Category Archives: B - READING - Page 20

READING – MARCH 2011

Posted by on March 31, 2011 No comments

(Ben­jamin Isakhan & Stephen Stock­well –ed.) The Secret His­to­ry of Democracy:
. . . . 19453. (Ben­jamin Isakhan & Stephen Stock­well) Democ­ra­cy and His­to­ry [pref­ace]
. . . . 19454. (Ben­jamin Isakhan) What is so “Prim­i­tive” about “Prim­i­tive Democracy”?
. . . . . . . . . . ― Com­par­ing the Ancient Mid­dle East and Clas­si­cal Athens [arti­cle] Read more »

READING – FEBRUARY 2011

Posted by on February 28, 2011 No comments

19364. (George Mac­Don­ald Fras­er) Flashman
19365. (Ken­neth Pomer­anz) The Mak­ing of a Hin­ter­land ― State, Soci­ety, and Econ­o­my in
. . . . . . Inland North Chi­na, 1853–1937
19366. (Antho­ny H. Birch) The Con­cepts & The­o­ries of Mod­ern Democ­ra­cy Read more »

READING – JANUARY 2011

Posted by on January 31, 2011 No comments

19320. (Jules Verne) Cinq Semaines en ballon
19321. (Steve Muhlberg­er) [in blog Muhlberg­er’s Ear­ly His­to­ry] Ago­ra (2009) [film review]
19322. (Fran­cis Spufford) Red Plen­ty Read more »

Ordering The Secret History of Democracy online

Posted by on January 17, 2011 No comments

It’s a bit pricey for most peo­ple I know, but if you’re in a posi­tion to rec­om­mend it to a library, fac­ul­ty, or insti­tu­tion, do so. In addi­tion to chap­ters by myself and old friend Steven Muhlberg­er, the con­trib­u­tors are Ben­jamin Isakhan, Stephen Stock­well, John Keane, Laris­sa Behrendt, Pauline Keat­ing, Mohamad Abdal­la & Hal­im Rane, Patri­cia Pires Boul­hosa, Luisa Gan­dol­fo, I.Kissa, and P.Fry.

Pre-orders in Cana­da from Chap­ters-Indi­go online (avail­able April 12)

in the U.S.A from Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble (avail­able April 12)

in the U.K. and Europe from Amazon.uk (avail­able Feb­ru­ary 11)

in Aus­tralia from EmporiumBooks.com.au (avail­able March 11)

“The thought-pro­vok­ing essays gath­ered in The Secret His­to­ry of Democ­ra­cy pro­vide con­vinc­ing evi­dence that demo­c­ra­t­ic mech­a­nisms have been invent­ed many times and in many places, includ­ing times and places neglect­ed in com­mon accounts. This col­lec­tion is a sober­ing reminder that demo­c­ra­t­ic prac­tices have often been suc­ceed­ed by some­thing else. But one also takes away a sense of the dynam­ic char­ac­ter of demo­c­ra­t­ic his­to­ry and the end­less diver­si­ty of prac­tices with some rea­son­able claim to embody demo­c­ra­t­ic prin­ci­ples. As grow­ing num­bers won­der about what sorts of polit­i­cal insti­tu­tions make sense in the face of the enor­mous prob­lems con­fronting the twen­ty-first cen­tu­ry, this demon­stra­tion of the long human his­to­ry of polit­i­cal cre­ativ­i­ty gives some rea­son for hope.”
-John Markoff

“A fas­ci­nat­ing, thought-pro­vok­ing and well-informed sur­vey of lit­tle-known “roots of democ­ra­cy” and “pro­to-demo­c­ra­t­ic” sys­tems and move­ments across the globe , from ancient and “prim­i­tive” to mod­ern soci­eties. An eye-open­er that forces us to dif­fer­en­ti­ate more care­ful­ly and to rethink the his­to­ry of democracy.”
- Kurt Raaflaub

