable.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

368

Publisher

Policy Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

144732708X

ISBN 13

9781447327080

A Thousand May Fall: An Immigrant Regiment's Civil War

By: Brian Matthew Jordan

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

A Thousand May Fall: An Immigrant Regiment's Civil War

By: Brian Matthew Jordan

From a Pulitzer Prize finalist, a pathbreaking history of the Civil War centered on a regiment of immigrants and their brutal experience of the conflict. The Civil War ended more than 150 years ago, yet our nation remains fiercely divided over its enduring legacies. In A Thousand May Fall, Pulitzer Prize finalist Brian Matthew Jordan returns us to the war itself, bringing us closer than perhaps any prior historian to the chaos of battle and the trials of military life. Creating an intimate, absorbing chronicle from the ordinary soldier’s perspective, he allows us to see the Civil War anew—and through unexpected eyes. At the heart of Jordan’s vital account is the 107th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, which was at once representative and exceptional. Its ranks weathered the human ordeal of war in painstakingly routine ways, fighting in two defining battles, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg, each time in the thick of the killing. But the men of the 107th were not lauded as heroes for their bravery and their suffering. Most of them were ethnic Germans, set apart by language and identity, and their loyalties were regularly questioned by a nativist Northern press. We so often assume that the Civil War was a uniquely American conflict, yet Jordan emphasizes the forgotten contributions made by immigrants to the Union cause. An incredible one quarter of the Union army was foreign born, he shows, with 200,000 native Germans alone fighting to save their adopted homeland and prove their patriotism. In the course of its service, the 107th Ohio was decimated five times over, and although one of its members earned the Medal of Honor for his daring performance in a skirmish in South Carolina, few others achieved any lasting distinction. Reclaiming these men for posterity, Jordan reveals that even as they endured the horrible extremes of war, the Ohioans contemplated the deeper meanings of the conflict at every turn—from personal questions of citizenship and belonging to the overriding matter of slavery and emancipation. Based on prodigious new research, including diaries, letters, and unpublished memoirs, A Thousand May Fall is a pioneering, revelatory history that restores the common man and the immigrant striver to the center of the Civil War. In our age of fractured politics and emboldened nativism, Jordan forces us to confront the wrenching human realities, and often-forgotten stakes, of the bloodiest episode in our nation’s history.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

384

Publisher

Liveright Publishing

Published Date

ISBN 10

1631495151

ISBN 13

9781631495151

Sacred Uncertainty

Religious Difference and the Shape of Melville's Career

By: Brian Yothers

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Sacred Uncertainty

Religious Difference and the Shape of Melville's Career

By: Brian Yothers

Yothers’ Sacred Uncertainty examines Melville’s engagement with religious difference, both within American culture and around the world. It is impossible to understand Melville’s wider engagement with religious and cultural questions, however, without understanding the fundamental tension between self and society, self and others that underlies his work, and that is manifested in particular in the way in which he interacts with other writers. There is almost certainly no more concrete or reliable way to get at Melville’s affirmations of and arguments with these interlocutors than in the markings and annotations that appear in his copies of many of their works, so Yothers examines Melville’s marginalia for clues to Melville’s thinking about self, other, and difference. Sacred Uncertainty provides a much needed exploration of Melville’s encounter with and reflection upon religious difference.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

257

Publisher

Northwestern University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0810130726

ISBN 13

9780810130722

The Humanist World of Renaissance Florence

By: Brian Maxson

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Humanist World of Renaissance Florence

By: Brian Maxson

The Humanist World of Renaissance Florence offers the first synthetic interpretation of the humanist movement in Renaissance Florence in more than fifty years.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

313

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1107043913

ISBN 13

9781107043916

Shakespeare's Patron: William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke, 1580 - 1630

Politics, Patronage and Power

By: Brian O'Farrell

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Shakespeare's Patron: William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke, 1580 - 1630

