Jan Morris is a fascinating personality. She originally was a he, and he was a guardsman in the British army, an officer from a good family. He left the service, became a historian, and then went to Denmark or wherever, and came back a she. She now writes unusual, affecting, eccentric, entertaining books that are terribly British and a bit disorganized. The Pax Brittanica trilogy is her life's work, near enough, though she's done other books that are very good. This one, however, is three volumes long, quite involved and very detailed. The series includes Heaven's Command, Pax Britannica, and Farewell the Trumpets. The first generally deals with the Empire in the 1840s on, the second follows things through the thirties, and the third follows the empire through its disbandment.

As I said, Morris is eccentric. This means that though the books are sort of chronological, they aren't exactly sorted the way you would expect, and this isn't really a history of the empire or the era. Instead, it's an anecdotal collection of tales, incidents, and sketches, marvelously told. Sort of like the difference between going through a cafeteria once and a sumptuous buffet where you go back and forth, taking time with what you enjoy. I thoroughly enjoyed the books, though I would hesitate to recommend them to someone who wasn't clear on either geography, or at least some basic history of the British Empire. Since this isn't either of those, you need them to understand what she's talking about occasionally.

I bought the trilogy in 1984 and have re-read it every year since then. Morris's attention to the finest details is amazing! I especially love the footnotes that provide further details to the cast of characters or updates on places, bulidings or sites as they are today. Jan's travel writing background especially evokes the visceral, from the bright colors, smells even the humidity of far flung places.

Its the only series you will ever need to read on the British Empire!

James Morris' PAX BRITANNICA, which uses the British Empire as it was in l900 as a framework, is the best work of popular history I've every read. Morris (who is now "Jan" rather than "James") is one of the world's great writers. This absorbing book focuses on the personalities, great and small, who shaped and controlled the Empire in its glory days. Of course there are many diversions, surprises and curiosities, and Morris fully exploits his brilliant talents as a teller of stories. Morris is as much travel writer as historian. Much of the pleasure (and credibility) of PAX BRITANNICA rests in the fact that Morris visited most of the places of empire and he describes many of them as they were when he was writing the book in the early 1970s. Nothing brings history to life like going to the places where it happened.

PAX BRITANNICA is part of a trilogy. Although the first in the series to be written, chronologically, it falls between HEAVEN'S COMMAND, about the creation of the Empire, and FAREWELL THE TRUMPETS, about the loss of the empire. Although quite splendid, in my opinion, the latter works lack the edge of inspiration, engagement and liveliness which make PAX BRITANNICA so special.

Other notable books by Morris include OXFORD, HONG-KONG, THE WORLD OF VENICE, AMONG THE CITIES and MANHATTAN '45. The versatile, wide-ranging Morris has also recently written a book called LINCOLN: A Foreigner's Quest.

Jan Morris is a fascinating personality. She originally was a he, and he was a guardsman in the British army, an officer from a good family. He left the service, became a historian, and then went to Denmark or wherever, and came back a she. She now writes unusual, affecting, eccentric, entertaining books that are terribly British and a bit disorganized. The Pax Brittanica trilogy is her life's work, near enough, though she's done other books that are very good. This one, however, is three volumes long, quite involved and very detailed. The series includes Heaven's Command, Pax Britannica, and Farewell the Trumpets. The first generally deals with the Empire in the 1840s on, the second follows things through the thirties, and the third follows the empire through its disbandment.

As I said, Morris is eccentric. This means that though the books are sort of chronological, they aren't exactly sorted the way you would expect, and this isn't really a history of the empire or the era. Instead, it's an anecdotal collection of tales, incidents, and sketches, marvelously told. Sort of like the difference between going through a cafeteria once and a sumptuous buffet where you go back and forth, taking time with what you enjoy. I thoroughly enjoyed the books, though I would hesitate to recommend them to someone who wasn't clear on either geography, or at least some basic history of the British Empire. Since this isn't either of those, you need them to understand what she's talking about occasionally.

