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Russia
- The Story of War
- Narrated by: James Cameron Stewart
- Length: 10 hrs and 35 mins
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Publisher's summary
No nation is a stranger to war, but for Russians war is a central part of who they are. Their "motherland" has been the battlefield where some of the largest armies have clashed, the most savage battles have been fought, the highest death tolls paid. Having prevailed over Mongol hordes and vanquished Napoleon and Hitler, many Russians believe no other nation has sacrificed so much for the world. In Russia: The Story of War, Gregory Carleton explores how this belief has produced a myth of exceptionalism that pervades Russian culture and politics and has helped forge a national identity rooted in war. While outsiders view Russia as an aggressor, Russians themselves see a country surrounded by enemies. Time and again history has called upon Russia to play the savior - of Europe, of Christianity, of civilization itself - and its victories have come at immense cost. In this telling, even defeats lose their sting. Isolation becomes a virtuous destiny and the whole of its bloody history a point of pride. War is the unifying thread of Russia's national epic, one that transcends its wrenching ideological transformations. As Putin's Russia asserts itself in ever bolder ways, knowing how the story of its war-torn past shapes the present is essential to understanding its self-image and worldview.
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Israel is a tiny state, and yet it has captured the world's attention, aroused its imagination, and, lately, been the object of its opprobrium. Why does such a small country speak to so many global concerns? More pressingly: Why does Israel make the decisions it does? And what lies in its future? We cannot answer these questions until we understand Israel's people and the questions and conflicts, the hopes and desires, that have animated their conversations and actions.
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Excellent, mildly but honestly biased, terrible narration
- By Schaq on 04-01-17
By: Daniel Gordis
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Looking for the Good War
- American Amnesia and the Violent Pursuit of Happiness
- By: Elizabeth D. Samet
- Narrated by: Suzanne Toren
- Length: 14 hrs and 21 mins
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In Looking for the Good War, Elizabeth D. Samet reexamines the literature, art, and culture that emerged after World War II, bringing her expertise as a professor of English at West Point to bear on the complexity of the postwar period in national life. She exposes the confusion about American identity that was expressed during and immediately after the war, and the deep national ambivalence toward war, violence, and veterans - all of which were suppressed in subsequent decades by a dangerously sentimental attitude toward the United States' "exceptional" history and destiny.
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Essential reading for military officers and political decision makers.
- By Arlene S. Burke on 02-23-22
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When Montezuma Met Cortes
- The True Story of the Meeting That Changed History
- By: Matthew Restall
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 16 hrs and 6 mins
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In 1519, the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortés first met Montezuma, the Aztec emperor, at the entrance to the capital city of Tenochtitlan. This introduction - the prelude to the Spanish seizure of Mexico City and to European colonization of the mainland of the Americas - has long been the symbol of Cortés' bold and brilliant military genius. Montezuma, on the other hand, is remembered as a coward who gave away a vast empire and touched off a wave of colonial invasions across the hemisphere. But is this really what happened?
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Flawed, but worth it for those interested.
- By "J" on 02-16-18
By: Matthew Restall
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Napoleon
- By: Paul Johnson
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 5 hrs and 52 mins
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Paul Johnson's book is a refreshing return to a concept whose time has come once again: the Great Man theory of biography. It serves as "the greatest possible refutation of those who hold that events are governed by forces, classes, economics, and geography rather than the powerful wills of men and women". Napoleon truly was the Great Man of his age, a towering and terrible genius who managed to conquer the Continent.
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Not your standard biography
- By Mark Grannis on 04-24-05
By: Paul Johnson
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The Long Shadow
- The Legacies of the Great War in the Twentieth Century
- By: David Reynolds
- Narrated by: John FitzGibbon
- Length: 19 hrs and 55 mins
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One of the most violent conflicts in the history of civilization, World War I has been strangely forgotten in American culture. It has become a ghostly war fought in a haze of memory, often seen merely as a distant preamble to World War II. In The Long Shadow critically-acclaimed historian David Reynolds seeks to broaden our vision by assessing the impact of the Great War across the twentieth century. He shows how events in that turbulent century—particularly World War II, the Cold War, and the collapse of Communism—shaped and reshaped attitudes to 1914–18.
