Save on pre-loved laptops
Ships from
Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Ships from
Amazon.com
Sold by
Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Sold by
Amazon.com
Payment
Secure transaction
Your transaction is secure
We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more
Kindle app logo image

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

Follow the author

N. A. M. Rodger
Follow
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.

The Price of Victory: A Naval History of Britain: 1815 - 1945 Hardcover – May 13, 2025

by N. A. M. Rodger (Author)

Purchase options and add-ons

The final installment of N. A. M. Rodger’s definitive, authoritative trilogy on Britain’s naval history

Across two acclaimed volumes, preeminent naval historian N. A. M. Rodger has traced the progress of naval warfare in Britain from the seventh century through to Trafalgar, combining decades of scholarship with original insights and analysis. In this final volume, N. A. M. Rodger delivers a magisterial history of the Royal Navy, beginning after its defeat of Napoleon and concluding in 1945 with the Second World War.

At the end of the French and Napoleonic Wars, British sea power was at its apogee. But by 1840, as one contemporary commentator put it, the Admiralty was full of “intellects becalmed in the smoke of Trafalgar.” How the Royal Navy reformed and reinvigorated itself in the course of the nineteenth century is just one thread in this magnificent book, which refuses to accept standard assumptions and analyses. Rodger’s comprehensive narrative goes beyond the conduct of war at sea to tell a sprawling story of naval warfare as a national endeavor. As in previous volumes, the social history of officers and men―and now also women―has a prominent place. Along the way, he describes the development and strategic significance of submarine and navy air forces and the rapid evolution of weapons and ships (from classic Nelsonian type to hybrid steam/sail ships, then armor-clad and the fully armored Dreadnoughts and beyond). He assesses the character and importance of leading admirals―Beatty, Fisher, Cunningham―together with the roles of other less famous but no less consequential figures. Rodger sets all this in the essential context of politics and geo-strategy.

Based on a lifetime’s learning, The Price of Victory is a masterful culmination of one of the most significant British historical works in recent decades. Naval specialists will find much that is new and will be invigorated by the originality of Rodger’s judgments; but everyone who is interested in one of the central threads in British history will find it rewarding.

24 page of illustrations; 64 images, 10 maps
Read more
Previous slide of product details
  1. Print length
    976 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    W. W. Norton & Company
  4. Publication date
    May 13, 2025
  5. Dimensions
    6.3 x 1.9 x 9.4 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0393292223
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0393292220
Next slide of product details
The%20Amazon%20Book%20Review
The Amazon Book Review
Book recommendations, author interviews, editors' picks, and more. Read it now.

Customers also bought or read

Page 1 of 1Start over
Previous page
  4. The Blood in Winter: England on the Brink of Civil War, 1642
    Just released
    Hardcover
    FREE delivery Tue, Nov 18
  6. Ring of Fire: A New History of the World at War: 1914
    Just released
    Hardcover
    Delivery Saturday
  7. McNamara at War: A New History
    Just released
    Hardcover
    Delivery Saturday
  19. Storyteller: The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson
    Just released
    Hardcover
    Delivery Saturday
  22. Deadwood: Gold, Guns, and Greed in the American West
    Just released
    Hardcover
    FREE delivery Tue, Nov 18
Next page
Loading...

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A definitive history . . . at last bringing Rodger’s great work to its conclusion."
― Max Hastings, Sunday Times

"With the The Price of Victory, NAM Rodger's great history of naval warfare is complete―and this final volume is a fascinating triumph. . . . Five stars."
― Simon Heffer, The Telegraph

"Magisterial. . . . A very considerable and scholarly work."
― Jonathan Boff, The Spectator

About the Author

N. A. M. Rodger is emeritus fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, and professor of naval history at the University of Exeter. He has been awarded the Julian Corbett Prize in Naval History, the Duke of Westminster’s Medal for Military Literature, and the Hattendorf Prize. He lives in Oxford.

Product details

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
N. A. M. Rodger

N. A. M. Rodger

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read book recommendations and more.