Showing results by narrator "Roger Davis" in All Categories

The story of one of the most brilliant, flamboyant and historically important men who ever lived. From the very beginning, Caesar's story makes dazzling reading. In his late teens he narrowly avoided execution for opposing the military dictator Sulla. He was decorated for valour in battle...

Based on the series produced for the BBC World Service A Financial Times and Bloomberg Business Week Book of the Year Who thought up paper money? How did the contraceptive pill change the face of the legal profession? Why was the horse collar as important for human progress as the steam engine?...

Opening with a panorama of Russian society, from the cloistered world of the Tsar to the brutal life of the peasants, A People’s Tragedy follows workers, soldiers, intellectuals and villagers as their world is consumed by revolution and then degenerates into violence and dictatorship. Drawing on vast original research, Figes conveys above all the shocking experience of the revolution for those who lived it, while providing the clearest and most cogent account of how and why it unfolded.

A brilliantly original history of the First World War, re-tracing the footsteps of the Indian Army's 1.5 million men who in 1914-18 served about the globe from Europe to Africa, Asia and the Indian Ocean. After years of neglect, The Indian Empire at War raises the curtain on the Indian soldiers'...

How do people of seemingly ordinary talent go on to achieve unexpected results? What can we learn from them? What are the ingredients for unreasonable success and how is it achieved? In this ground-breaking book, bestselling author Richard Koch charts a map of success, identifying the nine key...

In a novel of extraordinary richness the whole sweep of British civilisation unfolds through the story of one place, Salisbury, from beyond recorded time to the present day. The landscape - as old as time itself - shapes the destinies of the five families....

From back-office accountant to front-line executive, the rapid rise of the chief financial officer is unrivalled by any other corporate role. With access to every facet of the business, CFOs now wield a level of influence matched only by chief executives. This book explains how CFOs earned their privileged position, and what the future may hold for them. It describes their ever-expanding role, and how they are transforming their departments to help them deal with it.

How to live a better life. One of the most important books on Western philosophy - a powerful and inspirational guide for the complicated world of today 'Refreshing and restorative' GUARDIAN 'An ancient work of spiritual reflection which remains a powerful reminder of how we could live a more...

Why does it feel like something to be alive? For one of the boldest thinkers in neuroscience, solving this puzzle has been a lifetime's quest. Now at last, Mark Solms, who discovered the brain mechanism for dreaming, has arrived at his answer. More than just a philosophical argument, the Free Energy theory will profoundly change how you understand your own existence.

The Great War was the first truly global conflict and it changed the course of world history. In this magnum opus, critically acclaimed historian Peter Hart examines the conflict in every arena around the world, in a history that combines cutting-edge scholarship with vivid and unfamiliar eyewitness accounts, from kings and generals, and ordinary soldiers. 

LONGLISTED FOR THE FT/MCKINSEY BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD 2020 'A brilliant new book' Daily Telegraph 'Well written . . . and often entertaining' The Times 'A sparkling analysis' Prospect 'Entertaining and enlightening . . . This is a necessary critique and they make it with verve...

Madagascar's lost pirate utopia represents some of the first stirrings of Enlightenment political thought. In this jewel of a book, he offers a way to 'decolonise the Enlightenment', demonstrating how this mixed community experimented with an alternative vision of human freedom, far from that being formulated in the salons and coffee houses of Europe. Its actors were Malagasy women, merchants and traders, philosopher kings and escaped slaves, exploring ideas that were ultimately to be put into practice in by Western revolutionary regimes a century later. 

NATIONAL BESTSELLER Timeless insights into what it takes to lead a meaningful life—still profoundly relevant nearly two thousand years later. Now featuring a brand-new foreword from Ryan Holiday, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Obstacle Is the Way! “Meditations offers a...

An 'entertaining, informative and utterly depressing global history of an important commodity . . . By alerting readers to the ways that modernity's very origins are entangled with a seemingly benign and delicious substance, Sugar raises fundamental questions about our world.' Sven Beckert, the...

Only three short years after the end of the Japanese occupation, war came again to Malaya. The Chinese-backed guerrillas called it the War of the Running Dogs - their contemptuous term for those in Malaya who remained loyal to the British. The British Government referred to this bloody and costly struggle as the 'Malayan Emergency'. Yet it was a war that lasted twelve years and cost thousands of lives. By the time it was over Malaya had obtained its independence - but on British, not on Chinese or Communist terms.

This is a comprehensive history of Portugal that covers the whole span, from the Stone Age to today. An introduction provides an understanding of geographical and climatic issues, before an examination of Portugal's prehistory and classical Portugal, from the Stone Age to the end of the the Roman era. Portugal's history from AD 420 to the 13th century takes in the Suevi, Visigoths and Moors. Then, a look at medieval Portugal, covers the development of Christian Portugal culminating with the expulsion of the Moors, with a focus on key sites.  

A publishing sensation, the publication of Victor Klemperer's diaries brings to light one of the most extraordinary documents of the Nazi period. 'A classic ... Klemperer's diary deserves to rank alongside that of Anne Frank's' SUNDAY TIMES 'I can't remember when I read a more engrossing book'...

This is a concise history, intended for travellers, but of inestimable value to anyone looking for an overview of the Caribbean and its mainland coastal states, with a focus on the past few centuries. The history of the Caribbean does not make much sense without factoring in the cities - Pensacola, New Orleans, Galveston - and the ambitions of the states on its continental shores, notably the United States. This account is grounded in a look at the currents and channels of the sea, and its constraints, followed by the history of 'pre-contact' civilisations.

'Endlessly insightful and full of surprises - exactly what you would expect from Tim Harford' BILL BRYSON 'Entertaining . . . A lively introduction to some of the most ingenious, yet often overlooked inventions that have changed the way we live' The Times 'Every Tim Harford book is cause for...

One of the most famous true stories from the last war, The Great Escape tells how more than 600 men in a German prisoner-of-war camp worked together to achieve an extraordinary break-out. Every night for a year, they dug tunnels, and those who weren't digging forged passports, drew maps, faked weapons and tailored German uniforms and civilian clothes to wear once they had escaped. All of this was conducted under the very noses of their prison guards.