Most Popular Books by Melvyn Bragg

Melvyn Bragg is the author of The Adventure of English (2011), The Seventh Seal (2019), Time To Dance (2012), Crossing the Lines (2005), Back in the Day (2022).

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The Adventure of English

release date: Apr 01, 2011
The Adventure of English
Here is the riveting story of the English language, from its humble beginnings as a regional dialect to its current preeminence as the one global language, spoken by more than two billion people worldwide. In this groundbreaking book, Melvyn Bragg shows how English conquered the world. It is a magnificent adventure, full of jealousy, intrigue, and war—against a hoard of invaders, all armed with their own conquering languages, which bit by bit, the speakers of English absorbed and made their own. Along the way, its colorful story takes in a host of remarkable people, places, and events: the Norman invasion of England in 1066; the arrival of The Canterbury Tales and a “coarse” playwright named William Shakespeare, who added 2,000 words to the language; the songs of slaves; the words of Davy Crockett; and the Lewis and Clark expedition, which led to hundreds of new words as the explorers discovered unknown flora and fauna. The Adventure of English is an enthralling story not only of power, religion, and trade, but also of a people and how they changed the world.

The Seventh Seal

release date: Jul 25, 2019
The Seventh Seal
A medieval allegory of faith and doubt, ''The Seventh Seal'' contains the horrors of witch-burnings and plague, yet also features flashes of peace and joy. Each volume in the ''BFI Film Classics'' series contains a personal commentary on the film, a brief production history and a detailed filmography.

Time To Dance

release date: Jun 21, 2012
Time To Dance
A lifetime of restraint and placid affection erupts when a retired bank manager falls for a youngh girl. Set in Cumbria, this is an intensely moving evocation of an overwhelming passion and its destructive kernel of jealousy.

Crossing the Lines

release date: Jan 01, 2005
Crossing the Lines
A series of people find their fates intertwined, from a teenager''s seduction by the outside world, to his romance with a girl whose life is precariously balanced, to the struggles of his middle-aged parents.

Back in the Day

release date: May 26, 2022
Back in the Day
Melvyn Bragg''s first ever memoir - an elegiac, intimate account of growing up in post-war Cumbria, which lyrically evokes a vanished world. ''The best thing he''s ever written . . . I loved it'' Observer ''A memoir bursting with affection'' Sunday Times In this elegiac and heartfelt memoir, Melvyn Bragg recreates his youth in the Cumbrian market town of Wigton: a working-class boy who expected to leave school at fifteen yet who gained a scholarship to Oxford University; who happily roamed the streets and raided orchards with his gang of friends until a breakdown in adolescence drove him to find refuge in books. Vividly evoking the post-war era, Bragg draws an indelible portrait of all that formed him: a community-spirited northern town, still steeped in the old ways; the Lake District landscapes that inspired him; and the many remarkable people in his close-knit world. ''A moving portrait of a lost England . . . remarkable'' Daily Telegraph

The Second Inheritance

release date: Oct 13, 2022
The Second Inheritance
''The effect of the book is massive . . . loving, deep and perceptive'' Sunday Times ''Bragg has a very sure touch with his characters: they live'' Anthony Burgess, author of A Clockwork Orange In the shadow of Hadrian''s Wall, two young men chafe at the constraints of rural life and yearn to break free from the courses set for them: John Foster, driven hard by his tyrannical, ambitious father on their tenant farm, and Arthur Langley, reluctant inheritor of his father''s waning estate. Though class has long kept their neighbouring families apart, the pair form an intense friendship - until John makes the mistake of falling for Arthur''s mercurial sister.

Rich: The Life of Richard Burton

release date: May 10, 2012
Rich: The Life of Richard Burton
Richard Burton: star. The roaring boy from the Welsh coal valleys who came to sport on the banks of the old Nile, playing great Antony to Elizabeth Taylor''s Cleopatra. From the West End to Hollywood, from Camelot to Shakespeare, he drank, dazzled and despaired, playing out his life on the public stage. But there was another, quieter, off-stage Richard Burton, a face hidden from the multitude. Melvyn Bragg, allowed free access to the never-before-revealed Burton private notebooks, and with the cooperation of friends who have never spoken about him before, has brought together the private and public sides for the first time. Rich is the complete Richard Burton: a revelation.