“This excit­ing book sure­ly enlivens and enrich­es our debate on democ­ra­cy and its future by dig­ging afresh oft-for­got­ten, yet most enlight­en­ing demo­c­ra­t­ic expe­ri­ences found in human history. ”
- Takashi Inoguchi


READING – DECEMBER 2010

Posted by on December 31, 2010 No comments

19301. (Theodore Stur­geon) Some of Your Blood
19303. (Steve Muhlberg­er) [in blog Muhlberg­er’s Ear­ly His­to­ry] Review of Joust­ing in
. . . . . Medieval and Renais­sance Iberia by Noel Fallows
19303. (A. Mer­ritt) The Ship of Ishtar Read more »

READING – NOVEMBER 2010

Posted by on November 30, 2010 No comments

19281. (Wal­ter Scott) Waver­ley, or ‘Tis Six­ty Years Hence
19282. (Charles L. Har­ness) Lunar Justice
19283. (Marie Corel­li) A Romance of Two Worlds
19284. (Thomas Bur­nett Swann) How Are the Mighty Fall­en Read more »

The Sensual Fantasies of Thomas Burnett Swann

Posted by on November 15, 2010 No comments

Back in 1987, I read Thomas Bur­nett Swan­n’s Day of the Mino­taur, and enjoyed it, but did not fol­low through with any more of his books until recent weeks. Now, read­ing four more of his nov­els gives me a bet­ter appre­ci­a­tion of this odd fan­ta­sy writer, who descends more from the Pre-Raphaelites, Lord Dun­sany, and James Branch Cabell than the more usu­al fan­ta­sist’s pat­ri­mo­ny of Tolkien and Howard. Read more »

19281. (Walter Scott) Waverley, or ‘Tis Sixty Years Hence

Posted by on November 9, 2010 No comments

When Wal­ter Scott pub­lished the first of his nov­els, Waver­ley, in 1814, he was already well-known as a poet. The book was so spec­tac­u­lar­ly suc­cess­ful that it launched him on a career as a nov­el­ist known in every cor­ner of the world. His influ­ence in 19th Cen­tu­ry Cana­da, for instance, was such that nobody with pre­ten­tion to edu­ca­tion was with­out a set of “Waver­ley nov­els”. When I worked on var­i­ous Ontario farms, I often saw them in Vic­to­ri­an-era farm­hous­es. I found a com­plete set in a barn, for which I nego­ti­at­ed pay­ment in hay bal­ing. That set (gor­geous­ly bound) is long gone, but now I have anoth­er, acquired in a small Ontario town. Many of the scenes and char­ac­ters of Scot­t’s nov­els are pre­served in Toron­to street names. Any­one famil­iar with Cana­di­an his­to­ry knows that in the 19th Cen­tu­ry, its lit­er­ary icons were, in descend­ing order of impor­tance: the Bible, Rob­by Burns*, Shake­speare, Scott, and Dick­ens. Read more »

Tuesday, November 2, 2010 — The Secret History of Democracy: Publication Dates

Posted by on November 2, 2010 No comments

My long-time friend and col­league, Steve Muhlberg­er and I both have chap­ters in an upcom­ing book which may inter­est read­ers of this blog. The book is The Secret His­to­ry of Democ­ra­cy, edit­ed by Ben­jamin Isakhan and Steven Stock­well, and pub­lished by Pal­grave Macmil­lan. Read more »

READING – OCTOBER 2010

Posted by on October 31, 2010 No comments

19235. (James Boswell) Boswell’s Lon­don Jour­nal, 1762–1763 [ed. F. A. Pottle]
19236. (Eric Lin­klater) White-Maa’s Saga
19237. [2] (Charles Dar­win) The Ori­gin of Species by Means of Nat­ur­al Selection
19238. (Steve King­stone) How Pres­i­dent Lula Changed Brazil [arti­cle]
19239. (Isaac White) Review of Scott Pil­grim vs. the World [film review]
19240. (Thomas Bur­nett Swann) The Minikins of Yam
 Read more »