John Hardman, author of “The French Revolution: a political history”, is a recognised authority on the French Revolution and his micro-level knowledge is impressive. For a background to the momentous French Revolution, Robert Darnton’s “The revolutionary temper: Paris, 1748-89” provides a necessary complement.   Sean Sheehan   Hardman is unbeatable […]

There is an aching need to soberly model the contemporary political world and Anton Jäger in “Hyperpolitics” makes a convincing case for his decipherment of the mayhem, at least as it affects political culture in the US and Europe.   Sean Sheehan   For most of the twentieth century one […]

“Amazônia, sua linda” (Amazonia, you beauty) said Dom Phillips in his last social-media post at the end of May 2022. He and a fellow activist Bruno Pereira, on their way to the Javari Valley in northwest Brazil, were murdered six days later.   Sean Sheehan   Dom Phillips was researching […]

What it means to have a home has been central to drama, poetry and the novel for millennia. It is explored with insight by Tom McCarthy in a scintillating piece of literary analysis called “The threshold and the ledger”.   Sean Sheehan   The home/house as both a place of […]

Over thirty years ago, projecting slides onto plastic screens and mirrors, Claudia Andujar raised awareness of the sufferings of the Yanomami people brought about by illegal gold miners.   Sean Sheehan   The Yanomami live in an Amazonian region of northern Brazil and the forest of the Orinoco River basin […]