Politics, Patronage and Power

By: Brian O'Farrell

William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke, 1580-1630, was the 'uomo universale' of the Early Stuart Age. A prominent courtier in the reigns of Elizabeth I, James I and Charles I, he was the most important patron of the arts of the early seventeenth century, and almost certainly the person to whom Shakespeare dedicated his Sonnets. He was, in fact, the patron of almost every great literary and artistic figure of the period; Ben Jonson, Inigo Jones, John Donne, and George Herbert. Pembroke was an astute and powerful politician, the greatest electoral manager of the time, the wealthiest nobleman in the country, a powerful industrial entrepreneur, Chancellor of Oxford University and an indefatigable promoter of colonial enterprises. This major new work, the product of many years of research, is the first full length study of Pembroke. It has been exhaustively researched with all the extant manuscript and printed materials studied. Pembroke's poetry and patronage are fully discussed, his political life analysed, and his business activities both at home and abroad fully investigated.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

285

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing

Published Date

ISBN 10

1441191585

ISBN 13

9781441191588

Personal Librarians

Building Relationships for Student Success

By: Lynne Bisko,Heather Buchansky,Brian C. Gray,E. Gail Reese

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Personal Librarians

Building Relationships for Student Success

By: Lynne Bisko,Heather Buchansky,Brian C. Gray,E. Gail Reese

Experienced authors describe all aspects of a personal librarian program, including potential campus partners, diverse student populations, marketing approaches, technology integration, various assessment methods, and common pitfalls and how to avoid them. In order to get the most out of their research, students need to understand the depth of resources and services available to them. Personal librarian programs help students—especially new ones—to feel welcome in the library and comfortable asking for assistance. They provide enhanced support and serve as students' point of contact to help them build the information literacy skills necessary to successfully navigate their academic path. Personal Librarians: Building Relationships for Student Success focuses on specific ways to connect with and to engage first-year and other new-to-campus students. The authors provide concrete guidance, informed by interviews with other librarians who have successfully implemented such programs, for librarians wishing to begin or expand programs of their own. Personal librarian programs provide opportunities for the proactive to build relationships that grow student confidence as future needs arise—and the authors, who coordinate personal librarian programs at their own institutions, demonstrate how well they work.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

123

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 13

9798216127833

Abraham Lincoln and White America

By: Brian R. Dirck

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Abraham Lincoln and White America

By: Brian R. Dirck

As “Savior of the Union” and the “Great Emancipator,” Abraham Lincoln has been lauded for his courage, wisdom, and moral fiber. Yet Frederick Douglass’s assertion that Lincoln was the “white man’s president” has been used by some detractors as proof of his fundamentally racist character. Viewed objectively, Lincoln was a white man’s president by virtue of his own whiteness and that of the culture that produced him. Until now, however, historians have rarely explored just what this means for our understanding of the man and his actions. Writing at the vanguard of “whiteness studies,” Brian Dirck considers Lincoln as a typical American white man of his time who bore the multiple assumptions, prejudices, and limitations of his own racial identity. He shows us a Lincoln less willing or able to transcend those limitations than his more heroic persona might suggest but also contends that Lincoln’s understanding and approach to racial bigotry was more enlightened than those of most of his white contemporaries. Blazing a new trail in Lincoln studies, Dirck reveals that Lincoln was well aware of and sympathetic to white fears, especially that of descending into “white trash,” a notion that gnawed at a man eager to distance himself from his own coarse origins. But he also shows that after Lincoln crossed the Rubicon of black emancipation, he continued to grow beyond such cultural constraints, as seen in his seven recorded encounters with nonwhites. Dirck probes more deeply into what “white” meant in Lincoln’s time and what it meant to Lincoln himself, and from this perspective he proposes a new understanding of how Lincoln viewed whiteness as a distinct racial category that influenced his policies. As Dirck ably demonstrates, Lincoln rose far enough above the confines of his culture to accomplish deeds still worthy of our admiration, and he calls for a more critically informed admiration of Lincoln that allows us to celebrate his considerable accomplishments while simultaneously recognizing his limitations. When Douglass observed that Lincoln was the white man’s president, he may not have intended it as a serious analytical category. But, as Dirck shows, perhaps we should do so—the better to understand not just the Lincoln presidency, but the man himself.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