I just finished this magnificient volume. Morris has surely written a masterpiece. Many a time I have felt transfigured to 19th century India or sensed the wind on the African veld. The writing is stupendous. The portraits of characters just stunning. Alas! My only quibble is no pictures. NO PICTURES!!!! I have the Harcourt Brace publication and there are no pictures. Oh how I would like to see what Sleeman looked like! Nonetheless well worth the price.

I have always wondered how the British managed to gain their empire and, more importantly, how they were able to ignore certain facts staring them straight in the eye -- that other peoples and races have achieved great cultural accomplishments and are fully as human as the British. How could the British have come to regard the Zulu and other Africans as being, more or less, animals ?

The blindness of great empires and their makers is always fascinating.

James Morris is a magnificent writer. The portraits he paints of the people involved in this great play of destiny are vivid. From event to event, the book reads like an endlessly absorbing epic.

Truly great writing about a fascinating story.

blue prints surgery is a very good review book for surgery .it is just 113 pages which makes it very easy to study and covers the important topics tested in the usmle. has got very good diagrams and tables.not for indepth study, but good source of reveiw for the boards.i recommend this book for anyone preparing for the boards.

I did particularly well on the surgical subcategory of Step 2, and it's owed to this book. Hands down, it's the best, highest-yield 3rd/4th year review for surgical disease - including epidemiology, symptoms, signs, diagnosis, and management. Awesome for review before the big test; also useful for overview of surgical diseases during your clerkship. One small complaint: it costs lots of dollars for about 100 pages.

Like the title suggests, this is a coffee table sized book about homes that are primarily glass, generally in the classic modern tradition. The book is in five sections: Pioneers, Glass Structures, Landscape Houses, Urban Houses, and Glass Features. It is wonderful to browse. A minor weakness in the book is the layout of some pictures; some are too small and others go on both sides of the page but the book crease sometimes interupts the flow of the picture. The text, while often useful, sometimes could have been better understood if a simple drawing of the floorplan was more often included. A good, solid and fun title to read that includes more types of buildings, like a townhouse, than in other titles. But I would consider purchasing Classic Modern; Mid-Century Modern at Home, by Deborah Dietsch, or Living Modern; Bringing Modernism Home, by Andrew Weaving before purchasing this title.

I have found this book to be an excellent resource. The pictures are beautiful and the text was easy and delightful to read. The homes examined in the case studies make excellent use of the space they are given (some as small as 300 sq. ft) and are inspirational. This book has given me some great ideas for my home!

Jan Morris is a fascinating personality. She originally was a he, and he was a guardsman in the British army, an officer from a good family. He left the service, became a historian, and then went to Denmark or wherever, and came back a she. She now writes unusual, affecting, eccentric, entertaining books that are terribly British and a bit disorganized. The Pax Brittanica trilogy is her life's work, near enough, though she's done other books that are very good. This one, however, is three volumes long, quite involved and very detailed. The series includes Heaven's Command, Pax Britannica, and Farewell the Trumpets. The first generally deals with the Empire in the 1840s on, the second follows things through the thirties, and the third follows the empire through its disbandment.

As I said, Morris is eccentric. This means that though the books are sort of chronological, they aren't exactly sorted the way you would expect, and this isn't really a history of the empire or the era. Instead, it's an anecdotal collection of tales, incidents, and sketches, marvelously told. Sort of like the difference between going through a cafeteria once and a sumptuous buffet where you go back and forth, taking time with what you enjoy. I thoroughly enjoyed the books, though I would hesitate to recommend them to someone who wasn't clear on either geography, or at least some basic history of the British Empire. Since this isn't either of those, you need them to understand what she's talking about occasionally.

I just completed the final volume of James Morris' trilogy. The writing is superb. Although not as good as volume one (Heaven's Command), this book is well worth keeping. As usual; my only quibble is that there are no pictures in the Harcourt set that I have. That takes away a star.

Even if you haven't read the other two volumes in the Pax Britannica trilogy, Farewell the Trumpets is a must-buy. It's worth it just to read the brilliant eulogy for Winston Churchill, where in one chapter Morris does better job of capturing this man and his place in history than lesser authors could do in a whole volume.

