What are some /lit/ approved history books? Pic possibly related?

Try Peter Turchin's "War and peace and war"

>>9822825
where could one acquire books in digital form for as much as a janitor gets paid? asking for a friend.

>>9822851
MAM

>>9822881
can I have a clue?

>>9822892
He means myanonamouse. From my experience it's no better than libgen and irc.

>>9822896
Thanks friend

>>9822825
Pictured is definitely /lit/ approved. Hume and Macaulay's Englands; Caton, Foote, Macpherson on the American Civil War; Carlyle's French Rev; Bradford's Of Plymouth Plantation are five 'safe bet' instances.

>>9822825

Pic related is a good romp but Gibbon can't resist throwing a few proto-fedora groaners in there.
Also his style is dazzling at first and then starts to feel formulaic at some point (a whole lot of Enlightenment phraseology like "the indifference of his answer displayed the freedom of his mind" and shit like that) but honestly the fucking thing is like over 2000 pages so if that's the worst I can say about it then it's pretty good.

>>9823087
My copy's 3200 pps. Read it while going through a divorce. It kind of saved me.
One gains a good sense of how modern Europe took shape after the fall of the Western empire via the trafficking (and tracking) of barbarian hordes and the rise and expansion of Islam. The writing's fantastic throughout though (as said) evasive in places.

If you're at all interested in the French Revolution, I'd recommend Citizens by Simon Schama.

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Pic related
Marlborough by Churchill
>>9823303
This

>no herodotus or thucydides yet
:o

Cecil Chesterton -History of the US
Henry Adams- Administration of James Madison
Macaulay- History of Englanf

>>9823087
Outside of prose a lot of the facts are out of date, obviously. And his core thesis, that Christianity led to passivity which led to barbarians/the fall, is pretty obtuse for a question like "how did Rome fall?" I mean, it's a great book for its impact and scope but it's not relevant to the modern field.

>>9824242

please go fuck off back to plebbit
I'm so tired of idiots like you barging into Gibbon threads like you know what the fuck you're talking about. Yeah I'm sure your autistic analysis of fragmentary banking transactions and grain counts have given you the FACTS to vastly update our conception of the history of rome.
How autistic do you have to be to think the established narrative needs to be updated every 5 years when a new pottery shard is found
>b-b-b-b-but the numismatists have extensively analyzed the shape of majorian's head on a coin fragment unearthed in 1952 that Gibbon couldn't POSSIBLY have known about
kill yourself

>>9822825
"Stalingrad: The Infernal Cauldron" by Stephen Walsh... or Welsh... can't remember which. Read it around 2013-14 or so if I had to guess, great book, lots of interesting facts, one in particular I've put to memory.

>June-December 1941
>6,000,000 Soviet casualties
>2,000,000 Soviet POWs
>Over 20,000 tanks put out of commission

Yup, the first half a year or so of Operation Barbarossa went startlingly well for Nazi Germany, and yet still didn't meet Hitler's completely unrealistic goals of taking the ENTIRETY of the USSR within 6 months before winter, or at least before spring when the snow melts and everything turns muddy making driving/marching more difficult.

>>9824278
Like I said, it's a great book and is a foundational text to the field but it's hardly the standard narrative anymore. A 240 year old text in any field is going to be filled with inaccuracies, invalid conjectures, and missing facts so it's folly to think Gibbon is ironclad or close to it. Good book but take it with a grain of salt in a lot of places.

>>9823087
>Enlightenment phraseology
That just 18th century sentence balancing. You would not have made this mistake had you only brought history to the aid of criticism.

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Can anyone give me an opinion on Cyril Robinson?
Was going to start this soon.

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>>9824284
This. Macaulay isn't widely read anymore, but he's up there with Gibbon, Hume, Fox, and company.

Is siddartha mukherjee /lit/?

>>9823071
It's style is fantastic, but I don't recommend it all for someone who doesn't know much about Roman history. He takes a lot of historical liberties and injects his own opinions. One particularly weird one is that he kinda just shits on the Byzantine empire and turned historians off of it for the better part of 150 years. The best thing to do is get yourself an easy, readable survey and jump into progressively more niche books based on what fits your interest. Try SPQR by Mary Beard. It's very narrative-based and introduces a lot of good information.

>>9824497
>Try SPQR by Mary Beard

"no"

Unrelated question:
Can someone who's read Nabokov's Ada or Ardor tell me what kind of incest it is?
Is it like brother/sister or son/mother? My money is on Nabokov having an oedipus complex

>>9824278
Gibbon is good for literature and cultural references. But you're an utter retard if you seriously take that book as an academical narrative.

>>9824538
>implying our understanding of Roman history has changed significantly over the last 2 centuries
It hasn't.

>>9824591
Yes, it has dumbfuck. We've gained more cultural context, more physical evidence (Pompeii was hardly excavated during Gibbon's life), better understanding of migrational patterns, inclusion of environmental factors, different historiographical tools, and have found better and more reliable sources than Gibbon had. The overall narrative has largely stayed the same but the medium to fine details have changed dramatically in some cases. Gibbons thesis was likely wrong as anyone with a brain can tell you the fall of Rome was more than "christfags did it."

>>9824497
Person addressed. I read Gibbon as a Classics\English guy so I already had a pretty good handle on the Greeks, Alexandrians, and Romans when I read it. Gibbon like Carlyle is still read today for its literary qualities and over all greatness as a work of art, and justly so. Historically however Gibbon (like Sismondi or Guiciardini or Burckhardt) is of interest for historiographical purposes, or for as having been a great historian and a pioneer in his field. The history itself however AS history has long been surpassed. Nevertheless I'd recommend it. It truly is a great book.

Whats a good account of the Roman civil war between Augustus, Brutus and co.?

>>9824522
Mary Beard is a respected academic of Roman history, what's the problem?

>>9824957
Appian's Civil Wars
Syme's "Roman Revolution"

>>9825234
Academics can still write pop history dogshit

>>9822825
Gibbon didn't take into account the length of the Roman fall. The British Empire rose and fell in half the time it took Western Rome to fall.

>>9824664
Taking the economic fluctuation, environmental changes (end of their forests, expensive paper etc.) into account is a fairly modern invention as well. Or rather, we know much more of it than free bread and circus.

>>9825262
yes he did since the decline and fall goes all the way to byzantium's fall

What are some books about Byzantine court, military, and society?

>>9822851
libgen

>>9823324
nope

>>9825534
yup

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>>9825361

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>>9822825
Pretty good book about Hitler.

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Underrated.

>>9825588
>88

what am i supposed to make of that

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>>9823324

>>9825603
>>9825534
I have not heard of those books before.

Can you please tell me why I should avoid them?

>>9825604
The first three Age books are alright, probably as good as a historical materialist approach can get (that's not saying much), the fourth is an exercise in communist whitewashing.

>>9825604
they primarily view economics and economic relations as the prime mover in history.... they also view history in a deterministic and telelogical fashion.

people prefer fairy stories to materialistic, objective, fact based, historical analysis.

plebs

Myths and Legends of the First World War

Really dispells the retarded sensationalist bullshit of "THEY WERE BOMBED EVERY MINUTE WAR IS HELL *cow mooing*"

People always say Gibbon is out of date, so what books would you recommend for a current history of rome?

>>9825658
outdated == redpilled

>>9825560
Is this any good? I found it in my parent's garage.

>>9825592
Trying to find an unabridged copy right now in the original German, but it's a major pain; most copies are in Germany and shipping costs around $40.

>>9823303
I don't think I can trust Schama after he crashed and burned while trying to debate pseuds Mark Steyn and Nigel Farage on the European migration crisis.

>>9825658
Gibbon is still GOAT for the macroscopic narrative of the fall of the Roman empire, recent historical advances aside, and is worth reading for the prose alone.

>>9825259
nice cover. their cover of plutarch's lives is pretty cool as well, reminds me of midnight marauders

>>9824664

>Gibbons thesis was likely wrong as anyone with a brain can tell you the fall of Rome was more than "christfags did it."

