WINNER OF THE ORWELL PRIZE 2016 How did a country that liberated itself from seventy years of Soviet rule end up as one of the biggest threats to the West &, above all, to its own future? Why did the people who rejected Communist ideology come to accept state propaganda? In this bold & important book, Arkady Ostrovsky takes the reader on an enthralling journey through Russia`s tumultuous post-Soviet transformation & illuminates the key turning points that often took the world by surprise. As a foreign correspondent in his own country, Ostrovsky has experienced Russia`s modern history first-h&, & through original research & interviews he reveals the ideological conflicts, compromises & temptations that have left Russia on a knife-edge. ...

We live in a world made by science. How & when did this happen? This book tells the story of the extraordinary intellectual & cultural revolution that gave birth to modern science, & mounts a major challenge to the prevailing orthodoxy of its history. Before 1492 it was assumed that all significant knowledge was already available; there was no concept of progress; people looked for understanding to the past not the future. This book argues that the discovery of America demonstrated that new knowledge was possible: indeed it introduced the very concept of `discovery`, & opened the way to the invention of science. The first crucial discovery was Tycho Brahe`s nova of 1572: proof that there could be change in the heavens. The telescope (1610) rendered the old astronomy obsolete. Torricelli`s experiment with the vacuum (1643) led directly to the triumph of the experimental method in the Royal Society of Boyle & Newton. By 1750 Newtonianism was being celebrated throughout Europe. The new science did not consist simply of new discoveries, or new methods. It relied on a new understanding of what knowledge might be, & with this came a new language: discovery, progress, facts, experiments, hypotheses, theories, laws of nature
- almost all these terms existed before 1492, but their meanings were radically transformed so they became tools with which to think scientifically. We all now speak this language of science, which was invented during the Scientific Revolution. The new culture had its martyrs (Bruno, Galileo), its heroes (Kepler, Boyle), its propagandists (Voltaire, Diderot), & its patient labourers (Gilbert, Hooke). It led to a new rationalism, killing off alchemy, astrology, & belief in witchcraft. It led to the invention of the steam engine & to the first Industrial Revolution. David Wootton`s landmark book changes our understanding of how this great transformation came about, & of what science is.
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This book argues that while Anglo-Saxon culture has given rise to virtually no myths at all, myth has played a central role in the historical development of Scottish identity. Trevor-Roper explores three myths across 400 years of Scottish history: the political myth of the 'ancient constitution' of Scotland; the literary myth, including Walter Scott as well as Ossian & ancient poetry; & the sartorial myth of tartan & the kilt, invented
- ironically by Englishmen
- in quite modern times. Trevor-Roper reveals myth as an often deliberate cultural construction used to enshrine a people's identity. While his treatment of Scottish myth is highly critical, indeed debunking, he shows how the ritualisation & domestication of Scotland's myths as local colour diverted the Scottish intelligentsia from the path that led German intellectuals to a dangerous myth of racial supremacy. This compelling script was left unpublished on Trevor-Roper's death in 2003 & is now made available for the first time. Written with characteristic elegance, lucidity & wit, & containing defiant & challenging opinions, it will absorb & provoke Scottish readers & intrigue many others.

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' All modern nation states have a story of their origins, passed down through both official & popular culture, & yet few of these accounts have proved as divisive & influential as the Israeli national myth. The well-known tale of Jewish exile at the hands of the Romans during the first century AD, & the assertion of both cultural & racial continuity through to the Jewish people of the present day, resonates far beyond Israel's borders. Despite its use as a justification for Jewish settlement in Palestine & the project of a Greater Israel, there have been few scholarly investigations into the historical accuracy of the story as a whole. In this bold & ambitious new book, Shlomo Sand shows that the Israeli national myth has its origins in the nineteenth century, rather than in biblical times
- when Jewish historians, like scholars in many other cultures, reconstituted an imagined people in order to model a future nation. Sand forensically dissects the official story
- & demonstrates the construction of a nationalist myth & the collective mystification that this requires. A bestseller in Israel & France, Shlomo Sand's book has sparked a widespread & lively debate. Should the Jewish people regard themselves as genetically distinct & identifiable across the millennia
- or should that doctrine now be left behind & if the myth of the Jewish state is dismantled, could this open a path toward a more inclusive Israeli state, content within its borders?'


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Fantastic new fiction from the team behind the wildly successful ` The Princess & the..` picture book series. A single story in two colour printing this is a lovely beginner-reader series for 5/6 year olds which is hilarious &, just about, true to life. In this first story, troublesome twosome Nell & Freddie go on a school trip to a farm, where they pet the animals & learn about how they live, & Freddie smuggles a piglet out in his backpack. He thinks he`s saving it from becoming sausages. So Nell keeps it in her bedroom, gives it a bath & gets it involved in bringing a local crime wave to an end... ...

In Jennifer Egan`s highly acclaimed first novel, set in 1978, the political drama & familial tensions of the 1960s form a backdrop for the world of Phoebe O` Connor, age eighteen. Phoebe is obsessed with the memory & death of her sister Faith, a beautiful idealistic hippie who died in Italy in 1970. In order to find out the truth about Faith`s life & death, Phoebe retraces her steps from San Francisco across Europe, a quest which yields both complex & disturbing revelations about family, love, & Faith`s lost generation. This spellbinding novel introduced Egan`s remarkable ability to tie suspense with deeply insightful characters & the nuances of emotion. ...

` This is the story of about the strangest thing that I`ve ever encountered, old art dealer that I am.` It is perhaps the finest art collection of its kind, acquired through a lifetime of sacrifice
- but when a dealer comes to see it, he finds something quite unexpected, & is drawn into a peculiar deception of the collector himself... Stefan Zweig was a wildly popular writer of compelling short fiction: in this collection there are peaks of extraordinary emotion, stories of all that is human crushed by the movements of history, of letters that fill a young heart or drive a person towards death, of obsession & desire. They will stay with the reader for ever.
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The unseen letters of the only British officer to spend three years in the trenches throughout the First World War Colonel Graham Chaplin, commander of the Cameron Highlanders, wrote letters from the trenches almost daily to the wife he had married just before the war began. Even if he had no time to write, he would at least send a postcard to reassure her he was ` Quite well`. These personal & loving letters give a rare insight into the mind of a serving officer, his worries about his men & his family back home, his concern for the progress of the war (however cautiously phrased) & his comments on the growing list of friends dead or wounded. Having once refused what he considered unacceptably dangerous orders to send his troops over the top during the Battle of Loos, Chaplin wasn`t promoted out of the trenches until 1917. Respected & trusted by his men, he was, even so, the only officer to whom this happened. Andrew Davidson, author of the highly praised Fred`s War, analyses Chaplin`s unique status & weaves around his letters a fascinating portrait of a soldier`s life & of the war on the Western Front. ...

Few historical figures are as well-known as Napoleon Bonaparte, & yet the Emperor`s ten-month exile on the small island of Elba is virtually unexplored. Now, for the first time, we have a window into this critical moment when the most powerful man on earth turns defeat into one final challenge.A close character study mixed with a world-shaking drama, The Invisible Emperor will show Napoleon as he`s never before been seen: as heart-broken husb&, civil engineer, interior decorator, gardener & spy master. It will show a man at his nadir rise up against the global odds to build a miniature island empire, turn his two greatest foes into his closest confidantes, & return to France without firing a single shot. ...

A killer at large in a remote Basque Country valley, a detective to rival Sarah Lund, myth versus reality, masterful storytelling
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