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The World According to David Reynolds (feat. WWI)
- By Steve on 02-26-15
By: David Reynolds
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War Without Mercy
- Race and Power in the Pacific War
- By: John W. Dower
- Narrated by: Tim Campbell
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
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War Without Mercy has been hailed by the New York Times as "one of the most original and important books to be written about the war between Japan and the United States." In this monumental history, professor John Dower reveals a hidden, explosive dimension of the Pacific War - race - while writing what John Toland has called "a landmark book...a powerful, moving, and evenhanded history that is sorely needed in both America and Japan."
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War without Mercy
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The Ghost of Freedom
- A History of the Caucasus
- By: Charles King
- Narrated by: Michael Page
- Length: 11 hrs and 40 mins
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The Caucasus mountains rise at the intersection of Europe, Russia, and the Middle East. A land of astonishing natural beauty and a dizzying array of ancient cultures, the Caucasus for most of the 20th century lay inside the Soviet Union, before movements of national liberation created newly independent countries and sparked the devastating war in Chechnya.
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fascinating story of a messy region
- By A. T. Howarth on 07-30-20
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Women Warriors
- An Unexpected History
- By: Pamela D. Toler
- Narrated by: Rosemary Benson
- Length: 9 hrs and 48 mins
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Who says women don’t go to war? From Vikings and African queens to cross-dressing military doctors and WWII Russian fighter pilots, these are the stories of women for whom battle was not a metaphor.
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History denied
- By Melissa on 09-20-19
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Worlds at War
- The 2,500-Year Struggle Between East and West
- By: Anthony Pagden
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 20 hrs and 36 mins
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In the tradition of Jared Diamond and Jacques Barzun, prize-winning historian Anthony Pagden presents a sweeping history of the long struggle between East and West, from the Greeks to the present day.
The relationship between East and West has always been one of turmoil. In this historical tour de force, a renowned historian leads us from the world of classical antiquity, through the Dark Ages, to the Crusades, Europe's resurgence, and the dominance of the Ottoman Empire, which almost shattered Europe entirely. Pagden travels from Napoleon in Egypt to Europe's carving up of the finally moribund Ottomans - creating the modern Middle East along the way - and on to the present struggles in Iraq.
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Great story, with a lot of unfamiliar names
- By Tad Davis on 07-02-08
By: Anthony Pagden
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Nonviolence
- The History of a Dangerous Idea
- By: Mark Kurlansky
- Narrated by: Richard Dreyfuss
- Length: 7 hrs and 32 mins
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In this timely, highly original, and controversial narrative, New York Times best-selling author Mark Kurlansky discusses nonviolence as a distinct entity, a course of action, rather than a mere state of mind. Nonviolence can and should be a technique for overcoming social injustice and ending wars, he asserts, which is why it is the preferred method of those who speak truth to power.
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A brief, necessary account of the history of nonviolence
- By Real Talk on 07-29-20
By: Mark Kurlansky
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From Muhammed to Burj Khalifa
- A Crash Course in 2,000 Years of Middle East History
- By: Michael Rank
- Narrated by: Kevin Pierce
- Length: 2 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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To untangle the modern Middle East conflict and the 2,000 years behind it, this book is divided into 25 concise chapters. Each one is devoted to a major theme in Middle East history, such as the beginning of Islam, the Crusades, Genghis Khan, and the beginning of Israel in 1948. They can be read in a few minutes, giving you a fast overview of the issues and help you to understand Middle East current events.
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Interesting, but of course it's quite brief
- By Philo on 07-26-13
By: Michael Rank
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What listeners say about Russia
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Mother of 2
- 03-23-24
A deep insight into Russia’s self narrative
The chapter on civil war is my favorite as we in the West can learn the most from Russia’s fear of instability
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- Ted
- 07-17-19
Very well written
A great read for understanding Russia. A Near Western Country with Western influence. Great history lessons.
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- James E. Carr
- 03-03-23
Must Reading
Written after the Crimea/Dombas takeover, but before the current invasion of the rest of Ukraine, this scholarly work by an authority on the subject matter, gives us a coherent picture of how the majority of the Russian people have been conditioned to regard the rest of the world, the historical basis for that national outlook, and the stratagems employed by Putin and his predecessors, the Russian military, oligarchical elites, and the Russian Orthodox Church, to perpetuate this outlook. What the author portrays is a national sense of elitism and destiny to rule the world, martyrdom, and constant paranoia about imminent invasion from the "barbarian" western powers of Europe and America.
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- Banyan
- 06-02-24
The modern Russian myth
The narrative seems a little haphazard but there are lots of useful insights into how many Russian patriots view the world. Spoiler: It is not a friendly place.
