English Imperialism

The British East India Company served as one of the key players in the formation of the British Empire. From its origins as a trading company struggling to keep up with its superior Dutch, Portuguese, and Spanish competitors to its tenure as the ruling authority of the Indian subcontinent to its eventual hubristic downfall, the East India Company serves as a lens through which to explore the much larger economic and social forces that shaped the formation of a global British Empire.

The essays gathered in The Early Imperial Republic move beyond the question of whether the new republic was an empire, investigating instead where, how, and why it was one. They use the category of empire to situate the early United States in the global context its contemporaries understood, drawing important connections between territorial conquests on the continent and American incursions.

For years, Always Falling has been content in the capital of the Twin Kingdoms, seeing to its beloved the imperial composer…and there the neuter might have stayed, had it not received an urgent message summoning it home. After the cruelties that saw Always Falling exiled, the last thing it wants is to go back, much less in the company of a near stranger: Amet Emendexte-ilye, the new lover its beloved took to ens breast only a few months ago. But no one else can accompany Always Falling to the harbor city where it was once a member of a rarified aristocracy. And maybe a highland warrior, a...

Recommended listening for all Americans as well as for foreigners seeking to gain historical wisdom and insight, this magisterial and lucid history of America, from the beginning to the present, is written with a lighter touch by a respected historian.

Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness is one of the most influential works ever written in literature and a deeply unsettling read more than a century on. A scathing criticism of the corrupted European imperialism, the novel tells about Marlow's journey to the remote regions in Africa, up the Congo river, to find Kurtz, the best agent of a company trading ivory. Getting in touch with the exuberant and unrestrained nature of Africa, Marlow's experience becomes a journey back to the beginning of creation, a trip to the darkest parts of the human mind, “down” to repressed and unlawful desires....

The newspaper headlines all asked the same question; is James Brennan the new Messiah? Roy Lindermann's, MP for a ruling Liberal Party in crisis, is left a Top Secret folder by his dead friend Dustin Hislop. Investigating the folder's contents, he begins to unravel the story of James Brennan, writer, philosopher and, some would say, Messiah, who the Government put on trial for Treason. Brennan has been under house arrest for years, his only communication with the outside world being a soundless, live broadcast on TV every night from his farm. Now the transmissions have suddenly stopped. Is ...

With world war three looming on the horizon, everyone Is holding their breath and praying hard so that the current tensions on the eastern block do not spill out of control into world war three. The antagonists on both sides are not willing to give an inch of territory, none of them wants to be the first one to blink. This tense atmosphere brings back the memories of the famous Winston Churchill's speech in Fulton, Missouri, which went like...''an iron curtain has descended across the continent…'' well if Churchill was alive now, he would still say that the iron curtain is still in its ...

Captain Jack White DSO (1879 –1946) is a fascinating yet neglected figure in Irish history. Son of Field Marshal Sir George White V.C., he became a Boer war hero, and crucially was the first Commandant of the Irish Citizen Army. One of the few notable figures in Ireland to declare himself an anarchist, he led a remarkable life of action, and was a most unsystematic thinker. This is a long overdue assessment of his life and times. Leo Keohane vividly brings to life the contradictory worlds and glamour of this mercurial figure, who knew Lord Kitchener, was a dinner companion of King Edward ...

This riveting new history shows how having an empire and losing it has shaped modern Britain. Drawing on a mass of original research into the thoughts and feelings of the British people, pop culture, sport and media, Imperial Island tells a story of people on the move and of people trapped in the past, of the end of empire and the birth of multiculturalism, a chronicle of violence and a testament to togetherness. It is the story that best explains Britain today.

The extraordinary story of the theft of priceless Chinese antiques around the world and the connection to crimes spanning more than two centuries—with present-day implications.

