20th Century History

The internationally bestselling author tells her own adventurous life story as she enters her ninth decade 'A delightful companion in life and on the page' The Times 'Donna Leon has...

London, 1913. An exquisite strand of pale pink pearls, worth more than the Hope Diamond, has been bought by a Hatton Garden broker, capturing the attention of both jewelers and...

'Far from being the pious injunction of a Utopian dreamer, the command to love one's enemy is an absolute necessity for our survival.' Advocating love as strength and non-violence as...

In 1970 in Munich Gerhard Richter met Brigid Berlin alias Brigid Polk, Andy Warhol's legendary muse and enfant terrible of New York's high society. This meeting gave rise to Richter's...

From the most famous comedic actor in Ukraine to the most famous political hero in the world today, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky became the unlikely hero of our time. He...

Rarely is the public taken deep into the inner sanctum of major news organisations. In this extraordinary book, award-winning journalist John Lyons goes to the heart of how the media...

Featuring works from an international list of artists, the BP Portrait Award highlights the vitality of portrait painting today. This book presents the diverse range of styles in contemporary portraiture...

From the author of Safiyyah's War - winner of the Indie Book Award, the Week Junior Book Award, the Jhalak Children's & YA Prize and The Diverse Book Award. 'Historical...

The Russian government's deniable use of rogues, businessmen, enthusiasts, mercenaries and political technologists confounded policymakers as Moscow waged a covert invasion of Ukraine in 2014. Did Crimea and Donbas reveal...

Jesus and John Wayne is a sweeping, revisionist history of the last seventy-five years of white evangelicalism, revealing how evangelicals have worked to replace the Jesus of the Gospels with...

In order to understand the massive social and cultural changes that took place in Australia since the end of World War II, Michelle Arrow examines popular culture through three main...

The story of Australia's first elected Labor prime minister, from award-winning historian David Day. Prime Minister Andrew Fisher was one of Australia's great nation-builders, yet his story is largely unknown....

This biography of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke (b.1934) presents a fascinating portrait of a man whose musical output is inextricably linked to the strictures of life in the former...

A cultural exploration of playwriting, directing, acting, and theatre architecture in fin-de-siecle Munich. This text examines the commercial, political, and cultural tensions that fostered modernism's artistic revolt against the classical...

The Victorian Labor party came into being in the midst of the great strikes of the early 1890s, and in the shadow of a crippling economic depression that was to...

With the granting of the vote to women in 1902 Australian suffragist Rose Scott told male politicians that their names would be remembered when the names of the suffragettes had...

When it was published this was the full, post-glasnost critical biography of Mikhail Bulgakov (1891-1940), a great comic writer whose works are regarded as modern classics. This account of Bulgakov's...

The art of the Fang, the BaTeke, the BaKota and other African peoples is extremely vigorous and shows brilliant sense of form. The substantial aesthetic impact of their works upon...

From 1737, any play scheduled for performance in England was subject to censorship by the Lord Chamberlain's office. After questions in the house, the practice was finally abolished in 1968....

"This is the most complete description yet available in English of Stanislavski's real life in art" (New York Times) Jean Benedetti's critical biography of Konstantin Stanislavski, one of the towering...

The war in Afghanistan has given the public an unprecedented view of America's Special Forces, in situations where traditional arms and movement don't apply. Stiner and Clancy trace the transformation...

The Sunday Times bestselling novel about two star-crossed lovers in war-torn Cyprus Two teenagers, a Greek Cypriot and a Turkish Cypriot, meet at a taverna on the island they both...

Lyrical, immersive non-fiction chronicling the stories of nine Muslim women on the margins of modern India, from anthropologist and ethnographer Dr Lexi Stadlen Revelatory, lyrical and immersive, this is an...

Now a major documentary film starring Billy Bragg In the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the British Government banished their political enemies - viewed with the same alarm as today's...

The incredible and heart-breaking true stories of victims of a notorious adoption scandal - inspired by No.1 bestselling novel Before We Were Yours From the 1920s to 1950, Georgia Tann...

The 'Event' Autobiography of the Year now out in paperback - a brave, inspiring and wildly entertaining memoir full of self-help lessons for readers, from one of the world's most...

At the end of World War II, the United States dominated the world militarily, economically, and in moral standing - seen as the victor over tyranny and a champion of...

Kenneth Rose was one of the most astute observers of the post-war Establishment. The wry and amusing journals of the royal biographer and historian made objective observation a sculpted craft....

When you combine the deepest learning and the highest readability with the most plumptious story-telling, the result is A. N. Wilson ... Stephen Fry Known for his journalism, biographies and...

Throughout the years, Gloria Steinem is perhaps the single-most iconic figure associated with women's rights, her name practically synonymous with the word "feminism." Documenting everything from her boundary-pushing journalistic career...

Women's International Thought: A New History is the first cross-disciplinary history of women's international thought. Bringing together some of the foremost historians and scholars of international relations working today, this...

Presents an account of brutality against women in the Muslim world. This work explores the causes of the situation through a discussion of the historical role of Arab women in...

What individuals and countries remember and what they forget, and why, tell much about their current values, perceptions, and even aspirations. In this volume international specialists and practitioners from Europe,...

'In our time, Bernard Leach has done for pottery what Henry Moore has done for scuplture. This... infinitely rewarding book is an account of his pilgrimage through life.' Times Bernard...

Sammy Davis Jr. (1925-1990) rose from childhood stardom on the vaudeville stage to become one of the most famous African-American entertainers of the 1950s and 1960s (and the only black...

Manifestos and immodest proposals from China's most famous artist and activist, culled from his popular blog, shut down by Chinese authorities in 2009. In 2006, even though he could barely...

Detroit's Cold War locates the roots of American conservatism in a city that was a nexus of labor and industry in postwar America. Drawing on meticulous archival research focusing on...

The 50th anniversary edition of this classic World War 2 adventure set in south-east Asia. February, 1942: Singapore lies burning and shattered, defenceless before the conquering hordes of the Japanese...

Henry James was a renowned observer of European culture, both in his fiction and in his life. In particular, he loved Italy, visiting it 14 times and setting several of...

It was the biggest and most grisly case in criminal history. When bodies were discovered hidden in barrels in 1999 in South Australia, Jeremy Pudney was one of the first...

'Read any history of the Nineties in Britain and you will read about Britpop, Blair, the birth of the Premier League and the rise of new lads. I played no...

A Faulkner-esque Classic of Trinidadian literature - No Pain Like This Body is a lost masterpiece of contemporary fiction. 'A masterpiece of hurt' New York Times WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY...

An illustrated historical tour of London's 13 great railway termini, on a clockwise circuit from Paddington to Victoria. London's railway termini are among the most recognisable and familiar landmarks in...

"Superb" NICK COHEN, author of What's Left? "Tremendously entertaining" DOMINIC SANDBROOK, Sunday Times "Like his previous histories of the Seventies and Eighties, A Classless Society is an extraordinarily comprehensive work....

'A masterly mix of shrewd analysis, historical detail and telling quotes... Indispensable' Mail on Sunday 'Among a host of recent books on the 1980s, Turner's stands out as comfortably the...

'A masterful work of social history and cultural commentary, told with much wit. It almost makes you feel as if you were there' ROGER LEWIS, Mail on Sunday The 1970s....

'An illuminating work of massive insight' Alan Moore 'A sensational book. Heartily recommended' Rufus Hound It is the century about which we know too much, yet understand too little. With...

'I am sir [ sure ] you will act as human bean', wrote one distressed pensioner to Prime Minister Robert Menzies in 1953, pleading for assistance. Robert Menzies received 22,000...