Showing results for "Nonfiction" in World

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of A Political History of the World by Jonathan Holslag, read by Roy McMillan. In three thousand years of history, China has spent at least eleven centuries at war. The Roman Empire was in conflict during at least 50 per cent of its lifetime. Since 1776...

LONGLISTED FOR THE FINANCIAL TIMES AND SCHRODERS BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD "One of those books that changes the way you see the world. Gripping, urgent, important." ED CONWAY "This wonderful book is as welcome as it is overdue ... shines a much-needed light on this essential topic." RORY...

The ancient Greeks were exceptional and they were consequential. This innovative, engrossingly written book addresses head-on the problematic question of the Greek Miracle. It will appeal to anyone interested in the ancient world and its modern meaning. Reviel Netz boldly argues that the...

A fascinating and surprising history of the world told through the lines people have drawn on maps, described by Richard Osman as 'an absolutely incredible present for anyone who's interested in the world at all, which is sort of all of us' (The Rest Is Entertainment podcast) * * * Pre-order...

Brought to you by Penguin. In this paradigm-shifting global history of how humanity has reshaped the planet, and the planet has shaped human history, Sunil Amrith twins the stories of environment and Empire, of genocide and eco-cide, of the expansion of human freedom and its costs. Drawing on an...

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Do tough times create tougher people? Can humanity handle the power of its weapons without destroying itself? Will human technology ever peak or regress? And why, since the dawn of time, has it always seemed as though death and destruction are waiting just around...

What is 'Central Europe'? Where do its borders lie? Does it even exist? Attempts to define it usually yield more questions than answers. But perhaps the wrong questions are being asked. Luka Ivan Jukic disentangles the enigma of Central Europe through its birth, death, and rebirth. Today, Poland...

Brought to you by Penguin. A revelatory account of the racist conspiracy theory behind the global rise of authoritarian politics – from the prize-winning historian and number-one-bestselling author of How to Be an Antiracist, Ibram X. Kendi. Throughout the world, authoritarian movements are...

Brought to you by Penguin. An erudite and entertaining history of Moscow, a city whose rich past offers crucial insight into contemporary global politics Moscow stands at the centre of a nation comprising eleven percent of the globe’s landmass, eleven time zones and nearly one hundred and...

In February 1959, a group of nine experienced hikers in the Russian Ural Mountains died mysteriously on an elevation known as Dead Mountain. Eerie aspects of the incident—unexplained violent injuries, signs that they cut open and fled the tent without proper clothing or shoes, a strange final photograph taken by one of the hikers, and elevated levels of radiation found on some of their clothes—have led to decades of speculation over what really happened.

Brought to you by Penguin. How The Solar System Shaped Human History – And May Help Save Our Planet Our solar system is an extraordinary place where asteroids careen off course and solar winds hurl charged particles across billions of miles of space. Yet we seldom consider how these events, so...

Brought to you by Penguin. **Shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize 2024** A story of staggering scope and drama, Revolusi is the masterful and definitive account of the epic revolution that sparked the decolonisation of the modern world. *SHORTLISTED FOR THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE 2024* On a...

Some of the strangest things that ever happened are true.Stranger Nonfiction is a short narrative podcast about real events that were stranger than they had any right to be — scams, discoveries, cover-ups, mysteries, and moments when human behavior revealed something we didn't expect about ourselves.Each episode takes one true story and answers three questions: what happened, why it mattered, and what it can still teach us today.No guests. No charts. No filler. Just one story, told well, every week.Topics include history, psychology, con artistry, lost places, medical oddities, viral ...

Seventeen short nonfiction works in the public domain independently chosen by the readers. Volume 61 features articles and essays on both current and timeless topics, ranging from whether marijuana is addictive (U.S. Gov.) to what constitutes foolish behavior (Erasmus, Gelett Burgess). Sermons in Stone, an essay by Oscar Wilde on classic sculptures displayed at the British Museum, is complemented by an actual sermon (The Carnal Mind, Enmity Against God by Spurgeon), while Frederick William Shelton muses on the fleeting beauty of a ripe peach (Incidents in a Retired Life). Truth and lies, luck,...

Seventeen short nonfiction works in the public domain, independently chosen by the readers. Topics include philosophy--Bertrand Russell, Spinoza, and Epictetus; science and invention--the Wright brothers, Leibniz, arctic explorer Sir John Franklin, spider webs, and cylindrical silos; plays and cinema--Lillian Gish and Friedrich Schiller; satire--selections from Ambrose Bierce, Robert Benchley, and Seneca; biographies--Aaron Burr, and Sophia Packard of Spellman College; the murder of Archbishop Charles Seghers in Alaska in 1886; and a history of Torre Abbey in England. Summary by Sue Anderson ...

Fifteen short nonfiction works in the public domain, independently chosen by the readers. Topics include the history of aeroplanes, political speeches, travel, philosophy, Japan, the United Nations, Congressional law, rules of cricket and more. (Summary by Sue Anderson)Note: "On the Part Played by Accident in Discovery" by Ernst Mach was translated by Thomas J. McCormack.

"A regard for decency, even at the cost of success, is but the regard for one's own dignity" was novelist Joseph Conrad's take on fame, a quote from the preface to his autobiography A Personal Record (1912). Other lives chosen by readers to examine in vol. 085 include the Borgias; the Cynocephali; Hermann von Helmholtz; Edgar Allan Poe; John Burroughs; a pre-Revolutionary War magnate named Browne, who built a mansion on the ridge of a hill; women as a social class; and an 1821 rabies victim named Thomas, who exhibited hydrophobia. Political history receives scrutiny in Some Materials and a ...

Twenty short nonfiction works chosen by the readers. Is the sound of a dripping faucet music? According to Aldous Huxley, "The music of the drops is the symbol and type of the whole universe... asymptotic to sense, infinitely close to significance, but never touching it." (Water Music). Sensory and psychological exploration define several recordings in Vol. 075 (On the Pleasures of Friendship; Prohibition; The Danger of Lying in Bed; The Effects of Opium in Lowness of Spirits; How to Listen to Music; The Story of the Alphabet; Letter from William Blake; and Poets). Narrative history and ...

In May 1919, three U.S. Navy sea-planes made the first successful trans-Atlantic crossing to Europe. Lieutenant Walter Hinton was a pilot. His first hand account of this historic flight is one of 20 reader chosen selections in volume 105. Other exciting recountings include: My Toughest Trip, America's Cup Triumph, The Last Camping Match, and Up a Shot Tower. Several scientific topics are included in vol. 105: Remarkable Weather of 1911, The Scientific Presentation of History, Design of Airports, How Many Feathers Has a Bird?, Fruit Growing in the Far North, Flowering and Fruiting as Controlled...

Drawing on evidence from many fields, including archaeology, anthropology, neurology and linguistics, Sverker Johansson weaves these disparate threads together to show how our human ancestors evolved into language users. The Dawn of Language provides a fascinating survey of how grammar came into being and the differences or similarities between languages spoken around the world, before exploring how language eventually emerged in the very remote human past.