John Verney's Books

A Dinner of Herbs

By: John Verney

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In 1943, after parachuting into Sardinia to raid a German airfield, John Verney and several of his comrades from the British irregular forces were captured and sent to a POW camp in Italy’s Abruzzo region. As the Allies attempted to retake the country, Verney and two others made their escape. For months, they survived on the generosity and bravery of the local Italians who fed them and kept them hidden in haylofts and mountain caves―despite the scarcity of resources and the dangers they themselves faced by harboring English soldiers. Twenty years after the war, Verney revisited the scenes of his imprisonment and escape, and the result is both an enchanting evocation of Southern Italy and an exhilarating story of wartime daring. He recounts the ironic upsides of being a prisoner of war (“for the first time in four long years, I was free to do entirely what I wanted, which was to read as much as possible and try to learn to draw and write”) as well as the anxiety aroused by the possibility of attempting an escape. He describes the extremes of boredom, hunger, discomfort, and mutual irritation that he and his companions faced after their escape, and the immense capacity for tolerance and goodness that they discovered in each other―and especially in the desperately poor Italian families who helped them. Verney writes with a deceptive ease and wit, which reveals a subtlety and a candor that make this book as penetrating as it is delightful. “Delightful reading.”―Economist on Going to the Wars “This short, witty book is a triumph.”―Observer on Going to the Wars "One of the best memoirs of the Second World War."―The Independent on Going to the Wars “This book is unclassifiable: commentary, autobiography, satire by turns: but it is wholly readable, wholly successful. The author stands spokesman for a whole generation.”―Daily Telegraph on Going to the Wars

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Page Count

197

Publisher

Paul Dry Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

158988132X

ISBN 13

9781589881327

Going to the Wars

A Journey in Various Directions

By: John Verney

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Going to the Wars

A Journey in Various Directions

By: John Verney

“My brother officers. Are they human?” Thus reads the first journal entry of twenty-three-year-old John Verney, graduate of Eton and Oxford, lover of modern art and literature, who has, almost on a whim, joined a part-time cavalry regiment of the British Army in 1937. At the outbreak of World War II two years later, Verney arrives in the Middle East and there learns, almost in spite of himself, to be a soldier. In 1943, he becomes a parachutist and leads a “drop” into Sardinia to attack German airfields. His adventures there―two weeks wandering through enemy territory, his capture, and his eventual escape―are brilliantly told. Woven into the fabric of this narrative of a young man growing reluctantly to maturity and coming to terms with military life, are Verney’s thoughts and feelings about his wife, Lucinda, and the child he has never seen, and his longing to return to them. “Delightful reading.”―The Economist “This book is unclassifiable: commentary, autobiography, satire by turns: but it is wholly readable, wholly successful. The author stands spokesman for a whole generation.”―Daily Telegraph “This short, witty book is a triumph.”―Observer “An exciting writer.”―Raymond Mortimer, Sunday Times

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Page Count

227

Publisher

Paul Dry Books

ISBN 10

1589881311

ISBN 13

9781589881310

After the Civil Wars

English Politics and Government in the Reign of Charles II

By: John Miller

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After the Civil Wars

English Politics and Government in the Reign of Charles II

By: John Miller

The first study of Restoration England from the point of view of both rulers and ruled, this volume offers a vital reappraisal of seventeenth century England. The civil wars had a traumatic effect on the English people: memories of bloodshed and destruction and the ultimate horror of the execution of Charles I continued to be invoked for decades afterwards. It is often argued that the political and religious fissures created by the wars divided English society irrevocably, as demonstrated by the later bitter conflict between the Whig and Tory parties. After the Civil Wars proposes instead that although there was political conflict, Charles II's reign was not a continuation of the divisions of the civil wars.

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Page Count

252

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

131788552X

ISBN 13

9781317885528

Transforming English Rural Society

The Verneys and the Claydons, 1600–1820

By: John Broad

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Transforming English Rural Society

The Verneys and the Claydons, 1600–1820

By: John Broad

Between 1540 and 1920 the English elite transformed the countryside and landscape by building up landed estates which were concentrated around their country houses. John Broad's study of the Verney family of Middle Claydon in Buckinghamshire demonstrates two sides of that process. Charting the family's rise to wealth impelled by a strong dynastic imperative, Broad shows how the Verneys sought out heiress marriages to expand wealth and income. In parallel, he shows how the family managed its estates to maximize income and transformed three local village communities, creating a pattern of 'open' and 'closed' villages familiar to nineteenth-century commentators. Based on the formidable Verney family archive with its abundant correspondence, this book also examines the world of poor relief, farming families as well as strategies for estate expansion and social enhancement. It will appeal to anyone interested in the English countryside as a dynamic force in social and economic history.

