Missing History Books

[Formless]

Anyone else notice that history books in English are mostly all about U.S, Britain, WW I, WW II, Roman and and Greek history with maybe a bit about Germany and that is about it??? 

Kinda sad, for example I really had to dig around to find books about the German 30 years war (which was a giant deal for Germany, but almost not covered at all by English historians).  And I am still looking around for English books about John III Sobieski, Cyrus the Great, Saladin, Mohammad as General, not to mention Belisarius and books about the Romance of the Three kingdom times in China. 

Just sad, English popular history is just too narrow they ignore too much interesting stuff that happened in other places.  Sort of makes me wonder what other interesting people I never heard about because the books are simply not there. 

What do you guys think?

[Torben]

hm,  usually books cover mostly the history directly linked to a country. 

btw u should try military libraries.  read about clausewitz theorems,  they are being taught up to this day at west point so itr should be possible. 
check books from all the parties that participated in the wars of interest,  likely u will find one that got translated.  and dont forget to google for videos.  daily motion often has a few nice documentaries,  maybe youll find some in english.


btw to your grunwald post: i guess something like eternal loyalty is a thing that cant be promised : )

[Ginosaji]

I'm a bit into the 30 years war topic (I've got a project running that's connected to that period), but here (I'm Austrian) we didn't learn much about that war in school. The whole topic seems not to be very important here, while in Germany as far as I know it's a very big topic. I'm working with some German people on said project and it's amazing what they're able to tell about that war.

If you want to read about things like that I can only suggest you to search for books on that specific topic. Common history books always mostly cover the history of the area or country where they are sold.

[Torben]

well i´m german and we learned jack about it in school,  had too read up on myself -.-

but ya,  its a fascinating theme.

 btw,  austrians are gay (joke ; )  (really : )

[Ginosaji]

well i´m german and we learned jack about it in school,  had too read up on myself -.-

Yeah, but you did read into it while in the rest of the world it's not considered a topic interesting enough.
tbh. I also didn't learn much about Austrian history in school, mainly about the Habsburger family and that we sucked in both world wars. But here you can buy books about the Austrian naval fleet and stuff, where I can only think "when did we have something like a FLEET?!". Yeah, I know, we had a few big ships, but our flagship got destroyed without firing on any enemy - ever.
I highly doubt that you'll find that books anywhere else than in Austria.

btw,  austrians are gay (joke ; )  (really : )

Germans make bad jokes

[Torben]

well maybe in germany : )

cooles thing are those tiny little antique book shops that are harder and harder to find (thanks internet -.-)

i found all sorts of rly cool books there.  one of my last acquirements was a book about ze sexual escapades of french knights : )

[The_Angle]

Germans love censorship I heard. 3:

[Torben]

Germans love censorship I heard. 3:

what country are you from so i can drop down some biased bullshit?

or wait,  lets not let this topic turn into some random dudes flaming each other.  but seriously,  cut the crap

[Overdriven]

It kinda makes sense a lot of popular English historical writing is based around England and history that's linked to England. The same for most countries I guess.

One thing that frustrates me the most was History in school barely touched on the British Empire. Instead we learnt far more about the US, the Russian revolution, Rise of einstein. But very little about that little thing called the British Empire. Always pissed me off. So I've made sure to read many many historical books about it now 

If I want to find history from any other country, I tend to look to translations, rather than books by English authors.

[Thucydides]

what country are you from so i can drop down some biased bullshit?

or wait,  lets not let this topic turn into some random dudes flaming each other.  but seriously,  cut the crap

can't you be arrested for saying anything about the holocaust that isn't officially accepted? Or if you say something thats percieved to be racist?

Also, i don't know what libraries you visit, but my local public library has TONS of shit on everything, while the main reference library in my city has a ton of esoteric shit that i'll never read in my lifetime. You just gotta look carefully.

[Mtemtko]

Germans love censorship I heard. 3:

So I heard that RO2 copies bought in germany..... you know the rest 

[The_Angle]

I've seen numerous examples of over-sensative Authorities(People) censoring things, including their internet access and numerous amounts of video games. Also a clear lack of freedom of expression just because they're oh so afraid of being called chocolate chip cookie's boohoo. I'm not a sympathiser, and they're generally not a problem with me unless they get into Government somehow, but people should have every right to express themselves rather than live repressed.


/Derail.

What I'm saying is. MYCOUNTRYHASPARTIALLYMOREFREEDOMSANDPSEUDOFREEDOMSTHANYOUDOHARHARHAR.

[Ginosaji]

can't you be arrested for saying anything about the holocaust that isn't officially accepted?

I think you mixed that up with Austria. Here you go to jail if you say the wrong things about the holocaust in public. The whole thing is called "Verbotsgesetz" or something like "Law of prohibition". In 1947 Austria tried to get rid of all that nasty stuff that happened the years before so they just forbid everything connected to it. IMHO a big mistake because now we have several political parties that try not to come into conflict with that law while being completely "brown" inside. That way they also get votes by people too dumb to realize who they're voting for.

In Germany there's even an official political party called "NPD" which obviously is just a successor party of the NSDAP. But they're far less successfull than in Austria, maybe because they don't even try to deny that connection.

Oh, crap, did we fulfill Godwin's Law now? So early?

Or if you say something thats percieved to be racist?

No, that's completely wrong for Germany as well as for Austria. You can go to jail if you try to agitate people against some other nationality, though (at least in Austria, dunno about Germany).

[Torben]

woha quite some posts came up about this.  lets not get this too far,  but yes:  our constitution forbids to deny that the holocaust happened.   

its a price we are willing to pay.  also we still have right wing parties,  and that is good because the people themselves can show by not voting for them that there is no place for any racist ideology here.  blah blah.

we were talking about books

[Ginosaji]

but yes:  our constitution forbids to deny that the holocaust happened.   

Yours too? Didn't know that, sorry.

But I have to agree, we shouldn't go too far on this..