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Author: Michael Wood
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520231924
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 262
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Book Description
The author follows Alexander the Great's 22,000 mile expedition from Greece to India, recreating the epic marches and battles.
Author: Michael Wood
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520231924
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 262
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Book Description
The author follows Alexander the Great's 22,000 mile expedition from Greece to India, recreating the epic marches and battles.
Author: Michael Wood
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520213074
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 260
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Book Description
"The story of Alexander the Great's 22 000-mile expedition from Greece to India and his conquest of most of the known world is an extraordinary tale of bravery and cruelty, endurance and excess, chivalry and greed. [More than two] thousand years later, historian and author Michael Wood endeavours to retrace the ... conqueror's epic route, using only the ancient historians as his guide. ..."--Back cover.
Author: Michael Wood
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780563537830
Category : Asia
Languages : en
Pages : 256
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Book Description
Alexander the Great's 20,000-mile journey from Greece to India is seen as a key moment in history which laid the foundations for the later dominance of Western culture, but which also, ironically, paved the way for the spread of Islam. Retracing the journey in this book, Michael Wood travels by plane, train, boat and camel and on foot through many of the 20th century's major trouble spots, including Beirut and Kurdistan. Among the people he encounters are Lebanese traders, Iranian pilgrims and Afghan guerrillas.
Author: Philip Freeman
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416592814
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 418
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Book Description
In the first authoritative biography of Alexander the Great written for a general audience in a generation, classicist and historian Philip Freeman tells the remarkable life of the great conqueror. The celebrated Macedonian king has been one of the most enduring figures in history. He was a general of such skill and renown that for two thousand years other great leaders studied his strategy and tactics, from Hannibal to Napoleon, with countless more in between. He flashed across the sky of history like a comet, glowing brightly and burning out quickly: crowned at age nineteen, dead by thirty-two. He established the greatest empire of the ancient world; Greek coins and statues are found as far east as Afghanistan. Our interest in him has never faded. Alexander was born into the royal family of Macedonia, the kingdom that would soon rule over Greece. Tutored as a boy by Aristotle, Alexander had an inquisitive mind that would serve him well when he faced formidable obstacles during his military campaigns. Shortly after taking command of the army, he launched an invasion of the Persian empire, and continued his conquests as far south as the deserts of Egypt and as far east as the mountains of present-day Pakistan and the plains of India. Alexander spent nearly all his adult life away from his homeland, and he and his men helped spread the Greek language throughout western Asia, where it would become the lingua franca of the ancient world. Within a short time after Alexander’s death in Baghdad, his empire began to fracture. Best known among his successors are the Ptolemies of Egypt, whose empire lasted until Cleopatra. In his lively and authoritative biography of Alexander, classical scholar and historian Philip Freeman describes Alexander’s astonishing achievements and provides insight into the mercurial character of the great conqueror. Alexander could be petty and magnanimous, cruel and merciful, impulsive and farsighted. Above all, he was ferociously, intensely competitive and could not tolerate losing—which he rarely did. As Freeman explains, without Alexander, the influence of Greece on the ancient world would surely not have been as great as it was, even if his motivation was not to spread Greek culture for beneficial purposes but instead to unify his empire. Only a handful of people have influenced history as Alexander did, which is why he continues to fascinate us.
Author: Krzysztof Nawotka
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
ISBN: 1443818119
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 435
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Book Description
This book is possibly the most comprehensive biography of Alexander in print. It presents his story strictly on the basis of ancient sources, making use as much as possible of contemporary Greek inscriptions, coins, and of non-western evidence (Babylonian tablets, Egyptian papyri, Bactrian parchments). The latter in particular change our understanding of how the Achaemenid state was run and how the Macedonian conquests were perceived from the Oriental perspective. The book’s protagonist was the first in Western Civilization to be hailed Great. The specific aura and charisma of this young ruler, the scale of his conquests and the exotic landscapes and peoples encountered during a tireless trek of over 35,000 km spanning three continents is what the broader public have always found particularly appealing. The author travelled extensively in the footsteps of Alexander and made use of other geographical accounts to elucidate the spatial perspective of his conquests. Space and politics define the dynamics of his story. The author presents Alexander as a component of the historical processes in his epoch and considers his influence on developments in Greece, Macedonia, the Persian Empire and neighbouring countries. The book tries to steer clear of both idealizing Alexander the Great, typical of some earlier modern biographies, and of deconstructing his personality, which mars the minimalist approach of today’s scholarship.