Wow for someone with such a profoundly detailed understanding of Rome you would think that you could manage a more nuanced caricature of Gibbon's thesis.
This is exactly why I hate idiots like you. You've never even read Gibbon and here you are telling us he's "outdated" (whatever the fuck that means) while in the same breath telling us the overall narrative has stayed the same. It's like you're actually retarded.

>>9824538
""""""""""""""academical narrative"""""""""""""""""""""""

HAHAHAHAH HEHEHEHEHE HIHIHIHHIHIH HOOHOHOHOHOH

>>9824389

What mistake?

>>9822851
Matt Damon?

>>9826277
>Trying to find an unabridged copy right now in the original German, but it's a major pain; most copies are in Germany and shipping costs around $40.
I just bought mine yesterday for ~7€ (living in germany, with delivery):
https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/3423008385/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Where are you from? I am sure we can find a way to get it cheaper to you.

>>9826812
The general shape, parts, and abilities of a car has stayed the same but the internal workings, quality, and efficiency of the car has changed immensely from the Model T to a modern car. No one is saying that the Model T wasn't a landmark, not a great car, or not appreciable. However, no one would drive a Model T as their day car. Gibbon's overall history, his macro reasoning, and sources we're groundbreaking at the time but now we appreciate it for facets outside of it's accuracy or core thesis. The general narrative has stayed the same but every part of the book is Model-T level (and cars still use parts that work/appear very close to Model-T parts like modern historians agree on a lot of what Gibbon said, generally). It's not the Constitution or a living document, it's a text that was written in the late 1700's before Leopold von Ranke was even born and scholars seriously stopped to consider historiography post enlightenment. No one in this thread is promoting some revisionist history of Rome and no one has said Gibbon is anything worse than a cultural landmark. Yet, they all say he's not relevant to modern scholarship and, yes, outdated due to the absolute lack of historiographocal tools, post Gibbon scholarship, and inclusion of new discoveries. Just because something is a monolith in legacy and impact doesn't make it relevant to modern studies.

>>9826885
Why not just go all the way and type up a food analogy

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>>9826885

>argument by analogy

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>>9826277
The Book, Amazon Shipping to me and international one to you should add up to max 15-20€.
Message me on plebbit in case you're interested/ I forget the thread

/user/Kirschkernkissen/.

>>9826888
Unlevened bread in a world of sliced raisin bread.

>>9826885
>Yet, they all say he's not relevant to modern scholarship and, yes, outdated due to the absolute lack of historiographocal tools, post Gibbon scholarship, and inclusion of new discoveries. Just because something is a monolith in legacy and impact doesn't make it relevant to modern studies.

You're just cementing more and more exactly what I hate about the reddit brigade going around with their iconoclast anti-Gibbon ideology.

He's not relevant to modern scholarship? Excuse me but who the fuck cares?
Are you aware that no one here is a scholar of ancient Rome?
Do you understand how outrageously specialized you'd have to be to make an original contribution to ancient Rome scholarship in fucking 2017?
That field has been thoroughly plowed bro.
We don't want grain count records we just want a functional understanding of the history in order to frame our cultural thought.

>>9824242
What would be a good roman history books that's relevant to the modern field?

>>9826929
just read Gibbons and all the other classics, you aren't by profession a historian are you now

SPQR is pretty modern and good and Tom Holland or whatever his name was

>>9826929

We Wuz Patricians: A Historiographical Approach
by Na-tash Cotes

Using corn records Cotes revolutionizes the population estimates in support of his scientifically demonstrable thesis that only black virility could account for the growth variable K under such corn constraints

>>9826936
>dude just go read pop history garbage lmao

Fuck off Mary

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Thinking about getting a few books out of the Oxford History of the United States.

Has anyone read them? I'm starting only with "The glorious cause" as of now.

>>9826942
>Gibbons
>SPQR
>Holland
>pop-history garbage

OK DONT READ ANYTHING THATS NOT ACADEMIC STUDY PAPER DUDE FUCKIN EVERYTHING ELSE LMAO TOO BUD BUDDY IF YOU CANT ACCESS OXFORD LIBRARY WOOPS

>>9826943

>Robert Middlebrow

>>9826944
I was specifically referring to SPQR you dip, that is clear as day pop-history garbage

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What does /lit/ think of Mommsen?

>>9822851
B-ok.org
Libgen
Gutenberg

>>9824278
So much rage inside you, anon.

>>9826961

i know.
who hurt me?

>>9826965
I don't know. I think it's time to let go though, anon. You cannot change the past.

>>9826949
Thanks.

>>9826847
>>9826903

Thanks guys, I'm living in the USA right now. This copy on amazon is actually perfect though; the shipping is real cheap.

>outdated

I really wish this meme would fucking stop

>>9826940
Can't believe I actually typed this shit on Amazon, am I retarded?

>>9826998
No offense my man but I think you might be

>>9826998

It's not your fault man.
We live in a clown world and it's becoming increasingly impossible to tell satire from reality.

Opinion on Bryan Ward-Perkins and his "The Fall of Rome and the End of Civilization"?

>>9826979
Holy shit, decide already motherfuckers, is Gibbon outdated or not? What book should we read on roman history that's accurate?

>>9826917
>Do you understand how outrageously specialized you'd have to be to make an original contribution to ancient Rome scholarship in fucking 2017?
You could say that about almost ANY field like chemistry, linguistics, other national histories, physics, etc. Linguists recognize the importance of the Grimm brothers and their work factors into the framework of the field but no linguist solely applies their theories to the field. The age of generalists is dead. And then problem with Gibbon, like I said, is his thesis is limited in scope and depth to provide a sufficient answer for a complex question like "Why did Rome fall?" Obviously it's not really as simple as "Christfags did it" but he doesn't reason that environment, economics, populations, or some specific administrations could have significantly factored into the fall when they demonstrably did. He provided great framework and a good direction but he's not "relevant" in the sense that there's 230 years of more scholarship after him.

>>9827020
Just because their has been more scholarship it doesn't mean it's better

>scholarship just progressively gets better

>>9826978
Does Amazon.de ship directly to you? Otherwise just message me.

>>9827020
>but he doesn't reason that environment, economics, populations, or some specific administrations could have significantly factored into the fall

He actually literally does this.

>>9827008
Gibbon is historically accurate. His conclusions on some things are his own.

>tfw you get no good history book recommendations because everyone here (no one having read Gibbon of course) is sperging out

>>9827046
Oh stop being such a faggot

I have a giant folder full of history book recommendations they really are not that hard to come by

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>>9827046
Actually I just ordered Gibbons work due to all this butthurt.

>>9827008

What do you mean by "accurate?"

There's two different things going on here. Gibbon tries to provide a narrative and an analysis at the same time. Modern scholarship would not analysis Roman history in the same way that Gibbon does, but the received narrative is virtually the same.

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>>9827061
I want to read Gibbon but I have fucking 71 unread books on my shelf

Of course I brought this onto myself and I have no one else to blame, but I'm still enraged and frustrated all the same

>>9827008
Anon, Gibbon's masterpiece was written at the end of 18th century.

It is outdated.

If you want to read Gibbon to know roman history, avoid it; if you want to read Gibbon to know the thought and the thesis of an eighteenth century man on roman history, on "the Fall of Rome", read it.

The same discourse can be made with authors closer to our times like Syme, Spengler, Carcopino or Croce.

You Angloamericans are lucky, beacuse there are many informative (?) history books.
Author like Goldsworthy, Powell, Brunt, Fields

>>9827046
https://www.reddit.com/r/history/wiki/recommendedlist/

There you go, thank me later.

>>9827101
>You Angloamericans are lucky, beacuse there are many informative (?) history books.
It really is frustrating to be banned from reading all those books as a non-Angloamerican

When will they stop this discrimination? I'm about to say fuck it and just steal those books, that way I won't have to show my Angloamericanpass or pay for them

>>9827101
>If you want to read Gibbon to know roman history, avoid it

Confirmed for not knowing shit about roman history.
It's literally impossible to delve into Roman history as an English speaker and permanently avoid Gibbon. You will have to read him sooner or later.

>>9827109
Is this actually necessary? Do you like being a jerk to people? When did idiots like you infested this board? Just leave, trash.