232

Publisher

University Press of Kansas

Published Date

ISBN 10

0700621113

ISBN 13

9780700621118

Inglorious Passages

Noncombat Deaths in the American Civil War

By: Brian Steel Wills

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Inglorious Passages

Noncombat Deaths in the American Civil War

By: Brian Steel Wills

Of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers who died in the Civil War, two-thirds, by some estimates, were felled by disease; untold others were lost to accidents, murder, suicide, sunstroke, and drowning. Meanwhile thousands of civilians in both the north and south perished—in factories, while caught up in battles near their homes, and in other circumstances associated with wartime production and supply. These “inglorious passages,” no less than the deaths of soldiers in combat, devastated the armies in the field and families and communities at home. Inglorious Passages for the first time gives these noncombat deaths due consideration. In letters, diaries, obituaries, and other accounts, eminent Civil War historian Brian Steel Wills finds the powerful and poignant stories of fatal accidents and encounters and collateral civilian deaths that occurred in the factories and fields of the Union and the Confederacy from 1861 to 1865. Wills retrieves these stories from obscurity and the cold calculations of statistics to reveal the grave toll these losses exacted on soldiers and civilians, families and society. In its intimate details and its broad scope, his book demonstrates that for those who served and those who supported them, noncombat fatalities were as significant as battle deaths in impressing the full force of the American Civil War on the people called upon to live through it. With the publication of Inglorious Passages, those who paid the supreme sacrifice, regardless of situation or circumstance, will at last be included in the final tabulation of the nation’s bloodiest conflict.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

416

Publisher

University Press of Kansas

Published Date

ISBN 10

0700625089

ISBN 13

9780700625086

Marching Home: Union Veterans and Their Unending Civil War

By: Brian Matthew Jordan

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Marching Home: Union Veterans and Their Unending Civil War

By: Brian Matthew Jordan

Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History Winner of the Gov. John Andrew Award (Union Club of Boston) An acclaimed, groundbreaking, and “powerful exploration” (Washington Post) of the fate of Union veterans, who won the war but couldn’t bear the peace. For well over a century, traditional Civil War histories have concluded in 1865, with a bitterly won peace and Union soldiers returning triumphantly home. In a landmark work that challenges sterilized portraits accepted for generations, Civil War historian Brian Matthew Jordan creates an entirely new narrative. These veterans— tending rotting wounds, battling alcoholism, campaigning for paltry pensions— tragically realized that they stood as unwelcome reminders to a new America eager to heal, forget, and embrace the freewheeling bounty of the Gilded Age. Mining previously untapped archives, Jordan uncovers anguished letters and diaries, essays by amputees, and gruesome medical reports, all deeply revealing of the American psyche. In the model of twenty-first-century histories like Drew Gilpin Faust’s This Republic of Suffering or Maya Jasanoff ’s Liberty’s Exiles that illuminate the plight of the common man, Marching Home makes almost unbearably personal the rage and regret of Union veterans. Their untold stories are critically relevant today.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

400

Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company

Published Date

ISBN 10

0871407825

ISBN 13

9780871407825

Encyclopedia of American Popular Fiction

By: Geoff Hamilton,Brian Jones

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Encyclopedia of American Popular Fiction

By: Geoff Hamilton,Brian Jones

Covers contemporary authors and works that have enjoyed commercial success in the United States but are typically neglected by more "literary" guides. Provides high school and college students with everything they need to know to understand the authors and works of American popular fiction.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

