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From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, 1500 to the Present
Jacques Barzun · back to the book
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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorThe Story of Civilization (11 Volume Set)
Will Durant, Ariel Durant
The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined
Steven Pinker · 802 pages
From Goodreads: Selected by *The New York Times Book Review* as a Notable Book of the Year The author of *The New York Times* bestseller *The Stuff* of Thought offers a controversial history of violence. Faced with the ceaseless stream of news about war, crime, and terrorism, one could easily think we live in the most violent age ever seen. Yet as *New York Times* bestselling author Steven Pin
How Should We Then Live?: The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture
Francis A. Schaeffer · 288 pages
As one of the foremost evangelical thinkers of the twentieth century, Francis Schaeffer long pondered the fate of declining Western culture. In this brilliant book he analyzed the reasons for modern society's state of affairs and presented the only viable alternative: living by the Christian ethic, acceptance of God's revelation, and total affirmation of the Bible's morals, values, and meaning. -
The Rape of Europa: The Fate of Europe's Treasures in the Third Reich and the Second World War
Lynn H. Nicholas · 498 pages
A discussion on the theft and collection of great European art in World War 2.
History of Beauty
Umberto Eco, Girolamo De Michele · 438 pages
From the Publisher: What is beauty? What is art? What is taste and fashion? Is beauty something to be observed coolly and rationally or is it something dangerously involving? So begins Umberto Eco's intriguing journey into the aesthetics of beauty, in which he explores the ever-changing concept of the beautiful from the ancient Greeks to today. While closely examining the development of the visual
Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism
Peter Marshall · 778 pages
Navigating the broad "river of anarchy," from Taoism to Situationism, from Ranters to Punk rockers, from individualists to communists, from anarcho-syndicalists to anarcha-feminists, Demanding the Impossible is an authoritative and lively study of a widely misunderstood subject. It explores the key anarchist concepts of society and the state, freedom and equality, authority and power, and investig
The Waning of the Middle Ages: A Study of the Forms of Life, Thought and Art in France and the Netherlands in the Dawn of the Renaissance
Johan Huizinga · 344 pages
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
Yuval Noah Harari · 456 pages
From a renowned historian comes a groundbreaking narrative of humanity’s creation and evolution—a #1 international bestseller—that explores the ways in which biology and history have defined us and enhanced our understanding of what it means to be “human.” One hundred thousand years ago, at least six different species of humans inhabited Earth. Yet today there is only one—homo sapiens. What hap
Art in Theory 1900 - 2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas
Charles Harrison, Paul Wood · 1,288 pages
The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy
Jacob Burckhardt, Peter Murray · 462 pages
Jacob Burckhardt was born in 1818 in Basel, Switzerland. He studied history at the University of Berlin and taught art history and the Italian Renaissance in Berlin and Basel. His essay, as he called The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, was first published in 1860. Rich in its detailed account of the arts, fashions, manners, and thought of one of the most innovative eras in human history,
Doubt: A History: The Great Doubters and Their Legacy of Innovation from Socrates and Jesus to Thomas Jefferson and Emily Dickinson
Jennifer Michael Hecht · 551 pages
The Goldfinch
Donna Tartt · 817 pages
"The Goldfinch is a rarity that comes along perhaps half a dozen times per decade, a smartly written literary novel that connects with the heart as well as the mind....Donna Tartt has delivered an extraordinary work of fiction."--Stephen King, The New York Times Book Review Composed with the skills of a master, The Goldfinch is a haunted odyssey through present day America and a drama of enthra
The Renaissance
Will Durant · 776 pages
A history of the Renaissance as it flowered through Italy. Emphasizes the contributions of characters famous in history.
Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination
Peter Ackroyd · 518 pages
The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction
Walter Benjamin · 45 pages
"An attempt by literary critic Walter Benjamin to analyze the changed experience of art in modern society."--Page 4 of cover.
About Looking
John Berger · 198 pages
This successor to John Berger's Ways of Seeing, written over the last ten years, searches for meaning within and beyond what is looked at. Why do zoos disappoint children? Why do we take snapshots of those we love? How do the media use photographs of agony? When an animal looks us in the eyes, what does that look mean? Berger describes how a sixteenth-century masterpiece he saw in the 1960s com
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
Douglas R. Hofstadter · 777 pages
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, this book applies Godel's seminal contribution to modern mathematics to the study of the human mind and the development of artificial intelligence.
The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves, and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History
Robert M. Edsel · 473 pages
At the same time Adolf Hitler was attempting to take over the western world, his armies were methodically seeking and hoarding the finest art treasures in Europe. The Fuehrer had begun cataloguing the art he planned to collect as well as the art he would destroy: "degenerate" works he despised.In a race against time, behind enemy lines, often unarmed, a special force of American and British museu
A History of the World in 100 Objects
Neil MacGregor · 707 pages
Neil MacGregor's radio series 'A History of the World in 100 Objects' has been a unique event that has set a benchmark for public service broadcasting in the UK and across the world. This book will be the tie-in to that event, reproducing the scripts describing the objects that made us who we are.
The Coming of the Third Reich
Richard J. Evans · 622 pages
There is no story in twentieth-century history more important to understand than Hitler's rise to power and the collapse of civilization in Nazi Germany. With The Coming of the Third Reich, Richard Evans, one of the worlds most distinguished historians, has written the definitive account for our time. A masterful synthesis of a vast body of scholarly work integrated with important new research and
Retribution: The Battle for Japan, 1944-45
Max Hastings · 656 pages
By the summer of 1944 it was clear that Japan's defeat was inevitable, but how the drive to victory would be achieved remained unclear. The ensuing drama--that ended in Japan's utter devastation--was acted out across the vast theater of Asia in massive clashes between army, air, and naval forces.In recounting these extraordinary events, Max Hastings draws incisive portraits of MacArthur, Mao, Roos
Weimar Culture: The Outsider as Insider
Peter Gay · 222 pages