Zompist Bboard Again

Raphael wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 9:01 am

bradrn wrote: ↑Sun Jun 19, 2022 7:14 amIn any case, given that it’s self-hosted, I’ve already learnt a lot by making it.

Just noticed that part of the post. Wow.

It’s not as difficult as you might think. The hardest part was just finding an old computer to repurpose; the second-hardest was remembering to follow all the installation steps in the Arch Linux wiki in the right order. (If you do it in the wrong order, it doesn’t connect to the internet.) After that, it was just a matter of installing a webserver, buying a domain name and setting up DNS.

Do any of you know any history books covering a long period in history that try to intentionally avoid the common thing where history books take the more pages per period the closer they get to the present? Like, say, a book covering a thousand year period that would have a thousand pages and dedicate 10 pages to each decade, or 100 pages to each century?

Raphael wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 9:15 am Do any of you know any history books covering a long period in history that try to intentionally avoid the common thing where history books take the more pages per period the closer they get to the present? Like, say, a book covering a thousand year period that would have a thousand pages and dedicate 10 pages to each decade, or 100 pages to each century?

Can you actually imagine someone successfully writing such a thing? How long would it end up being, given the paucity of information about much of history?

Raphael wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 9:15 am Do any of you know any history books covering a long period in history that try to intentionally avoid the common thing where history books take the more pages per period the closer they get to the present? Like, say, a book covering a thousand year period that would have a thousand pages and dedicate 10 pages to each decade, or 100 pages to each century?

Sure. F.W. Mote's Imperial China 900–1800 comes close. Here's the years per page for its five sections:
N Song .84, S Song 1.4, Mongols 1.3, Ming 1.1, Qing 1.04

As you can see, he has the most to say about the Southern Song period; he actually speeds up at the end.

Or the book on Japan I just read, by Andrew Gordon: Meiji 2.1, early 20C 2.3, late 20C 1.8. Again, goes faster at the end.

It's probably not a coincidence that these are both books by Western scholars about East Asia. Writing about your own culture, it's harder to avoid the temptation to include all the details that created your readers' modern world.

You could certainly do this, as a sort of stunt, for European history, covering 1000–2000 in a thousand pages. But honestly it would all be pretty breezy. A 200-page book about the Renaissance, after all, would be just an intro, while covering WWII in six pages would be a bare outline.

My personal pet peeve about broad-scale histories is that the section on recent events very quickly gets dated, sometimes comically so, especially if the author is trying to evaluate Where The Nation Is Going or some such. I got lucky with my China book because events conspired to give it a natural ending point with the death of Deng. Another 25 years has added more dramatic economic progress, and zero resolution to the hanging political questions... most unsatisfying for a historian.

alice wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 1:19 pm

Raphael wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 9:15 am Do any of you know any history books covering a long period in history that try to intentionally avoid the common thing where history books take the more pages per period the closer they get to the present? Like, say, a book covering a thousand year period that would have a thousand pages and dedicate 10 pages to each decade, or 100 pages to each century?

Can you actually imagine someone successfully writing such a thing? How long would it end up being, given the paucity of information about much of history?

I'm trying to imagine someone working to make sure each chapter has exactly the same number of pages...and wondering "do photos or illustrations count towards that total?"

I'm mainly wondering if there's some way to avoid the tendency of many history books of acting as if there's more happening each year the closer you get to the present.

alice wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 1:19 pm Can you actually imagine someone successfully writing such a thing? How long would it end up being, given the paucity of information about much of history?

Oh, I don't think it would be possible for ancient or early medieval history, but, as zompist points out, from around 1000 CE onward it would probably be possible.

For really modern times, about the time from a long human lifetime before now until now, there seem to be popular histories dealing with each individual year in one volume, which are mainly marketed as presents for people born in the year in question. I guess if you would win the lottery and then spent a large portion of your winnings on buying a complete set of those, you'd have something a little bit like what I'm thinking of.

zompist wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 3:27 pm You could certainly do this, as a sort of stunt, for European history, covering 1000–2000 in a thousand pages. But honestly it would all be pretty breezy. A 200-page book about the Renaissance, after all, would be just an intro, while covering WWII in six pages would be a bare outline.