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Page Count

312

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

113945188X

ISBN 13

9781139451888

A Descriptive Catalogue of the First Series of the Works of the Camden Society

By: John Nichols

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A Descriptive Catalogue of the First Series of the Works of the Camden Society

By: John Nichols

Reprint of the original.

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Page Count

121

Publisher

BoD – Books on Demand

Published Date

ISBN 10

3368151029

ISBN 13

9783368151027

Postapocalyptic Fantasies in Antebellum American Literature

By: John Hay

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Postapocalyptic Fantasies in Antebellum American Literature

By: John Hay

Even before the Civil War, American writers were imagining life after a massive global catastrophe. For many, the blank slate of the American continent was instead a wreckage-strewn wasteland, a new world in ruins. Bringing together epic and lyric poems, fictional tales, travel narratives, and scientific texts, Postapocalyptic Fantasies in Antebellum American Literature reveals that US authors who enthusiastically celebrated the myths of primeval wilderness and virgin land also frequently resorted to speculations about the annihilation of civilizations, past and future. By examining such postapocalyptic fantasies, this study recovers an antebellum rhetoric untethered to claims for historical exceptionalism - a patriotic rhetoric that celebrates America while denying the United States a unique position outside of world history. As the scientific field of natural history produced new theories regarding biological extinction, geological transformation, and environmental collapse, American writers responded with wild visions of the ancient past and the distant future.

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Page Count

252

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1108307825

ISBN 13

9781108307826

The King's Smuggler

Jane Whorwood, Secret Agent to Charles I

By: John Fox

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The King's Smuggler

Jane Whorwood, Secret Agent to Charles I

By: John Fox

Jane Whorwood(1612–84) was one of Charles I's closest confidantes. The daughter of Scots courtiers at Whitehall and the wife of an Oxfordshire squire, when the court moved to Oxford in 1642, at the start of the Civil War, she helped the Royalist cause by spying for the king and smuggling at least three-quarters of a ton of gold to help pay for his army. When Charles was held captive by the Parliamentarians, from 1646 to 1649, she organised money, correspondence, several escape attempts, astrological advice and a ship to carry him to Holland. The king and she also had a wartime 'brief encounter'. After Charles's execution in 1649, Jane's marriage collapsed in one of the most public and acrimonious separation cases of the seventeenth century. Using crucial evidence, John Fox provides a detailed biography of this extraordinary woman, a forgotten key player in the English Civil War.

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Page Count

226

Publisher

The History Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0752469037

ISBN 13

9780752469034

The Price of Murder

By: John D. MacDonald

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The Price of Murder

By: John D. MacDonald

On the surface, they seem like three very different people: Danny Bronson, a cunning ex-con struggling to go straight; his brother, Lee, a former Gridiron star turned college professor; and Johnny Keefler, a crooked parole officer who lives for revenge. But they all grew up in the same corner of town, a grim little slum known as 'The Sink', where life is cheap and might makes right. And a story that's just as dark unfolds when their paths cross as men - at the intersection of brutal violence, illicit liaisons, a 'foolproof' scam and the intoxicating allure of cold, hard cash.

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Page Count

169

Publisher

Murder Room

Published Date

ISBN 10

1471911438

ISBN 13

9781471911439

Presidents and Assemblies

Constitutional Design and Electoral Dynamics

By: Matthew Soberg Shugart,John M. Carey

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Presidents and Assemblies

Constitutional Design and Electoral Dynamics

By: Matthew Soberg Shugart,John M. Carey

In recent years renewed attention has been directed to the importance of the role of institutional design in democratic politics. Particular interest has concerned constitutional design and the relative merits of parliamentary versus presidential systems. In this book, the authors systematically assess the strengths and weaknesses of various forms of presidential systems, drawing on recent developments in the theoretical literature about institutional design and electoral rules. They develop a typology of democratic regimes structured around the separation of powers principle, including two hybrid forms, the premier-presidential and president-parliamentary systems, and they evaluate a number of alternative ways of balancing powers between the branches within these basic frameworks. They also demonstrate that electoral rules are critically important in determining how political authority is exercised.

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Page Count

334

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0521429900

ISBN 13

9780521429900

Book's by John Verney

A Dinner of Herbs

A Dinner of Herbs

Going to the Wars

Going to the Wars

After the Civil Wars

After the Civil Wars

Transforming English Rural Society

Transforming English Rural Society

A Descriptive Catalogue of the First Series of the Works of the Camden Society

A Descriptive Catalogue of the First Series of the Works of the Camden Society

Postapocalyptic Fantasies in Antebellum American Literature

Postapocalyptic Fantasies in Antebellum American Literature

The King's Smuggler

The King's Smuggler

The Price of Murder

The Price of Murder

Presidents and Assemblies

Presidents and Assemblies

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