Books like Freedom and Death

This book is an extraordinary synthesis of half a century of history (c. 1520-1571) as European powers and the Ottoman Empire fought for control of the Mediterranean Sea. Empires of the Sea focuses on a number of momentous military engagements, the Siege of Rhodes (1522), the Siege of Malta (1565), the Ottoman conquest of Cyprus (1570-1), and the Battle of Lepanto (1571). Crowley writes like an artist evoking the colors and textures of the brilliant seventeenth-century amid a world of emperors, sultans, popes, and pirates. He manages to capture both the extraordinary individuals who shaped momentous events through their personalities and the broader historical trends that led to the defeat of Ottoman expansion during the 16th century and shaped the contours of Europe as we know it today.

Thucydides, along with Herodotus a generation earlier, created history as we know it. Herodotus added to narrative the analysis of cause: ‘why’ as well as ‘what’. Thucydides added different levels of causation: the immediate reasons for the war and the long-term causes. He studied how the dynamics of fear and power drive states into warfare. He took the gods out of history (it is hard to remember how radical that was). He studied the corruption of moral language and behaviour under the pressure of conflict. In Pericles’ Funeral Speech he set out the theory of Athenian democracy (Pericles would have denied that our own society was democratic—a challenging thought). Thucydides’ eye is not exactly cold, but it is unblinking: no historian seems so free of illusion.

More Italy here, Sicily this time, and set in the middle of the 19th century.

Again, I love reading about other important political eras, and really enjoy the beautiful prose and light ironic sense of humor. One of my favorite books, all-time. Gorgeous writing and the lightness of the scenes betray the seriousness of the era.

This was the point when Italy was unifying, and the main character of the novel is about to lose his exalted status as one of the great princes of Sicily. You feel for the man, even with his many flaws, and I love books where I’m engaged in the story but also learning a lot about history at the same time.

There is no better scholar of modern Greece than Mark Mazower and his latest work on the Greek Revolution is a tour de force. As the title suggests, Mazower explores how the Greek Revolution, based on the “new politics” of national identity, overthrew Ottoman imperialism and established the world’s first true nation-state. The Greek Revolution gives us all the famous characters from 1821 in detail: Koloktronis, the brigand turned general who became a national hero. Ibrahim Pasha, the son of the Pasha of Egypt who dreamed of conquering Greece for himself. Ioannis Kapodistrias was a brilliant diplomat who became the first Greek head of state only to be murdered by his own people. And George Byron, the poet, turned adventurer, turned financer of the Greek Revolution who died of fever while campaigning for Greek freedom. At the same time, the book analyzes more universal characteristics of revolutions: their fundamental… show more.

I get it. People read Homer’s Odyssey because of the adventures and gods and monsters, but for me, his best was his first epic poem, The Iliad. The opening word of the story is “rage,” and the action never stops until the last line. From clashing swords to souls sent down to the house of death, this could have been a heavy metal opera if only Homer had played an electric guitar instead of a lyre. I chose the Lombardo translation because it captures best the action and heroism and pulse-pounding excitement that keeps me reading this one over and over.

This book, published in the 1870s, is sometimes considered the best English novel ever written.

It is a monumental work, and while I found it very impressive, I have to admit that reading the long and detailed text felt heavy going at times.

Set in a provincial town with a large cast of characters, it depicts a middle-class way of life very different from that of today, and addresses various social and political questions of the time. One major theme is the psychology of marriage as analysed through the relationships between two ill-matched couples.

Not a novel, but it reads like one, as Nicolson tells the story of how the greatest sea voyage tale of all time – The Odyssey, and its sister epic The Iliad – came to be, with a cast of characters including the Greek heroes, gods and goddesses crossing the land and seascapes of Ancient Greece. 

Nicolson argues that these poems emerged not in the 8th century BC, when they were first written down, but a thousand years earlier in the oral tradition. In them, he sees the origin myths of the people who became the Greeks – the fusion of the native people of the Eastern Mediterranean and invaders from the northern steppes. 

But it is Nicolson’s personal investment in his subject that is so beguiling. A sailor himself, he brings his deep knowledge of the sea, of sailing, navigation, the capriciousness of wind, the knife-edge between… show more.

Logue’s modernist reworking of the Iliad – the Trojan war - mother of all Mediterranean contests, is quite unlike anything you’ll ever read. Logue doesn’t translate, he remakes. It’s as cinematic as a film script, cast in a poetic language as brilliant as anything in modern times, full of jump cuts, staccato effects, and startling contemporary references. The violence of the fighting has a slamming immediacy (‘Dust like red mist/Pain like chalk on slate’), the Mediterranean – ‘the sea that is always counting’ - glimmers and sighs, the Gods behave like spoiled children, helicopters go whumping over the dunes.

Ideally, novels are supposed to provide escape and insight, but sometimes a hefty novel can seem too ponderous a commitment for lazy people.

As an alternative, flash fiction can accommodate people who have failing attention spans or inflexible schedules. Sure, it won’t be as engrossing or uplifting as a 900-page novel, but it’s easy to dive into a random page and enjoy the magical possibilities of prose.

Yourgrau’s flash fictions are more playful than plausible. (Example: “A man comes home and finds his wife in bed with a squirrel.”) Good flash fiction doesn’t need a lot of action, just surrealistic touches and a surprising moment or two.

Eventually, after a few good laughs, you’ll be ready to read something longer and meatier.

All adventures begin with The Odyssey.

Before there was Don Quixote, Huckleberry Finn, or Bilbo Baggins, there was brave Odysseus. It was Homer who first taught us what it means to desperately desire “to make it there and back again.” For me, The Odyssey struck a personal cord. As a warrior who once answered his nation’s call, it often wasn’t the battles in far distant lands, but the journey home, that was most difficult. Home, that beautiful, powerful word, holds great magic for Odysseus, and for me, too. Many ideas can send a hero on an adventure, but only love of home can bring him back again. These are the greatest adventures of all, and why The Odyssey is foundational for my own novel.