This week I finished Sallust’s The Jugurthine War (translated by A.J. Woodman), Michael J. Lotus and James C. Bennett’s America 3.0, and Vaclav Smil’s fantastic The Earth’s Biosphere: Evolution, Dynamics, and Change.
Before the month is over I hope to read or finish:
William Freehling’s Road to Disunion: Secessionists at Bay, 1776-1850
Ji Junxiang’s The Orphan of Zhao. (Trans by Liu Jeng En).
Charles Murray’s Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010
Michael Lowe’s The Government of the Qin And Han Empires: 221 Bce-220 Ce
Appian’s The Civil Wars (Trans by John Carter).
What are you reading?
The Freehling book was a pleasure to read. Maybe I ought to reread it this month.
On your advice I'm reading Emmanuel Todd, "A Convergence of Civilizations".
@mmandias –
I am a bit surprised with it. I picked up the book because I read Freehling's Prelude to Civil War: The Nullification Crisis in South Carolina earlier this year. (Reviewed it here). Prelude surprised me with both the focused intensity of its writing and its relevance to much broader issues than the single incident covered in the book. It is a model of what a historical monograph should be. I was expecting a similar thing with Road to Disunion. Freehling's wit is still there, but the style is very different – he seems pretty committed to writing a true narrative history. These days that is a bold thing to do. Not bad, but different.
@Breviosity – you will have to tell me how it goes. I am not real familiar with that book or its claims (save that he addresses Samuel Huntington's famous thesis), but I am curious. Todd has gotten most of his predictions right so far; his predictions for the 21st century are probably worth listening to.
The Thirty Years War by CV Wedgwood (audio recording)
The Thirty Years War: Europe's Tragedy by Peter H. Wilson
Given the Muddle East seems condemned to its own variant of this conflict, I wanted better to understand it.
The Wars for Asia: 1911-1949 by S.C.M. Paine
Because to understand the geopolitics of East Asia today, thoroughly understanding how the Chinese Civil War and the Japanese aggression imof the first half of the Twentieth Century seems mandatory.
The 30 Years War is worth studying. So firmly do I believe this, I wrote a post about it:
"Musings – the Cognitive Consequences of Historical Metaphors"
You may find the contention of that post – that the study of the 30 Years War is more important for today's statesmen than the study of the Second World War – interesting.
Paine's Wars for Asia is near the top of my 'top priority' wish list.
'A Convergence of Civilizations' has been on my list but I don't know when/whether I'll get to it.
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On my definite to-read list:
A. Gilbert, 'Must Global Politics Constrain Democracy?'
(1999)
[prob. just the into and first 2 chapters]
Rousseau (various)
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On the possible list:
Hobsbawm, 'The Age of Empire'
D.A. Bell, 'The First Total War'
L. Khalili, 'Time in the Shadows: Confinement in Counterinsurgencies'
Schumpeter, "Sociology of Imperialism" in 'Imperialism/Social Classes'
M. Fabry, 'Recognizing States'
D. Levine, 'Recovering International Relations'
correction:
"into" shd be "intro"