Reddit reviews The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia (Kodansha Globe)

I'm going to be lazy and simply repost a post of mine from a year ago. :)

The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes is a well deserved winner of the Pulitzer Prize. A combination of history, science and biography and so very well written.

A few of my favourite biographies include the magisterial, and also Pulitzer Prize winning, Peter the Great by Robert Massie. He also wrote the wonderful Dreadnaught on the naval arms race between Britain and Germany just prior to WWI (a lot more interesting than it sounds!). Christopher Hibbert was one of the UK's much loved historians and biographers and amongst his many works his biography Queen Victoria - A Personal History is one of his best. Finally, perhaps my favourite biography of all is Everitt's Cicero - The Life and Times of Rome's Greatest Politician. This man was at the centre of the Fall of the Roman Republic; and indeed fell along with it.

Speaking of which, Rubicon - The Last Years of the Roman Republic is a recent and deserved best-seller on this fascinating period. Holland writes well and gives a great overview of the events, men (and women!) and unavoidable wars that accompanied the fall of the Republic, or the rise of the Empire (depending upon your perspective). :) Holland's Persian Fire on the Greco-Persian Wars (think Cyrus, Darius, Xerxes! Think of the Movie 300, if you must) is equally gripping.

Perhaps my favourite history book, or series, of all is Shelby Foote's magisterial trilogy on the American Civil War The Civil War - A Narrative. Quite simply one of the best books I've ever read.

If, like me, you're interested in teh history of Africa, start at the very beginning with The Wisdom of the Bones by Alan Walker and Pat Shipman (both famous paleoanthropologists). Whilst not the very latest in recent studies (nothing on Homo floresiensis for example), it is still perhaps the best introduction to human evolution available. Certainly the best I've come across. Then check out Africa - Biography of a Continent. Finish with the two masterpieces The Scramble for Africa on how European colonialism planted the seeds of the "dark continents" woes ever since, and The Washing of the Spears, a gripping history of the Anglo-Zulu wars of the 1870's. If you ever saw the movie Rorke's Drift or Zulu!, you will love this book.

Hopkirk's The Great Game - The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia teaches us that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

I should imagine that's enough to keep you going for the moment. I have plenty more suggestions if you want. :)

Upvoted. The Great Game is a page-turning winner's version whirlwind tour of the geopolitics of the 1800s. It's also my number 1.

http://www.amazon.com/Great-Game-Struggle-Central-Kodansha/dp/1568360223/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1312336926&sr=1-1

Reay Tannahill's "Food in History" is completely different but also very very good. She's cobbled together a lively survey of diets through the ages. When you've finished this book, you'll have accidentally learned what happened, who did it and in what order - while you were distracted by recipes, bad and weird.

http://www.amazon.com/Food-History-Reay-Tannahill/dp/0517884046

For historic, hilarious and educational fiction, go for "Flashman and the Redskins" to begin with. (If you like it, I'd go for "Flashman at The Charge" next and then his version of the "Great Game".)

http://www.amazon.com/Flashman-Redskins-George-MacDonald-Fraser/dp/0452264871/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1312337084&sr=1-1

If you like that book, I highly recommend Peter Hopkirk's The Great Game. A page-turner history of that spy-vs-spy era.

Very weak article. If you're interested in this part of the world it would be criminal for you to not read, The Great Game, by Peter Hopkirk.

> Those governments and insurgents were supplied and trained by US as a part of the Great Game as the USSR supplied and trained their own groups and governments to advance their interests.

Yeah... I'm interested in the British Empire, especially in India, and read Peter Hopkirk's The Great Game, which is mostly about the UK-Russia's proxy war in Afghanistan. It's kind of amazing how little has changed in the area after a century.

I was gonna say Lost City of Z. There's The Great Game: On Secret Service in High Asia, which is supposed to be really good. Here's the first page, it definitely got my interest.

The Great Game is an excellent primer on central Asia and imperial competition. Its effects are still evident today, so it is relevant. The metaphor of the great game is also applicable to US-China relations, IMO.

The "Great Game" period between the Russian and British Empires vying for supremacy in 19th century Central Asia. Really fascinating historical period complete with stories of amateur explorers, pathological fear of Russian encroachment on India, military incursions, domestic, colonial, and foreign politics, eccentric belief in "Empire", chance encounters on the road, psychopath kings and khans, etc. Surprising connections to events today and hammers home the dangers of engaging in Afghan affairs!

Here's the wikipedia for some info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Game

My favorite book on the subject: https://www.amazon.com/Great-Game-Struggle-Central-Kodansha/dp/1568360223

There are a couple from the great game period, where Russia and Britain were rivaling each other in the central asia. You'll likely find plenty original intelligence officers as authors in the references of Hopkirk's "The Great Game".

http://www.amazon.com/Great-Game-Struggle-Central-Kodansha/dp/1568360223 A book I'm reading that is really awesome and that I was looking up reviews for.

You're spamming me. Please stop. I've already responded to you.

> > Chinese textbook claim Tibet is always part of China, this is not correct. India textbook claim China has nothing to do with Tibet until 1950 invasion, that is not correct either.
>

> This is incredibly basic understanding of academia. This is literally entry-level thought. Even at Wikipedia they've always disallowed sources based on criteria just like this. This is not something you should be trumpeting as giving your opinion authority, this is something you should assume everybody already knows.

> Because they do.

>> do yourself a favor to borrow a book called great game. https://www.amazon.com/Great-Game-Struggle-Central-Kodansha/dp/1568360223 At least learn some history of Tibet first.

> I appreciate the offer, but I am already pretty well versed in this topic. Apart from anything else, your reccomendation lacks accuracy - the Great Game was between the British and Russian Empires, with Central Asia merely the staging ground. Moreso, that staging ground focused on the Hindu Kush, Afghanistan and the push to India, not the Himalayas. Tibet would be a passing reference in such a text.

Chinese textbook claim Tibet is always part of China, this is not correct.
India textbook claim China has nothing to do with Tibet until 1950 invasion, that is not correct either.

Nationalism blind people's mind, and it has nothing to do with Communism or Democrats. Both side brainwash their people for political reason.

do yourself a favor to borrow a book called great game.
https://www.amazon.com/Great-Game-Struggle-Central-Kodansha/dp/1568360223
At least learn some history of Tibet first.

for such a complicated issue, there is not black white answer.

The Great Game - Peter Hopkirk

Anything else by Hopkirk is also worth reading, but The Great Game focuses on the rivalry between Russia and Britain in Central Asia. It's a long book, but very readable. I read it before the current conflicts and went back and reread it. Amazing how little some things change.

The Great Game by Peter Hopkirk.

Peter Hopkirk wrote a superb book about this, called The Great Game. I highly recommend it.

It will make you very, very angry at US policy in Afghanistan and central Asia.