412

Publisher

Infobase Publishing

Published Date

ISBN 10

1438116942

ISBN 13

9781438116945

John Bell Hood and the Fight for Civil War Memory

By: Brian Craig Miller

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

John Bell Hood and the Fight for Civil War Memory

By: Brian Craig Miller

In this first biography of the general in more than twenty years, Miller offers a new original perspective, directly challenging those historians who have pointed to Hood's perceived personality flaws, his alleged abuse of painkillers, and other unsubstantiated claims as proof of his incompetence as a military leader. This book takes into account Hood's entire life -- as a student at West Point, his meteoric rise and fall as a soldier and Civil War commander, and his career as a successful postwar businessman. In many ways, Hood represents a typical southern man, consumed by personal and societal definitions of manhood that were threatened by amputation and preserved and reconstructed by Civil War memory. Miller consults an extensive variety of sources, explaining not only what Hood did but also the environment in which he lived and how it affected him"--Jacket.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

346

Publisher

Univ. of Tennessee Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1572337028

ISBN 13

9781572337022

Old School Still Matters

Lessons from History to Reform Public Education in America

By: Brian L. Fife

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Old School Still Matters

Lessons from History to Reform Public Education in America

By: Brian L. Fife

Can public schools in America be saved? This book considers theory, current practice, and the common school ideal through a historical lens to arrive at practical suggestions for reforming contemporary public education. Despite dramatic, sweeping changes in recent decades, a strong case can be made for guiding the reformation of contemporary public education in the United States on common school ideology of the nineteenth century. The author argues that the common school remains a public institution capable of preparing America's youth to contribute to the community in a positive manner, and that education must be treated at a public good where all children—regardless of social class—have a right to a quality education. The work includes a thorough overview of Horace Mann's writings on K–12 public education that support the common school ideal—concepts that are over 150 years old, yet still highly relevant today.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

346

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 10

0313398100

ISBN 13

9780313398100

P.G. Wodehouse and Hollywood

Screenwriting, Satires and Adaptations

By: Brian Taves

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

P.G. Wodehouse and Hollywood

Screenwriting, Satires and Adaptations

By: Brian Taves

Beloved British humorist P.G. Wodehouse produced a wealth of literature in his lengthy career, contributing novels, short stories, plays, lyrics and essays to the canon of comic writing. His work in film and television included two stints as a screenwriter in Hollywood in the 1930s, and his stories have been the basis for more than 150 film and television productions. He also wrote 20 stories and essays about Hollywood, satirizing the city and its entertainment magnates. This book studies P.G. Wodehouse's extensive, but often overlooked relationship with Tinsel Town. The book is arranged chronologically, covering Wodehouse's Hollywood career from his early efforts in silent film, to his later contributions in television, to his work adapted posthumously for the screen. Radio is covered as well, including a discussion of his internment in occupied France and his brief appearances on German radio. Reflecting Wodehouse's international appeal, the book covers Wodehouse films and television in England, Germany, Sweden, and India. Also included are a comprehensive, detailed list of Wodehouse's stories and articles about Hollywood, and a complete filmography of motion picture and television works to which he contributed or which were based on his stories.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

229

Publisher

McFarland

Published Date

ISBN 10

0786484438

ISBN 13

9780786484430

Reading Melville's Pierre; or, The Ambiguities

By: Brian Higgins,Hershel Parker

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Reading Melville's Pierre; or, The Ambiguities

By: Brian Higgins,Hershel Parker

Herman Melville's Pierre; or. The Ambiguities has a storied place in the history of American publishing. Melville began writing this follow-up to Moby-Dick in October 1851, thinking that it might prove even more significant than its predecessor. The 1852 publication of Pierre was catastrophic, however. Melville lost his English publisher, and American reviewers derided the book and called the author mad. InReading Melville's "Pierre; or, The Ambiguities," noted Melville authorities Brian Higgins and Hershel Parker probe the daunting story behind a deeply flawed but revealing work, one that directly reflects the major crisis of Melville's authorial life. Weighed down by huge debts, Melville took the manuscript of Pierre to his New York publisher, Harper and Brothers, desperately needing the new work to be a financial success. The Harpers balked at publishing such a dangerous psychological novel (incest was a theme) and offered him less than half the royalties they had paid for his previous books. The anguished Melville accepted the contract but subsequently added new passages to his manuscript -- passages that disparage the publishing industry and reflect his agony at the looming loss of his career. Higgins and Parker examine what can plausibly be reconstructed of Melville's original version of Pierreand explore the consequences of his belated decision to expand his work, showing in detail how his hastily written and awkwardly inserted additions marred much of what he had brilliantly achieved in the shorter version. They demonstrate that to understand Pierre, and Melville himself at this crisis, one must first understand the compositional history that resulted in the book as published. Setting Pierre in the context of Melville's literary life, Higgins and Parker's study is an illuminating demonstration of biographical and textual scholarship by two of the field's finest practitioners.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