Yes, of course that's true.

My personal pet peeve about broad-scale histories is that the section on recent events very quickly gets dated, sometimes comically so, especially if the author is trying to evaluate Where The Nation Is Going or some such.

Hm, now I wonder how that might be avoided. The obvious solution is to stop some time before the present, but what if the publishing house that commissioned the book doesn't allow for that option?

I got lucky with my China book because events conspired to give it a natural ending point with the death of Deng. Another 25 years has added more dramatic economic progress, and zero resolution to the hanging political questions... most unsatisfying for a historian.

Yes; for a while I thought that they would permanently keep the Jiang Zemin/Hu Jintao model of letting each guy run things for a limited number of years before sending him into retirement. I was quite surprised by the elevation of Xi.


Only somewhat related: one hypothetical book I'd love to read would be an at-length, in-depth treatment specifically of the political and technological history of the world's major countries during the years 1853-1871. A lot of things about which course modern history would take were decided during those years.

Raphael wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 5:14 pm

zompist wrote: My personal pet peeve about broad-scale histories is that the section on recent events very quickly gets dated, sometimes comically so, especially if the author is trying to evaluate Where The Nation Is Going or some such.

Hm, now I wonder how that might be avoided. The obvious solution is to stop some time before the present, but what if the publishing house that commissioned the book doesn't allow for that option?

I doubt it's publishers; I think authors feel like they want to be up to date. And sometimes history just doesn't cooperate. E.g. if you were writing about India or China in 1975, what could you say except that they were developing but kind of slowly? Same thing if you were writing about Germany in 1985: what could you say about the two Germanies that wouldn't become absurd in just a few years?

Only somewhat related: one hypothetical book I'd love to read would be an at-length, in-depth treatment specifically of the political and technological history of the world's major countries during the years 1853-1871. A lot of things about which course modern history would take were decided during those years.

Eh... the solution for this is separate books, I'm afraid. Your period would allow telling a great story about the American Civil War and the unification of Germany and Italy, but would be far less informative for Britain or Russia. And wouldn't a book that mostly covered the US Civil War and Germany seem like two completely separate books bound as one?

As it happens I'm reading a book on gunpowder weapons, and it talks a lot about that period. There's important stuff in that period about the transition to breech-loading rifles and ironclad ships. But you can't really understand technological history in slices that thin. Rifle technology, for instance, consists of a huge number of small steps going back 400 years.

zompist wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 5:41 pm I doubt it's publishers; I think authors feel like they want to be up to date. And sometimes history just doesn't cooperate.

You'd be surprised. A professor friend of mine wrote a book about the history of warfare. This was in the early zeros, so the publisher said there has to be a chapter on Islamic terrorism. He pushed back, saying it would be absurdly dated in a matter of months (this was back when everyone assumed the Taliban would be wrapped up any day now). Then the publisher pointed out that the more dated your final chapter, the sooner you can publish a second edition, and my friend's response was "let me get my typewriter."

At least, that's the way he tells the story. This is the same guy who only grades essays if he has a bottle of good whiskey on hand.

Moose-tache wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 11:14 pm this was back when everyone assumed the Taliban would be wrapped up any day now

I'm not sure if it's good or bad for your friend, but that was the case for 20 years. Just a little more occupation and Kabul would be totally ready to wipe out the Taliban.

zompist wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 5:41 pm

Raphael wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 5:14 pm Only somewhat related: one hypothetical book I'd love to read would be an at-length, in-depth treatment specifically of the political and technological history of the world's major countries during the years 1853-1871. A lot of things about which course modern history would take were decided during those years.

Eh... the solution for this is separate books, I'm afraid. Your period would allow telling a great story about the American Civil War and the unification of Germany and Italy, but would be far less informative for Britain or Russia. And wouldn't a book that mostly covered the US Civil War and Germany seem like two completely separate books bound as one?

I think you might be forgetting some stuff. For instance, you bring up Britain and Russia, and while it's true that in purely domestic matters, relatively little happened in those countries during those years - that "relatively little" did, however, include the abolition of serfdom and the Second Reform Act - in international and colonial affairs, both countries were fairly active during that period.

