Interlink's new illustrated history series seeks to explore the persistent themes of our recent past in order to prepare for the new century. Each volume offers a concise yet comprehensive analysis of a particular political, cultural or social phenomenon and is lavishly illustrated with color and b&w photographs and maps. In February 1917, the centuries-old and immense empire of the Czars, ally of the United States and Britain during World War I, suddenly collapses. Eight months later, the revolutionaries, under Lenin's leadership, take power and sign an armistice with Germany. Few would have bet on this government of inexperienced militants, against a force of armed counter-revolutionaries sustained by the West. But the mobilization of the population, the power of the Red Army and political police, the experience the communists gain during the war, and Lenin's skill in directing the new political economy, allow the Bolsheviks to strengthen their hold on the great empire. By the time of Lenin's death, on January 21, 1924, the door has been opened to many decades of communist power, though as Stalin gains prominence, that power will become much different than that of the heroes of the October Revolution.

Stichtse Historische Reeks nummer 16.

Congo, Afrika

Pedro Martínez is Oscar Lewis’ newest contribution to our knowledge of the culture of Mexican poverty. The book tries to do for the village scene what the earlier volume, The Children of Sanchez, did for the urban slum. In that both works are multi-biographical in nature, they are quite similar. However, this new one contains a number of features that make it distinctive from the first and, perhaps, more valuable.

The most important of these is the time span involved. Pedro Martinez is the result of no less than twenty years of contact with a single family. Lewis met the Martínez family for the first time in 1943. Formal study of the family began in 1944. Between that date and 1948 life histories were obtained from Pedro and his wife, Esperanza. Approximately ten years later Lewis returned, this time with a tape recorder. He re-interviewed Pedro alone, for Esperanza had already died. He tells us that the concordance between the two series of interviews is impressive, though the reader has no way of judging. Beginning in 1960, a life history was obtained from Felipe, Pedro’s oldest living son. The three life histories, translated and set into order by Lewis, make up the body of the book.

Pedro was born in 1889. He was seventy two when Lewis wrote his introduction to the book. His life, therefore, has spanned one of the most dynamic periods of Mexican history. This is fortunate, for seldom do we encounter a record of the feelings and thoughts that ordinary men have when caught up in significant historical processes. Historians will find Pedro’s recollections of the Zapata movement particularly illuminating. And his frustrating experience with the ejido system will perhaps aid in giving us a more balanced appraisal of that instrument of reform.

In this extraordinary study, D. A. Spellberg examines the life of 'A'isha bint Abi Bakr, Muhammad's most beloved and controversial wife, and a central figure in Islamic cultural history. Instead of employing the traditional chronological technique of the biographer, however, Spellberg uses 'A'isha as a lens through which to examine the place of women in Islamic societies.

Met een uitnodigingsbrief voor de boekpresentatie.

Met een terugblik van Annie M.G. Schmidt.

We know very little about spinsters in earlier times, for the stigma attached to the unmarried state often rendered these women almost invisible. Now a fascinating book opens a window into the lives of British spinsters in the mid-seventeenth to mid-nineteenth centuries, assessing the opportunities open to them and the restrictions placed upon them within different social classes, occupations, and periods. Bridget Hill examines how often spinsters were able to earn enough money to live independently, what provision the Poor Law made for them if they did not, whether extreme poverty led to their involvement in crime or prostitution, and, if they stayed in the parental home, what kind of lives they led. She looks at the part single women played in religious organisations and the role of friendship and letter-writing in their daily lives. She describes the nature of close relationships between women, some lesbian but many others not. Exploring the spinsters' possibilities of escape from restrictive lives, particularly by emigration or crossdressing, she discusses how successful these were. She provides details about the degree of surveillance single women suffered from the authorities

Utrechtse bijdragen tot de medievistiek, deel I. Middeleeuwen.