Since its formation in 1861, Italy has struggled to develop an effective political system and a secure sense of national identity. Christopher Duggan's acclaimed introduction...

With 19 spells at various clubs in the Football League, Jon Parkin has cut an instantly recognisable figure in English football for the past 20 years.At 6'4", and weighing in as...

1922. When the Turkish Army occupies Smyrna, Zoë Haggitiris escapes with her family, only to lose everything. Alone in a sea of desperate strangers, her life is touched, for a...

London, 1849. As a cholera epidemic draws nearer, Joshua Jeavons, engineer, is working on his great drain plan for the capital. When the deaths begin, he works even more...

Sensual, macabre, joyous and liberating, The Flowers of Evil, or Les Fleurs du Mal, is a beautifully debauched reflection on dreams, sin, life, and death. With subjects ranging...

Considered the bridge between romanticism and modernism, Matthew Arnold wrote verse that is simple, unadorned and straightforward. From the hypnotic and beautiful lines of "Dover...

It takes a remarkable writer to make an old story as fresh and compelling as the first time we heard it. With The Winter King, the first volume of his magnificent Warlord...

In the exhilarating Saxon Tales series, Bernard Cornwell reimagines one of the most fascinating tales in all of history - the birth of England - and breathes life into the...

The life of the complex, ruthless adversary of General Franco, whose life spanned much of Spain’s turbulent 20th century.From 1939 to 1975, the Spanish Communist Party,...

Uther, the High King of Britain, has died, leaving the infant Mordred as his only heir. His uncle, the loyal and gifted warlord Arthur, now rules as caretaker for a country which...