The period started with the Crimean War, which effectively ended four decades of Russia being the strongest power in Europe. Then there was the Second Opium War, which arguably had a much more lasting impact on China than the First Opium War. Within the British Empire, there was the Great Rebellion of 1857, which led to the final removal of the last Mughal Emperor, the dissolution of the EIC, and the introduction of direct British Government rule in India; and then there was, related to the tensions during and after the US Civil War, the founding of Canada, which eventually involved the end of the HBC's role as a governing authority.

Elsewhere, during the period in question, Japan went from the last months of isolation to the first years of the Meiji Era.

And then there was Napoleon III, who kept popping up in many of the major events of the time: he took part in the Crimean War on the British side, and then in the Second Opium War, again on the British side; his temporary alliance with Sardinia-Piedmont against Austria made the Risorgimento possible; he flirted with the Confederates and invaded Mexico during the US Civil War; and eventually, his defeat against Prussia and the other German states led to the Unification of Germany.

OK, I'll grant you that's a pretty interesting period!

On the other hand, some of those events only become coherent if you look at events before or later. E.g. the story of Japan's modernization requires going beyond 1871. You get the US Civil War, but ending at that time leaves you in the middle of Reconstruction, which is misleading. And it's hard to explain Napoleon I without the background of Napoleon I. Plus there's the fact that both Germany and France treated 1871 as just the prelude to something else.

Fair enough; I'm not saying that this period, or any period, can be treated in complete isolation from what came before or after. But history books have to start and end somewhere.

This is both horrifying and very creepy:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-61941170

Raphael wrote: ↑Sun Jun 26, 2022 12:55 pm This is both horrifying and very creepy:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-61941170

Contaminated hooch was my first thought -- happens a lot, even in bars and clubs, though the one-roof death toll here is a lot higher than I've heard of before.

fusijui wrote: ↑Sun Jun 26, 2022 10:50 pm

Raphael wrote: ↑Sun Jun 26, 2022 12:55 pm This is both horrifying and very creepy:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-61941170

Contaminated hooch was my first thought -- happens a lot, even in bars and clubs, though the one-roof death toll here is a lot higher than I've heard of before.

That's my thought too... of course, that kind of death toll is more similar to what's happened with fires at clubs, not just contaminated hooch.

Travis B. wrote: ↑Mon Jun 27, 2022 10:17 am of course, that kind of death toll is more similar to what's happened with fires at clubs, not just contaminated hooch.

Which makes it so creepy that the bodies apparently show no signs of external injuries.

Raphael wrote: ↑Mon Jun 27, 2022 1:44 pm

Travis B. wrote: ↑Mon Jun 27, 2022 10:17 am of course, that kind of death toll is more similar to what's happened with fires at clubs, not just contaminated hooch.

Which makes it so creepy that the bodies apparently show no signs of external injuries.

That's exactly what made me flash to 'dodgy owner serving methanol' (or something else cheap and nasty). (If it had been a fire, the death toll could well have been even higher!)

fusijui wrote: ↑Mon Jun 27, 2022 7:32 pm

Raphael wrote: ↑Mon Jun 27, 2022 1:44 pm

Travis B. wrote: ↑Mon Jun 27, 2022 10:17 am of course, that kind of death toll is more similar to what's happened with fires at clubs, not just contaminated hooch.

Which makes it so creepy that the bodies apparently show no signs of external injuries.

That's exactly what made me flash to 'dodgy owner serving methanol' (or something else cheap and nasty). (If it had been a fire, the death toll could well have been even higher!)

The problem with the methanol hypothesis is that methanol usually takes longer to kill one than whatever killed these people.

Carbon monoxide poisoning perchance? (It is winter in SA right now, and they could have had dodgy heating...)

Travis B. wrote: ↑Tue Jun 28, 2022 8:54 am The problem with the methanol hypothesis is that methanol usually takes longer to kill one than whatever killed these people.

Sure, but it can definitely kill you within a few hours too, which seems within the bounds of plausibility in a partygoing~nightclubbing situation. The carbon monoxide idea (below) is also a good one, and if it weren't for the "in a club" part of the headline would've been my first guess, I guess.