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Atrocities: The 100 Deadliest Episodes in Human History Reprint Edition, Kindle Edition
“An amusing (really) account of the murderous ways of despots, slave traders, blundering royals, gladiators and assorted hordes.”—New York Times
Evangelists of human progress meet their opposite in Matthew White’s epic examination of history’s one hundred most violent events, or, in White’s piquant phrasing, “the numbers that people want to argue about.” Reaching back to the Second Persian War in 480 BCE and moving chronologically through history, White surrounds hard facts (time and place) and succinct takeaways (who usually gets the blame?) with lively military, social, and political histories.
- ISBN-13978-0393345230
- EditionReprint
- PublisherW. W. Norton & Company
- Publication dateNovember 7, 2011
- LanguageEnglish
- File size5318 KB
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Editorial Reviews
Review
― Christian Science Monitor
"White . . . gives voice to the suffering of ordinary people that, inexorably, has defined every historical epoch."
― Military Review
"Genius."
― NPR
"[White] doesn’t take sides so much as report the facts―and the death tolls. . . . Full of fascinating information about parts of the world little-known to most Westerners."
― Washington Post
About the Author
Product details
- ASIN : B005LW5JMQ
- Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (November 7, 2011)
- Publication date : November 7, 2011
- Language : English
- File size : 5318 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Not Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 689 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #531,880 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #181 in Historical Study Reference (Kindle Store)
- #475 in Historical Study Reference (Books)
- #607 in History Encyclopedias
- Customer Reviews:
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I also developed a rather intense sick feeling knowing human beings have changed very little over the last ten thousand years. We immodestly pat ourselves on the back as rising to unheard of levels of civilization and enlightened social intercourse. But, whites history is unapologetically inclusive of recent acts of unspeakable barbarity, such as WWII, the senseless monstrosities from the Korean peninsula, and human induced horrors from Central Africa, and other acts of inhuman butchery many of which have happened in this century! White tries to find some pattern to it all in his closing chapters and yet, the reader has to come to the conclusion, there is nothing that can be directly blamed for it except gross human stupidity and madness of mob mentality. We really are a unique species in more way than just our so-called high intelligence. We are crafty apes, with murder in our black hearts. We are ruthless and selfish and pitiless. We are not just capable of grand individual sweeps of specie-cide, we seem to gladly and massively follow the inhuman and murderous orders of any tyrant willing to toss us a few crumbs of moldy bread to us so such evil creatures can magnify their well thought out horrors a million fold. It is fascinating and disgusting, horrible and informative, sickening and intriguing to learn this dark side to our own inner psyche. The word "humanity" takes on an entirely different shade after reading this well written and intensely informative book.
Organized in a chronological manner, each “episode” (war, genocide, etc.) is presented as a chapter. Each chapter includes a summary header that encapsulates the episode by including: death toll, participants, time frame, location, general reasoning behind episode, who or what’s to blame and the episode’s rank on the list of 100. Following the header, White delves into the dirty details of the event in a succinct manner that is rich with details. His witty summaries of each episode include a degree of sarcasm that somehow manages to blend the grave subject manner with a bit of humor. The humor relates mostly to how mankind’s stupidity often leads to mass death … many of the episodes presents will have readers shaking their heads. White makes the depressing topic rather enjoyable to read. There are no illustrations/pictures (other than the cover) and only a handful of maps in the book, but the text renders such visual aids unnecessary. The appendices at the end of the book provide the rationale behind the rankings, additional summarized data and the sources used to create the book.
Overall, ATROCITIES is a terrific and useful reference that brings to light many lesser-known historical events from all over the world. There were quite a few episodes that I had never heard of, especially in Africa. I have always enjoyed almanacs, older versions of the Guinness Book of World records and The Book of Lists, so this book really hit the mark with me.
The author writes with a sense of humor. I also enjoyed his honesty and thoughtfulness when estimating the deaths associated with events.
Whites summaries of the various causes of the violence are fascinating and a very useful learning tool for a student of history or someone who simply dabbles in it. This book is a very rare hybrid. A serious informational reference source and full of tidbits for the history buff who just likes to have some handy facts at his command.
The only reservation I can think of is his entry on Peter the Great of Russia. He openly recognizes that Peter was mainly interested in modernizing Russia and moving it out of its backward, ancient past yet he still holds Peter strictly accountable for the 3 million deaths estimated to have occurred during this "modernization" without asking the very real question of whether his actions made life better for millions of Russians in the long run.
All in all an outstanding book.
Top reviews from other countries
I appreciate his writing style - a trace of "gallows humor" that probably helped him through the nightmarish task of writing this book. It might be a haunting read for some people, given that there is no limit to the agony which one person can inflict on another. If you can imagine a horrible torture, it's been done (and may still be going on in some countries).
One final note: if you've been schooled to believe that human beings are born "tabula rasa" (a blank slate), or that good people only do bad things because of wicked social forces, you may have to revise your thinking. Criminologists (a group in which I am a member) are notorious for providing "sociological alibis" for bad behaviour. It could be that we carry a non-adaptive mutation - one which may tragically end life on earth through environmental degradation or a global nuclear war. We're certainly capable of doing it as White has shown.
The seller was prompt and the book was delivered as advertised. I would do business with them again. Much appreciated