Monday 7 June 2010

Thomas Pakenham, "The Boer War" (1979, rep. 1997)

Dating from the mid-1970s, and re-released in the late 1990s, Pakenham's The Boer War is an excellent revisitation of a conflict that had been too long overlooked (and really, still is). It provides good balance between discussion of military, political, and economic decision-making regarding the war, profiles of important personages, and poses challenging revisions to dominant understandings. Pakenham writes with what a friend called, 'typical heavy-handed British academic history language'. It's certainly not a high-school text sort of affair, but overall I found the book eminently readable. I thought the character and plot construction, once the first few chapters were past, helped propel me along quite pleasurably. As I mentioned to my wife, I would be entirely happy if I could write history books of this quality (and that, Mr. Pakenham, is high praise indeed).

Here's the Introduction to the book, in case you'd like a taste for yourself.

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