Customer Reviews

A History of the World in 100 Objects

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

"A History of the World in 100 Objects" began with a BBC Radio 4 program that described 100 striking objects housed in the British Museum in London. I encountered the "100 Objects" while visiting the museum in the summer of 2010, and I was delighted to learn several months later that the original radio scripts were being adapted into a book.

The result, as author Neil MacGregor reminds us, is simply "a" history of the world rather than "the" history. Each chapter tells the story of a unique object or set of objects, ranging from a hand axe and chopping tools that are more than a million years old through the modern credit card and a solar-powered lamp and charger. Some of the objects are famous, some are obscure, but each inspires its own intriguing story. Chapter by brief chapter, the book carefully and clearly describes each object, places it in its historical context, and explains what it meant (or may have meant) to the people who created, used or admired it.

The UK edition of the book is quite elegant--nearly 700 pages of high-quality paper with numerous striking color photographs showing each object from multiple vantage points. It makes a fine gift for friends and family who appreciate art, or history, or both, and it deserves pride of place on any bookshelf.

As an aside, for those interested in the original BBC Channel 4 Radio program that inspired the book, you can download each of the 100 original broadcasts on iTunes. They make a marvelous companion to the book.

The book is extremely well written but not concise -- think of it as musings over the evolution of human civilization rather than as a history book. It is broken down into short 100 chapters making it ideal to as a relaxing read before bedtime. Only wish I would have thought to gotten the videos.

One of the joys of being resident in the UK is the presence of the wonderful BBC Radio 4 a channel with which listeners have a true lifelong love affair. To Dear American chums a quick scan across the internet to the BBC "i" player will find this rich source and life will be all the better for it. Radio 4 challenges, it provokes and gets as near to that much sought after but rarely achieved quality "the heart of the matter" as is humanly possible (the probing questions of presenters on the Today programme makes me think that democracy still has a fighting chance). The channel also carries many brilliant series of which "A History of the World in 100 Objects" by Neil MacGregor is a prime example, even the trailers leading up to its broadcast in January this year were great. What a pleasure therefore to have copy in the written word of this weighty book (738 pages) to accompany the series and to revisit the passion and authority of Neil MacGregor, director of the British Museum and cultivator of fabulous facts.

The whole premise underpinning this epic journey was predicated on a wicked idea conceived by Mark Damazer, then head of Radio 4 to challenge our hugely knowledgeable bods at the British Museum to undertake a somewhat mischievous and loaded exercise. Indeed on the surface any attempt to tell a rather large tale like the history of the world over a modest 2 million years in this manner seems like a piece of First Class honours inspired lunacy. "Baby and bathwater" is the phrase that comes to mind and even if the radio series and the following book were outright bilge you would at least have to give Neil MacGregor three stars for accepting the challenge and embracing with gusto the humongous concept. Yet he succeeds triumphantly and as the BBC blurb states he sets out in copious detail the sheer importance of "A chipped stone that was one of the first things ever made by human hands; a clay tablet telling the story of the great flood centuries before the Bible; a broken hunter's spear dropped by one of the earliest settlers in America; a hoard of gold abandoned in the Wars of the Roses ... every object tells a story" The use of this quote shows just how bloody difficult it is to summarize the sheer diversity of the subject matter and scale of the challenge that the author faced. I frankly remain in awe of his herculean task not least of all for his chapter on the English pepper pot dating from 350 BC which should be required reading for every child of school age. Most of all he understands the true value of encyclopaedic knowledge, in short the ability to illuminate through a fine selection of the facts while at the same time employing the skills of the story teller and then re-connecting his narratives with the present.

Certainly it is true that the hugely hyped and momentous unveiling of THE one object that defines the modern age was somewhat of a disappointment (I will not spoil it - read the book). That said you suspect that MacGregor probably faced the same horrific challenge as Douglas Adams encountered in "The Hitch-hikers guide to the galaxy" coming up with something simple but clever enough to answer the Ultimate Question. Anyway give him a break since he was probably in need of a rest by this time.

