Overview

From the rise and fall of empires in China, Persia, and Rome itself to the spread of Buddhism and advent of Christianity and Islam, right up to Western imperialism and the great wars of the twentieth century, this epic, magisterial work illuminates how the Silk Roads--the crossroads of the world, the meeting place of East and West--perhaps more than anything else, shaped global history over the past two millennia. It was on the Silk Roads that East and West first encountered each other through trade and conquest, leading to the spread of ideas, cultures, and religions, and it was the appetites for foreign goods that drove economies and the growth of nations. From the first cities in Mesopotamia to the emergence of Greece and Rome to the depredations by the Mongols, the transmission of the Black Death, the struggles of the Great Game, and the fall of Communism, the fate of the West has always been inextricably linked to the East. By way of events as disparate as the American Revolution and the world wars of the twentieth century, Peter Frankopan realigns the world, orienting us eastward, and illuminating how even the rise of the West five hundred years ago resulted from its efforts to gain access to and control of these Eurasian trading networks. In an increasingly globalized planet, where current events in Asia and the Middle East dominate the world's attention, this magnificent work of history is very much a work of our times.

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9781665150798

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A glorious read...Frankopan is an exhilarating companion for the journey along the routes which conveyed silk, slaves, ideas, religion, and disease and around which today may hang the destiny of the world. -- Vanity Fair Laurence Kennedy is a solid narrator. His pacing is slow but always clear, and his voice is deep and pleasant to listen to...His cultured British accent suits Frankopan's Oxford vocabulary and English outlook. -- AudioFile This is history on a grand scale, with a sweep and ambition that is rare...A remarkable book on many levels, a proper historical epic of dazzling range and achievement. -- Guardian (London) This provocative history challenges the view of the West as heir to a pure Greco-Roman culture...Frankopan marshals diverse examples to demonstrate the interconnectedness of cultures, showing in vivid detail the economic and social impact of the silk and the slave trades, the Black Death, and the Buddhist influence on Christianity. -- New Yorker

Author Information

Peter Frankopan is a historian based at Oxford University. He is the author of The First Crusade: The Call from the East and The Silk Roads. He is a senior research fellow at Worcester College, Oxford, and the director of the Oxford Centre for Byzantine Research at Oxford University. His revised translation of The Alexiad was published in the United States in 2009. Laurence Kennedy is a voice talent and audiobook narrator.

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