My recommendation is to take your time and savor this book. Like Heaven's Command and Pax Britannica, Farewell the Trumpets is episodic in its presentation, each chapter a self-contained nugget, so that you can enjoy dipping into it frequently.

Although I am an enormous fan of Morris's later works, this early study of Venice (originally published in England simply as VENICE) is just not up to the level of her later work. When it came out Morris hadn't yet mastered either her style or her level of tone: as a result, the work reads much too preciously, with far too many trivial examples to support her points, too much xenophobic snobbery aimed towards tourists (something Morris later worjked very hard *against* in her other works), and an experience of venice that doesn;t really seem to capture the city at all. When this book wasd written several other studies of Italian cities were coming out by older, more experienced writers, and it's useful to compare them with Morris's VENICE: Mary McCarthy's STONES OF FLORENCE and VENICE OBSERVED are much more readable, and Elizabeth Bowen's beautiful A TIME IN ROME captures the city in a much more recognizable way than Morris's now-dated study does. but this was a useful text for Morris to correct the immaturities of his style before he (later she) went on to master the genre and become its leading living practitioner.

You'll be fascinated by this book if you've never been to Venice and don't expect to ever go (you'll probably change your mind before getting very far into the book, though); if you haven't been yet but will go soon; or if you've already been there. In my own case, I read the book in preparation for a trip to "the Serenissima". Once I was there, I had the odd experience of feeling I knew the place intimately, even though I had never personally seen it, and I didn't know where anything was. I also enjoyed seeing the city and its monuments greatly, having been armed with scores of legends and anecdotes about them. And now that my trip is over, I'm anxious to re-read much of the book, so that I can compare my own experience of the city with Morris's.

Morris's is an intimate, thorough, and honest portrait of Venice. Although she is biased in favor of the city (she calls it "the most beautiful city on earth, only waiting to be admired", and she admitted in a reading I attended that it was her favorite of the dozens of cities she's written about), she describes in great detail the flaws and annoyances of the place. Her style of writing is magnificent and perfectly parallels the character of the city. She uses some vivid and very creative metaphors; one of my favorites was her description of an old painting as "an orgy of fleshy limbs and cherubs".

My main complaint about "The World of Venice" is that it's too thorough. Especially if you haven't been to the city, the endless lists of the "minor monuments" of the city, the countless fortress islands in the Venetian lagoon, and all of the Titians and Tintorettos to be found around the city, are tedious. At times I really had to make an effort to wade through the minutia.

Another disappointment is the book's method of describing the history of Venice. You learn the city's history in bits and pieces and in random chronological order through the anecdotes throughout the book. There is no overall view of the history of the place, and in general the book seems to assume that you already know it all anyway. I still recommend reading the book, but do a little reading elsewhere on Venetian history first.

This book is a sheer delight for any visitor who has been charmed by Venice and longs to go back. Not for the unitiated, this is not a travel book for those who have never been there. It assumes some knowledge of the city and often teases with references to locations and legends that are familiar to visitors of the Veneto but which can be maddeningly vague for the person who has never experienced the phantasmagoria that Venice can be. Beautifully written, it evokes the moods and majesty and, sometimes, historical horrors of the world's most fascinating city.

I have always been a fan of the intellectual debates in the New York Review of Books letters to the editor pages. This book consists of two articles by Crews and the subsequent debates surrounding them. I would have liked to see better defenses of Freud, but none of the eminent defenders of psychoanalysis is able to mount a serious challenge to Crews's devastating attacks.

