A History of the Modern World Since 1815

by Joel Colton

This is Vol. 2; begins on p. 425 and ends on p. 1052. Conceived and written as a history of the modern world rather than a truncated Western Civilization book, this text is one of the most highly praised history texts ever published. It has been adopted at more than 1000 schools and has been translated into six languages. Lloyd Kramer joins the author team for this ninth edition that includes two new color inserts highlighting fine art, additional pedagogy to guide students through challenging material, and full, up-to-date inclusion of current events. Now packaged with PowerWeb, a dynamic course-specific rather than book-specific supplement that engages your students in three levels of resource materials and provides a true avenue to extending learning about a subject, A History of the Modern World is a necessity in any world history course.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, World History, European History, Military Fiction, War

628 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1950

About the author

Joel G. Colton was a modern history scholar and author. He received his B.A. in history from City College in 1939 and his M.A. from Columbia University in 1940. After serving in the U.S. Army during WW II, he returned to Columbia, from which he received his Ph.D. in 1950. He taught at Duke University from 1947 until his retirement in 1982, except while serving as director of humanities at the Rockefeller Foundation between 1974 and 1982.

Reviews

[Katherine Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'll add some details later. As a high school student in California in the 1970's, I learned the importance of history when one of my classes gave a detailed history of the Vietnam War, a recent event which may have only recently concluded at the time. Oh those radical Californians ...

I was shocked and dismayed by what I read, as I had absorbed some of the reporting from the war in my daily life. This had a clear impact on my life, one of many, that resulted in my eventual degree in political science. I'm pretty sure this huge book was part of assigned reading during that study, and I did attempt to read it at the time, at least the assigned parts. But I was mightily distracted in those years, and so I missed this very decent effort at encompassing "world history." It is widely used in college courses around the world, and in its 11th or 12th edition. Mine is the 4th edition, published in 1971, so there's been a good bit of history since it was published.

When I retired, one goal was to read every book I own. Looking at this 2 volume tome, I admit I was intimidated. But for one of my retirement adventures, being an election judge working 15 hours a day with several of those hours being slow ones, I took up the challenge.

This is actually engagingly written. So once I started, I was hooked. I mean, history is the biggest story of adventure of this planet, full of journeys and horrors and amazing advances. And so much of history involves ideas that fire the best human efforts. So I've slowly plugged forward through until today, when I finished it.

It met my expectations, as I knew it was written by white male academics. I knew there would be limitations, which really HAVE to be addressed. I'll recommend some of the books that did that for me, at the end of this review. But I know I am suffering big gaps of knowledge, so I accept all recommendations.

The authors don't ignore Asia, the Middle East, or Africa, or Latin America, but they certainly do not give these places their due. And women exist only insofar as suffrage is recognized as a measurement of human progress throughout the book. Slavery, though not ignored, is given short shrift. You knew it would be, right? But it is not ignored.

I'm sure there remain other deficiencies. That certainly does not completely devalue this book. But the true value of education in the humanities is that the student learns that history is written by the victors, which is not the only valuable story to learn.

Give me a day or two and I'll share how I filled in some of those gaps.

[Jacques Defraigne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have read this book as a consultation book for facts about modern history. It's a very structured book, jam-packed with information. You should have it at home on your bookshelf to have a reference work for this period. This book does that perfectly.

[Erik Chvojka · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why does the world look the way it does now? Why are there tensions, conflicts, emigration and dictators in certain parts of the world? This book will tell you how and why we got to the current global geopolitical layout and much much more. Simply a great book!

[Arianna · Rating 4 out of 5]

So I didn't read the whole thing, but I had my last history class today, so I figure I probably won't be doing too much reading from this book anymore. As far as history textbooks go, it's a bit dry, but it definitely reviews history accurately and cohesively. Perhaps I'll get an opportunity to read more of it in the future?

[Steve Shea · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read it in high school, in college, and in grad school, and used it to teach (though not as assigned reading except one chapter for a few unluckies at College Prep in Oakland). It's a classic for good reasons, and probably for less-good reasons, but still my first reference for Modern Europe.

[Aaron · Rating 3 out of 5]

I can't believe I'm done with this book. It took me forever… That being said, I enjoyed it, and learned a lot.