“The Columbia History of the World”, edited by John A. Garraty and Peter Gay, forward by William J. McGill

 

1257 pages, Harper & Row Publishers, ISBN-13: 978-0060114329

Dang. The Columbia History of the World has been sitting on my bookshelf since 1987. I got it from the Barnes & Noble over stock pile (just how many times have I said that, anyway?) when I was still a kid and bought damn near any book with “history” in the title, I was hooked so. Be warned, though: this book seems to have been written for college history professors, not the general public, as names, ideas and terms are mentioned with no explanation as to what they are – almost as if one is expected to have a priori knowledge of these matters. That, and the writing is as dry as sandpaper left out in the sun in the Sahara Dessert. But then again, what would you expect? In addition to John A. Garraty (who earned his doctorate and taught history at Columbia) and Peter Gay (originally Peter Joachim Fröhlich and a Sterling Professor of History at Yale University), other authors include Jacques Barzun, Richard Hofstadter and Ernest Nagel. That’s a lotta brain power, but not necessarily a lotta writing talent.

Okay, with all that out of the way, there’s this: Columbia is much more than a mere blow-by-blow recitation of facts, peppered as it is with economic and political science insights, such as: the observation that in ancient Athens, “the rights of private property [were] the only sure foundation of civil liberty [so that’s where the Founding fathers got it!]”; or “[t]he first need of any social system is to create incentives to make people do more work than required by their immediate wants [hear that, Democrats?]”; and also “religion provided the incentive for works of economic supererogation [well…obviously. Yeah]”. If you’re looking for a history full of verve with a gripping narrative, go elsewhere, BUT if its ideas that float your boat, then get yer oars out and start paddling.