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>>9827094
Don't blame yourself. My "currently reading stack" has 9 books on it and further 15 are waiting, while 7 new ones are on their way. But after I realised that having a personal library from which you can choose and pick depending to your mood is much more satifying than just storing and displaying read ones, my guilt as dissolved. Just relax, once society will will go apeshit dystopian you still will have 70+ reasons to not kill yourself. Yet.

>>9827028
Yup, ships directly to me in NY.

>>9827008
Read him, then read a comprehensive contemporary work, and decide for yourself. Try Durant's Story of Civilization, third volume.

>>9827135
Great, hope you enjoy it in ze Kraut language as well.

>>9824307
the problem was with how fiercely the russians fought even in hopeless situations, fueled by the fear of loss. the nazis regarded most russians as sub humans and stalin called anyone that surrendered a traitor deserving the death penalty, so they put up a desperate fight out of necessity.

>>9827191
Why did Hitler and the nazis hate the slavs anyway? Aren't they white? Aren't they part of the superior aryan race according to the Nazi ideology?

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Any good? I know people say it's more of a journalistic work than history

>>9827204
honestly haven't read up on the nazis, so couldn't say. probably viewed them as more mongolian than white if I had to guess.

>>9827215
If that is the case, then why are there so many russian NeoNazis out there? Don't they read history? Last I heard, St. Petersburg was full of russian NeoNazis.

About to start reading Will Durants Story of civilization book series. I know it's probably not the best source of accurate history given it's age and massive scope, but as a starting point to get a wholesome picture of the western history I hope that it is sufficient.
Pretty much still a pleb at history and only got the drive to start studying it from listening to hardcore history podcast by Dan Carlin, who uses Durant as a source pretty often.

>>9827209
It's a good read but yes, Shirer is very much a journalist and makes no qualms about it

One example would be the Reichstag fire, he is convinced 100% Hitler burned it down without any sort of proof when that is borderline a conspiracy theory

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>>9827204
Nah, Hitler wasn't antislavic
Quick and dirty:
>Hitler and Pilsudzki were bbf
>both wanted Danzig deal and friendship
>Hitler praised the polaks for a great addition in the Reich
>Pilsudski dies
>Next in line got kiked and rather allied with the british to not have to gib Danzig
>Hitler made up a reason to invade poland to further his goals
>to make his people act aggainst Slavs he had to make up new propaganda, wich changed from bbf to Untermensch
>British don't help poland
>poland got fucked
>today (((some))) try to claim the Nazis always hated the Slavs

pic related before the death of Pilsudski

>>9827204
It went kind of like this:
Aryans>other whites>blacks and slavs>gypsies>jews

>>9827204
Hitler viewed Poles as honorary Aryans by the end of World War II and didn't always express disdain toward the Polish people. Like another poster said, relegating Poles to the status of untermensch was meant to justify the invasion of Poland, providing yet another example of how the Nazi racial ideology was nothing but a twisted, incoherent mess.

>>9827239
This is what I'm doing - but take your time to intersperse other relevant primary texts into your study. For example, when reading The Life of Greece: read Herodotus when you get to the chapter regarding the Greco-Persian Wars, and then read Thucydides when you get to the chapter regarding the Peloponnesian War; maybe read some plays by the tragedians or comedians; and so on.

>>9827008
The criticism of Gibbon is his dated perspective that there is no sincere religious faith. He was looking down on the religious as superstitious or corrupt from a late enlightenment point of view.

Otherwise it is a masterwork of history.

>>9827118
this succinctly puts it.

>>9827046
>mrrrr noone has read what I have read!

Everyone here is a history or lit major, everyone has read this shit. If you want to read good works go to a subjects wiki page, goto further reading, and read academic reviews on the suggested books to find the best regarded ones.

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>>9822825

>>9827396
>Everyone here is a history or lit major

Looks like SOMEONE fell into the trap of projecting their own person onto an anonymous image board!

Whoops!

>>9827396
>blind appeal to academic authority
boot lick much?

>>9827446
>>9827419
>I suck cock

Not projecting, just an observation.

>>9827383
I'll definitely be reading herodotus at some point, though I already know the basic "story" of the persian wars through hardcore history. he spends over 10 hours setting the context for the persian empire and then re telling what herodotus told us in his histories.

>>9827446
>i know better than academics who have read more books on one single subject than i have read books in my life

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Is this guy any good? He wrote about some interesting subjects, but it stinks of pop-history to me.

What is pop-history?

>>9827733
I guess it's history written for as broad an audience as possible.

>>9827789
And Why is bad?
Isn't pop-history correct methodologically?
Is bad to tell the History for a wide audience?

>>9827520
I read that book recently and liked it a lot. It had an extensive bibliography and notes in the back, so I'd recommend it.

>>9827733
The equivalent of History Channel "documentaries" where they have EPIC reenactments accompanied by sweeping generalizations and people who pick out "fun" details, borderline conspiracy theories and "what-could-have-been"s, all the while rightly treating the audience as fucking retards

>>9827850
That's not SPQR then. Why was SPQR labeled pop-history.

>>9827865
Oh fuck off Mary stop pretending your work is academic

Literally the equivalent of an airport novel

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>whomst't've

>>9827865
Pop-history isn't necessarily bad.

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>>9827915
he's so droll looking

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>>9822825

Redpill me on historical narratives.

>>9828119
Great Man "theory" is thoroughly correct and libtards just can't handle it

>>9828119

Men in positions of influence and power are only there through accident and social necessity and their prominence in historical narrative is just a convenient method of linearity.

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>ITT: shitting on Gibbon yet suggesting no alternatives
Right, off to order it now

>>9827401
How is this? I've had it on my list to check out for awhile.

>>9828175
>Pericles just happened into a position of widespread admiration and power at the zenith of Athenian society.

>Washington was chosen by lot to lead the Continental army.

>France would still have invaded Russia had Napoleon not been at the helm.

Tolstoy is a great writer, and his narrative is a masterpiece, but his meta-historical theory is bogus. Tolstoy himself has shown that by taking his place aside the Great Men of history.

>>9828159
>>9828175
I must have worded this question poorly.
What I mean by historical narrative was those history books that present history like a novel almost, relying almost entirely on true events if possible.

>>9828282

You either don't understand or are misrepresenting the alternative mode of thinking.

It isn't that Pericles accidentally stumbled into a position of power or that Washington was chosen by lot. They were both capable men. But among their contemporaries were also many highly capable men who are now totally lost to history. The idea is that, had Pericles or Washington not existed, then one of these men would have filled their role, and with the same results, because the resolution of historical events are dependent upon extremely wide-ranging and powerful factors that are out of the control and comprehension of a single man.

The great man theory is literally just hero-worship.
"There was some divine spark in Pericles and that's why he was so great."
It's actually retarded.

You know the great man theory is retarded once you analyze our own contemporary world.
If history is made by great men then who are the great men of our generation? Obama? Merkel? Putin? Trump? The only people who would characterize our current leaders as great are ideologues. And it has always been the same, it's just that people get memed by the mists of history and start myth-building. It's the pathos of distance.

>>9828356
>"There was some divine spark in Pericles and that's why he was so great."
Doesn't have to be divine spark. Could just be unique character and systems of support. I highly doubt that most of the other capable politicians of the American Civil War had the humble, melancholic, arduous, and yet erudite background of Abraham Lincoln, which is one of the reasons he was one of the most, if the most, sober and capable leaders available at the time. Reducing Great Man theory to a caricature is to reduce humankind to something unrecognizable and robotic.

>>9828356
>The idea is that, had Pericles or Washington not existed, then one of these men would have filled their role,

mental gymnastic bullshit, throw it in the fucking trash.

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>>9828248
10/10 can recommend

It's like he is dancing through the centuries, giving you the bigger picture but also some little sidefact bits letting the people and ideas become so much more complex. It's really beautyfull, at least for a pleb like myself without some artsy degree. Ib4 you might also enjoy God's Philosophers by James Hannam, it gives the coming years a nice intro.

>>9828368
>Reducing Great Man theory to a caricature is to reduce humankind to something unrecognizable and robotic.

