An ambitious history of Britain told through the stories of twenty-five notable structures, from the Iron Age fortification of Maiden Castle in Dorset to the Gherkin. Building Britannia is a chronicle of social, political and economic change seen through the prism of the country's built environment, but also a sequence of closely observed studies of a series of intrinsically remarkable structures: some of them beautiful or otherwise imposing; some of them more coldly functional; all of them with richly fascinating stories to tell. Steven Parissien tells both a national story, tracing how a growing sense of British nationhood was expressed through the country's architecture, and also examines how these structures were used by later generations to signpost, mythologise or remake British history. Rubbing shoulders with some 'expected' building choices – the Roman baths at Aquae Sulis, the early Gothic splendour of Lincoln Cathedral and the Tudor jewel that is Little Moreton Hall – are some striking inclusions that promise to open doors into what will be, for many readers, less familiar areas of social history: these include The Briton’s Protection, a Regency pub close in Manchester city centre and the Edwardian Baroque Electric Cinema in Notting Hill, one of the country's oldest working cinemas. Thus as well as identifying the relevance of certain iconic structures to the unfolding of the national story, Building Britannia finds fascination and meaning in the everyday and the disregarded.

The railway station is one of England s most distinctive, characterful and best-loved building-types. Yet over the past century the nation s stations have often been overlooked or dismissed, and have suffered accordingly. Hearteningly, today a new interest in railways fuelled by the need for sustainability, by a growing awareness of the realities of transport economics and by the dedication of enthusiastic volunteers at heritage railways across the country has sparked a renaissance for the historic railway station and a new appreciation of the aesthetic virtues and regeneration potential of imaginative station architecture.The English Railway Station is an accessible, engaging and comprehensively-illustrated general history of the architectural development and social history of the British railway station, from the dawn of the Railway Age to the ravages of the 1960s and the station s rebirth at the end of the 20th century. It traces how the station evolved into a recognisable building type, examines the great cathedrals and the evocative country stations of the Victorian era, and looks at how the railway station has, over the last fifty years, regained its place at the heart of our communities."

Canaletto's time in Mid-Georgian Britain has received much scholarly attention in the past. But this book places his work in a broader political and social context, linking his paintings and drawings with a growing sense of assurance and mission which the British nation was beginning to display - perhaps best represented by the works of William Hogarth.

This innovative and compelling study reconsiders Whistler's work from the context of his military service and his relationship with 'nature at the margins'. Whistler came from a family of soldiers and engineers; his father, Major George Washington Whistler, was originally a US military engineer. Drawing and mapmaking were important components of the military training that Whistler acquired as an offi cer cadet at West Point Academy in 1851-4 and subsequently in the Drawing Department at the US Coast and Geodetic Survey, where he attempted to realise his father's hopes that he would make engineering or architecture his profession. These infl uences in turn shaped Whistler's attitude towards nature, as expressed in works ranging from his celebrated London 'Nocturnes' to his French coastal scenes - all of which were created after Whistler moved permanently to Europe in 1855. Whistler's close observation of nature and its moods underpinned his powerful and haunting visions of nineteenth-century life. His images explore the contrasts between the natural and man-made worlds: rivers and wharves, gardens and courtyards, the ideal and the naturalistic. And his singular vison was always defi ned by his enduring affi nity with the makers of railways, bridges and ships, the cornerstones of Victorian wealth and trade. Infl uenced by Rembrandt, Whistler's early etchings of London are notable for their focus on line and topographical accuracy. From the 1860s, his enthusiasm for Japanese art, too, infl uenced his attitude to perspective and spatial relations between objects. This led him, in his London Nocturnes, to reduce the external world before him to its bare bones. Whistler's smoky images of warehouses, bridges, harbours and tall ships were designed to showcase a new kind of productive, wealth-generating landscape. It is a view of nature constrained by man-made structures: the shadowy outline of the warehouses and chimneys on the far shore; the mast and rigging of a Thames barge in the middle distance. This absorbing book reassesses a familiar and notoriously colourful artistic fi gure in a fascinating and pertinent new light, and is an important new contribution to our understanding of the Victorian art world and its physical context.

"The Life of the Automobile" is the first comprehensive world history of the car.
The automobile has arguably shaped the modern era more profoundly than any other human invention, and author Steven Parissien examines the impact, development, and significance of the automobile over its turbulent and colorful 130-year history. Readers learn the grand and turbulent history of the motor car, from its earliest appearance in the 1880s--as little more than a powered quadricycle--and the innovations of the early pioneer carmakers. The author examines the advances of the interwar era, the Golden Age of the 1950s, and the iconic years of the 1960s to the decades of doubt and uncertainty following the oil crisis of 1973, the global mergers of the 1990s, the bailouts of the early twenty-first century, and the emergence of the electric car.
This is not just a story of horsepower and performance but a tale of extraordinary people: of intuitive carmakers such as Karl Benz, Sir Henry Royce, Giovanni Agnelli (Fiat), Andre Citroen, and Louis Renault; of exceptionally gifted designers such as the eccentric, Ohio-born Chris Bangle (BMW); and of visionary industrialists such as Henry Ford, Ferdinand Porsche (the Volkswagen Beetle), and Gene Bordinat (the Ford Mustang), among numerous other game changers.
Above all, this comprehensive history demonstrates how the epic story of the car mirrors the history of the modern era, from the brave hopes and soaring ambitions of the early twentieth century to the cynicism and ecological concerns of a century later. Bringing to life the flamboyant entrepreneurs, shrewd businessmen, and gifted engineers that worked behind the scenes to bring us horsepower and performance, "The Life of the Automobile" is a globe-spanning account of the auto industry that is sure to rev the engines of entrepreneurs and gearheads alike.

The killing of holders of high office for a predetermined political or ideological purpose is a practice as old as power politics itself. Assassins tells the darkly sensational story of twenty centuries of political murder, from the Roman era to the present. It includes accounts of many of the most infamous assassinations in history, from the slaying of Julius Caesar in 44 BC to the shooting of President Kennedy in 1963. Drawing on the latest research, Dr Steven Parissien presents a richly entertaining sequence of case-studies of this, the ultimate method of regime change. Each elegantly written essay includes not only a gripping account of the assassination, its political context and consequences, but also a biographical profile of both the slayer and the slain. Assassins runs the full gamut of murderous methods and motivations - from multiple stabbing to suicide bombing to aerial attack, from dynastic overthrow to religious fanaticism to the 'propaganda of the deed'. Sometimes shocking, but always involving and informative, it offers a dramatic and distinctive perspective on more than two millennia of world history.

Transport buildings--railway stations, airport terminals, bus and coach stations, motorway service areas, filling stations, and garages--are such a part of everyday scenery they are easily overlooked. This book is the first to take a close look at the architecture of British transport buildings of the twentieth century, a period during which transportation systems, methods, and even purposes underwent enormous change.

The contributors to the book consider transport buildings both well known and unfamiliar from a variety of intriguing viewpoints. They explore the design and promotion of the London Underground, the battle between road and rail, the intentions of architects--to glamorize travel, to calm fears, to accommodate huge numbers of travelers--and the political and cultural significance of the transport buildings that have become a major part of modern life.