Overview

Simon Schama explores the mysterious contradictions of the Dutch nation that invented itself from the ground up, attained an unprecedented level of affluence, and lived in constant dread of being corrupted by happiness. Drawing on a vast array of period documents and sumptuously reproduced art, Schama recreates in precise detail a nation's mental state. He tells of bloody uprisings and beached whales, of the cult of hygiene and the plague of tobacco, of thrifty housewives and profligate tulip-speculators. He tells us how the Dutch celebrated themselves and how they were slandered by their enemies.

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Simon Schama is the author of several award-winning books, including Rough Crossings, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award. He has written and presented forty television documentary films for the BBC, PBS, and The History Channel, including the Emmy-winning Power of Art, on subjects that range from John Donne to Tolstoy. He is University Professor of Art History and History at Columbia University in New York. Mike Cooper is a British voice talent who left big-city life in London for a log cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Mike is recognizable from his years with the BBC World Service, and as the narrator of countless television documentaries. A disruptive influence in school, Mike's first break in narration came at age six, when his teacher realized he could tell the afternoon story better than her (and she could get a nap by way of a bonus). When he's not in his home studio, you'll find him enjoying hobby farm life and tending to two charming pet goats, named Baxter and Hazel.

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