It's actually precisely the fucking opposite.
To take the Great Man theory seriously is to condemn 99.99999% of humanity as somehow fundamentally different from and lesser to the people who were "great."
No, there is one (1) human nature. Napoleon wasn't a demigod beyond the constraints of human necessity. He was like us.

Also, when I asked you who are the great men of our generation, it wasn't a rhetorical question, I actually want to know.

>>9828370

Not an argument.

>>9828394
>To take the Great Man theory seriously is to condemn 99.99999% of humanity as somehow fundamentally different from and lesser to the people who were "great."
But it's true. And you don't need to surrender to some sort of deterministic formula or some delusional mythos to believe in it. Actions have consequences, actions determine and are determined by character, and some people simply have consistently chosen better actions over a long period of time to the point where they were able to effect sweeping changes. I would agree that taking Great Man Theory to an extreme to ignore all situational factors also is flawed, since you cannot make something of yourself if you're not presented enough opportunities.

>Also, when I asked you who are the great men of our generation, it wasn't a rhetorical question, I actually want to know.
The people you don't know about. Zbigniew Brzenzinski. George H. W. Bush. etc. People who are closest to the loci of power. We live in a much larger and more complicated world than the era of Napoleon, so there are a lot more factions and a lot more resistance to "move" forces the way figures used to be able to.

>>9828440
>The people you don't know about. Zbigniew Brzenzinski. George H. W. Bush. etc. People who are closest to the loci of power. We live in a much larger and more complicated world than the era of Napoleon, so there are a lot more factions and a lot more resistance to "move" forces the way figures used to be able to.

hmm what a coinky-dink

>>9828445
>wow it is much harder to change the lives of 7 billion people than the lives of 500 million and more difficult to perceive said changes in the "information age" simulacrum
>please ignore the fact that people like Alexander the Great, Qin Shi Huangdi, Julius Caesar, Jesus, Asoka, Mohammed, Frederick Barbarossa, Huanya Capac, Gustav Adolphus, Napoleon, Pedro II, Otto von Bismarck, Adolf Hitler, etc. existed and enacted enormous influence on historical events.

>>9828394
lol

>>9828457

The point is that you can't name any contemporary "great men" because not enough time for myth-building has yet elapsed.
Could you be anymore dishonest. When has influencing the lives of literally the entire world ever been the criteria for "greatness."
What influence did Barbarossa have on China?

>>9828484
I named two who orchestrated the end of the Cold War and are directly responsible for the current geopolitical situation today. And here you are mentioning that I couldn't name any contemporary "great men". You have no position to call other people dishonest. And who said that you need to directly influence politics halfway across the planet to be a "great man"? The worldly domain was smaller back then. You wouldn't criticize a great man theory for its inability to explain why William the Conqueror didn't influence the Toltecs, would you?

>>9828394
I think the reason why liberals hate Great Man theory is because it would reveal to them that 1) character and responsibility are important; 2) actions have consequences; and 3) not every him, her, and xir could have done what Napoleon did because 99.99999% have neither the strength of will nor the vision to sculpt the world in the way that he did. Liberals thrive on victim mentality and shun building self-agency, which is why they only consider background and not individual choices when evaluating any situation.

>>9828491

I'm starting to think you're too stupid to carry on this conversation.
Your answer about contemporary greats contained a lot of equivocating about how the world is somehow more complicated (it just is) and how I just don't know the great ones because they are grey eminences or something.

The two you did name apparently for the sake of ending the Cold War is laughable as the end of the Cold War was entirely dependent on the collapse of communism with which they had nothing to do.
So in other words the reason you gave behind the "greatness" of Bush and Brzezinski is totally non-explanatory and ahistorical in that it doesn't account for WHY the Cold War ended. Oh, it just did. Because Bush was so great. Nice history lesson.

>Who said that you need to influence politics halfway across the planet to be a great man

Uh you did with "change the lives of 7 billion people" dumbass. I'm out until someone more intelligent comes in to defend Great Man theory.

>>9828507

I'm well aware of why ideological liberals oppose it.
Not everyone opposes it for those same reasons. There is a deterministic quality to history that many people find much more compelling than muh ooga booga big man kill snake theory.

Also just because others could have walked in Napoleon's shoes doesn't mean that EVERYONE could have. That's not the same thing.

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>>9824307
Any thoughts on how this book stacks up with Anthony Beevor's Stalingrad? I read Beevor's book and thought it was incredible.

>>9828528
>you're too stupid because you won't submit to my poorly constructed argument, laughable rebuttals, and consistent strawman arguments
Brilliant. You are a shining example of intellectualism.

>.Your answer about contemporary greats contained a lot of equivocating about how the world is somehow more complicated (it just is) and how I just don't know the great ones because they are grey eminences or something.
I wonder how you are trying to justify how the world isn't more complicated. The rise of nation states, the existence of nuclear weapons, and the dominance of asymmetrical warfare is one of many examples I can provide that can illustrate just how much cultural, socioeconomic, and political inertia has been added to the world since the premodern ages. Having seven times the population, with each person adding their own interactions and motives into the grand scheme of things, will add additional complexity. This should be intuitive and obvious.

>The two you did name apparently for the sake of ending the Cold War is laughable as the end of the Cold War was entirely dependent on the collapse of communism with which they had nothing to do.
Confirmed historycuck. Both men that I mentioned orchestrated the geopolitical arena for the Soviet Union to collapse, from leading CIA projects such as the Mujaheddin to ramping the military arms race that bankrupted the Soviet Union.

>So in other words the reason you gave behind the "greatness" of Bush and Brzezinski is totally non-explanatory and ahistorical in that it doesn't account for WHY the Cold War ended. Oh, it just did. Because Bush was so great. Nice history lesson.
I didn't see an argument here. Just snark.

>Uh you did with "change the lives of 7 billion people" dumbass.
I was highlighting the differences in scale between the premodern age and, well, modern times. We do live in a more interconnected and globalized society, so the very nature of human civilization has changed fundamentally, meaning that the standards for greatness change too. People who could have been great in the 1500s may not be able to wield the same amount of influence because they do not have the character to do it.

>I'm out until someone more intelligent comes in to defend Great Man theory.
Why would anybody waste their time with a moron like you? You clearly cannot articulate a single point without degenerating into a sniveling mess. Go back to plebbit with your ridiculous spacing, your bratty attitude, and your total lack of substance.

>>9828578
>triggered

>>9828584
Not an argument. Who brought out the profanity and the insults again?

>>9828578

So, you opened your post with the implication that I'm not a worthy opponent because I insulted you, and then ended with a flurry of insults.
Do you see now why I think you're stupid? I'm not casually throwing it out there as an insult, I just genuinely think you have low intelligence and aren't up to writing a consistent post, much less historical analysis.

And since you keep harping on this "the world is just so much more complex so there can't be great men" meme I'll fill you in on what actually happened.

It isn't that the world fundamentally changed (ridiculous idea) it's that electronic media has made myth-building much more difficult because our political figures are much more visible now. In the past a king was a figure of supreme awe to the common man, precisely because the king was inaccessible and never seen. Why aren't we awed by Trump? Because we're inundated with his all too human presence. It has nothing to do with a fundamental change in human character, what a totally ridiculous proposition.

Also, since according to you current circumstances no longer permit the regular appearance of great men anymore, you're going to have to come up with an alternate historical theory, because history is still fucking happening in the absence of muh great men. And that theory you come up with will be the one I fucking said it will be.
So either face up to your logical inconsistencies or stay assblasted and keep cucking for your great dicks.

>>9828356
>>9828394


>They were both capable men. But among their contemporaries were also many highly capable men who are now totally lost to history. The idea is that, had Pericles or Washington not existed, then one of these men would have filled their role

This is a nonsense argument: if Pericles steps aside, individual A fills his shoes; if individual A steps aside, individual B fills his shoes; and so, but not forever - because there are a finite number of individuals who possess the talent and faculties necessary to fill in the shoes of Pericles at any given time; you cannot keep eliminating great men ad infinitum, at some point you will run out. That is, in effect, the theory of Great Men - there is a finite class of individuals who through their merits and virtues supersede all other individuals in their age.