The Usurper: and Other Stories is an engaging collection that cuts through race, culture, religion, and creed. These short stories portray a unique perspective of traditional African life in the context of the modern world: 1. The son of a prince maneuvers his way to become the new king. Is he of royal blood? (The Usurper). 2. A reputable juju buckles under the threat of a mad cow, despite his powers to crush anything and anybody on its path. (Ngoko's Folly). 3. A clan head abuses his position and squanders the wealth that has been passed down from generation to generation until his angry ...

On Saturday 29 September 1923, the Palestine Mandate became law and the British Empire reached what would prove to be its maximum territorial extent, covering a scarcely credible quarter of the world's land mass, containing 460 million people. But the tide was beginning to turn. This book is a new way of looking at the British Empire. It immerses the listener in the contemporary moment, focusing on particular people and stories from that day, gleaned from newspapers, letters, diaries, official documents, magazines, films and novels.

George Macartney's disastrous 1793 mission to China plays a central role in the prevailing narrative of modern Sino-European relations. Summarily dismissed by the Qing court, Macartney failed in nearly all of his objectives, perhaps setting the stage for the Opium Wars of the 19th century and the mistrust that still marks the relationship today. The Last Embassy tells the story of the Dutch mission of 1795, bringing to light a dramatic but little-known episode that transforms our understanding of the history of China and the West.

Madagascar's lost pirate utopia represents some of the first stirrings of Enlightenment political thought. In this jewel of a book, he offers a way to 'decolonise the Enlightenment', demonstrating how this mixed community experimented with an alternative vision of human freedom, far from that being formulated in the salons and coffee houses of Europe. Its actors were Malagasy women, merchants and traders, philosopher kings and escaped slaves, exploring ideas that were ultimately to be put into practice in by Western revolutionary regimes a century later.

U.S. exceptionalism, the idea that the United States of America is superior to other nations, is no more fact-based and no less harmful than racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry. The purpose of this audiobook is to persuade you of that statement. This audiobook examines how the United States actually compares with other countries, how people think about the comparison, what damage that thinking does, and what changes we might want to consider making.

The history of the United States is, to a large extent, a history of armed conflict. The nation was first forged in war, a tough fight for independence against one of the world’s largest empires, and that fight would resume less than a generation later with the War of 1812. Then, there were constant low-level conflicts with Native Americans as the nation expanded westwards, and occasionally the country engaged in full-scale war against the Sioux, Comanche, and Apache.

There are two smoking guns provided in this audiobook. One describes the advantage that the UK Square Mile took in the financial fleecing of the United States. The second is the advantage Israel took in establishing a financial incentive to neocons, Rothschilds, and other UK wealth to push for regime change in the Middle East. The Anglo-American Empire has adopted a plan for dominance in the Middle East. This dominance taken to its logical conclusion is dangerous and is based upon greed and power. The USA has been abused by both the UK and Israel in this process.

J. A. (John) Hobson's 1902 book, Imperialism: A Study, presents an original and controversial interpretation of the forces that motivated Britain to conquer foreign lands in the 18th century. Hobson advances the idea that ultrawealthy financiers consciously worked to manipulate political leaders, all so they could invest money and sell goods in the outposts of a country's empire.

In this ground-breaking analysis, author James Kurth (a Harvard student of Samuel Huntington) explains that the roots of America's current foreign policy crisis lie in contradictions of an American empire which attempted to transform traditional American national interests promoted by Presidents like Teddy Roosevelt and FDR into a new American-led global order that has unsuccessfully attempted to promote supposedly universal, rather than uniquely American, ideals.

This audiobook is the first to offer a concise, accessible overview of the evolution of the Soviet Union as a multiethnic empire. It reflects on how the Soviet Union was home to many ethnic minorities, and how their fates, and that of the USSR itself, were bound to the question of how the Soviet state responded variously throughout its existence to the fundamental question of ethnic difference across its vast and diverse territory. The audiobook then examines how the Soviet collapse in 1991 fractured the Union along markedly national lines.