which books are really good for understanding the history of what period? Ie, if someone wanted to innoculate himself with history painlessly, even pleasantly, what would be the best novels for what period, and how reliable? And you don’t have to get as technical as I do—it just happens to be kind of a borderline period.
I’ll start with:
BRONZE AGE GREECE:
Mary Renault: *The King Must Die.* Covers pre-Greeks (Minoan era) and proto-Greeks (early invasion of Minoan-held territory by northern tribes). [futzy explanation: there were 2 invasions from the north—more or less population drift, rather than line-up-at-the-border and charge type invasions: Wave A and Wave B. Wave A was the era of most Greek legends, and the Trojan War; it also includes the fall of Minoan power and the rise of Wave A Greeks: ie, the Theseus legend, which is the subject of this book. —
A footnote just for those of you who, out of pure curiosity, would like to know what Wave B was: Wave B is the Spartans and their ilk, different accent, same language, many similarities to the Romans, who arrived in Italy close to the same time. Wave B Greeks are not in this book.]
also from Robert Graves we have
10 BC – AD 54, Rome: I Claudius and Claudius the God
1640 -1649-ish England Robert Graves – my favourite – Wife to Mr Milton, the story of Marie Powell, who married Milton when she was 16 and he 34, in 1643- it is written as her diary, and most successfully conjures up the interior life of a young woman (most certainly not happily married)
England, Civil War, 1640’s: one of my childhood favourites, mentioned above, Rosemary Sutcliffe, also wrote a very good (adult)book, The Rider on the White Horse, about a woman during the English Civil War, she was Lady Anne Fairfax, the wife of one of Cromwell’s generals, Sir Thomas Fairfax, and she travelled on campaign with him, so you get a strong woman character, her relationship with her husband, and intimate details of parts of the civil war. (by the way, Sutcliffe read Renault – asked if she admired Renault’s work, she replied “Oh yes, I get completely carried away by her books”)
There is also Tolstoy’s War and Peace set in the time of Napoleon’s invasion of Tsarist Russia.
The consensus is that it’s one of the greatest novels of all time in any language.
It gives an accurate and unforgettable picture of that historical period. There are vivid descriptions of battles and major events as well as the ordinary life of people of all social classes.
The excellent translation by Louise and Aylmer Maude is available on Project Gutenberg.
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2600
Don’t be put off by the first few chapters which are set in a high society soirée where the manners are very affected and insincere.
Sometimes readers start out and think that the whole book will be like that. It’s not. Don’t be put off. The first people you meet are very minor characters. Keep reading, and soon a major character, Pierre Bezukhov, comes blundering in to the soirée like a bull in a china shop, and after a short while the action moves elsewhere.
It’s not the easiest novel to get into, but once you do…
As someone once said, when you reach a certain point in War and Peace it’s as though great chords of music begin to sound. By the end of the novel readers often feel like the characters are members of their own family.
It needs a certain effort to get into, but it’s really worth it. Reading War and Peace for the first time is one of life’s great experiences.
went to the secondhand bookshop today – came home with a stack of penguin clasics including Claudius the God, Tolstoy’s war and peace (thanks Green Wyvern!), a first ed of Wife to Mr Milton, Grave’s Count Belisarius (end of 5th C to 565 AD – 5 years before the birth of the prophet Mohammed says RG – a Christian commander of Household Knights in the Roman empire as it battled Goths and retook Italy, fought Huns in the East, and Moors in Carthage, under the emperor Justinian); Thomas Mann’s the Holy Sinner – the medieval myth of Pope Gregory, based on the epic poem by the German poet Hartmann (c. 1165 -1210) and Mary Renault’s Fire from heaven, the first part of her Alexander trilogy 356 BC, Thrace.
Moorish Spain, 700-1460. The book is called Moorish Spain, for simplicity ;-). By R Fletcher. I might be biased by prior and otherwise gained knowledge but I think this is an easy and accessible read.
The period is often overlooked by non-European history buffs who favor Greco-Roman and British history but by doing so misses out on a real significant period when it comes to shaping what ended up as Western Civilisation (whatever that might be,lol – not entering THAT debate!)
A word to the wise: When reading books in translation try to check out who did the translation. Some translators are much better than others. I first read Kristen Lavransdatter (Sigrid Undsett) back in the seventies. It was not easy reading. I found myself mentally ‘smoothing’ as I went. Tina Nunally did a new translation around 2000. I have only read excerpts but what I have read is *very* engaging. The books take place in 14th century Norway and provide a wonderful contrast with society in Italy and France at that time.
In art history medieval art is mostly southern Europe and entirely church oriented. Undsett is the writer who gave me a sense of folk art that must have existed.
For another side of the English Civil War read Royal Escape by Georgette Heyer. It covers the time between CharlesII’s defeat at the Battle of Worcester and his escape to France six weeks later. This is real hair raising on the back of the neck stuff. Of course we know he escaped but this story brings home how narrow that escape was.
Am I remembering correctly that water was not served at noble banquets after that because, when a toast was drunk passing the glass over water signified support for Charles? It may be apocryphal but it’s still neat! 😉
Just a correction of the roman numerals — Charles II was the Restoration King – ruled 1660-85, after the Cromwellian period. He had no legitimate children and was succeeded by his brother James II. James then got deposed and replaced by his daughter Mary and her husband William, and I think then by her sister Anne, and then the crown went to the Hanovers. I believe Bonnie Prince Charlie was James II’s grandson, and he wasn’t born till 1720. His supporters, after his father’s death, referred to him as CHarles III. (And Charles I, just to be complete, was the one that got beheaded back in 1649.)