>If history is made by great men then who are the great men of our generation? Obama? Merkel? Putin? Trump?

Ever individual who finds himself in a position of power does not automatically ascend to the status of being a Great Man. It is difficult to determine what contemporary figures will join their ranks, without knowing the long term consequences of their respective actions: Merkel is certainly a contender for her country, given the length of her term in office; Obama seems unlikely; Putin is another possibility; and so on. But look back a little further to the 20th century: surely we can categorize such pre- and post-war figures as Churchill, Hitler, and Roosevelt as having earned their regality for their contributions to history.


>The great man theory is literally just hero-worship.

I fail to see what exactly is the problem with hero-worship; it represents an ideal for every man and woman to strive towards; resulting in the prevalence of such virtues which build great societies.

>>9828632
>This is a nonsense argument: if Pericles steps aside, individual A fills his shoes; if individual A steps aside, individual B fills his shoes; and so, but not forever - because there are a finite number of individuals who possess the talent and faculties necessary to fill in the shoes of Pericles at any given time; you cannot keep eliminating great men ad infinitum, at some point you will run out. That is, in effect, the theory of Great Men - there is a finite class of individuals who through their merits and virtues supersede all other individuals in their age.

I already addressed this here >>9828536
I don't argue that every individual can be a Pericles. Obviously not.
There is a finite amount but that is not what the Great Man theory says. The Great Man theory doesn't say there's a class of individuals it says there's a UNIQUE individual that left his stamp on history because of his unique greatness. This is not the same thing.

>Ever individual who finds himself in a position of power does not automatically ascend to the status of being a Great Man. But look back a little further to the 20th century: surely we can categorize such pre- and post-war figures as Churchill, Hitler, and Roosevelt as having earned their regality for their contributions to history.

You're actually just making my point. The reason not every individual in a position of power ascends to Great Man status is because to be a so-called great man you need a great theater of action. It is the EVENTS that make the great man.

>I fail to see what exactly is the problem with hero-worship; it represents an ideal for every man and woman to strive towards;

Well, it's ahistorical for one, which is a pretty damn big one in a discussion about history.
If you want to talk about ideals then write a novel. Keep your fiction out of the domain of history.

>>9828507
American liberals don't think character matters?

>>9828619
>
So, you opened your post with the implication that I'm not a worthy opponent because I insulted you, and then ended with a flurry of insults.
Do you see now why I think you're stupid? I'm not casually throwing it out there as an insult, I just genuinely think you have low intelligence and aren't up to writing a consistent post, much less historical analysis.
Losing all sense of decorum because you weren't able to persuade the opponent, and then blaming it on the opponent's inteligence instead of your poor argumentation, isn't a good look. No amount of attacks on my intelligence is going to improve your argument.

>It isn't that the world fundamentally changed (ridiculous idea) it's that electronic media has made myth-building much more difficult because our political figures are much more visible now. In the past a king was a figure of supreme awe to the common man, precisely because the king was inaccessible and never seen. Why aren't we awed by Trump? Because we're inundated with his all too human presence.
I don't think "great men" has anything to do with building myths and I never implied that it did. So, well argued point, but irrelevant. Besides, not everybody was "awed" by every great figure in history.

>It has nothing to do with a fundamental change in human character, what a totally ridiculous proposition.
I never argued that though. You seem to be obsessed with belittling my thinking abilities, and yet you cannot understand the simplest of my points. Human character didn't change, but the character necessary to be great in a given context has changed.

>Also, since according to you current circumstances no longer permit the regular appearance of great men anymore
Huh? I never argued this. I claimed, for the fourth time, that the nature of greatness has changed. I cited examples of people whose wills changed the trajectory of history, George H. W. Bush and Zbigniew Brzezinski, but you brushed it aside due to your lack of knowledge regarding the Cold War with your statement that they did "nothing" to bring down the Soviet Union. I don't think I've heard of a more profoundly ignorant statement.

>So either face up to your logical inconsistencies or stay assblasted and keep cucking for your great dicks.
If you can point out a logical inconsistency in an argument that I've actually presented and not in the ridiculous strawman that you've imagined for yourself, then I would be grateful. But you've done nothing but act aggressively despite having no credibility for doing so.

At this point, I'm beginning to wonder if you're a troll or just a pitifully misguided person, judging from the way you can't handle an argument without making it personal and without committing fatal flaws. If you continue to respond in this way, I'll just keep it simple with "Not an argument" or "Not my argument", because it's not worth spending more effort to explain my views only to have it fall on deaf ears.

>>9828661
>but the character necessary to be great in a given context has changed.
>the nature of greatness has changed


I'm actually taking this as you conceding defeat btw. I know you'll whine about strawmen or something but I literally think that you don't understand your own argument. Sorry if you think that's a cop-out but I never signed up for a formal debate anyways and I feel like I could make your case better than you are so it just isn't interesting for me anymore. It's like playing a game of chess as both sides.

>judging from the way you can't handle an argument without making it personal and without committing fatal flaws

Just to get psychological for a moment, do you have a personality disorder? This is an incredible sentence to read in light of the course of the discussion I mean go back and read your previous posts bro lol
I mean 10 minutes ago you were telling me to go back to plebbit and now you're somehow above the fray?
This is like nuclear level assblasted. My bantz were so strong your entire personality short circuited lol

>>9828746
>I'm actually taking this as you conceding defeat btw. I know you'll whine about strawmen or something but I literally think that you don't understand your own argument. Sorry if you think that's a cop-out but I never signed up for a formal debate anyways and I feel like I could make your case better than you are so it just isn't interesting for me anymore. It's like playing a game of chess as both sides.
Not a rebuttal. Every moment in history requires a unique set of skills to be maneuvered in one way or another. Somebody who wasn't a powerful orator like Lincoln could not have made the impact that he did during Republican Party primaries and during the Civil War. This should be completely obvious and not obfuscate the fact that it still requires great people.

>Just to get psychological for a moment, do you have a personality disorder? This is an incredible sentence to read in light of the course of the discussion I mean go back and read your previous posts bro lol
>I mean 10 minutes ago you were telling me to go back to plebbit and now you're somehow above the fray?
>This is like nuclear level assblasted. My bantz were so strong your entire personality short circuited lol
Also not a rebuttal. And you sound like a textbook narcissist. Seek help.

>>9828746

you sound like a profoundly stupid cunt
bravo on the trolling, because if that wasn't a troll, then I worry for your life and the people around you

>>9828657


>There is a finite amount but that is not what the Great Man theory says. The Great Man theory doesn't say there's a class of individuals it says there's a UNIQUE individual that left his stamp on history because of his unique greatness. This is not the same thing.

I think the acknowledgement of the existence of a finite class of individuals who are capable of filling the shoes of Pericles does not categorically disprove the theory; rather it lends it credit, because Pericles can be considered a Great Man, not because he is a member of that class of capable individuals, but because of the actions he took to effect changes in the historical course of Athens and all of Greece. Pericles is unique in the historical narrative which we accept, which is why he has ascended to the status of being a Great Man, but of course if we consider a whole number of possible narratives: what if person A or person B filled his shoes, then his singularity fades. Furthermore, to presume that Pericles' contemporaries are fully capable of acting as Great Men in his stead seems to me to be a wild assumption that alone would cause this argument to collapse.

I think I did a poor job formulating my thoughts on this - so I wouldn't blame you if you decided to break off this discussion. I'm going to try and come up with something more coherent at some point.


>You're actually just making my point. The reason not every individual in a position of power ascends to Great Man status is because to be a so-called great man you need a great theater of action. It is the EVENTS that make the great man.

I'm not sure that this is a point of contention: a king who does nothing with his wealth or his power is not a Great Man; a king who uses his wealth and his power to construct an empire is a Great Man: the hedonism of the former does not amount to any impact on history; the virtues and vision of the latter is what ultimately affects history significantly.


>Well, it's ahistorical for one, which is a pretty damn big one in a discussion about history.

