Sunday, September 11, 2011

What is David Edgerton reading?

The current featured contributor at Writers Read: David Edgerton, author of Britain's War Machine.

His entry begins:
Javier Cercas, The Anatomy of a Moment (Bloomsbury 2011)
This astonishing account of what the Spanish call the ’23-F’, the attempted coup of 23 February 1981, much more incisive than most histories and imaginatively richer than most novels, is a masterpiece. It is a work of sparkling intelligence about the transition from Francoism, a huge political rupture which consumed its architects, three men who on the fateful day stayed seated in the Spanish parliament, in the certain knowledge that for them there was no escape. They...[read on]
Among the early praise for Britain's War Machine:
"A stunning book told with authority, clarity and compelling energy."
--James Holland, author of The Battle Of Britain

"Absolutely fascinating. This book will make you think differently about Britain's role in the Second World War."
--Laurence Rees, author of Auschwitz: The Nazis and the "Final Solution"

"A remarkable achievement. He re-envisions Britain's role in the Second World War and with it Britain's place in modernity. The period will never look the same again."
--Adam Tooze, author of The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy
Learn more about Britain's War Machine at the Oxford University Press website.

David Edgerton is the Hans Rausing Professor at Imperial College London where he was the Founding Director of its Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine. He is the author of the iconoclastic and brilliant The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History since 1900 (Oxford, 2007).

The Page 69 Test: The Shock of the Old.

Writers Read: David Edgerton (May 2007).

Writers Read: David Edgerton.

--Marshal Zeringue