Read Anywhere and on Any Device!

Subscribe to Read | $0.00

Join today and start reading your favorite books for Free!

Create Free Account

Dead Certainties: Unwarranted Speculations

3.5/5 ( ratings)

Like his The Embarrassment of Riches and the bestselling Citizens, Simon Schama's latest book is both history and literature of immense stylishness and ambition. But Dead Certainties goes beyond these more conventional histories to address the deeper enigmas that confront a student of the past. In order to do so, Schama reconstructs -- and at times reinvents -- two ambiguous deaths: the first, that of General James Wolfe at the battle of Quebec in 1759; the second, in 1849, that of George Parkman, an eccentric Boston brahmin whose murder by an impecunious Harvard professor in 1849 was a grisly reproach to the moral sanctity of his society. Out of these stories -- with all of their bizarre coincidences and contradictions -- Schama creates a dazzling and supremely vital work of historical imagination.

Language: English

Pages: 352

Format: Paperback

Publisher: Vintage

Release: June 02, 1992

ISBN: 0679736131

ISBN 13: 9780679736134

Dead Certainties: Unwarranted Speculations

3.5/5 ( ratings)

Like his The Embarrassment of Riches and the bestselling Citizens, Simon Schama's latest book is both history and literature of immense stylishness and ambition. But Dead Certainties goes beyond these more conventional histories to address the deeper enigmas that confront a student of the past. In order to do so, Schama reconstructs -- and at times reinvents -- two ambiguous deaths: the first, that of General James Wolfe at the battle of Quebec in 1759; the second, in 1849, that of George Parkman, an eccentric Boston brahmin whose murder by an impecunious Harvard professor in 1849 was a grisly reproach to the moral sanctity of his society. Out of these stories -- with all of their bizarre coincidences and contradictions -- Schama creates a dazzling and supremely vital work of historical imagination.

Language: English

Pages: 352

Format: Paperback

Publisher: Vintage

Release: June 02, 1992

ISBN: 0679736131

ISBN 13: 9780679736134

More books from Simon Schama

The Power of Art

3.9/5 ( ratings)

A History of Britain: At the Edge of the World? 3500 BC-AD 1603

Rembrandt's Eyes

4.1/5 ( ratings)

The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age

A History of Britain: The Wars of the British 1603-1776

The Story of the Jews: Finding the Words, 1000 BCE – 1492 CE

3.9/5 ( ratings)

A History of Britain: The Fate Of Empire 1776-2000

Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves and the American Revolution

3.9/5 ( ratings)

Flesh in the Age of Reason: The Modern Foundations of Body and Soul

3.8/5 ( ratings)

Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution

Art

3.7/5 ( ratings)

The Story of the Jews Volume 2: When Words Fail: 1492--Present

4.4/5 ( ratings)

Landscape and Memory

4.3/5 ( ratings)

The Global Refugee Crisis: How Should We Respond?

3.3/5 ( ratings)

The Death of the Past

3.5/5 ( ratings)

Belonging: The Story of the Jews 1492–1900

4.5/5 ( ratings)

Remembered Light: Cy Twombly in Lexington

3.7/5 ( ratings)

Fifty Years of Works on Paper: The Drawings at the Hermitage

4.1/5 ( ratings)

Patriots and Liberators: Revolution in the Netherlands, 1780-1813

3.2/5 ( ratings)

The Story of the Jews: Belonging (1492-1900) (Vol 2)

4.3/5 ( ratings)

Rate this book!

Write a review?