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Showing 81 - 100 of 5597 items
By Dr Sarvepalli Gopal. 1975
Among the few great statesmen to emerge in Asia, Jawaharal Nehru achieved a national metamorphosis in some ways even more…
astonishing than that of another towering patriarch, Mao Tse-tung. Not only did he wrest from the British their most prized and dearly loved Imperial possession and give his people independence, he brought his culturally rich yet economically improvised nation into the twentieth century as a force to be reasoned with. The first volume of Sarvepalli Gopal’s remarkable biographic, covering Nehru’s youth and ending with Independence in 1947, is written from first-hand knowledge of the man who served for ten years in the Ministry for External Affairs and from the unlimited access granted him by the Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to her father’s private papers.By Christopher Harding. 2020
A SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020'Mightily impressive ... a marvellous read' Sunday TimesFrom the acclaimed author of Japan…
Story, this is the history of Japan, distilled into the stories of twenty remarkable individuals. The vivid and entertaining portraits in Chris Harding's enormously enjoyable new book take the reader from the earliest written accounts of Japan right through to the life of the current empress, Masako. We encounter shamans and warlords, poets and revolutionaries, scientists, artists and adventurers - each offering insights of their own into this extraordinary place. For anyone new to Japan, this book is the ideal introduction. For anyone already deeply involved with it, this is a book filled with surprises and pleasures.By Snorri Sturluson. 1996
This compelling Icelandic history describes the life of King Harald Hardradi, from his battles across Europe and Russia to his…
final assault on England in 1066, less than three weeks before the invasion of William the Conqueror. It was a battle that led to his death and marked the end of an era in which Europe had been dominated by the threat of Scandinavian forces. Despite England's triumph, it also played a crucial part in fatally weakening the English army immediately prior to the Norman Conquest, changing the course of history. Taken from the Heimskringla - Snorri Sturluson's complete account of Norway from prehistoric times to 1177 - this is a brilliantly human depiction of the turbulent life and savage death of the last great Norse warrior-king.By Thomas Cogswell. 2016
James's reign marked one of the very rare major breaks in England's monarchy. Already James VI of Scotland and a…
highly experienced ruler who had established his authority over the Scottish Kirk, he marched south on Elizabeth I's death to become James I of England and Ireland, uniting the British Isles for the first time and founding the Stuart dynasty which would, with several lurches, reign for over a century. Indeed his descendant still occupies the throne. A complex, curious man and great survivor, James drastically changed court life in London and presided over such major projects as the Authorized Version of the Bible and the establishment of English settlements in Virginia, Massachusetts, Gujarat and the Caribbean. Although he failed to unite England and Scotland, he insisted that ambassadors acknowledge him as King of Great Britain and that vessels from both countries display a version of the current Union Flag. He was often accused of being too informal and insufficiently regal - but when his son, Charles I, decided to redress these criticisms in his own reign he was destroyed. How much of the roots of this disaster were to be found in James's reign is one of the many problems dramatized in Thomas Cogswell's brilliant and highly entertaining new book.By Sean O'Callaghan. 2015
FROM THE FORMER IRA MEMBER AND AUTHOR OF THE INFORMER, SEAN O'CALLAGHAN'Very interesting on how fanaticism can develop within a…
community, and especially relevant today.' Bob GeldofThe story of revolutionary James Connolly, his role in the 1916 Easter Rising, and his subsequent influence both on O'Callaghan himself, and on 20th century Irish politics.Easter Monday, 24th April, 1916: James Connolly, a 48-year-old Edinburgh-born Marxist and former British soldier, stands at the top of the steps of Liberty Hall, Dublin. 'We are going out to be slaughtered,' Connolly told his comrades, and with this he set in train the Easter Rising of 1916.Two weeks later, in a scene that has haunted Nationalist Ireland ever since, he was carried to his place of execution having been badly wounded. Placed on a chair, he was shot dead by soldiers of the army he had once served in.This is not a traditional biography; it is a book about Sean O'Callaghan's relationship with a man who was to deeply influence his formative years; it is about the politics of violent extremism that O'Callaghan subsequently became caught up in; and it's about the kind of individuals who are willing to sacrifice everything, including their lives, for a holy cause.Never has a book been more timely.By Olaudah Equiano. 2016
'Cut iron with iron,What makes iron valuable,Big kuku tree and big silk-cotton tree,Fari and Kaunju -' Told and retold since…
the fourteenth century, this West African epic chronicles the story of the mighty warrior who saves his people and founds an empire. One of 46 new books in the bestselling Little Black Classics series, to celebrate the first ever Penguin Classic in 1946. Each book gives readers a taste of the Classics' huge range and diversity, with works from around the world and across the centuries - including fables, decadence, heartbreak, tall tales, satire, ghosts, battles and elephants.By Brian Keenan. 2009