288

Publisher

LSU Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0807149063

ISBN 13

9780807149065

War of a Thousand Deserts

Indian Raids and the U. S. -Mexican War

By: Brian DeLay

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

War of a Thousand Deserts

Indian Raids and the U. S. -Mexican War

By: Brian DeLay

In the early 1830s, after decades of relative peace, northern Mexicans and the Indians whom they called "the barbarians" descended into a terrifying cycle of violence. For the next fifteen years, owing in part to changes unleashed by American expansion, Indian warriors launched devastating attacks across ten Mexican states. Raids and counter-raids claimed thousands of lives, ruined much of northern Mexico's economy, depopulated its countryside, and left man-made "deserts" in place of thriving settlements. Just as important, this vast interethnic war informed and emboldened U.S. arguments in favor of seizing Mexican territory while leaving northern Mexicans too divided, exhausted, and distracted to resist the American invasion and subsequent occupation. Exploring Mexican, American, and Indian sources ranging from diplomatic correspondence and congressional debates to captivity narratives and plains Indians' pictorial calendars, "War of a Thousand Deserts" recovers the surprising and previously unrecognized ways in which economic, cultural, and political developments within native communities affected nineteenth-century nation-states. In the process this ambitious book offers a rich and often harrowing new narrative of the era when the United States seized half of Mexico's national territory.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

496

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300150423

ISBN 13

9780300150421

Hopis and the Counterculture

Traditionalism, Appropriation, and the Birth of a Social Field

By: Brian Haley

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Hopis and the Counterculture

Traditionalism, Appropriation, and the Birth of a Social Field

By: Brian Haley

This book addresses how the Hopi became icons of the followers of alternative spiritualities and reveals one of the major pathways for the explosive appropriation of Indigenous identities in the 1960s. It reveals a largely unknown network of Native, non-Indian, and neo-Indian actors who spread misrepresentations of the Hopi that they created through interactions with the Hopi Traditionalist faction of the 1940s through 1980s. Significantly, many non-Hopis involved adopted Indian identities during this time, becoming "neo-Indians." Exploring the new social field that developed to spread these ideas, Hopis and the Counterculture meticulously traces the trajectories of figures such as Ammon Hennacy, Craig Carpenter, Frank Waters, and the Firesign Theatre, among others. Drawing on insights into the interplay between primitivism, radicalism, stereotyping, and identity, Haley expands on concepts from scholars such as Roy Harvey Pearce's notion of "isolated radicals" and Jonathan Friedman's observations regarding the ascendancy of primitivism amid global crises. Haley scrutinizes the roles played by non-Hopi actors and the timing behind the widespread popularization of Hopi religious practices.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

328

Publisher

University of Arizona Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0816553653

ISBN 13

9780816553655

The Early Parties and Politics in Britain, 1688-1832

By: Brian Hill

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Early Parties and Politics in Britain, 1688-1832

By: Brian Hill

There has always been a tendency to view British politics before the 1832 reform act as though the parties in parliament were clumsy, embryo versions of the later Conservatives and Liberals - their every act interpreted as being either as further striving towards modernity or a relapse into more primitive patterns of behaviour. This can be helpful to students in disentangling some very complex factional material, but for much of the time the 19th and 20th century party labels simply do not make any sense at all in this earlier period. A good, clear account of what exactly was meant by 'party' and how the different parliamentary groupings evolved from the Restoration to the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars has long been needed, and Brian Hill, who has studied this issue for many years, has at last provided such an account.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

