LoveReading Says
Every so often a book comes along that makes you realise you've been peering down the wrong end of the telescope. The Earth Transformed by Peter Frankopan is such a book.
They say that history is written by the winners and the assumption therein is that the winners are human beings. Over the course of over 600 pages Frankopan comes from a different perspective, providing extensive evidence regarding the role of climate, nature, and therefore available resources in determining the paths of human history.
Historians are normally given to analysing the political, strategic or tactical choices historical leaders make which lead to major change, whereas for Frankopan this usually omits the influence of a bigger actor - namely the planet. From the Book of Genesis to the post-industrial age, Frankopan's forensic research is fascinating, global and meticulously analysed. It's clear that the author holds the view that we are teetering on the edge of a climate catastrophe, but The Earth Transformed does not in itself catastrophise. There are terrible warnings of course, messages from the earth that things are going awry, but there are also signs of hope, advancement and enlightenment. The future is uncertain, and the idea that there has always been climate change and we will simply adapt is a common cry from the industrialists.
In his conclusion Frankopan contrarily writes 'What history in general and this book in particular show is that there have been a great many times in the past when societies, peoples and cultures have proved unable to adapt. Indeed in some respects, the human story of progress is about batons being repeatedly dropped and picked up by others." I genuinely felt while reading The Earth Transformed that I was reading something that would one day be regarded as a key document in the study of climate change, to be read by those who picked up the baton.
Greg Hackett
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| Primary Genre |
History
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The Earth Transformed Synopsis
THE TIMES BEST HISTORY BOOK OF 2023
A BOOK OF THE YEAR PICK FOR THE TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES, BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE, GUARDIAN, INDEPENDENT AND FINANCIAL TIMES
A BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK | AN INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER
'Humanity has transformed the Earth: Frankopan transforms our understanding of history' Financial Times
'Vast, learned and timely work' Sunday Times
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From the international bestselling author of The Silk Roads comes a major history of how a changing climate has dramatically shaped the development-and demise-of civilisations across time.
When we think about history, we rarely pay much attention to the most destructive floods, the worst winters, the most devastating droughts or the ways that ecosystems have changed over time.
In The Earth Transformed, Peter Frankopan, one of the world's leading historians, shows that the natural environment is a crucial, if not the defining, factor in global history - and not just of humankind. Volcanic eruptions, solar activities, atmospheric, oceanic and other shifts, as well as anthropogenic behaviour, are fundamental parts of the past and the present. In this magnificent and groundbreaking book, we learn about the origins of our species: about the development of religion and language and their relationships with the environment; about how the desire to centralise agricultural surplus formed the origins of the bureaucratic state; about how growing demands for harvests resulted in the increased shipment of enslaved peoples; about how efforts to understand and manipulate the weather have a long and deep history. All provide lessons of profound importance as we face a precarious future of rapid global warming.
Taking us from the Big Bang to the present day and beyond, The Earth Transformed forces us to reckon with humankind's continuing efforts to make sense of the natural world.
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'This is epic, gripping, original history that leaps off the page' Sathnam Sanghera, author of Empireland
'All Historians aiming to tell a narrative face the problem of when exactly to start it. Only Peter Frankopan would go back 2.5 billion years to the Great Oxidation Event' Tom Holland
A 2023 HIGHLIGHT FOR: BBC NEWS * SUNDAY TIMES CULTURE * FINANCIAL TIMES * NEW EUROPEAN * GUARDIAN * NEW STATESMAN * THE TIMES * THE WEEK * WATERSTONES * BLACKWELL'S
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9781526622556 |
| Publication date: |
28th March 2024 |
| Author: |
Peter Frankopan |
| Publisher: |
Bloomsbury an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing (UK) |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Pagination: |
736 pages |
| Primary Genre |
History
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