To his eternal credit it is understood that as a result of the radio series and now this book, citizens of our curious nation have been flocking to Bloomsbury to seek out the hereto unknown treasures/pleasures of the British Museum and examine for themselves the Mexican ceremonial ballgame belt (AD100-500) and yes the good old pepperpot. Satisfying the other key factor of the whole exercise is that some of more obvious choices that he could have gone for are ignored at the expense of the more quirky but equally illustrative. This then is a wonderful book, full of lavish illustrations and crystal clear maps. And yes I know that times are hard and deep cuts stalk the land but "A History of the World in 100 Objects" by Neil MacGregor is a fairly priced volume full of unparalleled treasure and should be included on all lists heading up the chimney to Santa in the next few months.

I'm afraid I must respectfully disagree with other customers in the review section. For the price, this is a FIVE-STAR book. It is illustrated beautifully with full color photographs. I have the hard-copy and not the Kindle version (though I do own a Kindle). My guess is that the pages would present stunningly on the Kindle for iPad or Kindle for Mac. I also have a Kindle E-ink reader. I doubt it would show well on that last device. I noticed one of the reviewers criticized the photo quality. I must disagree. I find it to be top notch. It is presented in a matte format rather than glossy print.. so my guess is the reviewer would have preferred the glossy versions. I, on the other hand, love the matte finishes on all the photographs which are nicely crisp and detailed.

EXCELLENT book for the price. A perfect gift for a history buff. I love it and I bought it here on Amazon.

I picked up this book when visiting the British Museum in July 2011. Now I wish I had waited and bought it form Amazon instead of lugging it around! Truly happy to see it for sale in the U.S. I am recommending it to my friends. Each chapter highlights a different item from the museum's collection. The chapters are quick reads. I find it fun to pick it up and read a chapter at random. A nice book to leave hanging around for guests to browse through as well. It is thick, though, not a big coffee table book. Generally, a nice collection of writings on a broad range of interesting museum pieces.

Books like this one help the reader to reflect on how we reconstruct history from objects that come down to us from the past. Inevitably, historical objects are interpreted in the context of our times and cultural narratives. Sometimes the historian sees what he wants to see and makes an object fit into a preconceived narrative of the past.

Some of the objects described in this book seem to me to have been over-interpreted in this way. This can be a danger when trying to understand historical objects from indigenous peoples now trying to assert their identity and place in history.

Occasionally, one favoured interpretation is presented as the likely truth, whereas there are a number of other equally plausible explanations. The fact is that we often have no way of knowing what the truth is - if, indeed, there is only one truth.

This is however a minor blemish on an excellent book. In fact it may not even be a blemish at all, in that it causes the reader to think about broader matters of historiography.

In this age of tweets and soundbytes, it's almost hard to believe (yet refreshing) that someone would have the poise to write a volume like this.

My only complaint is the quality of the paper and the binding, which aren't top notch. But for the price, I can't complain. I hope it was worth the author's while.

Very good in general, but the pictures should be better. In all cases the background is flat black, which is dull and lowers the contrast when the object is also dark or is illuminated with insufficient light, as some are. In some cases, there are better pictures in the web site. Also, the dimensions of each object should appear in the picture.

****
"Dr MacGregor all along modestly emphasized collegiality and collectivity in the making of the radio series, but ... Only he could have persuaded a galaxy of talking heads, ... crafted this very particular, idiosyncratic and tendentious, inevitably, but also transcendently humane, history." --Paul Cartledge, AG leventis professor, Cambridge University
*

The history of the world isn't one of separate civilizations - we're all linked, we all interact, and always have done, remarked the Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen. This work would be a great place to start, by picking out 100 objects from the British Museum, to tell "a" history of the world. Day by day a new treasure unearths, each one loaded with meaning. MacGregor and his museum colleagues to choose 100 objects "that had to range in date from the beginning of human history around two million years ago and come right up to the present day. The objects had to cover the whole world, as far as possible equally. All this is probably just nit-picking, but amazingly interesting.

Neil MacGregor relates the history of the world by reference to 100 objects that can be just found in the British Museum, which he is director. Gloriously unfamiliar objects such as the sphinx of Tarharqo: 680 BC, and Tang Tomb figurines: AD 728, were brought alive and placed in their historical and cultural milieu in an amusing and often exciting way. There are several underlying themes, most important of which McG stated on the first exhibit, the mummy of Horned-jitef, an Egyptian priest from the Temple of Karnak, who reminds the world of our common heritage. A map of the heavens on the inner coffin lid, as habitual in the Egyptian belief, was meant to guide the Egyptian through the after life.

