"A very readable book which portrays the human being behind the music, increasing our love of both." Yehudi Menuhin, from inside cover.

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    Behind the façade of enemy and Swedish propaganda the central character is discovered: more dependent on others, more complex and with wider interests than usually assumed – a man who regarded someone without mathematics as 'lacking one sense', who cared for social justice as well as for architecture and deserved in some measure the label of 'philosopher' bestowed on him by one of Louis XIV's diplomats.Riddles no doubt remain, but answers have been attempted to the questions which contemporaries and posterity alike have asked: did Charles' just war of defence have aggressive aspects? Why did he pay homage to Mars but not to Venus? How was the offensive of 1718 mounted and what were its objectives? Was he, as many historians still hold, murdered by someone on his own side or was the shot that ended his life that of an 'honest enemy bullet'?

    Nicolson called his book a gallery of portraits, e.g. Saint Simon, elegant, a social climber; the dashing Prince Potemkin; Count Cagliostro, practitioner of black arts; Thomas Paine, inflamer of the masses; Jacques Casanova, lover, pornographer, and con man. This single masterful volume synthesizes, through people and events, the 18th century ideals of reason and liberty, the attack on superstition, tradition and authority that shook the world and produced a revolution in values. New Introduction by Adam Nicolson, Harold Nicolson's grandson.

    He worked in her father's stables. Unable to restrain their emotions or cool their desire, they fled secure surroundings for a harsh, uncertain future. With only tender passion and bold dreams to sustain them, they forged a prosperous country empire -- a proud heritage for another generation.ALL EARTH TO LOVE begins the magnificent saga of a remarkable English family chronicled for four generations in the "Hastingford Trilogy."

    Robert Darnton, in his lively study of mesmerism and its relation to eighteenth-century radical political thought and popular scientific notions, provides a useful contribution to the study of popular culture and the manner in which ideas are diffused down through various social levels.