Selected Product:
| Harold and William: The Battle for England, A.D. 1064-1066
Hardcover
Edition: 1st Cooper Squar
Author: Benton Patterson
Publisher: Cooper Square Press
Release Date: 2001-10-25
ISBN-10: 0815411650
ISBN-13: 9780815411659
List Price: $28.95
Average Customer Rating:
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Washington and Cornwallis: The Battle for America, 1775-1783
ISBN-10: 1589790219
ISBN-13: 9781589790216
List Price:$24.95
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Dramatically tells the story of 2 rivals in their battle for the crown and the destiny of England.
Good Storytelling, Poor Scholarship
| Customer Rating: | I enjoyed reading this book. I believe that its virtue resides in providing a straight-forward play-by-play of the lives of Duke William of Normandy and Harold Godwinson from 1064-1066. It's an enjoyable read for learning about the time period and the events of 1066.
What's lacking is scholarship. Patterson is a professor of journalism at the Univeristy of Florida, and he explains in the afterword that he draws his literary influence from Hunter S. Thompson, Tom Wolfe and similar story-telling journalists of the 1960s. I applaud Mr. Patterson for stepping out of his comfort zone to approach a work of history. However, as he tells the story of the parallel lives of William and Harold in journalistic fashion, he neglects to inform the reader from whence he found his information. For me, that's a problem.
Nowhere is this more disturbing than in the first chapter "The Royal Mission" where Patterson states flatly that King Edward 'The Confessor' dispatched Harold to Normandy to offer Duke William the crown. This is a theory, and a frail one at that! Patterson states it as fact and cites none of his sources. No one can say for certain why Harold ventured to the continent. If one does, he or she needs to he honest with the reader about how this is personal speculation, not history.
In contrast, I enjoyed reading about the Battle at Stamford Bridge: Patterson provided some good and gruesome details and explained how Harold was able to muster the English forces to surprise the Vikings. I was unfamiliar with this part of the story prior to reading the book. I also enjoyed reading about some of the royal ceremonies on both sides of the Channel. I learned a lot from reading the book. However, I'm nervous that what I learned might be based not upon historical evidence but Mr. Patterson's conjecture. I'll have to read more to discover what corroborates with Patterson's tale.
I read this book immediately after reading Andrew Bridgeford's "1066: The Hidden History of the Bayeux Tapestry."1066: The Hidden History in the Bayeux Tapestry That is a work that is both eminently readable and of superior scholarship. "Harold and William" was a good read but fell short of expectations after reading the superior book first. |
Biased, yes, but what history is not biased?
| Customer Rating: | I've read the other reviews criticizing Harold and William for its bias towards Harold, but what written history is without bias? History tends to be recorded by winners, survivors, descendants and later observers, the majority of whom tend not to be actual eyewitnesses to the event chronicled for their audience. Credit should be given Mr. Patterson for tackling a subject lacking in available documentation. He has several things working for him: he is British, and they are some of the best historians, he is an academic and professor of journalism, and he is fascinated with his subject matter. This is a labor of love, and Mr. Patterson wishes to share it with us. Can you blame him for that?
As for those desiring a text with lively dialogue and vivid action, please attend to any number of historical fictional adventures not based in fact. I find Mr. Patterson's writing style concise, yet descriptive and his narrative tempered to the right degree to keep me interested. He maintains a fluid plot and his attention to detail with chronologies and background materials adds to the reader's interest and education.
Give thanks that the world has historians willing to take a chance and present their theories before us. You only have to look to Hollywood to see history mangled for lowest common denominator audiences. If you disagree with Mr. Patterson's book, then write your own in rebuttal. |
Don't let the bad intro throw you!!
| Customer Rating: | Initially I was getting ready to put this book aside because the author stated that he perceived the Saxons as the good guys.I thought not another one of these pro-Anglos,like a southern American lamenting old "Dixie".Anyways Hastings was almost a thousand years difference and with not alot of primary sources available,how could anyone honestly believe the Saxons were such wonderful people.Ask LLewelyn of Wales what he thought about the Saxon "wonderfullness",so how far back are we going to go on this?
Anyway, I don't think the authors' stated bias affected his interpretations at all and this book is packed with tension and excitement,I actually had to put the book aside a few times so I could savor it.Two strong personalities Harold and William headed on a collision course with lots of swinging axes.A great movie script if some producer could latch on to this book. |
Dissatisfying
| Customer Rating: | "Harold & William" is an easy read. It's a fairly concise (200 pages) telling of the story of the personal rivalry behind the Norman conquest of England -- a rivalry between England's last Saxon king (Harold) and the Duke of Normandy (William, later William I). The root of the rivalry lies in the alleged oath by Harold to support William's claim to the English throne after Edward the Confessor's death and Harold's own election to the throne later on, causing William to seek it by force. The story is further complicated by Harold's younger brother Tostig, who for his own reasons persuaded the King of Norway to make an invasion attempt that same year, just weeks before William's landing. "Harold & William" is a good introduction to the story.
As a work of scholarship, the book fails to stand up. Documents are scant and unreliable, but Patterson makes no attempt to analyze them or compare evidence. Rather, he just tells the story as he has interpreted it, and his own words of sympathy for Harold in the introduction demonstrate a strong subjective viewpoint. As for the facts, he simply states that he made what he believes are the "most reasonable" interpretations. Basically, he hasn't contributed anything to the subject other than what he feels. It's largely undocumented opinion.
In the book's defense, one might say that Patterson was never trying to write an annotated, definitive work of scholarship. He was just trying to tell a story. However, the book doesn't really succeed on this level either, because Patterson is not a strong enough writer to make it particularly gripping. It isn't infused with the page-turning passion that a good journalist or best-selling mystery writer would write with.
The book's saving grace is the story itself, because it IS compelling. But there are better books to read. As a place to start, I would suggest David Howarth's "1066: The Year of the Conquest." He too sympathizes with Harold, but he goes through all the facts (what few there are) before laying out his own view--and manages to do so concisely, without dragging down the tale. |
Interesting, if extremely slanted
| Customer Rating: | | In the introduction to this work, Mr. Patterson tells us a few things that apparently do not bias his viewpoint - namely that he is a descendant of the long-deceased King Harold of the 11th century AD, and that the wrong man won at Hastings on that fateful October day in 1066. Needless to say - I was a little surprised and turned off immediately. He goes on to say that huge gaps occur in the historical record, and his novel-esque narrative will have the holes filled by his best guess of what happened. Okay - perhaps it's not a crime, but we're trying to peddle this as history, when, if you do read the text, it is not. I am familiar with most of the sources used as references (although strangely enough there is NO CITING AT ALL), and the incredible amount of detail into which Patterson occassionally delves is quite astonishing. In all - this is entertaining, but dont' take the man's word for law. His is a story tainted heavily by bias and a great deal of guess-work where it is not necessary. As the old axim goes (and I use it to argue that "history" need be neutral): Don't try to be a great man, just be a man, and let history make its own judgments. Mr. Patterson - present us with the happenings, but don't tell us who "should" have won. You are quick to pass judgment upon something you profess is largely lost in the abyss of the past. |
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