You're going to have to elaborate a bit here: why exactly is it ahistorical or fictional to look up to these Great Men? I abhor attempts to construct a totally ideal and objective historical narrative - it seems to me to be a fruitless effort, not to mention cold and inhuman. We differ on this point philosophically, but I would rather have a continuous historical narrative, even a romanticized one, in which we accept, for example, much of what Herodotus has written unless an explicit reason exists not to, rather than a historical narrative filled with gaps in which our understanding did not live up to the rigor we demanded.

>>9828573
I hear Beevor is the best, but sadly I have not yet read his stuff. I require time, for at the moment I am drunk and doesn't affeared of anything but good feels do address strathingcom of wellington... and such... faggot...

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I'm gonna shill for the Landmark Thucydides. Its really a wonderful edition I think. The supplementary material is great as well as the appendixes. I'm far more familiar with Greece's geography now and those maps definitely help comprehending how the Peloponnesian War unfolded.

Does anyone have experience with the Herodotus or Xenophon Landmark edition?

>>9828381
I really enjoyed Dawn to Decadence, and I should have known when I started it, but instead of ending up ending up with one more finished book on my shelf, I ended up with one more finished book, and like 40 books on my wishlist just from the references he made that sounded interesting to me.

Also IMO after the late 19th century cultural history got really fucking weird and boring, except for the repercussions of the two world wars. I know I'm a pleb who doesn't understand more modern literary/cultural movements, and my preference to older themes and structures is probably due to my relative literary inexperience, but holy shit the last 150 pages of DtD were an absolute fucking crawl, after having really enjoyed everything prior.

>>9828231
What are you guys looking for? Do you even know the scope of Gibbon's work? It literally starts around 100AD and the bulk of it focuses on the Byzantine empire, following it to the fall of Constantinople in 1453.

This is not a Roman history of Caesar, Augustus, Mark Antony, Nero, et al. It is not classical Rome, it is not about what you think of when you think "ancient Rome" and it will assume you know about monarchical Rome, republican Rome, early imperial Rome, and the transitions between those states.

>>9829322
Checkin' them dubs anon. I have all three of those, and Arrian. I'm not a scholar and am not super familiar with the primary sources so I can't say how accurate they are, but they are excellent for the average pleb.

>>9829706
Irving rocks.

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>>9822825
History of the Third Reich Series by
Richard J. Evans

>>9829676
I know that feel and I also think the same way about the last pages but rather like to tell myself that it tels something about our times rather than myself. The modern times really seem to have lost its beauty. Semi-related documentary about the cultural changes and what we lost in contrast to those beautiful ones:

https://vimeo.com/128428182

Best books on the american revolution? I've read 1776 and john adams by McCullough which were excellent. Would be interested in biographies from the time period also.
Anything else from before that would be cool also. Age of discovery stuff in the Americas etc. Thank you.

>>9831179
How the Nation Was Won - E. Graham Lowry

>>9831179
I made this post a few days ago:
https://warosu.org/lit/thread/S9806015#p9806065

In addition to the things in there, I'd recommend Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power by Jon Meacham.

>>9831179
I was going to give Trevelyan's The American Revolution a shot.

>>9825234
she is a self absorbed twat

>>9828658
Liberals in general don't, hence the overbearing emphasis on blind equality.

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Library of America FTW

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Stuka Pilot - Hans-Ulrich Rudel

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Bernard Cornwell - Waterloo: The History of Four Days, Three Armies, and Three Battles

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>>9830278
>trilogy
>covers have completely different designs

>>9832462
I've got that one, haven't read it yet though, I want to finish the Sharpe series.

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Doesn't seem to exist in English.

>>9832523
It's different editions you RETARD

>>9825626
>>9825623
One of you two seems very confused as to what materialism is in history.

>>9825658
History of Rome podcast by mike duncan

>>9827025
Anon what causes fire? Phlogistated air or some weird new fangled "oxygen"

>>9827204
Nazi ideology made no sense.

>>9827460
I graduated in Finance and Economics.

Buddy of mine who comes here sometimes, Aerospace engineering.

>>9833339
First episodes are kinda rough but once he hits his stride it's good stuff.

>>9828632
>I fail to see what exactly is the problem with hero-worship; it represents an ideal for every man and woman to strive towards; resulting in the prevalence of such virtues which build great societies.

Only this has happened zero times

>>9833474
Jesus of Nazareth. Buddha. Muhammad.

>inb4 they were mythical

People don't worship the hero. They worship the hero's qualities. It doesn't matter if these role models didn't literally exist.

>>9833494
And this has built great societies exactly when?

>>9833474
bullshit, if you look at silicon valley it was built by following the example set by bill hewlett and dave packard, and there are tons of examples in the arts, both music and visual art

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>>9833497

>>9833497
the United States was built on classical antiquity, also every communist revolution ever was based on copying Lenin, get a clue man

>>9833474

also, every stem fag ever has some stem hero that they worship, and the textbooks deliberately encourage this by having little hero bios of the most productive math geniuses like newton, gauss, etc. stem people are the biggest hero worshippers out there

>>9833502
Following a good example is not "Hero Worship that builds great societies"

>>9833515
what's the difference between "hero worship" and "following a good example" exactly?

>>9833515
yes, yes, good goy, don't look to heroes of your civilization's history for archetypes of achievement, just wack off to cartoons and eat junk food that decimates your sperm count, yes yes!

>>9833520
To me they seem two different things. Let's think about it for a while.

>>9833527
We probably have different hobbies. Good luck with that sperm count.

>>9833532
oh i see now you're going to switch up your persona, first you were a angsty beta resentful of heroic males, now you're an olympic athlete built like a greek sculpture, got it

I posted this on /his/ and got 0 replies Can /lit/ do better?

Saints and heroes

Pretty interesting that ancient Greek heroes and Catholic saints are so alike. Both are believed to be more powerful in their local area, both are usually remembered for the story of their death, both are greater than mortals but lesser than god (s), both are believed to favor their followers, both are enshrined in tombs and statues, both receive offerings, and the physical remains of both are revered as sacred. Why is that?

>>9833546
catholic saints just replaced the cults of roman emperors who were deified after their death, read a book

>>9833551
Name a book that proves your contention and I will.

>>9833552
i don't know one off the top of my head, i read so much shit on rome, might be in "caesar and christ" by will durant, but it's probably in any book that covers conversion of rome

where the fuck did all these god damn noobs come from? is there another influx of redit shitlords coming in, jesus christ, fuck off with this entry level shit

>>9833559
need a diaper change there qt pie? you got a rash baby bear?

>>9833497
When people mimicked the heroes of myth and legend.

Archetypal heroes aren't merely limited to slaying dragons and walking on water; heroes are also people who broke ground and founded cities, stepped beyond their boundaries and charted the unknown, offered help and aid to the sick and the poor and otherwise didn't leave their fellow men to die whence they've fallen ill or of injury, preserved and distributed or contemplated new wisdom, created works of art that inspire in either provocative new ways of thinking of old problems or by outlining the framework of the next incredible unknown that the non-artistic but would-be hero would otherwise not fathom of. In other words: they are people who established a collective historical culture which served as the antecedent that gave men a direction/orientation to give order to the otherwise uncertain future, or even more reductively: endowed them with the capacity to even contemplate building something in the intangible dimension of potentiality, the deferral of gratification. We here and now are the product of literally all colluding forces no matter how big or how small. If the rest of Aristotle was burned before being translated and proliferated throughout Europe there is no telling how drastically the landscape of culture would change as the ideas were no longer capable of influencing the thoughts and actions of the great thinkers, especially so when so many of them build off of each other centuries apart. In this way, the very people preserving literature are heroes responsible for aiding the creation of a civilization that they wouldn't even be alive to witness the groundbreaking of, but that in no way can be a detraction or indictment of their invaluable contribution in creating a great society.

>>9829322
>>9829732

Yeah I have Herodotus and Arrian and they're two of the best books I own. I'll get the others soon and they better hurry up with the next one, Julius Caesar I believe it is

>>9832648
On Sharpe series now. GREAT summer reading.