This devastating book has two parts: (1) The Unknown Freud, where the reader gets a picture of Freud as a dictator, a megalomaniac and egotripper. A pope who alone knew the truth and who founded a secret commission to protect his 'church' against the heathen. He was a bad psychoanalyst (e.g. the Wolf Man case) and a venal man (e.g. the catastrophic Horace Fink case, where he tried to get his own hands on some money of the heiress).
I agree with the author that psychoanalysis is a pseudoscience - statements cannot be tested and the research results cannot be verified uniformly. Although it is not totally without meaning (Karl Popper), it is not a science.
(2) the revenge of the repressed
A frontal attack on the caste of the psychoanalysts, depicted as 'religious zealots, self-help evangelists, sociopolitical ideologues, and outright charlatans who trade in the ever seductive currency of guilt and blame, while keeping the doctor's fees mounting.'
The author is particularly severe with their latest 'school' : the 'recovered memory movement', based on the rape of children by their parents (really!). This lead to false accusations and condemnations of innocent people. No wonder the author predicts an accelerating collapse of psychoanalysis as a respected institution.
A much needed and courageous book to halt a profession riding at full speed on a misty highway. And a much needed angle on Freud as a person, written in a style to slaughter the not so innocent father of psychoanalysis.
After reading this book, I agree with Peter Madawar, who called doctrinaire psychoanalytic theory "the most stupendous intellectual confidence trick of the twentieth century".

Frederick Crews really knows how to tap that deep reservoir of hostility found in modern Freudian psychoanalysts. In 1993 and 1994 FC wrote two essays in the New York Review of Books debunking Freud in the first, and tearing to shreds the recovered memory movement in the second.

These two essays and the letters in response to them have been put into the book The Memory Wars. As someone trained in experimental psychology you can guess my own personal bias in this matter. Crews discusses Freud's botched cases; his frequent vacillation in theory formation; some of his sillier theories; and his serious interjection of personal bias into the formation of his beliefs. The main problem with the whole Freudian system is the total lack of scientific evidence supporting it. Freudian psychoanalysis is founded on anecdote and supported by anecdotes. To be fair, much current non-Freudian therapy is also based on anecdote. Indignant Freud followers write back, and their letters are indeed interesting (and often pompous).

The second half of the book takes on the recovered memory movement. It would be great to poke fun at this movement if it weren't for the fact that it has caused so much damage to all parties involved. Symptoms checklists are published with the statement if you suffer from these symptoms you may be a victim of sexual abuse. Read the list and you will find that the majority of Americans will find that they have been abused. It's all a patient seduction game with the intent to make big money. Hospitals have even set up units to treat such patients (Having worked in the psychiatric hospital industry I am well aware of the "product lines" that such facilities set up in order to fill beds). Crews does an excellent job of dissecting the memory movement, and once again we get to read the indignant responses.

Those who believe that psychological therapy should be based on sound scientific evidence will love this book. Those who have accepted Freudianism with a religious like faith will, of course, hate it. To me this whole subject is analogous to the evolution vs. creationist debate. It's science versus pseudoscience.

I loved this book; it gives the reader an excellent overview of the Cuban economy and political party structure for the early 1990's and beyond. Seeing how it is a textbook of sorts I was shocked to find at times I could not put it down. I endorse this book highly.

Ulysses is great fun. It takes a bit more work to read than most books, just as it takes a bit more work to play tennis than it does to play catch. You shouldn't feel compelled to put the work in, any more than you should feel compelled to learn an unusually difficult sport. But people who do put the work in and who have a good time doing it shouldn't be made to feel guilty about it either. It's a pleasure to follow the interweaving lines of the Sirens chapter, for instance, and anyone who does it will see that the chapter is alive in a way that almost nothing else is in literature. Joyce is a terrific comic writer and a terrific creator of vivid, complicated characters. But he requires the reader to put in some extra effort to enjoy how good he is, and I can't blame anyone who gives up after a few pages and refuses to go any further. On the other hand, I've noticed that people who don't like Joyce's approach seem to want to attack people who do. This is silly. Again, it's like hating people for playing basketball just because you prefer skateboarding. Both the Joyce lovers and the Joyce haters should lighten up a bit.

