New acquisitions
Recently I have mostly bought:
- John Adamson, The Civil Wars (Palgrave Macmillan, May 2008).
- Judith M. Bennett, History Matters (University of Pennsylvania Press, September 2007).
- Barbara Donagan, War in England 1642-1649 (OUP Oxford, February 2008).
- Andrew Hopper, ‘Black Tom’ (Manchester University Press, April 2007).
- Patrick Little, Oliver Cromwell (Palgrave Macmillan, November 2008).
- Tim Padfield, Copyright for Records Managers and Archivists (Facet Publishing, January 2007).
I think Donagan’s War in England is probably the most expensive book I’ve ever bought.
Comment by Nick — 8:08 am, 12 April 2009 [permanent link to this comment]
I’ve been working my way through Adamson and his contributors’ essays since Christmas. It’s a good collection, with a particularly interesting essay by Clive Holmes, although I thought Adamson’s otherwise excellent historiographical introduction withered away a bit when it came to mapping out the future direction of approaches to the civil wars.
I know the feeling on book prices. You know you are too immersed in your subject when you (for example!) seriously contemplate paying £70 for a book on royalist newsbooks that the library will not get for another 9 months… (I didn’t get it in the end, but I had to drag myself away from Blackwell’s!).
Comment by Gavin Robinson — 6:13 pm, 19 April 2009 [permanent link to this comment]
This was “only” £50, but I’m not sure why as you’d think something about the military experience of the civil wars would have a broader appeal than just academics. At least now I’ve got a well-paid job I can afford most things I want.
The Holmes essay is really good. I would’ve liked a bit more discussion of Mark Stoyle’s work on Cornish identity as that’s the one possible exception. Holmes just mentioned in the further reading bit that he doesn’t find it entirely convincing but doesn’t say why.
Phil Baker’s chapter is great too. I think revisionism left us with much too narrow definitions of politics, ideology, and radicalism.
I’m not surprised that Adamson was a bit unsure about the future. Right now the field is very diverse and unpredictable, and to me that’s definitely a good thing. I hope no-one ever manages to impose a master narrative on it again.