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Here's some that I've enjoyed:
>Napoleon the Great by Andrew Roberts (pic related)
>Storm of Steel by Ernst Junger
>The Second World War by Winston Churchill
>The Rise and Fall of The Third Reich by William Shirer
>The Gallic War by Julius Caesar

>>9827815
>>9827865
One of the things I hated about SPQR was that she drones on in a dry manner with no apparent structure to the order of events.
She writes in a manner that sounds as if she is merely speculating about events, frequently giving "what ifs" rather than concrete information. She seems to meander randomly around topics offering her thoughts and musings on them.

>>9822851
http://libgen.io/

>>9834259
>as if she is merely speculating about events, frequently giving "what ifs" rather than concrete information

it's almost as if information about the ancient world was incredibly fragmentary and mostly unreliable, forcing historians to speculate. i get that you might aesthetically prefer someone who gives definite answers with confidence but anyone who still talks that way about the ancient world is a conman.

>>9834288
I probably just prefer information heavy books to have a more authoritative tone

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>>9827204
>>9827261
>Danzig
But what about the claim that Germans were slaughtered at Danzig by Poles with the Britain having their back? It were going on for weeks and asking Britain to put pressure and make them stop were constantly ignored. Please read pic related (appear in the second column but I suggest reading everything), distributed to the British people by airdrop.

I would like to post the documentary (with the same name) proposing this with multiple speeches translated to get the whole picture (from their side at least) but It seem to have been removed from the face of the earth. What really struck me were the appeal not to bomb any cities and hospitals and only strategic buildings, later ignored by Churchill. The reason I find it interesting is because of how war is carried out today and how it make cities completely inhabitable.

The victor writes history and while both sides can be accused of propaganda I am not going to accept the one dimensional cartoon villain narrative pushed in schools. If your people are being slaughtered, hospitals bombed, eventually anyone would snap. Again I will suggest to read this >>9832452 not because it is related but because It is from the perspective of a soldier and has little to do with actual politics. Or one can continue to view the Germans as cartoon villains.

>>9834348
>But what about the claim that Germans were slaughtered at Danzig by Poles with the Britain having their back?
Well, it's rumoured that it have been the germans themselves as they really needed a good reason to attack a former friend and ally. So taking Hitler and co seriously is not a real argument.

Your late point about Chuchill bombing Dresden just for the lolz is right. They just wanted to punish the germans as their competitor. Th British fucked both, germany and poland over for their own gains. The eternal anglo.

>>9827120
this is a funny way of being contrarian though. I figure if you're gonna be a jerk, be funny about it and its all good

>>9834348
>But what about the claim that Germans were slaughtered at Danzig by Poles

it is false and preposterous. danzing had a majority german population with an armed german police force that joined the invading nazis in '39. the poles constituted 5% of the population in the late 20s and maybe 15% tops in the late 30s. the idea of an oppressed german minority in danzig is a total fantasy.

>>9834288
i would agree with the other guy mate, i have SPQR and am reading it at the moment. It reads more like someone speaking than writing a history book. Its not bad, but its not a good read compared to other books covering similar period and content. Its also the second Beard book i have read and i didn't really like the style of the other either.

I'll be travelling through Africa (specifically Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Bostwana and Mozambique) for 3 months this year, any recommendations for some Sub-Saharan Africa history? It doesn't have to be specific to those countries.

>>9830255
Paul Johnson is top tier, although sometimes his judeophilia makes me nauseous.

>>9834433
bait

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>>9834433
>The Innocent Anthropologist: Notes from a Mud Hut
https://www.amazon.de/Innocent-Anthropologist-Notes-Mud-Hut/dp/1906011508/ref=sr_1_1?s=books-intl-de&ie=UTF8&qid=1501583072&sr=1-1&keywords=nigel+barley

>Safer Sex: What You Can Do to Avoid AIDS
https://www.amazon.de/Safer-Sex-What-Avoid-AIDS/dp/009920021X/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?s=books-intl-de&ie=UTF8&qid=1501583265&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=how+to+avoid+hiv

>>9832274
Please put these in order.

>>9834463
>>9834440
Honestly not bait. Just looking for a general overview of the history of the area, even if a majority of it is colonial.

I also understand that Ethiopia has quite a rich history like the Aksumite Empire

Asimov ones

>>9834009
Fuckin' epic, anon. Enjoy! God save Ireland!

>>9824109
They're great books but not necessarily for understanding history, anon, due to how simple their perceptions were at the time. Herodotus believed in flying snakes because someone told a guy who told a guy who told him.

>>9834785

Yeah I'm sure your perceptions are more refined than Thucydides

>>9834785
Flyint snakes is just a metaphor for dragons. Now you can continue the argument that believing in dragons is absurd but even that itself is a deeper archetypal allegory that has existed since the dawn of man.

>>9834785
Everything written by Herodotus, Thucydides, and other ancient historians should be accepted as true unless an explicit reason exists to reject something.

>They're great books but not necessarily for understanding history
This is such a brain dead statement: Herodotus and Thucydides are primary sources for our understanding of hundreds of years of Greek history, including the Greco-Persian and Peloponnesian wars; without these texts we would know very little about either of these events.

>>9834846
>>9834785
Based on the descriptions in Herodotus: they were most likely locust swarms.

>>9834846

Yes we watched Peterson videos too dude.

>>9835082
No, "we" didn't, /pol/.

>>9834785
t. philistine

>>9835093

Yeah just ignore cultural trends, nothing more patrician than burying your head in the sand

>>9835093
>Peterson
>/pol/

>oh.its.retarded.jpg

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>>9835098
>/pol/s flavor of the month e-celeb
>a cultural trend

""""""""""""ok""""""""""""

>>9835099
>dude praise kek X-D

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>>9835119
I'm not even into /pol/, that's why I replied to your nonsense. I can't stand you faggots acting like a family of hemorhoids after a double portion chili just because something even vaguely contradicts your personal beliefs. Not everyfuckingthing is /pol/. Go back to your containment board >>r/eddit

>>9835133
not that dude, and I'm all for civil discussion, but I don't think it's fair to characterize skipping a marginal philosopher's work as "burying your head in the sand"

If it becomes apparent he's influenced culture in a meaningful way I'll probably look into it more, but I've never gotten the impression that he's an important figure in either philosophy or modern discourse.

>>9835133
>tries to tell someone else to go back to muh reddit
>can't manage a working link
:-)

Why don't you just go and keep ironically worshiping frog cartoons people shitpost with in order to compensate for your lack of female companionship, faggot

>>9835119

I mean you can ignore reality if it hurts your feelings but "flavor of the month e-celeb" is literally a cultural trend dumbass.

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>>9835143
Nah, that wasn't my point at all. It just rustles my jimmies to constantly see this faggorty pop up without any real context. It's like they actually whish that /pol/ would notice them.

>>9835151
>:-)
Opinion discarged.

>>9835157
>a "cultural trend" which nobody outside of the 500.000 retards browsing the Donald Trump reddit is aware of or participates in

Not a single one of his video has even broken 1 million views Anon

>>9835143

Maybe you should try actually understanding the discussion before wading in.
The point of his comment was to dismiss Peterson as /pol/ which is a ideologically charged epithet on /lit/ for something supposedly low-brow or not worth consideration.
That's where "burying your head in the sand" comes from.

>>9835171

>Not a single one of his video has even broken 1 million views Anon

Not only is this a totally arbitrary criteria for cultural trend, it isn't even true.
>youtube.com
>jordan peterson
>filter results
>filter by view count

>>9835165
You can't deny that the character of this website has changed in the last five years. This used to be a place for fairly free, if idiotic, discourse. The influx of stormfront refugees and perhaps a renaissance of far-right ideologies has had a negative effect on discussion here. Sure, people are too ready to say "back to >>>/pol/", but when you have thread after thread on multiple boards derailed by posters that want to talk about global jewish domination, or the inferiority of blacks, it sucks. There's not a single board on this site anymore that doesn't have some philistine trying to bring up his ideology in reference to anything at all. Black musician on /mu/? Gorilla. Jewish author? (((can't have a serious discussion about that))). Gay director? Degenerate!