Local rather than international, the dramas and privations described in this memoir are not the stuff of headlines. This is…
the story of an ordinary boy growing up in Belfast after the war; an ordinary boy who would go on to become world-famous as a hostage in Beirut and author of the extraordinary testimony of imprisonment and survival that was An Evil Cradling. Brian Keenan has captured the vanished world of 1950s Belfast in all its vivid vernacular and grey, post-war austerity. I'll Tell Me Ma is an affectionate story of a disaffected childhood. At the centre is a shy, self-conscious boy of unusual moral integrity; a boy puzzled by religion and sectarianism, in love with books and music and full of curiosity about the world outside. It is also a book about coming-to-terms with the past: a resounding, thrilling record of redemption.By Nicholas Vincent. 2009
King John ruled England for seventeen and a half years, yet his entire reign is usually reduced to one image:…
of the villainous monarch outmanoeuvred by rebellious barons into agreeing to Magna Carta at Runnymede in 1215. Ever since, John has come to be seen as an archetypal tyrant. But how evil was he? In this perceptive short account, Nicholas Vincent unpicks John's life through his deeds and his personality. The youngest of four brothers, overlooked and given a distinctly unroyal name, John seemed doomed to failure. As king, he was reputedly cruel and treacherous, pursuing his own interests at the expense of his country, losing the continental empire bequeathed to him by his father Henry and his brother Richard and eventually plunging England into civil war. Only his lordship of Ireland showed some success. Yet, as this fascinating biography asks, were his crimes necessarily greater than those of his ancestors - or was he judged more harshly because, ultimately, he failed as a warlord?By Mike Rossiter. 1999
SURVIVOR STORIES FROM DUNKIRK, NOW THE SUBJECT OF A MAJOR FILM FROM CHRISTOPHER NOLANWhen Britain declared war against Germany in…
September 1939, thousands of young men sailed across the English Channel to fight for their country. Among them were the seven soldiers who share their stories in this book. Some joined up out of patriotism, others for adventure or the prospect of a secure wage. They were fit, trained and proud to wear the armband of the British Expeditionary Forces. For many, the first months were strangely peaceful, but when the Germans invaded in May 1940 they advanced with shocking speed. The German armoured columns sliced through neutral Holland and Belgium. The French Army collapsed and within a week the soldiers of the BEF were forced to retreat. Fighting tough and bloody rearguard actions, they endured relentless shelling and fearsome dive-bomb attacks. Constantly on the move, and facing a German onslaught on three fronts, they were soon exhausted, hungry and low on ammunition. They headed finally to their one chance of salvation: the beaches of Dunkirk. Mike Rossiter tells the stories of seven veterans who went through a hellish baptism of fire in the first battles on the front line, and fought in the last-ditch defence of Dunkirk. They saw their comrades bombed and drowned off the beaches. Their accounts give us a fascinating and privileged insight into the reality of the war and what it was really like to face the German Blitzkrieg in 1940. They take us from the confident, idyllic days of the phoney war in the French countryside to the sudden shock of battle, from the fear and confusion of retreat to the wait for an uncertain rescue. These are the compelling stories of seven men who are proud to say I Fought at Dunkirk.By Paul Kenyon. 2009
Eighty miles off the Libyan coast water is leaking rapidly into the bottom of a dilapidated wooden boat. Twenty-seven men,…
crammed in side-by-side, desperately attempt to bail it out, but the boat is sinking. In the distance one of their number spots a ship and, forcing the last moments of life from the engine, they move towards it. But the crew refuses to allow them on board. Instead the men scramble onto the floats of a huge industrial tuna net, and watch as their boat rolls over and disappears into the heaving Mediterranean.Like tens of thousands of others Justice set off from his rural village with an idealised vision of an new life in England - the 'home' country - desperate just to earn his way and help his orphaned brother and sister left behind. During his long journey to the African coast, he's captured, jailed and tortured, before escaping and heading northwards again. Once in Tripoli he's duped into handing over his life savings for a trip in a wreck of a boat across miles of open sea to almost certain death. But there is also compassion here and he meets old and wise souls along the way. The tuna net is not the end of Justice's story. It is an extraordinary tale of courage, and an important account of a life caught between cultures, on the edge of survival.By Dr Sarvepalli Gopal. 1957
The third and final volume of Sarvepalli Gopal’s biography of Jawaharlal Nehru covers the last eight years of his life…
