|
Books > History > History of specific subjects > Social & cultural history
|
Dahcotah
(Paperback)
Mary Henderson Eastman
|
R462
Discovery Miles 4 620
|
Ships in 12 - 17 working days
|
|
A SPECTATOR and PROSPECT Book of 2022 'Ceaselessly interesting,
knowledgeable and evocative' Spectator 'A fresh way to write
history' Alan Johnson 'A quirky, amused, erudite homage to France .
. . ambitious and original' The Times _____ Original, knowledgeable
and endlessly entertaining, France: An Adventure History is an
unforgettable journey through France from the first century BC to
the present day. Drawn from countless new discoveries and thirty
years of exploring France on foot, in the library and across 30,000
miles on the author's beloved bike, it begins with Gaulish and
Roman times and ends in the age of #MeToo, Black Lives Matter, the
Gilets Jaunes and Covid-19. From the plains of Provence to the
slums and boulevards of Paris, events and themes of French history
may be familiar - Louis XIV, the French Revolution, the French
Resistance, the Tour de France - but all are presented in a shining
new light. Frequently hilarious, always surprising, France: An
Adventure History is a sweeping panorama of France, teeming with
characters, stories and coincidences, and offering a thrilling
sense of discovery and enlightenment. This vivid, living history of
one of the world's most fascinating nations will make even seasoned
Francophiles wonder if they really know that terra incognita which
is currently referred to as 'France'. _____ 'Packed full of
discoveries' The Sunday Times 'A gorgeous tapestry of insights,
stories and surprises' Fintan O'Toole 'A rich and vibrant narrative
. . . clear-eyed but imaginative storytelling' Financial Times
'Full of life' Prospect
ON THE NIGHT TRAINS, THE LAST STOP WAS ALWAYS HELL.
The price exacted from across the African subcontinent for South
Africa's stalled 20th-century industrial revolution is, in human terms,
still largely hidden from history. For half a century, up to the
mid-1950s, privately operated trains travelled by night between Ressano
Garcia, on the Mozambique border, and Booysens station, in
Johannesburg. The night trains carried Mozambicans recruited to work in
the mines of the booming Witwatersrand. The up-trains disgorged their
human cargo into the maw of the great Rand mining machine, while the
down-trains whisked away the time-expired miners - often ill, broken or
insane, and preyed on by con men, petty criminals and corrupt
officials. While mine labour was recruited from all over southern
Africa, Mozambican migrants made up the largest component, and they
paid the highest price.
Charles van Onselen clinically reconstructs the world of the night
trains, which were run as a partnership between the mining houses and
the railways. By tracing the up and down rail journeys undertaken by
black migrants over half a century it is possible to discern how racial
thinking, expressed logistically, reflected South Africa's evolving
systems of segregation and apartheid. Mirroring the brutal logic of
industrial capitalism, this was a system of transport designed to
maximise profit at the expense of the health, well-being and even the
lives of those it conveyed.
The story of the night trains echoes today through songs such as
'Stimela' and 'Shosholoza'. But the experience of the poverty-stricken
Mozambicans who travelled on the trains has never been told. THE NIGHT
TRAINS lays bare this hellish world.
|
|