A comprehensive look at the Boxer Rebellion of 1898-1900, a bloody uprising in north China against native Christians and foreign missionaries.

    

    A compassionate and discerning exploration of the complex relationship between the server, the served, and the world they lived in, Servants opens a window onto British society from the Edwardian period to the present.

    Saxons, Vikings, and Celts, which resulted from a systematic ten-year DNA survey of more than 10,000 volunteers, traces the true genetic makeup of the British Isles and its descendants, taking readers from the Pontnewydd cave in North Wales to the resting place of "The Red Lady" of Paviland and the tomb of King Arthur. Genealogy has become a popular pastime of Americans interested in their heritage, and this is the perfect work for anyone interested in finding their heritage in England, Scotland, or Ireland.

    In prose that is, at once, both clear-eyed and full of acerbic wit, Sanghera shows how our past is everywhere: from how we live to how we think, from the foundation of the NHS to the nature of our racism, from our distrust of intellectuals in public life to the exceptionalism that imbued the campaign for Brexit and the government's early response to the Covid crisis. And yet empire is a subject, weirdly hidden from view.The British Empire ran for centuries and covered vast swathes of the world. It is, as Sanghera reveals, fundamental to understanding Britain. However, even among those who celebrate the empire there seems to be a desire not to look at it too closely - not to include the subject in our school history books, not to emphasize it too much in our favourite museums.At a time of great division, when we are arguing about what it means to be British, Sanghera's book urges us to address this bewildering contradiction. For, it is only by stepping back and seeing where we really come from, that we can begin to understand who we are, and what unites us.

    Reading it is like unravelling the bandages on a mummy to find the face of the past staring back in all its terrible and poignant humanity’ Financial TimesA groundbreaking account of what it was like to live in a Victorian body from one of our best historians.Why did the great philosophical novelist George Eliot feel so self-conscious that her right hand was larger than her left?Exactly what made Darwin grow that iconic beard in 1862, a good five years after his contemporaries had all retired their razors?Who knew Queen Victoria had a personal hygiene problem as a young woman and the crisis that followed led to a hurried commitment to marry Albert?What did John Sell Cotman, a handsome drawing room operator who painted some of the most exquisite watercolours the world has ever seen, feel about marrying a woman whose big nose made smart people snigger?How did a working-class child called Fanny Adams disintegrate into pieces in 1867 before being reassembled into a popular joke, one we still reference today, but would stop, appalled, if we knew its origins?Kathryn Hughes follows a thickened index finger or deep baritone voice into the realms of social history, medical discourse, aesthetic practise and religious observance – its language is one of admiring glances, cruel sniggers, an implacably turned back. The result is an eye-opening, deeply intelligent, groundbreaking account that brings the Victorians back to life and helps us understand how they lived their lives.

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    Helplessness in the face of disease and human disaster helped to perpetuate this belief in magic and the supernatural. As Keith Thomas shows, England during these years resembled in many ways today's underdeveloped areas. The English population was exceedingly liable to pain, sickness, and premature death; many were illiterate; epidemics such as the bubonic plague plowed through English towns, at times cutting the number of London's inhabitants by a sixth; fire was a constant threat; the food supply was precarious; and for most diseases there was no effective medical remedy. In this fascinating and detailed book, Keith Thomas shows how magic, like the medieval Church, offered an explanation for misfortune and a means of redress in times of adversity. The supernatural thus had its own practical utility in daily life. Some forms of magic were challenged by the Protestant Reformation, but only with the increased search for scientific explanation of the universe did the English people begin to abandon their recourse to the supernatural. Science and technology have made us less vulnerable to some of the hazards which confronted the people of the past. Yet Religion and the Decline of Magic concludes that if magic is defined as the employment of ineffective techniques to allay anxiety when effective ones are not available, then we must recognize that no society will ever be free from it.

    She introduces us to men and women from all walks of life: gentlewoman Anne Dormer in her stately Oxfordshire mansion, bachelor clerk and future novelist Anthony Trollope in his dreary London lodgings, genteel spinsters keeping up appearances in two rooms with yellow wallpaper, servants with only a locking box to call their own.Vickery makes ingenious use of upholsterer’s ledgers, burglary trials, and other unusual sources to reveal the roles of house and home in economic survival, social success, and political representation during the long eighteenth century.

    It was a time of uncertainty and incessant warfare, a time during which the crown was constantly contested, alliances were made and broken, and peasants and townsmen alike arose in revolt. This was the raw material of Shakespeare's dramas, and Norwich holds up his work to the light of history to ask: Who was the real Falstaff? How accurate a historian was the playwright? Shakespeare's Kings is a marvelous study of the Bard's method of spinning history into art, and a captivating portrait of the Middle Ages.

    Continuous warfare became an accepted way of life in the Victorian era, and in the process the size of the British Empire quadrupled.But engrossing as these small wars are—and they bristle with bizarre, tragic, and often humorous incident—it is the officers and men who fought them that dominate this book. With their courage, foolhardiness, and eccentricities, they are an unforgettable lot.

    Although almost six centuries old, the Battle of Agincourt still captivates the imaginations of men and women on both sides of the Atlantic. It has been immortalized in high culture (Shakespeare's Henry V) and low (the New York Post prints Henry's battle cry on its editorial page each Memorial Day). It is the classic underdog story in the history of warfare, and generations have wondered how the English -- outnumbered by the French six to one -- could have succeeded so bravely and brilliantly. Drawing upon a wide range of sources, eminent scholar Juliet Barker casts aside the legend and shows us that the truth behind Agincourt is just as exciting, just as fascinating, and far more significant. She paints a gripping narrative of the October 1415 clash between outnumbered English archers and heavily armored French knights. But she also takes us beyond the battlefield into palaces and common cottages to bring into vivid focus an entire medieval world in flux. Populated with chivalrous heroes, dastardly spies, and a ferocious and bold king, Agincourt is as earthshaking as its subject -- and confirms Juliet Barker's status as both a historian and a storyteller of the first rank.

