Revolution History

A lauded expert on European history paints a vivid picture of Paris, London, and New York during the Age of Revolutions, exploring how each city fostered or suppressed political uprisings within its boundaries. In The Unruly City, historian Mike Rapport offers a vivid history of three intertwined cities toward the end of the 18th century - Paris, London, and New York - all in the midst of political chaos and revolution.

John Adams told Thomas Jefferson that “history is to ascribe the American Revolution to Thomas Paine.” Thomas Edison called him “the equal of Washington in making American liberty possible.” He was a founder of both the United States and the French Revolution. He invented the phrase, “The United States of America.” He rose from abject poverty in working-class England to the highest levels of the era’s intellectual elite. And yet, by the end of his life, Thomas Paine was almost universally reviled.

The U.S. government spends enormous resources each year on the gathering and analysis of intelligence, yet the history of American foreign policy is littered with missteps and misunderstandings that have resulted from intelligence failures. In Why Intelligence Fails, Robert Jervis examines the politics and psychology of two of the more spectacular intelligence failures in recent memory: the belief that the Shah in Iran was secure and stable in 1978, and the claim that Iraq had active WMD programs in 2002.

In December 1667, maverick physician Jean Denis transfused calf’s blood into one of Paris’s most notorious madmen. Days later, the madman was dead and Denis was framed for murder. A riveting expos of the fierce debates, deadly politics, and cutthroat rivalries behind the first transfusion experiments, Blood Work takes us from dissection rooms in palaces to the streets of Paris, providing an unforgettable portrait of an era that wrestled with the same questions about morality and experimentation that haunt medical science today.

Though the Shawnee chief Tecumseh attempted to form a confederacy of tribes to stem the tide of white settlement in the Old Northwest, in November of 1811, the Americans marched to his village at the mouth of Tippecanoe Creek. The ensuing battle ended all hope of an Indian federation and had far-reaching effects on American and British relations. The British, blamed for providing the Indians with arms, drew the ire of hawks in Congress, who clamored ever more loudly for a war to end England’s power in North America.

A comprehensive look at the brutal wilderness war that secured America's independence… With Musket and Tomahawk is a vivid account of the American and British struggles in the sprawling wilderness region of the northeast during the Revolutionary War. Combining strategic, tactical, and personal detail, this book describes how the patriots of the recently organized Northern Army defeated England's massive onslaught of 1777, thereby all but ensuring America's independence.

Desde una perspectiva centrada en los ciudadanos de a pie, a los que se les pone rostro y voz, Retaguardia roja indaga en las lógicas subyacentes a la violencia que se desplegó de forma brutal contra los adversarios políticos en la zona republicana durante la guerra civil española (1936-1939).

Originally published anonymously, The Federalist Papers first appeared in 1787 as a series of letters to New York newspapers exhorting voters to ratify the proposed Constitution of the United States. Still hotly debated and open to often controversial interpretations, the arguments first presented here by three of America's greatest patriots and political theorists were created during a critical moment in our nation's history.

Fidel Castro is one of the most influential and controversial men of the last 50 years, equally revered and reviled by people across the globe. To the West, Castro has long been one of the prominent faces of Communism, and the main reason Cuba has been ostracized by many liberal democracies, particularly the United States. On the other hand, Castro has been admired by those who despised capitalism, and despite the fact the political platform Castro advocated has been almost universally repudiated and only maintains a weak hold even in Cuba.

The themes of the history of Cuba are as vast as they are inspiring. Cuba has stared death in the face throughout its rocky history, and most of the time it has gazed into the eyes of death and smiled. Over and over, oppressors have attempted to seize this island and its riches for their own selfish purposes. And over and over, revolutions have risen up to conquer in an attempt to return Cuba to its people. The story of Cuba is a tale of courage and sacrifice, of horrific oppression and inspiring vision.

In this provocative biography, Mary Sarah Bilder looks to the Age of the Constitution to investigate the rise of a radical new idea in the English-speaking world: female genius. Bilder finds the perfect exemplar of this phenomenon in Eliza Harriot Barons O'Connor. Female Genius reconstructs Eliza Harriot's transatlantic life, paying particular attention to her lectures and the academies she founded, inspiring countless young American women to consider a college education and a role in the political forum.

The American Revolution is replete with seminal moments that every American learns in school, from the "shot heard 'round the world" to the Declaration of Independence, but the events that led up to the fighting at Lexington and Concord were borne out of 10 years of division between the British and their American colonies over everything from colonial representation in governments to taxation, the nature of searches, and the quartering of British regulars in private houses.

The shift from the Paleolithic to Neolithic periods represents a watershed moment in human history. While many may consider the humans of both stone ages to be unintelligent barbarians, this brief history proves that the humans of yesteryear were just as smart as we are today. Between 10,000 BC and 2,000 BC, they instituted revolutionary changes in human life. All over the globe, formerly nomadic people began settling into villages, farming, and creating high-tech stone inventions.

The revolutions that raged across Europe and the Americas over seven decades, from 1760 to 1825, created the modern world. Revolutionaries shattered empires, toppled social hierarchies, and birthed a world of republics. But old injustices lingered on and the powerful engines of revolutionary change created new and insidious forms of inequality. In The Age of Revolutions, historian Nathan Perl-Rosenthal offers the first narrative history of this entire era.

This is ex-slave Frederick Douglass' second autobiography. It was written after 10 years of reflection following his legal emancipation in 1846, and his break with his mentor, William Lloyd Garrison, catapulted Douglass into the international spotlight as the foremost spokesman for American blacks, both freed and slave.

The American Revolution was a home-front war that brought scarcity, bloodshed, and danger into the life of every American, and Carol Berkin shows us that women played a vital role throughout the struggle. Berkin takes us into the ordinary moments of extraordinary lives. We see women boycotting British goods in the years before independence, writing propaganda that radicalized their neighbors, raising funds for the army, and helping finance the fledgling government. We see how they managed farms, plantations, and businesses while their men went into battle.

Jim Weiss guides listeners on a journey to encounter the fascinating people, high ideals, and bloody battles of the French Revolution and Napoleon's empire. Enter the whirlwind of the French Revolution and follow Napoleon's relentless march of conquest. From the burning desert sands of Egypt and the frozen plains of Russia to the lush jungles of Haiti and the sweeping prairies of North America, Jim Weiss guides listeners through the story of a tumultuous worldwide struggle for liberty.

The prize-winning historian’s fresh look at the people and events that decided America’s struggle for independence. Its suspenseful climax is the 500-mile march undertaken by General Washington to surround Cornwallis at Yorktown.

The Jefferson Lies tackles seven myths about Thomas Jefferson head-on and answers pressing questions about this incredible statesman.

History has always celebrated the "Founding Fathers"—the sly but victorious tactics of Washington, the daring exploits of Lafayette, the grand ideas of Jefferson. Yet we rarely hear of the women who kept the colonies running and liberty alive. Obstinate Daughters finally rewrites the story of America’s birth by revealing the courageous, resourceful women whose actions shaped a nation.