and Prime Ministership. It deals with his efforts to sustain economic and social advance of the Indian people and not to lose hold of the principles of his foreign policy even while relations with China deteriorated, culminating the large scale aggression in both the western and eastern sections of the long boundary between the two countries.By Mary Prince. 2004
The History of Mary Prince (1831) was the first narrative of a black woman to be published in Britain. It…
describes Prince's sufferings as a slave in Bermuda, Turks Island and Antigua, and her eventual arrival in London with her brutal owner Mr Wood in 1828. Prince escaped from him and sought assistance from the Anti-Slavery Society, where she dictated her remarkable story to Susanna Strickland (later Moodie). A moving and graphic document, The History drew attention to the continuation of slavery in the Caribbean, despite an 1807 Act of Parliament officially ending the slave trade. It inspired two libel actions and ran into three editions in the year of its publication. This powerful rallying cry for emancipation remains an extraordinary testament to Prince's ill-treatment, suffering and survival.By Jo Wheeler. 2018
Celebrating the lives of the magnificent women, the ATA girls, who courageously flew Spitfires, Tiger Moths, Lancaster Bombers and many…
other aircraft during World War Two.These extraordinary women, Mary Ellis, Jackie Moggridge and Pauline Gower are just a few of the remarkable stories inside . . . Since the invention of aeroplanes, women have taken to the skies. They have broken records, performed daredevil stunts and faced such sexism and prejudice that they were effectively barred from working as pilots.That changed in the Second World War. Led by firebrand Pauline Gower, an elite group of British women were selected as ferry pilots to fly for the Air Transport Auxiliary. They risked their lives flying munitions and equipment for the boys on the front line.Flying day and night without radio; dodging storms, barrage balloons and anti-aircraft fire; and with only a map, compass and their eyesight to guide them, they navigated the treacherous wartime skies.____________The Hurricane Girls is the thrilling, moving and inspirational story of the female air force who once ruled our skies.By Stephen Church. 2017
Henry III was a medieval king whose long reign continues to have a profound impact on us today. He was…
on the throne for 56 years and during this time England was transformed from being the private play-thing of a French speaking dynasty into a medieval state in which the king answered for his actions to an English parliament, which emerged during Henry's lifetime. Despite Henry's central importance for the birth of parliament and the development of a state recognisably modern in many of its institutions, it is Henry's most vociferous opponent, Simon de Montfort, who is in many ways more famous than the monarch himself. Henry is principally known today as the driving force behind the building of Westminster Abbey, but he deserves to be better understood for many reasons - as Stephen Church's sparkling account makes clear.Part of the Penguin Monarchs series: short, fresh, expert accounts of England's rulers in a highly collectible formatBy Richard Barber. 2014
Henry II (1154-89) through a series of astonishing dynastic coups became the ruler of an enormous European empire. One of…
the most dynamic, restless and clever men ever to rule England, he was brought down both by his catastrophic relationship with his archbishop Thomas Becket and his debilitating arguments with his sons, most importantly the future Richard I and King John. His empire may have ultimately collapsed, but in Richard Barber's vivid and sympathetic account the reader can see why Henry II left such a compelling impression on his contemporaries.By Edmund King. 2018
'To be a medieval king was a job of work ... This was a man who knew how to run…
a complex organization. He was England's CEO'The youngest of William the Conqueror's sons, Henry I came to unchallenged power only after two of his brothers died in strange hunting accidents and he had imprisoned the other. He was destined to become one of the greatest of all medieval monarchs, both through his own ruthlessness, and through his dynastic legacy. Edmund King's engrossing portrait shows a strikingly charismatic, intelligent and fortunate man, whose rule was looked back on as the real post-conquest founding of England as a new realm: wealthy, stable, bureaucratised and self-confident.By Chips Channon. 2021
The second volume of the remarkable, Sunday Times bestselling diaries of Chips Channon.'A masterpiece - a time machine that transports…
the reader back to British politics and high society at the end of the 1930s.' Robert Harris'The uncensored, unvarnished thought of one of the 20th century's greatest diarists. - Best Biographies of the Year, Telegraph'An unrivalled guide to the social and political life of Britain in the first half of the 20th century.' Books of the Year, The Times'Fascinating.' New Statesman'Never a dull day, never a dull sentence.' Daily Mail_______________________________________________This second volume of the bestselling diaries of Henry 'Chips' Channon takes us from the heady aftermath of the Munich agreement, when the Prime Minister so admired by Chips was credited with having averted a general European conflagration, through the rapid unravelling of appeasement, and on to the tribulations of the early years of the Second World War. It closes with a moment of hope, as Channon, in recording the fall of Mussolini in July 1943, reflects: 'The war must be more than half over.'For much of