I have been reading Norwich's work since the 1980s, when I stumbled across a used edition of his three-volume (this was before the condensed one-volume edition) history of Byzantium.
Norwich writes classic narrative, personality-centered--dare I say, Carlylean?--history, and after reading his introduction to the person of the future Emperor Constantine, I was hooked.
And in this work, he does not disappoint. Norwich once again covers a period about which I know quite a lot, in an amateurish way, but brings a new perspective by integrating all of European history in the relevant period by framing it as the story of the four dominant monarchs of the era--Henry VIII, Francis I (whom I originally encountered in my schoolboy years in France and Belgium as "Francois 1er"), Charles V ("Charles-Quint"), and an unexpected fourth, Suleiman the Magnificent. It is a well-structured and clearly-written, sprightly and entertaining, integrated history of Europe in the first half of the 16th century.
Norwich moves with ease from the grand sweep of international relations--the impact of the Reformation, the constant pressure on Latin Christendom from the Turks, the ever-changing alliances of the Big Four--to intimate details of the private lives of the participants. And he does this in a way that clearly integrates what had always been for me several separate streams of history--Henry and the Papacy; Francis and his Italian campaigns; Charles and the multiple headaches of the Turks on one side and the Reformers on the other; and of course, Suleiman's continued attempts to relight the flame of Muslim conquest of Europe, including of course the well-known siege of Vienna but also his encounters with the Knights-Hospitaller, first on Rhodes and later on Malta.
Perhaps the only area that feels a bit neglected--to this American reader at least--is the larger global conflicts from the Americas to the Spice Islands. But those stories merit their own volume, which perhaps Norwich will someday wrote! :-)
Though perhaps not: one of the interesting--and somewhat surprising--aspects of Norwich's work is his focus on the Med as the center of the action in almost all his works: Byzantium, Venice, Sicily, "the Middle Sea," and of course, this volume. At least for the others it is understandable, but in this one it is a bit surprising. I've not yet read his recent work on France, so I reserve judgment, but...I expect it, too, will spend a lot of time in and around the Med.
Interesting because the received wisdom--at least when I was a lad--was that the Med ceased being at the heart of Europe with the decline of the Roman Empire and particularly the end of the Empire in the West in the late 5th century: the view then being that the center of mass of European affairs moved north--which, somewhat surprisingly for an Englishman, Norwich implicitly rejects.
If you've read Norwich's other works, you won't be disappointed. If you think history is dry or boring, prepare to be pleasantly surprised.
If you subscribe to the Marxist or Annaliste view that history is about larger forces and that individuals don't matter, find out how wrong that is.
If you disdain history as being about "kings and battles," prepare to be instructed that kings have lives, too, and that battles matter: you'll never see the world the same way after reading about Mohacs 1526.
Highly recommended.
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Top reviews from other countries
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- Sarah WoodReviewed in Italy on February 23, 2017
Usual polished performance from Norwich
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Amazon KundeReviewed in Germany on October 28, 2018
Sehr informativ und sehr kurzweilig
