The Pessimist's Guide to History 3e: An Irresistible Compendium of Catastrophes, Barbarities, Massacres, and Mayhem-from... |
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The Pessimist's Guide to History 3e: An Irresistible Compendium of Catastrophes, Barbarities, Massacres, and Mayhem-from...
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by Doris Flexner and Stuart Berg Flexner
Sales Rank: 166225
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List Price: $14.95
$10.17
At Amazon
on 11-27-2008.
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Features
Cover Type: Paperback with 512 pages
Published by: Collins; Updated edition May 27, 2008
Written in: English
ISBN 10 Number: 006143101X
ISBN 13 Number: 978-0061431012
Book Dimensions:
7.8 x 5.3 x 1.4 inches
Weighs: 13.6 ounces
Product Description
The classic irreverent look at the past—now updated with even more appalling facts!
Fourteen billion or so years ago, the Big Bang exploded—and it's been downhill from there. For every spectacular discovery throughout history, there have been hundreds of devastating epidemics; for every benevolent despot, a thousand like Vlad the Impaler; for every cup half-full, a greater cup half-empty. This enthralling, enlightening, and devilishly entertaining chronicle of disasters and dastardly deeds brings to light the darkest events in history and the most abysmal calamities to strike the planet . . . so far.
88 BC: Mithridates VI Eupator provides an early example of genocide by massacring 100,000 Romans.
1347: Saint Vitus' Dance Epidemic shimmies across Europe like a deadly disco fever, leaving its victims twitching, uncontrollably leaping, and foaming at the mouth.
1888: Jack the Ripper stalks through the dark alleys of Whitechapel, England, turning the world's oldest profession into the world's most dangerous one.
1939: A Swiss chemist wins a Nobel Prize for developing DDT—and the environment gets another nail in the coffin.
2005: Hurricane Katrina devastates the Gulf Coast. In a classic double whammy, the government response also devastates the Gulf Coast.
And much, much more!
About The Author
Stuart Flexner and Doris Flexner are popular reference historians. Doris Flexner, who did all the updates on this book, is also the author of The Optimist's Guide to History. She lives in Chapel Hill, NC.
Reader Reviews
The Pessimist's Guide to History seeks to catalogue the worst disasters from history, and in the main it achieves this goal. The reader can learn about countless incidents that have occurred which really do add to the adage that "life isn't fair", as well as gather some ideas about places more susceptible to disasters than others. In Europe, Italy seems most affected by earthquakes and volcanoes, with Turkey also falling prey to the earthquake menace. Elsewhere around the world, Pakistan, Afghanistan and India are subject to major earthquakes, as is China (also the scene of calamatious flooding and ensuing famines), Bangladesh has been home to many of the worst cyclones, and Peru is another place to avoid if you don't like earthquakes. Despite achieving its aims of cataloguing disasters, there are two things that stand out negatively for this book. The first is the silly comments that follow many of the descriptions of a disaster, which do little to add anything of interest to preceding text. For example, for an entry regarding the eruption of Taal in the Philippines in 1591, we are met with "Mother Nature burps again". A second example relates to the 1864 Calcutta Cyclone - "Another washout in India". These comments are unfortunate, as they are ultimately pointless and distract from, and sometimes cheapen, the tale they relate to. The second negative mark against this book is the poor job at proof-reading that would seem to have occurred. Given that the book is in its third updated edition, this really is inexcusable. Several noticeable examples include "An A-4E Skyraider fighter plane preparing for lunch", "the fire probably burned from within their suits as well as without", "one of the worst disasters of modem times", "plans were made to demolish the bridge and replace it by a four-story structure" and "Almost all victims who remained inside where consumed in the flames of asphyxiated by the smoke". If these marks against do not grate too much, this is a very interesting book to read, easy to pick up and browse through for ten minutes or equally to sit down and plough through for an hour. Hopefully, the fourth edition, when updated and published, will at least correct the grammatical and spelling errors. In summary: Worth a read, but don't expect a masterpiece.
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The Pessimist's Guide to History 3e: An Irresistible Compendium of Catastrophes, Barbarities, Massacres, and Mayhem-from...
Available from Amazon
Price: $10.17
Updated on 11-27-2008.
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