Documentary history of western civilization

Describes the Early Middle Ages, its social order, culture, and literature such as "Beowulf". Also describes the Central Middle Ages, country life and city life, scholasticism, troubadour lyric poetry, and religious literature. Includes the Late Middle Ages with Boccaccio's description of the Black death, Chaucer's picture of medieval society, a sermon by Meister Eckhart, and chapters from "The Imitation of Christ" .

Denis Mack Smith is the foremost English historian of modern Italy. In this volume, he collected, translated, introduced and commented upon key documents about Italian history, from the Napoleonic period through the risorgimento to the unification of Italy in the wake of her participation in the 1866 Austro-Prussian War. This is a model for the presentation of documentary evidence and commentary. I recall studying the unification of Italy as a subject many years ago: a text like this would have been ideal to move beyond the factual basis towards engagement with key source materials. Smith's commentaries are exemplary in calling attention to the issues without necessarily pointing the student too directly towards conclusions.

These three literary movements [realism, naturalism, symbolism] may be said to have reflected changing taste, in accordance with the propostion that each generation feels a need to express itself in a new way. The nineteenth century was dynamic and turbulent During its first few decades, romanticism had overturned the traditional restraints and rules of classicism, introducing a need for constant change and ever-growing subjectivity which some keen observers predicted could only end in anarchy. Nineteenth-century writers certainly found repose in no single style, but had to experiment constantly. If it is true that each generation is impelled to assert its individuality, and each individual his uniqueness, it was above all true in the restless century that followed the French Revolution and the romantic revolution." [Back cover].