this period, Channon is genuinely an eye-witness to unfolding events. He reassures Neville Chamberlain as he fights for his political life in May 1940. He chats to Winston Churchill while the two men inspect the bombed-out chamber of the House of Commons a few months later. From his desk at the Foreign Office he charts the progress of the war. But with the departure of his boss 'Rab' Butler to the Ministry of Education, and Channon's subsequent exclusion from the corridors of power, his life changes - and with it the preoccupations and tone of the diaries. The conduct of the war remains a constant theme, but more personal preoccupations come increasingly to the fore. As he throws himself back into the pleasures of society, he records his encounters with the likes of Noël Coward, Prince Philip, General de Gaulle and Oscar Wilde's erstwhile lover Lord Alfred Douglas. He describes dinners with members of European royal dynasties, and recounts gossip and scandal about the great, the good and the less good. And he charts the implosion of his marriage and his burgeoning, passionate friendship with a young officer on Wavell's staff.These are diaries that bring a whole epoch vividly to life.By Chips Channon. 2021
The Sunday Times bestselling edition of Chips Channon's remarkable diaries.Born in Chicago in 1897, 'Chips' Channon settled in England after…
the Great War, married into the immensely wealthy Guinness family, and served as Conservative MP for Southend-on-Sea from 1935 until his death in 1958. His career was unremarkable. His diaries are quite the opposite. Elegant, gossipy and bitchy by turns, they are the unfettered observations of a man who went everywhere and who knew everybody. Whether describing the antics of London society in the interwar years, or the growing scandal surrounding his close friends Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson during the abdication crisis, or the mood in the House of Commons in the lead up to the Munich crisis, his sense of drama and his eye for the telling detail are unmatched. These are diaries that bring a whole epoch vividly to life. A heavily abridged and censored edition of the diaries was published in 1967. Only now, sixty years after Chips's death, can an extensive text be shared.________________________________'Chips perfectly embodied the qualities vital to the task: a capacious ear for gossip, a neat turn of phrase, a waspish desire to tell all, and easy access to the highest social circles across Europe.[...] Blending Woosterish antics with a Lady Bracknellesque capacity for acid comment. Replete with fascinating insights.' Jesse Norman, Financial TimesBy Chips Channon. 2022
This third and final volume of the unexpurgated diaries of Sir Henry 'Chips' Channon begins as the Second World War…
is turning in the Allies' favour. It ends with Chips descending into poor health but still able to turn a pointed phrase about the political events that swirl around him and the great and the good with whom he mingles.Throughout these final fourteen years Chips assiduously describes events in and around Westminster, gossiping about individual MPs' ambitions and indiscretions, but also rising powerfully to the occasion to capture the mood of the House on VE Day or the ceremony of George VI's funeral. His energies, though, are increasingly absorbed by a private life that at times reaches Byzantine levels of complexity. We encounter the London of the theatre and the cinema, peopled by such figures as John Gielgud, Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh and Douglas Fairbanks Jr, as well as a seemingly endless grand parties at which Chips might well rub shoulders with Cecil Beaton, the Mountbattens, or any number of dethroned European monarchs. He has been described as 'The greatest British diarist of the 20th century'. This final volume fully justifies that accolade.By Sean O'Driscoll. 2022
'Fascinating . . . O'Driscoll's research is impressive' Ben Macintyre, The Times_____The story behind the hit movie Baltimore, starring Imogen…
Poots.The astonishing story of the English heiress who devoted her life to the IRA.She grew up in a Chelsea townhouse and on a Devon estate.She was presented to the Queen at Buckingham Palace as a debutante in 1958.She trained at Oxford as an academic economist and had a love affair with a female professor (who was on the rebound from Iris Murdoch).At thirty, she commenced giving her inheritance away to the poor.In 1972, the deadliest year of the Northern Irish Troubles, she travelled to Ireland and joined the IRA.Sean O'Driscoll's Heiress, Rebel, Vigilante, Bomber tells the astonishing story of Rose Dugdale, who went on to become a committed terrorist, participating in a major art heist and a bombing raid on a police and army barracks; who kept a pregnancy secret for nine months in prison and gave birth there; and who ended up at the heart of the IRA's bomb-making operation during its deadly final spasms in the 1990s. Heiress, Rebel, Vigilante, Bomber is both the page-turning biography of a remarkable woman and a groundbreaking account of the inner workings of a terrorist organization._____'It would be hard to overstate how good this book is . . . a fantastic read' Sunday Independent'Superb . . . an even-handed and thrilling gallop through [Dugdale's] improbable life' Daily Telegraph'Excellent' Michael McDowell, Irish Times'Possibly the most extraordinary book you'll read this year' Irish Examiner'Jaw-dropping' Joe Duffy'Well-researched' Irish Times