AJP Taylor

Woebot

Well-known member
read his first world war book at christmas and was rapt (and humbled natch)

particularly love his analysis of the start of the war- he insists that it was the result of the franz ferdinand assasination, and that every other historian has trouble understanding how such a small event can trigger such enormous events

which i thought was interesting from chaos theory, butterfly wings start a hurricane, perspective

has anyone else read other of his books?
 

zhao

there are no accidents
well for a butterfly to start a hurricane all the right conditions have to be present, set, and ready to go -- by which time if it wasn't the butterfly it would have been the beetle. or the frog or the lizard or the humming-bird for that matter. right?
 

Guybrush

Dittohead
well for a butterfly to start a hurricane all the right conditions have to be present, set, and ready to go -- by which time if it wasn't the butterfly it would have been the beetle. or the frog or the lizard or the humming-bird for that matter. right?
This was what I learned in school, too. I remember it being stressed that the war just as easily could have broken out in 1906, 1911, and at a couple of other dates which I cannot recall. Here is a handy run-down of the interpretations which exist.
 
Another recommended book on the matter is "Origins of World War I" by Ruth Henig, which includes a summaric view of the most often stressed causes of the war, the historic pretext as well as a round up of the historical debate. A bit more extensive than the wiki-article above, yet handy and not more than an afternoon read.
 

mms

sometimes
read his first world war book at christmas and was rapt (and humbled natch)

particularly love his analysis of the start of the war- he insists that it was the result of the franz ferdinand assasination, and that every other historian has trouble understanding how such a small event can trigger such enormous events

which i thought was interesting from chaos theory, butterfly wings start a hurricane, perspective

has anyone else read other of his books?

my a level history teachers loved him, this was the theory i basically learnt. great stuff i want to re-read it now.

the other really interesting historian is ep thompson, who if you read a j p taylor at a level you graduate onto for a degree if you are reading the areas he wrote about.
 

Octopus?

Well-known member
the other really interesting historian is ep thompson, who if you read a j p taylor at a level you graduate onto for a degree if you are reading the areas he wrote about.

Read his "Making Of The English Working Class" last year and feel in love with both his style and approach. Anyone read his Blake book? He touches on Blake quickly in MotEWC, but not extensively and I was curious to know what his full-length appraisal of B was like.
 

Grievous Angel

Beast of Burden
read his first world war book at christmas and was rapt (and humbled natch)
Yeah, it's bitching.

particularly love his analysis of the start of the war- he insists that it was the result of the franz ferdinand assasination, and that every other historian has trouble understanding how such a small event can trigger such enormous events

which i thought was interesting from chaos theory, butterfly wings start a hurricane, perspective

I'm not sure that's quite the right spin to put on his position. I remember him going into enormous detail about how that small event was the trigger because of a vast network of inter-related systems and processes that were ready for war, which people didn't quite understand at the time, which is I think the point that guybrush aand zhao are making. This is the "war by time table" theory I learnt in A level history. That wikipedia entry is excellent BTW, a really good update.

A similar book in terms of being a revelatory bit of 20th century academic writing that was aimed at the general reader is Money: Where it came from and where it went by JK Galbraith, though he doesn't have quite the enduring reputation among economists as AJPT has among historians AFAICT.
 
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