Reviews Archive

Review

Great Books: William Golding’s The Spire

The social hierarchy of medieval cathedral building is the jumping-off point for Golding’s masterly exploration of faith, delusion and obsession.

Matthew Lloyd Roberts January 13, 2023

Review

Queenly forces to be reckoned with

The historian Alison Weir places the focus back on the lives of the women who sometimes challenged, but indisputably shaped and secured, England’s royal dynasty.

Estelle Paranque January 13, 2023

A wood engraving of the destruction of the Athenian Army in Sicily during the Peloponnesian War, 413 BC. Credit: The Granger Collection / Alamy Stock Photo.

Review

Have Realists lost their way?

In An Unwritten Future, Jonathan Kirshner argues that realists have lost their way. If realism is a pessimistic intellectual tradition of thought about world politics, for Kirshner..

Patrick Porter January 6, 2023

Review

Books of the Year

Contributors to Engelsberg Ideas highlight the books they’ve enjoyed in 2022.

Engelsberg Ideas December 22, 2022

Pressure gauge shows zero gas consumption at a gas plant in Europe. Credit: Anton Zubchevskyi / Alamy Stock Photo.

Review

Sanctions as potent yet unwieldy weapons of war

This timely book is a valuable history on a technique that dominates today’s landscape of war. But a discussion about the time sanctions require to take effect is vital.

Rob Johnson December 16, 2022

Review

Great Books: E.H. Carr’s Nationalism and After

E.H. Carr envisioned a world ‘after’ nationalism. He did not expect there would be no ‘after’ — just more of the same. But his insights remain instructive on the conditions for int..

Sergey Radchenko December 9, 2022

‘Jay Gould's private bowling alley’ by Frederick Burr Opper, 1857-1937.

Review

Jay Gould — robber baron or capitalist hero?

As a symbolic figure of late-nineteenth century American capitalism, Jay Gould is less known today than some of the other economic titans of the period. In his own time, however, G..

Samuel Gregg December 9, 2022