It wasn't like this a few years ago. I'm fine with people using whatever language they want to, I'm not gonna freak out if someone calls me a nigger, faggot or kike. The thing I can't stand is that it's actually these guys making an emotional value judgement about something based on a superficial quality of the topic at hand. Then someone responds, and it ALWAYS derails the thread.

>>9835172
I understand it to the degree that Jordan Peterson is a /lit/ meme that needs to be allowed to die before we could have a serious discussion about him.

>>9835188
HIS videos you retard

Do you know how YouTube works?

>>9835190

>The thing I can't stand is that it's actually these guys making an emotional value judgement

I'm sorry but how could you possibly know this?

>>9835198
>/lit/ meme

*/pol/ meme

>>9835198

To me this sounds suspiciously like
>I need enough time to have elapsed to where the phenomenon has ended and someone has broken it down and told me what to think about it and then we can discuss it


>>9835200

Uhh why do they need to be uploaded on his channel for it to count?
Did the views magically not happen because it wasn't on his official channel?
Keep moving the goal posts.

>>9835215
If he didn't upload the video it's not his video?

A Joe Rogan podcast with him on it getting views is at the virtue of Joe Rogan being popular, not his person. Which is cemented by the fact that none of those views translated to people looking at his own channel

>>9835190
Yes the board has changed but I can't conform to your conclusion. I don't think it's negative. This board is just a cross section of the wider public, which is undeniably shifting to the right after the pendulum has been pushed far to far to the left.

And speaking of derailing; last week alone I had 8 threads go apeshit due to /pol/, but not because a /pol/tard posted unasked for infographics but because shitheads like that one above got all butthurt and started to link everything non-comfy - just like right know the thread is fucked due to him.

I don't really care for people posting about their beliefs and ideologies, most are degenerate, right as left. I would just appreciate it if they could make real arguments or use another thread instead of throwing around "based maymays". Faggots faggoting about how bad /pol/ is, are even worse than /pol/ at it's most batshit crazy moments.

>>9835215
I get that you want to feel like you are part of some cultural zeitgeist or revolution or whatever but Jordan Peterson is hardly relevant to anything

>>9835218

>If he didn't upload the video it's not his video?

Ok so you're a retard. I'm out.

>>9835227

I get that you want to knock down strawmen to feel powerful but I don't consider myself a subscriber to anything and he's a part of the same "zeitgeist" that just made Trump president.
How is it still possible for people to not notice this?

>>9835202
I guess I can't. I do respect plenty of right-wing thinkers and intellectuals, but I hate this meme which sets up the right et al. as the rational, versus the emotional left. Certainly when someone wades into a gay thread on >>>/gif/ calling everyone degenerates and to get off their board, that's emotional.

But the broader point is that I think this newly-charged movement of fascists and racial ideology is incapable of containing itself where it belongs. I understand that everything is basically political, and when you're constantly re-contextualizing the world with a fresh ideological viewpoint, you're going to apply it to everything in the world around you. It is, however, much to the detriment of discussion about anything else.

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>>9835233
>How is it still possible for people to not notice this?
Pic related.

>>9835233
>implying the /pol/ kiddies that watch Jordan Peterson stick it to those silly lefties and clean their room because he told them to are even old enough to vote

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>>9835233
>the meme-right made Trump president

people seriously believe this

>>9835251
n-no shut up that kid shouting "pepe" at a Hilary rally is what turned the tide!!!

Alright guys you can stop replying I just realized that everyone here is a retard and I've outgrown lit so I'm leaving now have fun lads.

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>>9835233
>"zeitgeist" that just made Trump president

Nothing more complex than the stupefied American electorate made him president. Certainly not a tiny minority of young, closeted fascists. As usual the presidency was decided largely by the middle-aged and elderly, who reliably vote for incumbents, and failing to have an incumbent, vote for the party not in power.

>>9835082
>it was Peterson's idea
Maybe that's your problem.

>>9833371
Neither. If scholarship just gets progressively better and things just become outdated, everything we currently know is wrong.

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The Devil in the White City is actually a really good read. It's about the 1893 World's Fair and a serial killer that operated a hotel during it that he used to lure victims. I would recommend if you like 19th century history, serial killer stories, or have an interest in architecture.

>>9825604
It's only because the author is a commie so of course it'll get bashed on here, even though his works are fairly nonpolitical

Hobsbawm is one of the better historians in recent memory tbqh

excellent bibliography on ancient roman history:
>http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/bibliography.html

this gibbon thing is ridiculous. he is perhaps the greatest prose writer in english and a fantastic historian as well. however, his conclusions are limited by the evidence available to him. archaeology has taken a larger place in contemporary historical conclusions than just philology (study of ancient texts), which gibbon relies on HEAVILY.

he's a colossus in historiography, but not the thing to read first, if that makes sense.

peter's brown's "word of late antiquity AD 150-750" and wickham's "the inheritance of rome" may better serve as an introduction to that period of history.

>>9835190
Most of those people are trolls attempting to LARP as /pol/ posters while appearing like the_donald posters. You shouldn't take the bait seriously, but apparently much of /lit/ does, which has ruined forum quality far more than any influx of right-wingers.

>>9835725
it's a terrible read. Boring and "witty"in a bad way. there are some interesting parts relating to the building of the Fair but that's it.

>>9834009
Sharpe is GOAT
I've read four of the books, although out of order, I went: Battle, Tiger, Eagle, Sword
What's the next one I should do?

>>9822851
Gibbon is now public domain, you can just get it from archive.org or project gutenberg.

>>9836654
Trafalgar is my personal favourite, even though Sharpe is a wee bit out of his element due to being in the British Army and not a part of the British Navy, but Bernard Cornwell seems to have REALLY done his research for ships o' th' line. Sharpe's Regiment is quite good, and I recall enjoying Sharpe's Enemy if I'm remembering correctly as to which one that is. Oh, and isn't Sharpe's Fury the one set around... what was it... 1806-7 perhaps? A battle near Lisbon? That one's remarkable! There's also a book in the Sharpe Series in which Cornwell basically writes himself in as a character but I can't remember which book that is, but I'm pretty sure it's based in Spain, not Portugal, so perhaps one of the 1809-10 books maybe? It's really hard for me to remember which book is which year so I may very well have gotten them wrong.

>>9834552
The Harp!

>>9836654
I began at Rifles and am now on Siege. I've been alternating these with the Hornblower (Forester) series. Just can't seem to stop!
I am a heavy reader, but the last few summers I've cut myself a break (reading war and historical stuff) and it's the best reading decision I've ever made.

>>9827204
Hitler wanted Russia's oil so he could get to the Middle East for its oil, and since that meant going to war with Slavs he called Slavs lower beings. Hitler was neither consistent nor honest, and truthtelling in wartime is neither to begin with.

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>>9822825
>The Glory and The Dream
>Death of a President
>American Ceaser

>>9837043
Such an awesome character. Can't wait to watch the rest of the TV movies of the Sharpe's series, but not before I read the books. Last one I watched was Sharpe's Regiment.

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>>9833976
Sweet, I just ordered the Arrian one. I'm almost done with the Greeks meme chart but want some closure on what happened after the Peloponnesian War and Xenophon.

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Does anyone have thoughts on Diarmond MacCulloch's History of Christianity?

>>9823071
Hume's England is a contrarian joke

>>9837667
How so?

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Anthony Beevor - The Second World War

>>9822825
US Grant's Memoirs: one of the best things I ever had the fortune of reading.

>>9830263
Yep. Why is he shunned by academia? He gives the most complete picture of Hitler I have read. The bad, the good, the ugly, the beautiful of Nazi Germany's highest leaders. He is critical and has very good attention to detail.

>>9838948
Can you even still buy Hitler's War though?

I'm pretty sure the publisher burned all the copies after the holocaust denial trial

What are some good books based on the first wolrd war?

>>9823324
(((???)))

>>9837667
Only one of the reasons it's /lit/ approved as opposed to /his/ approved, anon.

>>9835655
We get asymptotically closer to the truth Pirsig

>>9834433
http://www.unesco.org/new/en/social-and-human-sciences/themes/general-history-of-africa/volumes/