255

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing

Published Date

ISBN 10

1349244872

ISBN 13

9781349244874

Old Age and the Search for Security

An American Social History

By: Carole Haber,Brian Gratton

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Old Age and the Search for Security

An American Social History

By: Carole Haber,Brian Gratton

Haber and Gratton lay to rest many conventional assumptions concerning the place of older persons in American history." -- Choice "Haber and Gratton's meaty little book does more than provide an intelligent synthesis of existing old-age history; its new interpretations, insights, and shifts of emphasis will provoke responses and help move historians' work away from the now threadbare original disputes in e field toward new questions and approaches." -- American Historical Review "Indeed, Haber and Gratton give us a refreshingly multidimensional history of the shift in old-age security from work, assets, or children to government annuities." -- Contemporary Sociology "... the history of old age has finally come of age. The authors successfully synthesize the best of the earlier social and cultural studies with new empirical evidence and recent findings of economic historians." -- Journal of Economic History "A truly 'revisionary' interpretation of the cultural and structural forces that shaped the elderly's lives from the colonial period to the present. Lucid and controversial, [it] is bound to be widely cited and hotly contested." -- W. Andrew Achenbaum This social history of the American elderly offers a provocative new view of aging in the United States. It revises traditional assumptions about the economic status of the old and challenges the long-held contention that industrialization destroyed family relationships.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

260

Publisher

Indiana University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0253113024

ISBN 13

9780253113023

The Pearl of Greatest Price

Mormonism's Most Controversial Scripture

By: Terryl Givens,Brian Hauglid

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Pearl of Greatest Price

Mormonism's Most Controversial Scripture

By: Terryl Givens,Brian Hauglid

The Pearl of Greatest Price narrates the history of Mormonism's fourth volume of scripture, canonized in 1880. The authors track its predecessors, describe its several components, and assess their theological significance within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Four principal sections are discussed, along with attendant controversies associated with each. The Book of Moses purports to be a Mosaic narrative missing from the biblical version of Genesis. Too little treated in the scholarship on Mormonism, these chapters, produced only months after the Book of Mormon was published, actually contain the theological nucleus of Latter-day Saint doctrines as well as a virtual template for the Restoration Joseph Smith was to effect. In The Pearl of Greatest Price, the author covers three principal parts that are the focus of many of the controversies engulfing Mormonism today. These parts are The Book of Abraham, The Book of Moses, and The Joseph Smith History. Most controversial of all is the Book of Abraham, a production that arose out of a group of papyri Smith acquired, along with four mummies, in 1835. Most of the papyri disappeared in the great Chicago Fire, but surviving fragments have been identified as Egyptian funerary documents. This has created one of the most serious challenges to Smith's prophetic claims the LDS church has faced. LDS scholars, however, have developed several frameworks for vindicating the inspiration of the resulting narrative and Smith's calling as a prophet. The author attempts to make sense of Smith's several, at times divergent, accounts of his First Vision, one of which is canonized as scripture. He also assesses the creedal nature of Smith's "Articles of Faith," in the context of his professed anti-creedalism. In sum, this study chronicles the volume's historical legacy and theological indispensability to the Latter-day Saint tradition, as well as the reasons for its resilience and future prospects in the face of daunting challenges.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

297

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0190603879

ISBN 13

9780190603878

The Poet of Loch Ness

By: Brian Jay Corrigan

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Poet of Loch Ness

By: Brian Jay Corrigan

Spending the summer in Scotland after her bland American professor husband receives a grant to study Loch Ness, Perdita Miggs is astonished when their guide turns out to be her long-lost first love, an attractive local poet.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

332

Publisher

Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

0312329318

ISBN 13

9780312329310

Beyond the Formalist-Realist Divide

The Role of Politics in Judging

By: Brian Z. Tamanaha

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Beyond the Formalist-Realist Divide

