Author: J. M. Roberts, Frederick Davidson
Binding: Audio Cassette
ISBN: 0786117095
Availability: In stock soon. Order now to get in line. First come, first served.

$85.95

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Twentieth Century Part 2
by: J. M. Roberts, Frederick Davidson

Editorial Review:

Offering a dazzling overview of a turbulent century, The Penguin History of the Twentieth Century explores the dramatic events and underlying trends that made the twentieth century the most transformative in human history. Despite two devastating World Wars and the traumatic rise and fall of communism, wealth has increased significantly alongside a four-fold leap in population, women's lives have been transformed, America has assumed undisputed political and cultural leadership, and China is now clearly awaiting its moment--J. M. Robert's masterly overview, now updated to the present day, brings all of this and more into focus.
J.M. Roberts's monumental Penguin History of the World became a publishing phenomenon and sold in the hundreds of thousands. Now he has produced an equally brilliant new book, focusing solely on our own troubled and dramatic century, and it has all the breathtaking sweep and confident judgment of his previous work. Most important, Roberts takes a truly international view of things. The 20th century, he argues, is marked as much as anything by the decline of Europe as the world's sole arbiter and the emergence of today's cosmopolitan, global civilization, born of decolonization, the resurgence of Islam, and the vibrant, self-assured new nations of Asia and Latin America. He also examines the other two major trends of our time: the social and economic empowerment of women and the extraordinary quadrupling of the world's population, most of it in Third World countries. A challenging and exacting read, Twentieth Century is destined to be a classic. --Christopher Hart, Amazon.co.uk

Customer Reviews:

Avg. Customer Rating: 3.5 / 5.0

Impressive to say the least:

I think the review on the back most aptly describes this book: "The most comprehensive, objective, geographically neutral and yet accessible history of the century yet published in English". Economist, Books of the Year.
Leave it to the Economist to say more in one sentence than others could do (including myself) in paragraphs.
This book is a very good summary of the century. The author analyzes history while leaving biases out. When he does write about prevailing opinions that are confrontational... more info

A book that every 21st century habitant should read:

I'm not an historian and English is not my native language, but I found that this book gave me a new and broad understanding of the world we are living in. I feel that if more of our politicians and authorities would have the knowledge this book provides we could be guided in a better way in the difficult years of this first decade of the new century. The book is easy to read,the prose of Mr. Roberts is fluent and any good reader will really enjoy it.

from one of the best moderm writers of history:

Roberts was one of the best modern writers of history. His "History of the World" has become a classic. He also wrote "A History of Europe" and this "Twentieth Century: The History of the World, 1901 to 2000". Both of these later works appear to have grown out of his "History of the World". That isn't a bad thing.
This book is one of the best end of the century reflections on the 20th Century. It is very much written from the viewpoint of a scholar. This is something that turns some folks off, which is... more info

zero emotion:

(yawn) I love to sink my teeth into big history books but this one's so flat. I tried several times to pick this one up but it seemed very monotone to me. It was like reading a text book. Perhaps it was all just above me, but I wouldn't recommend it unless you were a hardcore "facts" person.

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