before we start discussing what you and your fellow wolfson history award judges consider to be the best history books of 2022, have you noticed among them any particular approach to history or way of dealing with the past that is particularly original or interesting?
I think the shortlist shows us that the story is in a very healthy state. all six of these books are very well produced. They have a very varied and intriguing theme. you have all kinds of different people being talked about. There is a book on God, one on Turkey, one on the United States, and then two on medieval England. three of the books were written by men and three by women.
You are reading: New history books 2022
First there are the Ottomans: Khans, Caesars and Caliphs by Marc David Baer. tell us why this was shortlisted: what makes it one of the best history books of the year?
This is a very interesting book. The Ottoman Turks were a very important and enduring dynasty, ruling for seven centuries. and the book develops a broad narrative that highlights the importance of the ottoman dynasty, both in relation to the countries of the middle east and its role in european history. for many Europeans for about half a millennium, the Ottomans represented the exotic, dangerous, non-Christian East. they were the enemy to be feared. the book highlights six key moments in Ottoman history as important.
First, the founding of the Ottoman state in northwestern Anatolia in the late 13th century by the Turkmen tribal leader, Osman I, after whom the dynasty was named. second, the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans after 1354, which transformed the Ottoman state into a transcontinental empire. Third, the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed the Conqueror, which brought the Byzantine Empire to an end. Fourth, the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent from 1522 to 1566, which marked the height of the power of the Ottoman Empire. Then there is the Siege of Vienna in 1683, which ended in Ottoman defeat by the Habsburg Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold I. It marked the beginning of the end of Ottoman rule in Eastern Europe. finally, there is the successful war of turkish independence led by mustafa kemal atatürk, which brought about the republic of turkey in 1923 and the abolition of the ottoman monarchy.
Ottoman tentacles extended everywhere, not only politically, but also commercially. They controlled the main trade routes by land and sea. this book delves into primary and secondary historical sources, but is written in a very clear and accessible manner, and will be accessible to general readers as well as scholars and students.
Do you have a very original version or are you just telling a good story well?
has a very global perspective. there is not much about what is going on nationally with the ottomans. it is more about what they are doing abroad. it’s about the Ottomans being a big colonial power and they want more land.
Let’s move on to the bane of all witches: life and death in the new world by malcolm gaskill. making it one of the best history books of 2022.
The narrative of this book centers on the frontier town of Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1651, when there were rumors of witches and heretics, and the community was caught in a web of spite, mistrust, and denunciation. This was the beginning of colonial America, where newly arrived English settlers’ dreams of love and freedom could give way to paranoia and terror, enmity and rage. Gaskill uses previously unexamined sources to tell the tragic story of one family and, through it, expose an entire society in an agonizing transition between supernatural hauntings and the advent of a more enlightened age.
gaskill has written several books on witchcraft, but this one is a bit different. focuses on a specific episode from 370 years ago to teach broader lessons about superstition, mental illness, and human cruelty. examines the misery of isolation endured by pioneers far from home, trapped in a strange and terrifying environment.
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The book is beautifully and clearly written and has received excellent reviews. I was quite surprised to find out that he was interested in witches after reading it.
Let’s stay a little longer in the 17th century. Clare Jackson’s Devil’s Land: England Under Siege 1588-1688 takes us from the England of the Armada to the Glorious Revolution, but he takes a different view of what people might traditionally think of as his British history in the 17th century. is that so?
is a highly original account of perhaps the most turbulent and radical era in English history, if I may be so bold. tells the story of a nation in a state of almost continuous crisis and will change our view of the 17th century. it is also very well written. Provides new insights by looking at England through European eyes. the author emphasizes that foreigners called england ‘devil’s land’, a devilish country, badly damaged by religious extremism, royal collapse, civil war and what i would describe as riotous riots. The book examines the complexity of England’s geopolitical compromises and the perpetually anxious nature of life in Stuart’s time.