The Role of Politics in Judging

By: Brian Z. Tamanaha

According to conventional wisdom in American legal culture, the 1870s to 1920s was the age of legal formalism, when judges believed that the law was autonomous and logically ordered, and that they mechanically deduced right answers in cases. In the 1920s and 1930s, the story continues, the legal realists discredited this view by demonstrating that the law is marked by gaps and contradictions, arguing that judges construct legal justifications to support desired outcomes. This often-repeated historical account is virtually taken for granted today, and continues to shape understandings about judging. In this groundbreaking book, esteemed legal theorist Brian Tamanaha thoroughly debunks the formalist-realist divide. Drawing from extensive research into the writings of judges and scholars, Tamanaha shows how, over the past century and a half, jurists have regularly expressed a balanced view of judging that acknowledges the limitations of law and of judges, yet recognizes that judges can and do render rule-bound decisions. He reveals how the story about the formalist age was an invention of politically motivated critics of the courts, and how it has led to significant misunderstandings about legal realism. Beyond the Formalist-Realist Divide traces how this false tale has distorted studies of judging by political scientists and debates among legal theorists. Recovering a balanced realism about judging, this book fundamentally rewrites legal history and offers a fresh perspective for theorists, judges, and practitioners of law.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

265

Publisher

Princeton University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1400831989

ISBN 13

9781400831982

Four from the forties

Arliss, Crabtree, Knowles and Huntington

By: Brian McFarlane

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Four from the forties

Arliss, Crabtree, Knowles and Huntington

By: Brian McFarlane

The ‘Gainsborough melodramas’ were a mainstay of 1940s British cinema, and helped make the careers of such stars as Margaret Lockwood, James Mason and Stewart Granger. But what was unique about these films? And who were the directors behind them? This book presents four key filmmakers, each with his own talents and specialities. It traces their professional lives through the highs of the 1940s, when the popularity of Gainsborough films was at its peak, to the tougher decades that followed the genre’s decline. Featuring expert analysis of such films as The Man in Grey (1943), Madonna of the Seven Moons (1945) and The Upturned Glass (1947), alongside valuable historical context, the book constitutes the first extended examination of this group of directors. It combines critical acumen with readability, making it a valuable resource for students, lecturers and general readers alike.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

258

Publisher

Manchester University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

152611058X

ISBN 13

9781526110589

Heterocosms

By: Brian Stableford

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Heterocosms

By: Brian Stableford

This new collection of critical essays on science fiction and fantasy literature and media features the following pieces: "The Last Chocolate Bar and the Majesty of Truth: Reflections on the Concept of 'Hardness' in Science Fiction," "How Should a Science Fiction Story End?," "The Third Generation of Genre Science Fiction," "Deus ex Machina; or, How to Achieve a Perfect Science-Fictional Climax," "Biotechnology and Utopia," "Far Futures," "How Should a Science Fiction Story Begin?," and "The Discovery of Secondary Worlds: Notes on the Aesthetics and Methodology of Heterocosmic Creativity." Brian Stableford is the bestselling writer of 50 books and hundreds of essays, including science fiction, fantasy, literary criticism, and popular nonfiction. He lives and works in Reading, England. I. O. Evans Studies In the Philosophy and Criticism of Literature No. 39.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

278

Publisher

Wildside Press LLC

Published Date

ISBN 10

0809519070

ISBN 13

9780809519071

Wounded in War they Would Work in Peace

By: Sqn Ldr Brian Relf

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Wounded in War they Would Work in Peace

By: Sqn Ldr Brian Relf

The history of DOGH Macdonnell Gardens. Created as a community of homes on the outskirts of Watford, England, for disabled married officers and their families after WW1. and from which assistance could be given to get them back into employment. Priority was given to career officers suffering from mental trauma. The project was patronised by royalty and supported by major industrialists initially and administered for many years by the Officers' Association until Haig Housing Trust became the sole Trustee in 2011. This is the black and white paperback edition; a full colour hard cover edition and an ebook are also available.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

