Civilization: A New History of the Western World - Tapa blanda

"The book is a brilliant example of authorial brevity, the writing neither hurried nor baldly functional" (Edward Vallance BBC History Magazine)

"Urgent, compelling, breathtaking in scope, Osborne's Civilization confronts the vital question of our time." (John Carey)

"It is a bold adventurer who proposes to survey the history of the Western civilization in a mere 500 pages, and not only to say something fresh about many aspects of it, but to do so in a spirit of perceptive scepticism that refuses to go along with standard views and reflex valuations. Roger Osborne offers himself this challenge and meets it brilliantly." (A C Grayling Independent on Sunday)

"Roger Osborne's absorbing blockbuster... is an admirable achievement: a coherent narrative that gallops from the painting of the Lascaux buffalo to the cloning of Dolly the Sheep, from the Beaker people to the McDonald's people, in fewer than 500 crisply written pages." (Boyd Tonkin The Independent)

"Civilization is an immensely important book and an exhilarating read. It deserves the widest audience." (Gregor Dallas Literary Review)

Ever since the attacks of 11th September western leaders have described a world engaged in 'a fight for civilization.' But what do we mean by civilization? We believe in a western tradition of openness and freedom that has produced a good life for many millions of people and a culture of enormous depth and creative power. But the history of our civilization is also filled with unspeakable brutality - for every Leonardo there is a Mussolini, for every Beethoven symphony a concentration camp, for every Chrysler Building a My Lai massacre. How can we come to the defence of a civilization whose benefits seem so questionable?

In this ambitious and important book Roger Osborne shows that we can only truly understand our civilization by re-examining and confronting our past, with all its glories and catastrophes. Sweeping in its scope and comprehensive in its coverage, Civilization tells the story of the western world from its origins to the present. Tying together the histories of empires, art, philosophy, science and politics, Civilization includes the crucial events and people in the history of the western world from the siege of Troy to the Gettysburg address, from Charlemagne to the European Union, from Aristotle to Einstein, and from Giotto to John Ford.

Civilization is the story we tell each other in order to place ourselves in the world and to justify our actions. In the last few decades this story has, for many western citizens, become increasingly tarnished and divorced from reality. Roger Osborne, however, forges a new story of the past that is both challenging and inspiring. At such a dangerous time in the world's history, this brilliant book is required reading.