The author paints England as a failed state, and its precariousness is presented in great detail. During these 100 years, many of the chaotic events described by Jackson were triggered by England’s “quarrelsome relationship” with Europe. his book presents england with a siege mentality. it is a country uncomfortable with the idea of foreign influence and always at odds with itself.
and, at a time when english was a peripheral language in europe, the stuart establishment was populated by worldly, multilingual cosmopolitans. jackson writes about them wittily. she really brings stuart england alive. however, despite her profound scholarship, her book is clearly accessible to both interested general readers and specialized historians. All in all, it’s a remarkable achievement.
next is going to church in medieval england by nicholas orme. It’s about parish life in the middle ages, isn’t it? why does it stand out among the 2022 history books?
it often moves. It shows us how religious life was woven into people’s everyday experiences, from Anglo-Saxon times to the Reformation. it is also richly illustrated. These churches were crucial to English religious and social life, for weekday Sunday church services and for public holidays such as Christmas and Easter celebrations. the recurring cycle of baptisms, marriages, funerals, the everyday existence of ordinary people in parish churches are at the very center of the story.
The book looks at who went to church and who didn’t. the final chapter discusses the English reformation: what aspects of church worship changed and what remained. it shows how, unlike today, religious practice was the warp and woof of life, though parish churches still hold an important place in the English imagination, even as church attendance has declined. in the modern era churches are part of the national heritage. but medieval churches were more than pretty buildings. they were the heart of a community, the focal point of an endless cycle of feasts and fasts that give meaning to a fragile and transient life. orme focuses primarily on the period 1200 to 1530.
Moving to God: An Anatomy by Francesca Stavrakopoulou.
stavrakopoulou is a remarkable and unusual historian. his attitude towards the bible in this book is controversial. he has a decidedly anthropological bias. She describes how, three thousand years ago in the Holy Land, the inhabitants knew many deities, led by a father god named El. Later, one such deity, known as Yahweh, had a human-shaped body and feet to walk on. she had a wife, offspring and colleagues. her body changed all the time. at one point, he was a virile young man, stocky and emanating a red-hot light. however, in the book of daniel, he had a more heavenly color. he had the white hair and beard of an ancient deity possessing wisdom.
“the book is full of unusual interpretations of how the bible shows the divine”
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Throughout this book, God is anthropomorphized. Through a detailed examination of the Bible, Stavrakopoulou writes about the various gods represented in ancient myths and rituals. they came from a particular time, and were made in the image of the people who lived then, who were shaped by their circumstances and experience of the world. She argues that the important people in the Hebrew Bible were not historical figures and that probably very little of the Hebrew Bible is historical fact. she bases this on arguments that ancient writers had a very different understanding of “fact” and “fiction” than the modern definition of those terms.
the book is full of unusual interpretations of how the bible shows the divine. The author argues that her arguments about the physicality of God enhance our understanding of the history of the great monotheistic religions and Western culture. It is a book that invites reflection and cannot fail to generate controversy.
let’s go to the last of the best history books of 2022, fallen idols: twelve statues that made history by alex von tunzelmann
Of all these six books, this is the most accessible to the general reader. it is fascinating. examine the fate of fallen statues of famous people from the past.
In 2020, protesters toppled and smashed statues around the world, from the United States to New Zealand. This book examines why statues were put up, what messages they conveyed, how those messages were challenged, what controversies these statues caused, and why and how they were destroyed. the book is very well researched and considers the statues as a visible and public form of historical narration.
the choice of statues is very wide, geographically, and includes, among others, stalin, george v, lenin, saddam hussein and george washington. I cannot resist pointing out that it is not surprising that the statues are all of men. Above all, this book is worth reading for the light it sheds on the function of statues today, as well as yesterday, and the book seeks to discuss the contemporary debate and the rewriting of the past for the present. he also looks at the curious absence of historical awareness on the part of many who are still determined to tear down statues. it’s kind of a comment, if you will, on ‘waking up’, I think. As military historian Dan Snow put it well, “Like all the best historians, von Tunzelmann uses the past to explain what is happening today.” I found this book intelligent, enlightening, and thoroughly enjoyable.
what does it say about the modern debate about statues? you ask if we should put them and what they mean and all that kind of stuff? Does she have a particular opinion on that?
It’s not a particular take. she simply lets us decide what we think. a lot depends on who the people are. but his opinion is that it doesn’t seem like the people who are taking these statues down really understand the historical setting in which they were placed.
but she’s not going to get into that controversy at all.
Not really. she is more interested in the statues and why they were put up in the first place. It’s a very interesting book. I found it quite provocative.
part of our best books of 2022 series.
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