America's World

The following is a list of the titles chosen for the fall, 2005--spring, 2006 American History Book Discussion group. For times and dates, call the Sachem Public Library Welcome Desk at 631 588-5024.

Introduction

The history of the United States did not occur in a vacuum.

While this country was being settled & developed, other nations were experiencing their own growth & changes as well. This book discussion will explore the dynasties & revolutions, the kings & queens, and the conquerors & the conquered that influenced the growth of the maturing & increasingly powerful nation.

Isabella of Castile: The First Renaissance Queen, by Nancy Rubin. St. Martin's, 1991
Isabella was many things: wife, mother, Catholic, master strategist, promoter of the arts, and a woman with vision enough to fund the expedition that brought Christopher Columbus into contact with the New World.

The Life of Elizabeth I, by Alison Weir. Ballantine, 1998.
Perhaps the most influential sovereign England has ever known, this book examines not only Elizabeth's personal life--her relationships with her many suitors and how she played one against the other to her advantage--it demonstrates how she handled one international crisis after another and always prevailed. She reigned during one of the most constructive periods in English history--literature bloomed through the works of Spenser, Marlowe and Shakespeare. Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh were instrumental in expanding English influence in the New World..

Marie Antoinette: The Last Queen of France, by Evelyne Lever. FSG, 2000.
Immature, self-indulgent, impetuous and wholly unprepared for the role history cast for her was Marie Antoinette. She was willfully out of touch with the nation's dire economic troubles, the seething social and political climate of pre-revolutionary France, and eventually retreated--from both her husband and the public--behind a wall of courtiers and into a world of opulent fantasy--until it was too late to alter her fate.

Napoleon: A Biography, by Frank McLynn. Arcade, 2002, 1997.
A profile the French emperor who gave his name to an era. McLynn presents Bonaparte as an opportunist who took advantage of a series of events and situations he could manipulate into achieving supreme control, who saw France's raw, revolutionary condition as the perfect playing field for an "ambitious, politically conscious, and energetic soldier" such as himself. But, in the long run, he failed as a politician, which eventually caused his failure as a general as well.

Queen Victoria: A Personal History, by Christopher Hibbert. Basic, 2000.
A fresh and intimate portrait of the woman who shaped a century. During her long reign, she dealt with conflicts ranging from petty royal quarrels to war in Crimea and rebellion in India. She saw monarchs fall, empires crumble, new continents explored, and England grow into a dominant global and industrial power--a position soon to be rivaled by Britain's erstwhile colony across the sea.

Napoleon III: A Life, by Fenton Bresler. C&G, 1999.
Louis-Napoleon, the nephew of the aforementioned Napoleon, was president of the Second Republic and emperor of the Second Empire. Under his reign, France's economy expanded and Paris was modernized. Elected president of France in 1848, he subsequently engineered a coup d'etat and ruled as a reform-minded autocrat. His defeat of Austria helped to create an Italian nation, yet his own ultimate defeat by Prussia ushered in modern Germany and sowed the seeds for the two World Wars.

Nicholas and Alexandra, by Robert Massie. Atheneum, 1985, 1967.
The story of the last Imperial Family to rule Russia--their triumphs tragedies, accomplishments and failures--and the events which defined the course of Russian history. It is about their triumphs and tragedies, their accomplishments and failures.

Lenin: A Biography, by Robert Service. Harvard Univ. Press, 2000.
Born Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov in 1870, the son of a schools inspector and a doctor's daughter, Lenin was to become the greatest single force in the Soviet revolution and one of the most influential politician of the twentieth century, a rebel whose devotion to destruction proved greater than his love for the "proletariat" he supposedly served. Service shows how his intellectual preoccupations and inner rage underwent volatile interaction and propelled his career from young Marxist activist to founder of the communist party and the Soviet state--and how he bequeathed to Russia a legacy of political oppression and social intimidation that has yet to be expunged.

Stalin: The Court of the Red Czar, by Simon Sebag Montefiore. Knopf, 2004, 2003.
More than 50 years after his death, Stalin remains a figure of powerful and dark fascination. As many as 20 million Soviets died in his purges and infamous Gulag, giving him the lasting distinction as a personification of evil in the twentieth century.This chronicle strives to understand both his dictatorship and the man himself.

Mao: A Life, by Philip Short. Holt, 2000, 1999.
It is said that Mao, who was in power from 1949 until his death in 1976, may have been responsible for more deaths than Hitler and Stalin combined. Clearly, we cannot understand today's China without first understanding Mao. Attempts to view Mao's life through Western lenses inevitably present a cartoonish monster or hero, both far removed from the real man. Philip Short's masterly assessment-informed by secret documents recently found in China-allows the reader to understand this colossal figure whose shadow will dominate the twenty-first century.
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Titles chosen by Brad Silverman
Annotated by Lynne Kennedy

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