    During the last twelve years, half of the Man Booker awards went to novels written in non-standard English. What would once have been derogatorily termed "dialect literature" has come into its own in a language known variously as slang, creole, patois, pidgin, or, in the words of Nigerian novelist Ken Saro-Wiwa, "rotten English."The first anthology of its kind, "Rotten English" celebrates vernacular literature from around the English-speaking world, from Robert Burns, Mark Twain, and Zora Neale Hurston to Papua New Guinea's John Kasaipwalova and Tobago's Marlene Nourbese Philip. With concise introductions that explain the context and aesthetics of the vernacular tradition, Rotten English pays tribute to the changes English has undergone as it has become a global language.Contents:"Raal right singin'": vernacular poetry. Colonization in reverse" and Bans O'killing by Louise BennettWings of a dove by Kamau BrathwaiteAuld lang syne, Highland Mary, and "Bonnie Lesley" by Robert BurnsA negro love song and When Malindy sings by Paul Laurence DunbarMother to son and Po' boy blues by Langston HughesInglan is a bitch by Linton Kwesi JohnsonWukhand by Paul Keens-DouglasTommy by Rudyard KiplingUnrelated incidents-no.3 by Tom LeonardComin back ower the border by Mary McCabeQuashie to Buccra by Claude McKayDis poem by MutabarukaQuestions! Questions! by M. NourbeSe Philipno more love poems #1 by Ntozake Shange"So like I say ... ": vernacular short stories. Po' Sandy by Charles ChestnuttThe brief wondrous life of Oscar Wao by Junot DiazLetters from Whetu by Patricia GraceSpunk and Story in Harlem slang by Zora Neale HurstonBetel nut is bad magic for airplanes by John KasaipwalovaJoebell and America by Earl LovelaceThe ghost of Firozsha Baag by Rohinton MistryThe celebrated jumping frog of Calaveras County and A True story, repeated word for word as I heard it by Mark TwainA soft touch and Granny's old junk by Irvine WelshOnly the dead know Brooklyn by Thomas Wolfe. "I wanna say I am somebody": selections from vernacular novels. from True history of the Kelly Gang by Peter Careyfrom The snapper by Roddy Doylefrom Once there were warriors by Alan DuffAn overture to the commencement of a very rigid journey by Jonathan Safran Foerfrom Beasts of no nation by Uzodinma IwealaBaywatch and de preacher from Tide running by Oonya KempadooFace, from Rolling the R's by R. Zamora Linmarkfrom Londonstani by Gautam Malkanifrom No mate for the magpie by Frances Molloyfrom Push by Sapphirefrom Sozaboy: a novel in rotten English by Ken Saro-Wiwafrom The housing lark by Sam Selvon. "A new English": essays on vernacular literature. The African writer and the English. language by Chinua AchebeHow to tame a wild tongue by Gloria AnzalduaIf Black English isn't a language, then tell me what is? by James Baldwinfrom History of the voice: the development of nation language in Anglophone Caribbean poetry by Kamau Brathwaitefrom Minute on Indian education by Thomas MacaulayAfrican speech ... English words by Gabriel OkaraThe absence of writing or How I almost became a spy by M. NourbeSe PhilipMother tongue by Amy Tan

    By contrast, this book examines the effects of the empire on men, women and children across the globe: both those under imperial rule and those who implemented it. Looking beyond politics and diplomacy, Philippa Levine combines a traditional approach to colonial history with an investigation of the experience of living within the empire.Spanning the period from Cromwell's rule to decolonization in the late twentieth century, and including an extensive chronology for ease of reference, Levine considers the impact of British rule for people in Africa, India and Australia, as well as for the English rulers, and for the Welsh, Scots and Irish who were subject to 'internal colonialism' under the English yoke. Imperialism often led to serious unrest; Levine examines the cruel side of imperialism's purportedly 'civilizing' mission unflinchingly.

    Sir Michael had become increasingly alarmed at the effect Gandhi was having on his province, as well as recent demonstrations, strikes, and shows of Hindu-Muslim unity. All these things, to Sir Michael, were a precursor to a second Indian revolt. What happened next shocked the world. An unauthorized gathering in the Jallianwallah Bagh in Amritsar in April 1919 became the focal point for Sir Michael’s law enforcers. Dyer marched his soldiers into the walled garden, blocking the only exit. Then, without issuing any order to disperse, he instructed his men to open fire, turning their guns on the thickest parts of the crowd, filled with over a thousand unarmed men, women, and children. For ten minutes, the soldiers continued firing, stopping only when they ran out of ammunition. According to legend, eighteen-year-old Sikh orphan Udham Singh was injured in the attack, and remained surrounded by the dead and dying until he was able to move the next morning. Then, he supposedly picked up a handful of blood-soaked earth, smeared it across his forehead, and vowed to kill the men responsible. The truth, as the author has discovered, is more complex—but no less dramatic. Award-winning journalist Anita Anand traced Singh’s journey through Africa, the United States, and across Europe until, in March 1940, he finally arrived in front of O’Dwyer himself in a London hall ready to shoot him down. The Patient Assassin shines a devastating light on one of history’s most horrific events, but it reads like a taut thriller and reveals the incredible but true story behind a legend that still endures today.