Author: Michael Wood
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1473530105
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 272
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Book Description
Michael Wood retraces Alexander the Greats amazing journey from Greece to India, searching for the truth behind the legend and experiencing the tremendous scale of his achievements. Using the ancient historians as his guides, Wood follows Alexanders journey as closely as possible, crossing deserts and rivers, from Turkey to war-torn Afghanistan. As the journey progresses, he recreates the drama of Alexanders epic marches and bloody battles. All along the way he finds proof of the survival of the legends surrounding Alexander, a leader whose life has excited the worlds imagination for the 2,000 years. 'Wood tells a glorious story with some very dark shadows.' New York Times 'Wood is a perceptive, entertaining and enthusiastic companion.' Sunday Times 'Wood is a lively storyteller.' The Washington Post
Author: Martin Puchner
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 0812988272
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 466
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Book Description
The story of literature in sixteen acts—from Homer to Harry Potter, including The Tale of Genji, Don Quixote, The Communist Manifesto, and how they shaped world history In this groundbreaking book, Martin Puchner leads us on a remarkable journey through time and around the globe to reveal the how stories and literature have created the world we have today. Through sixteen foundational texts selected from more than four thousand years of world literature, he shows us how writing has inspired the rise and fall of empires and nations, the spark of philosophical and political ideas, and the birth of religious beliefs. We meet Murasaki, a lady from eleventh-century Japan who wrote the first novel, The Tale of Genji, and follow the adventures of Miguel de Cervantes as he battles pirates, both seafaring and literary. We watch Goethe discover world literature in Sicily, and follow the rise in influence of The Communist Manifesto. Puchner takes us to Troy, Pergamum, and China, speaks with Nobel laureates Derek Walcott in the Caribbean and Orhan Pamuk in Istanbul, and introduces us to the wordsmiths of the oral epic Sunjata in West Africa. This delightful narrative also chronicles the inventions—writing technologies, the printing press, the book itself—that have shaped people, commerce, and history. In a book that Elaine Scarry has praised as “unique and spellbinding,” Puchner shows how literature turned our planet into a written world. Praise for The Written World “It’s with exhilaration . . . that one hails Martin Puchner’s book, which asserts not merely the importance of literature but its all-importance. . . . Storytelling is as human as breathing.”—The New York Times Book Review “Puchner has a keen eye for the ironies of history. . . . His ideal is ‘world literature,’ a phrase he borrows from Goethe. . . . The breathtaking scope and infectious enthusiasm of this book are a tribute to that ideal.”—The Sunday Times (U.K.) “Enthralling . . . Perfect reading for a long chilly night . . . [Puchner] brings these works and their origins to vivid life.”—BookPage “Well worth a read, to find out how come we read.”—Margaret Atwood, via Twitter
Author: Elizabeth Baynham
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
ISBN: 9780472108589
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 260
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Book Description
The literary tradition surrounding the Macedonian conqueror is rich, contradictory and complex. Much of what we know comes from the history of Quintus Curtius, who wrote a history of Alexander in the first century AD. Baynham explores Curtius' historical style and his presentation of the legendary king. She examines his use of ancient sources, and discusses why Curtius chose to preserve the information about Alexander that he did. She demonstrates that his work was a carefully planned narrative, and that he was not only interested in presenting Alexander as a clever ruler and accomplished tactician, but also as a human subject to the whims of chance, of fortuna .
Author: Michael Wood
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520247246
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 284
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Book Description
In this companion to a forthcoming PBS series, Wood journeys to some of the remotest places on earth in search of four of mankind's most powerful myths: Shangri-La, Jason and the Golden Fleece, the Queen of Sheba, and King Arthur.
Author: Peter G. Tsouras
Publisher: Potomac Books, Inc.
ISBN: 1612340490
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 153
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Book Description
Alexander the Great (356-323 B.C.E.), who reigned as king of Macedonia for only thirteen years, set a flame of conquest that introduced the dynamism of Hellenism to the Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, and South Asian worlds. Re-creating their ossified cultures, he established a standard of leadership and military conquest that the most successful of Roman emperors, medieval knights, and steppe barbarians would never truly match. Julius Caesar wept that he could not surpass Alexander, while Napoleon could only dream of such invincibility. Alexander had the great fortune to be born the able son of Philip II, one of the most talented men of war and politics produced by the Hellenic world, who created for Alexander the foundation of the Macedonian state and army that would be the tools of his future greatness. Alexander's invincibility was the product of his profound genius - the perfection of body, boundless energy, imagination, daring, intellect, and vision in one man. He was a master tactician, strategist, logistician, diplomat, and statesman, with an ability to win the affection and quick obedience of others. Even his enemies fell victim to his valor and charm. His personal attributes and accomplishments were so far removed from those of ordinary men that he achieved almost superhuman status within his lifetime. Above all, he was the preeminent man of war. Even today, as the noise of battle rattles Kandahar, a city in Afghanistan that Alexander named for himself, war clings to his name.
