Peter Burke

The road to hell is paved with good intentions, silk and sermons. In 1846, linguistics professor Fabrice Cleriquot is despatched from Lyon to the Swan River Colony, sent away with a box full of silkworms to stop him from bringing more disgrace upon the family. Accompanying him on board the Elizabeth are twenty-eight mismatched and misguided Catholic missionaries including Dom...

Ignorance by Peter Burke "A fascinating catalogue of the conditions and agency of ignorance"—Jeffrey Collins, Times Literary Supplement "A declaration of love for education"—Stefan Bauer, History Today "Dazzling . . . a deliciously knowledgeable history of ignorance"—David Armitage A rich, wide-ranging history of ignorance in all its forms, from antiquity to the present day. Throughout history, every age has thought...

From Leonardo Da Vinci to Oliver Sacks: the first history of the western polymath, from the Renaissance to the present "An absorbing group portrait and intellectual history."—Kirkus Reviews "An admirable mixture of industry and erudition."—Robert Wilson, Wall Street Journal From Leonardo Da Vinci to John Dee and Comenius, from George Eliot to Oliver Sacks and Susan Sontag, polymaths have moved...

Eyewitnessing evaluates the place and potency of images among other kinds of historical evidence. By reviewing the many varieties of images across region, period, and medium, and by looking at the pragmatic uses of images—from the Bayeux Tapestry to an engraving of a printing press or a reconstruction of a building—Peter Burke illuminates the damaging consequences of our assumption that...

The first three editions of this bestselling book have established A Social History of the Media as a classic, providing a masterful overview of communication media and of the social and cultural contexts within which they emerged and evolved over time. This fourth edition has been revised and updated throughout to reflect the latest developments in the field. Additionally, an...

From comic verse to practical jokes, pornography to satire, acting to acrobatics, the Renaissance witnessed the flowering of play in all its forms. In the first wide-ranging and accessible introduction to play in Renaissance Italy, Play in Renaissance Italy by Peter Burke, a celebrated historian of the Italian Renaissance, synthesises over forty years’ research. Burke explores the various forms of...

What is Cultural History? has established itself as an essential guide to what cultural historians do and how they do it. Now fully updated in its third edition, leading historian Peter Burke offers afresh his accessible account of the past, present, and future of cultural history, as it has been practised not only in the English-speaking world but also in...

In the 1930s, a number of Irishmen came to New Zealand seeking a better life. Many carried bitter memories of the atrocities committed by the Black and Tans and the British during WWI and the early 1920s. With the onset of WWII came the threat of conscription into the armed forces. As citizens of a neutral country, many Irishmen refused...