That mankind has always tried to express itself artistically is one of the lessons we take from McG efforts. Mostly, the powerful have tried to dishonestly apply art for political propaganda, as was well illustrated by a Turkish coin with the head of Alexander the Great, or the bronze statue of the emperor Augustus, which was discovered in the Sudan. MacGregor comments sarcastically, "A thoughtful alien handling the banknotes of China and the United States today, might well assume that one was ruled by Mao and the other by George Washington." While AG leventis professor, Paul Cartledge believes that the book arising from Radio 4's popular history series is a valuable artifact in itself.

Another intellectual lesson in our global culture, is that events that we think at the epicenter to history might not be just the same in the estimation of our grandchildren or their children. MacGregor delights in the fact that among his objects, "Canonical events - the making of the Roman Empire, the Mongol destruction of Baghdad, the European Renaissance, the Napoleonic wars, the bombing of Hiroshima, ..." are not central stage. If there is an evident bias in his selections, it is for the losers in history's great struggles; McG's enjoys to make champions of underdogs whose societies were eclipsed centuries ago, and thereby coaches us to think of our own real place in the history of global civilization.

"Eli was ninety-eight years old, and his eyes were so dim that he could not see." -- 1 Samuel 4:15 (NKJV)

Let me address right away the objections that some will have to this outstanding resource:

1. The photographs are often dim and unclear. Yup. That's true. But the point of the book is to tell the story of the objects, not to highlight them as things of beauty as might be the case for a painting or a sculpture.

2. The electronic version costs a lot more than $9.99 and is almost as much as the hardcover. Yup. I thought that hardcover was inexpensive for what it is. Buy that one if you don't want to spend a lot for your Kindle.

If you get past those problems, I think you'll love this book. It's like having several of the world's top authorities on each of 100 objects tell you deep meanings that you wouldn't grasp by visiting the British Museum on your own and staring at the objects.

I was very impressed by the selection process, finding objects that convey interesting information at several levels. For instance, an object might tell you something about who made it and how it was used. These objects also have significance in terms of where the elements of the object came from (frequently indicating long-distance trade that you probably wouldn't have expected). Further, aspects of the objects may also reveal something about common human instincts that show up in many different cultures at about the same time. In addition, you get a sense of chronology that you probably didn't know in terms of what each civilization was doing at the same time.

While it would be nice if 100 objects would tell all of human history, that's frankly impossible. A more accurate title for the book would probably be something like "Multicultural Dimensions of Human Experience Represented in 100 Objects from the British Museum." So don't let the title lead you to make unrealistic assumptions about the book.

To me, a handful of the objects were so fascinating that I would have felt rewarded simply by having those few pages.

Here are my favorites:

--Olduvai Handaxe
--Swimming Reindeer
--Ain Sakhri Lovers Figurine
--Jomon Pot
--Jade Axe
--Rhind Mathematical Papyrus
--Minoan Bull-leaper
--Mold Gold Cape
--Chinese Bronze Bell
--Ceremonial Ballgame Belt
--Sutton Hoo Helmet
--Maya Relief of Royal Blood-letting
--Vale of York Hoard
--Kilwa Pot Sherds
--Ife Head
--Taino Ritual Seat
--Tughra of Suleiman the Magnificent
--Ming Banknote
--Jade Dragon Cup
--Mechanical Galleon
--Kakiemon Elephants
--Akan Drum
--Hawaiian Feather Helmet
--North American Buckskin Map
--Australian Bark Shield
--Jade Bi
--Hokusai's The Great Wave
--Suffragette-defaced Penny
--Russian Revolutionary Plate
--Throne of Weapons

When you get the book, see what you think.

I particularly liked the way that commenting scholars were selected who should have a superior cultural and historical perspective on the objects.

One of my sons and his wife work in a well-known museum. I've recommended the book to them as a way to gain perspective on how to tell a collection's story in more complete and compelling ways.

Bravo, Director MacGregor!