Synopses & Reviews
What if there had been no American War of Independence? What if Hitler had invaded Britain? What if Kennedy had lived? What if Russia had won the Cold War? Niall Ferguson, author of the highly acclaimed The Pity of War, leads the charge in this historically rigorous series of separate voyages into imaginary time” and provides far-reaching answers to these intriguing questions.Fergusons brilliant 90-page introduction doubles as a manifesto on the methodology of counter-factual history. His equally masterful afterword traces the likely historical ripples that would have proceeded from the maintenance of Stuart rule in England. This breathtaking narrative gives us a convincing, detailed alternative history” of the Westfrom the accession of James III” in 1701, to a Nazi-occupied England, to a U.S. Prime Minister Kennedy who lives to complete his term.
Synopsis
Speculative history at its best, in which a talented team of historians, led by Niall Ferguson, explore what might have happened if nine momentous events had turned out differently.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. 441-[529]) and index.
Table of Contents
Virtual history : towards a "chaotic" theory of the past /Niall Ferguson --England without Cromwell : what if Charles I had avoided the Civil War? /John Adamson --British America : what if there had been no American Revolution? /J.C.D. Clark --British Ireland : what if home rule had been enacted in 1912? /Alvin Johnson --Kaiser's European Union : what if Britain had "stood aside" in August 1914? /Niall Ferguson --Hitler's England : what if Nazi Germany had invaded Britain in May 1940? /Andrew Roberts --Nazi Europe : what if Nazi Germany had defeated the Soviet Union? /Michael Burleigh --Stalin's war or peace : what if the Cold War had been avoided? /Jonathan Haslam --Camelot continued : what if John F. Kennedy had lived? /Diane Kunz --1989 without Gorbachev : what if Communism had not collapsed? /Mark Almond --Virtual history, 1646-1996 /Niall Ferguson.