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- C. Plucker
- 11-13-23
Stuffy Tangents: A Story of Russian Invasions
This book could have been cut in half, if not more. The summary is Russia has been invaded a bunch, that's why they are exceptionalist. End of story. The bulk of the book is quotes from books and poems, and other notations from pop culture of the era being described. If extravagant tangents are your jam, this book will be up your alley.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Broyles fam
- 11-29-18
Fantastic
Excellent book to understand how Russia sees themselves. I very much recommend this book if nothing else but to listen to the authors use of vocabulary.
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- Mike From Mesa
- 07-16-17
A bit dry and academic
All nations have their historic tales, and their national culture, and hence the attitudes of the citizens, are built upon those tales. Thus a nation’s attitudes and world views are formed based upon the shared national view of their history and Professor Carleton’s premise is that the Russian world view is based upon the almost continual series of wars that have raged across the Russian land and the fact that many of those wars, and the resulting Russian victories, have protected Europe and what we think of as Western Civilization from the ravages of cultural destruction. That is, Russia, and its people, have served as a shield protecting Europe and, at the same time, Russia has often been the victim of attacks by the very people that Russia has been protecting.
While Russia’s history has been full of wars, Professor Carleton points to three in particular - Russia’s fight against Genghis Kahn, and its eventual ability to throw off the Mongol yoke, Russia’s war against the French under Napoleon and, of course, Russia’s successful defense against Hitler in World War II. He points out that in all three cases Russia’s fight against the foe either protected Europe from those same invaders (the Mongols) or freed Europe from the yoke of the invaders (Napoleon and Hitler), but that Europe, instead of being grateful, has taken advantage of a Russia weakened by those very wars. Thus Russian distrust of The West stems from both the unwillingness of the European nations to acknowledge that their safety has often been at the cost of Russia’s war dead and from those same Europeans taking advantage of a Russia weakened by those very invasions to invade Russia themselves.
Professor Carleton’s main point, I think, is that Western nations, including the European nations, the US, Canada, and others, do not have to actually agree with the Russian view, but should understand that this view is what drives the Russian government and people to view others as they do and that without understanding that view it is impossible to understand the underlying currents of Russian foreign policy. One very enlightening comment was a quote from Czar Alexander that Russia has only two allies - its army and its navy.
The book is interesting, but the presentation is often dry and academic and it is easy to think of this as a textbook for some college course rather than a book aimed at the popular market. The material is not only interesting and informative, but goes a long way to explain why Russia acts and reacts as it does to outside events, and the topics of the Crimea and the breakaway Ukrainian provinces are treated as special topics as is the Russian view that much of The West is doing the work that the German Nazi government attempted to do during the 1930s and mid 1940s. This book is not an apology for Russian behavior and Professor Carleton makes clear that he does not agree with the Russian views, but that it is important to understand the basis for those views to be able to understand the actions the Russian government takes. In that this is a valuable and informative book.
The narration by James Cameron Stewart is very well done. The material is often dry, but Mr Stewart’s narration of it often rescues it and keeps the book alive. While I enjoyed it, I would have enjoyed it quite a bit more had it not been so academic in its presentation.
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- Sparks Fan
- 10-21-22
Interesting perspective
I had read/heard books about Russia in the context of its national mythos, but not from an exclusively military perspective. It was a fascinating listen with captivating stories and insights.
The book touched on this very briefly towards the end, and the author already did so much, but I'd be interested in hearing more about two things in the future: 1) how and why the Russian people allow this mythos to be used as a catch-all when they are generally the ones to suffer the most (read: be offered up as cannon fodder), and 2) how the "West" can engage Russia and vice-versa without the dynamic laid out in the book becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. Also, not really touched on in this book (aside from tangential mention in the context of the 1904-1905 Russo-Japanese war) is the relationship between Russia and modern China. How do the dynamics plays out there? Same for Turkey (yes, a member of the "West" via NATO, but not really) and Iran.
I'm seeing this mythos being employed in Russian state TV as regards the war in Ukraine in 2022. More militaristic, ultra-nationalist voices in pro-Russian/Z camp Telegram channels are less forgiving of this assumed fate that Russian soldiers must die because such is their fate. They want better armor, weaponry, and strategy for Russian forces in Ukraine. I should add that Russian forces and Russia, in general, should leave Ukraine and restore pre-2014 borders per the 1994 Budapest Memorandum!
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