There is not a book out there that is more frustrating than James Joyce's Ulysses...unless, of course, it is Joyce's Finnegan's Wake. The problem lies in the fact that this novel is such an amazing piece of art that the reader can feel like Joyce forgot all about him. It is almost impossible to read by oneself with it's seemingly garbled maze of words and phrases and madness. However, this is what makes it such a joy to read. Imagine that an author decided to do away with any and all rules concerning fiction and to write a book that was it's own entity, showing you what it wanted to show you, telling you what it wanted to tell you and acting like its own character. This is what Joyce has accomplished with Ulysses. I was fortunate enough to read this book in a class, four months of nothing but Ulysses, and I have to warn would be readers that I don't think I would have made it through without expert guidance. I would advise anyone wishing to tackle this literary giant to gather some book loving friends, and a guidebook or two for Ulysses, and to take it very slowly. Read a chapter a week and then meet up with you group to discuss and puzzle out what you have just read. I am willing to bet that your weekly conversations will be a greater work of art than any book out there, and I think that Joyce would have liked that, would have enjoyed sparking debates and conversation, its probably the main reason why anyone creates anything; for it to be enjoyed and shared. The story line is simple, you have two main characters, Stephen Dedalus, the brilliant but alienated loner. You have Leopold Bloom, a simple man who is as alienated as Stephen, but not for his mind, for his cultural background and meek manner. The entire book takes place over the course of one day in Dublin, and after the first three chapters the entire book simply follows Bloom around during a day when he knows that his wife is having a romantic meeting with her lover. It is hard to sum up such a giant book in a few sentences like this, but basically Bloom is trying to set his life back on track, trying to reconcile himself with his wife's betrayal, and trying to reach out to Stephen who he feels could use a loving family. Of course, you could read this book and not find any of what I am saying in there, but the beauty of Ulysses is that I would love to hear what it is that you found in this novel as much as I would love sharing what I found.

If you approach Joyce's Ulysses looking to be told a story worthy of the Modern Library's #1 book of the 20th Century, then you will most likely be disappointed. But if you throw aside your expectations of what makes a book great and just read the words as you would the people, places, sights and sounds that trigger your thoughts during the course of a normal day, then you will be amazed.

In Ulysses, James Joyce uses his superhuman vocabulary and literary knowledge to relate a day in the life of a couple Irishmen (Stephen Dedalus and his friend, Leopold Bloom) and the people with whom they interact. Joyce's words are abnormally sophisticated, yet one never gets the feeling he is simply showing off. While his writing style is often referred to as stream-of-consciousness, it is clear that every word is appropriately placed and deeply thought out. As Ulysses meanders along through its day, the objects that enter the periphery of the protagonists triggers emotions and thoughts that lead to: poems, songs, theological and political discussions, laughing, shouting, incoherent noises, etc. The novel ranges from sublime to aggravating, but that is only because it is so true to its form. How many times in a normal day, if we were to stop and ruminate upon what we were just thinking, would we then think, "What was that?" But then it's quickly on to the next interaction destined to spark different emotions, thoughts, ideas, etc...

It is impossible to sum this book up. It follows no plot or pattern other than that it is simply 1 day. A few people... 1 day.

Reading this book reminded me at times of the Simpsons episode where Homer is seen watching an episode of David Lynch's Twin Peaks. "Brilliant!" Homer remarks, but then quietly to himself, "I have no idea what is going on here." While I often found myself in Homer's predicament while reading Ulysses, I was always able to appreciate Joyce's writing, even if the individual words were all I understood. For that reason, I plan on reading this book again several years from now to see what life has taught me that might expand my understanding of Joyce's beautiful day.

This was a great Because it shows that avery one is good at something. Becuase Horace can sing high notes and Morris can sing low notes. But there friend Dolores just sings notes that no one had ever heard before. So he gets cut from the chorus because and just cant sing at all. so he writes a letter to teachers. Saying he loves to sing. Then the teacher reades it and its a peom so he lets Dolores sing it in the concert.

Horace and Morris are two talented singers. Dolores decides to for the three of them to join the school chorus. Now, the only problem is, is that Dolores can't really sing that well. Horace sings the high notes, Morris sings the low notes, and Dolores just sings off key.
After trying out in front of Moustro Provolone, Horace and Morris make the "team", but Dolores gets cut. Dolores starts feeling sad for herself, but pulls through and thinks up a way to get into the chorus. After writing a letter to Moustro Provolone, he realizes her true talent, and invites her to help him.

A nice rhymed lesson that there is a place for everyone in a chorus, after the cheesy Moustro gets convinced. Horace and Morris sing well, Boris and Chloris listen fine, but Dolores, well Dolores is another story.