109

Publisher

Lulu.com

Published Date

ISBN 10

129168817X

ISBN 13

9781291688177

Higher Education in Transition

The Challenges of the New Millennium

By: Brian L. Fife,Joseph Losco

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Higher Education in Transition

The Challenges of the New Millennium

By: Brian L. Fife,Joseph Losco

This book explores the state of higher education at century's end and the challenges awaiting it in the next millennium. It assesses changes in the student population, the role of faculty, spending patterns, government support, the role of intercollegiate athletics, the nature of presidential leadership, and the impact of technological change. This volume is a call to educators, parents, and taxpayers alike to enter into a dialogue about the future directions of higher education that they are willing to support. Because in the last few decades higher education has attempted to extend both its reach and scope despite the finite nature of resources at its disposal, the new millennium will mark a time when colleges and universities must clearly delimit and prioritize their goals. This volume is a call to educators, parents, and taxpayers alike to enter into a dialogue about the future directions of higher education that they are willing to support. The role of higher education in a high-tech, interdependent world economy has never been more important than it is today. Yet, never before has its future been so cloudy. Changes in the nature of the student population, tuition increases that consistently outpace the cost of living, increasing conflict between faculty and administration personnel, attacks on tenure, the professionalization of collegiate sports, and political attacks and threats to state funding are all transforming an institution in ways that are, as yet, uncertain at best. This volume reviews the source and impact of change on today's colleges and universities. Leading scholars contribute chapters on specific aspects of collegiate life and the way internal and external forces are changing the scope and function of higher education.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

233

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 10

0313034265

ISBN 13

9780313034268

Artistic and Political Patronage in Early Stuart England

The Career of William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke, 1580-1630

By: Brian O'Farrell

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Artistic and Political Patronage in Early Stuart England

The Career of William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke, 1580-1630

By: Brian O'Farrell

Artistic and Political Patronage in Early Stuart England explores the remarkable life and career of William Herbert, Third Earl of Pembroke. Pembroke was one of the most influential aristocrats during the reigns of Elizabeth I, James I and Charles I. He was a great patron, a prominent politician and electoral manager, an entrepreneur, and a gifted poet. Yet despite his influence and many talents, Pembroke’s life has been little studied by historians. Drawing on archival material, this book throws new light on Pembroke, and demonstrates just how significant he was during his lifetime. This book will appeal to scholars and students of early modern British history, as well as those interested in politics and patronage during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

265

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1000346315

ISBN 13

9781000346312

A Brief History of Superheroes

From Superman to the Avengers, the Evolution of Comic Book Legends

By: Brian J. Robb

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

A Brief History of Superheroes

From Superman to the Avengers, the Evolution of Comic Book Legends

By: Brian J. Robb

A fascinating written exploration of the superhero phenomenon, from its beginnings in the depths of Great Depression to the blockbuster movies of today. For over 90 years, superheroes have been interrogated, deconstructed, and reinvented. In this wide-ranging study, Robb looks at the diverse characters, their creators, and the ways in which their creations have been reinvented for successive generations. Inevitably, the focus is on the United States, but the context is international, including an examination of characters developed in India and Japan in reaction to the traditional American hero. Sections examine: the birth of the superhero, including Superman, in 1938; the DC family (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and The Justice Society/League of America), from the 1940s to the 1960s; the superheroes enlistment in the war effort in the 1940s and 50s; their neutering by the Comics Code; the challenge to DC from the Marvel family (The Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, and The X-Men), from the 1960s to the 1980s; the superhero as complex anti-hero; superheroes deconstructed in the 1980s (The Watchmen and Frank Miller’s Batman), and their politicization; independent comic book creators and new publishers in the 1980s and 90s; superheroes in retreat, and their rebirth at the movies in blockbusters from Batman to Spider-Man and The Avengers.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

205

Publisher

Robinson

Published Date

ISBN 10

1472110706

ISBN 13

9781472110701

Book's by Brian Grant Kent

Username

Password

Password again

Birthday

Email