Here is a fascinating account of the qualities that have served well andpoorly in the Oval Office, from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Bill Clinton.Greenstein surveys political skill, vision, cognitive ... more »

With the utterance of a single line--"Doctor Livingstone, I presume?"--a remote meeting in the heart of Africa was transformed into one of the most famous encounters in exploration history. But the ... more »

Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized Americas rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was Daniel Hudson... more »

Saudi Arabia is more and more an irrational state--a place that spawns global terrorism even as it succumbs to an ancient and deeply seated isolationism, a kingdom led by a royal family that can't g... more »

The deciphering of the Rosetta stone was one of the great intellectual triumphs of all time, unlocking the secrets of thousands of years of Egypts ancient civilization. Yet in the past two centuries... more »

Liberals loyalty to the United States is off-limits as a subject of political debate. Why is the relative patriotism of the two parties the only issue that is out of bounds for rational discussion? ... more »

"Storm on the Horizon is the little-known story of the key land battle of Desert Storm: the Battle for Khafji -- and how that engagement has become part of military history. Combining some of the mo... more »

"In June 1863, just days before the epic clash at Gettysburg ended the last rebel land invasion of the North, a small party of the Confederate Navy mounted a devastating series of raids on the New E... more »

"In the spring of 1984, I went to the northwest of France, to Normandy, to prepare an NBC documentary on the fortieth anniversary of D-Day, the massive and daring Allied invasion of Europe that mark... more »

Chapter 1 The Will to Power At the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since. -Salvador Dalí How, ... more »

An elegantly designed, beautifully composed volume of personal letters from famous American men and women that celebrates the American Experience and illuminates the rich history of some of Am... more »

A seventeen-year-old who enlisted in the army in 1941 writes to describe the Bataan Death March. Other members of the greatest generation describe their war — in such historic episodes as Guadalcana... more »

In the American colonies of the 1770s, people were fed up with British laws. Local farmers and tradesmen secretly formed a militia. In 1775, when the British marched into Lexington and Concord, Mass... more »

From the bestselling author of Tulipomania comes Batavia’s Graveyard , the spellbinding true story of mutiny, shipwreck, murder, and survival. It was the autumn of 1628, and the ... more »

Ludwig van Beethoven lay dying in 1827, a young musician named Ferdinand Hiller came to pay his respects to the great composer. In those days, it was customary to snip a lock of hair as a keepsake, ... more »

David Halberstam’s masterpiece, the defining history of the making of the Vietnam tragedy, with a new Foreword by Senator John McCain. Using portraits of America’s flawed policy makers and ac... more »

The story of Jason and the Argonauts and Homer's tales of Ulysses' wanderings are among the greatest of the ancient epics, but they are not merely fiction. Following the clues in the classical texts... more »

From Pulitzer-Prize-nominated author Susan Griffin comes an unprecedented, provocative look at the dazzling world of the West’s first independent women, whose lively liaisons brought them unspoken i... more »

The world remembers Edison, Ford, and the Wright Brothers. But what about Philo T. Farnsworth, the inventor of television, an innovation that did as much as any other to shape the twentieth century?... more »

Cassidy's Run is the riveting story of one of the best-kept secrets of the Cold War—an espionage operation mounted by Washington against the Soviet Union that ran for twenty-three years. ... more »

It was a catastrophe without precedent in recorded history: for months on end, starting in A.D. 535, a strange, dusky haze robbed much of the earth of normal sunlight. Crops failed in Asia and the M... more »

In the tradition of Cod and Olives : a fascinating journey into the hidden history, culture, and commerce of caviar. Once merely a substitute for meat during religious fas... more »

Jacob Burckhardt was born in 1818 in Basel, Switzerland. He studied history at the University of Berlin and taught art history and the Italian Renaissance in Berlin and Basel. His essay, as he calle... more »

From one of our greatest historians, a magnificent reckoning with the modern world's most fateful idea. With astonishing authority and clarity, Richard Pipes has fused a lifetime's scholarshi... more »