Smartcat’s point is well taken. Translations range in quality from excellent to wretched. Unfortunately, except for a few high profile classics (Home, Dante, Cervantes, and a few more) your choice in translators is usually Hobson’s Choice. I’d love to read, for example, a Cherryh translations of Commentarii de Bello Gallico but C.J. probably can’t afford to spend the time as it would take nearly as long to do a good translation as to write a new novel. (And I imagine that most of us — including me — would rather have that novel.)
I stalled out trying to read Kristen Lavransdatter sometime in the late seventies or early eighties. It’s nice to hear that a better translation may now be available. I don’t know that I’ll get a round tuit and time soon, though.
What a great list of books! Mary Renault was my introduction to the joys of historical fiction. I have reread her books numerous times. I also highly recommend all the Pearl S. Buck’s novels. I discovered both authors by happenstance in a thrift store, hard covers for just $.75 a piece! The first Buck novel I read was The Good Earth set in a Chinese village before the 1949 Revolution. Truly engaging.
Not historical fiction but an enjoyable read nonetheless is The Letters of Napoleon to Josephine. This is the collection of letters they wrote to each other and reveals the world they lived in.
If we’d been given historical fiction to read when I was in high school I think I would have become a student of history at a much younger age.
Clavell’s Shogun is my all-time favorite for insights into Japanese and particularly Samurai culture around the period of the Tokugawa Shogunate and the “discovery” of Japan by the Portuguese. Also of interest is the difference between Portuguese and Spanish sailing vessels compared to Dutch trading vessels, and their crew organization. What’s not to love – Japanese culture, a “Foreigner” in the court, a strong female lead, and sailing ships, plus politics (religious and Japanese) and international intrigue! Especially loved the exquisitly drawn description of the tea ceremony and its use to show respect in a failing/failed marriage.
The book is much better than either the two-hour movie, or the six-part serialization for TV.
While I support those who suggest reading Sigrid Undset’s books, I have to add that I found the earlier translation very good for my own reading. That may be in part because I was raised on the King James Bible, and consequently have little trouble reading Shakespeare. For those to whom Elizabethan English seems a foreign language, the newer translation is probably better. But I enjoyed the feeling of the archaic language, since the story is about 14th Century Norway. The older language is less “democratic”, and reflects the hierarchical nature of the society in the story. From what I’ve seen of the reviews on Amazon, I think my experience may not be unique in this regard. If you have trouble reading Shakespeare, don’t read the older translation. But one way or the other, DO read “Kristin Lavransdatter”!
Same two 🙂
Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey/Maturin for Georgian England and Napoleonic period.
Dorothy Dunnett’s Lymond Chronicles and House of Nicollo series, set in Bruges (the chief commercial city of the world at it’s peak), Tudor, Stewart and pre-Tudor England/Scotland, Ottoman Empire (Suleiman The Great), Venice, Genoa and Florence, the fall of Trebizond, Ivan The Terrible, the period before the fall of African commercial hub Islamic Timbuktu, the Knights Hospitaliers and James de Lusignan’s Cyprus.
I quite like Dorothy Dunnett’s King Hereafter. Gives a solid contemporary feel to Macbeth, even though Dunnett fictionally conflates him with Jarl Thorfinn II of Orkney. (Which I think, too, is as likely as their being half-brothers.)
And I will, I swear, read anything Cecelia Holland writes. Some of it only once, mind, but oh boy.
Speaking of Bronze Age remind me of the excellent Age of Broze comic books by Eric Shanower. Amazing details that really fits best with how I think bronze age Greece and the area would have been like.
Although fairly conventionally plotted you can’t beat Bernard Cornwell’s “Sharpe” series for a sense of how it would feel to be a Napoleonic War era soldier. I wouldn’t bother with his Arthurian books or “Stonehenge” though!
Robert Graves, Lindsey Davies and, perhaps surprisingly, Simon Scarrow for Ancient Rome. For an interesting take on the Roman invasion of britain through to the Boudiccan revolt try Pauline Gedges’ “The Eagle and the Raven”.
If you want to try sub-Roman Britain there’s a raft of books involving historical interpretations of Arthur – most have a dose of fantasy chucked in there, unfortunately. Gillian Bradshaw’s “Hawk of May” trilogy, although for young adults, seems to capture the heroic society depicted in early British poetry quite nicely.
For a much more thoughtful view of the interaction between Britons and Saxons Melvin Bragg’s “Credo”, set around the establishment of Whitby Abbey and the end of the British kingdoms in modern England is a fantastic read.
I like those Sharpe novels too. Allan Malinson has a nice series set in the same time period about some British dragoons. Very nice. And I like Simon Scarrow’s Cato books as well. Haven’t heard of Robert Graves, will check him out. Thanks.
I like Raphael Sabatini – Scaramouche for the French Revolution. and he did a lot of medieval ones too. I think several of his books are available in ebook format at gutenberg. My copies are all very old – i can’t remember where I found them, its been decades.
I just downloaded the Lymond books from amazon on my Kindle. the sense of riches is hard to describe. Imagine being able to read Checkmate any time I choose….
I didn’t think anybody else remembered Sabatini. 😉 I liked those books.
As it happens, I saw a new German paperback edition of Sabatini’s “Captain Blood” in a bookshop on Friday. The film is still one of my favourite pirate movies.
Sabatini is remembered now mostly for the movies that were made from his books, Scaramouche, Captain Blood, Sea Hawk, The Black Swan, etc. The books are every bit as good (or better) than the movies. And if you like those, there are more in the same vein. The above named books are intermittently available in print, and Project Gutenberg has those and a bunch more.
After all this talk of Georgette Heyer I just read “The Private World of Georgette Heyer” by Jane Aiken Hodge. It’s a fascinating glimpse into the world of a most private person.