Customer Reviews

A History of Britain (3500 B.C. - 1603 A.D.) (VHS)

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Simon Schama's 'A History of Britain' is an absolute 'must have' for anyone interested in history and/or PEOPLE, for it is the PEOPLE who inhabited the Sceptred Isle which Schuma makes his focus in this wonderful series, with even 'old chestnuts' like The Battle of Hastings taking on a new glamour as Schama asks us to imagine we were Norman knights or Saxon foot soldiers on the brink of the bloody battle.

A thousand fabulous locations and silently 'dramatised' footage of events bring this history of Britain into visual context, yet it is Schama's chatty, polemic style of narrative which give this series its slightly 'revisionist' kick (Thomas Becket is described as a 'cockney', Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry II are said to have 'fancied' each other.)

The history of the British Isles has sort of been 'done', and as a former history student myself, I knew it would take something pretty special to make this history 'exciting' and 'new' again. Schama's 'History of Britain' succeeds where so many similar series have failed; it throws a delightful and exciting new light upon a history we THOUGHT we all knew.

Highly recommended.

THE HISTORY OF BRITAIN is exciting history even for people with only a casual interest. Its not a typical documentary with events and dates and speeches. Rather Simon Schama tells us stories about the people, struggles, causes, battles, and motivations of the people who shaped one of the most interesting countries and empires.

Two of the three parts in the series are completed and ran on the History Channel. The first part goes thru Henry VIII and covers stories of some of the storied names: Romans, Vikings, Saxons, Normans, Alfred the Great, William the Conqueror, John and the Magna Carta, the Edwards, the Henrys, the War of the Roses, the Hundred Years War among many others. Its great for dwelling on WHY and HOW did something happen rather than the WHAT. Why were the Normans able to conquer England and why did William the Conqueror try?

The second part covers Queen Elizabeth up to Queen Victoria. The stories Simon Schama particular focus on include Queen Elizabeth vs Queen Mary, the Stuarts vs Cromwell, Parliament, and William of Orange, the English vs the Scots, the French imperialists vs the British imperialists, and the American Revolutionaries vs Parliament. A particularly interesting story covers the American Revolution from the British point of view. Another covers how democracy developed in England bit by bit and struggle after struggle. Why did it develop in England and not other places?

People can identify with historical names as people with real stories more than dates and events and Simon Schama uses this with great success in making history come alive in this excellent series.

I enjoyed this series immensely. Because of the vast period of time the series covers Mr. Schama is forced to brush over many events and individuals, but I don't believe that it suffers because of it.

I suppose one can quibble with the fact that he never mentions Sir Thomas Moore, breezes past the Hundred Years War, ignores Richard III, his brother Edward IV, and gives Mary and Elizabeth just a cursory look. Yet I never found the series to suffer because of it.

Schama is telling the story of the evolution of the island of Britain into what we now call England. He looks at critical times and events that played such a major role in that evoution, such as the Reformation,the conflict between Henry II and Beckett and the Black Death to name just a few. It's an ambitious undertaking and I believe that Mr. Schama accomplishes the task with style.

As far as a documentaries go its reminds me of the productions from the seventies. Only a minmual amount of recreations using actors and a heavy amount of narration while we view cathedrals, crops in the fields,works of art and of course Mr.Schama. The impressive thing is I never felt my attention waver. I was engrossed by all six parts and I plan on watching them again one day soon. Mr. Schama is a witty writer who enertains while he instructs and lectures. He's never dry and he does a nice job of balancing his history between the political and socio/economic schools of thought. Though I really didn't learn anything new from his survey of Britain I was entertained and challenged by his perspective. And that's what history is all about. Not just learning facts and dates, but constantly striving for a new perspective and understanding on events that have occured long ago or just last week. It's a good series and I recommend it to the seasoned history buff or the newcomer who's just getting his/her feet wet. Enjoy.

After having covered some British history only briefly in a college "western civ" class, it was enormously gratifying to come across a series that brings the subject alive, just as Simon Schama has done here; yes, there are some spots where I thought perhaps he could have gone into (I would have liked to hear a bit more about post-Roman England and about St. Anselm, whose conduct as Archbishop of Canterbury gives an idea about why Becket might have acted as he did,) but the severe nature of Henry VIII's "reformation" of the English church was brought out in such stark nature, that it ended up raising my awareness of some of the other critical transformations involving Church and government of the time. Schama is frank (even blunt), very clear, and enormously fun to take in. Bravo!

Simon Schama is surely one of the more interesting and most intelligent commentators on the history of Britain, and his stories of death, destruction and outrageous suffering and heroics are guaranteed to hold the attention. He provides an interesting perspective on his country, analyzing the brutalization of one group after another,including the Jews.

It is ironic that Schama, who refers to himself in the film as "a nice Jewish boy," would have been one of the victims in another era, but here he manages to communicate an intense fondness for his country, a fondness born of his thorough knowledge of the ways in which Britain has shaped and has been shaped by the many peoples who have settled there. This is a fascinating film.

Mr Elgie is being unfair when he complains that this tape does not cover the evolution of Britain since 1603AD. What he seems to have missed is that this is just the first of a two part series and that Part 2 will cover the period post 1603.

I've not seen the video but have had very good reports of it from my family back in Britain. I have read the book though and certainly enjoyed it. I'm told that it covers more material than the video so together they probably make a good set.

Mr Elgie's comments regarding the lack of depth are probably correct if the book is anything to go by. This is not necessarily a bad thing though as it provides the reader or viewer with a good overview of the whole 4,500 yr period. They can then identify those periods that are of greater interest to them and search out more detailed studies of them.

Based on the reviews that I'd read of this series, I have to confess a certain amount of disappointment.

Yes, A History of Britain is definitely a good overview and introduction to British history. But it is strong in breadth, not in depth. It also ends abruptly, and offers no coherent theory on how Britain has evolved and why.

I was extremely satisfied with certain elements of the video. Schama's depiction of the inside of a previously Catholic church in England, and of what it might have looked like in England's catholic period, is extraordinary. This is beyond a doubt the best use of computer graphics for historical purposes that I have ever seen.

I will also say that his brief overview of the War of the Roses is an easy-to-understand introduction to a complex period.

But ending where Schama did (an extremely brief talk on the persecution of Catholics after Mary), I was left unfulfilled. I hope another historian will take up the cause of bringing British history to the television screen. It definitely could use another try!