A review by titus_hjelm
At the Edge of the World? 3500 BC–AD 1603 by Simon Schama

2.0

Has anyone ever asked if dynastic history really is the only approach the so-called trade audience is interested in reading? This History of Britain is 98% kings and queens with only a stray line dedicated to the mass of the people populating the British isles. There’s nothing wrong with the prose as such—if the royal approach is your cup of tea—but somehow I imagined that 20 years into 21st century even popular historians would recognise the limits of this kind of elite history. Overall, this doesn’t feel like a very ambitious project at all, somewhat surprisingly, from Schama.