A Son of War

release date: Jul 07, 2004
A Son of War
This novel takes up where Bragg''s The Soldier''s Return left off, following the lives of the Richardson family from 1947 to the mid-1950s. The family is forever altered by the father''s return from WWII.

A Time to Dance

release date: Jan 01, 1990
A Time to Dance
A lifetime of restraint and placid affection erupts when a retired bank manager falls for a young girl, as far removed from him in background and experience as in age. Set in Cumbria, this is an intensely moving evocation of an overwhelming passion and its destructive kernel of jealousy.

On Giants' Shoulders

release date: Aug 27, 1999
On Giants' Shoulders
Some of the greatest minds of science are profiled in a series of engaging portraits, including Archimedes, Galileo, Newton, Darwin, Curie, Freud, Einstein, James Watson, and Francis Crick.

Love Without End

release date: Nov 05, 2019
Love Without End
The Timeless Romance of Heloise and Abelard Is Given New Life in this Poignant Novel by an Award-Winning Author, for Fans of Philippa Gregory and Elizabeth Chadwick The tale Heloise and Abelard has captivated the attentions of romantics since the twelfth century. Heloise was a woman beyond her time: educated, fierce, and unafraid to be herself. When Peter Abelard, a radical philosopher determined to reform the archaic practices of the Church from within, becomes her private tutor, the attraction is overwhelming. Their passionate love affair soon becomes dangerous, as enemies and opportunists hide in every shadow. In the twenty-first century, Arthur, a historian and author, roams the city of Paris to step into the shoes of Peter Abelard, to understand his true reasoning for abandoning Heloise. Needing to discuss his hypothesis and hoping to reconcile, Arthur invites his estranged daughter, Julia, to join him in the city of lights. But Julia could care less about lovers long dead; she is on a mission to discover the truth about her parents, and why her father left. Told in alternating narratives that transcend centuries, Love Without End delivers an unflinching look into relationships, fractured and whole, to discover the true nature of love in all its forms.

The Silken Net

release date: Feb 20, 2003
The Silken Net
A compelling story of passion, loyalty and the dangers of an obsessive relationship by the Booker Prize-longlisted and bestselling author Melvyn Bragg Half-French and with an agile, inquiring mind, Rosemary Lewis cannot help being out of the ordinary in Thurston, the Cumbrian market town where she grows up between the wars. An early, bruising failure in love drives her inwards to the solace of books until she meets Edgar - vigorous, down to earth and determined to win her. Charting their life together, this powerful novel probes with exceptional acuity the heights and tortured depths of a bond that becomes a shackle. ''Rosemary is an outstanding creation'' Sunday Telegraph ''A vigorous but never crude study of female sexuality, it is distinguished by passages of prose which have precisely the sort of leaping life that Lawrence held up before himself as an ideal all through his career'' Guardian

Remember Me...

release date: Jan 01, 2009
Remember Me...
"A passionate but ultimately tragic love affair starts when two students - one French, one English - meet at university at the beginning of the sixties. From its tentative, unpromising early stages, the relationship develops into a life-changing one, whose profound impact continues to reverberate forty years later."--BOOK JACKET.

The Soldier's Return

release date: Nov 21, 2011
The Soldier's Return
Right from the start, when the train carrying British soldier Sam Richardson home to Wigton after his service in the Burma campaign breaks down two miles from town and he and his army comrades have to walk home, it is clear we are in the hands of a compassionate, clear-sighted writer. Bragg''s work has been compared to that of Hardy and D.H. Lawrence, not without some justice. His smalltown people are closely and warmly observed, but without a shred of sentimentality, and although this story is familiar¢a man home from a dehumanizing war finds it hard to readjust¢it has seldom been imbued with such rueful humanity. For Sam, England after WWII, and after the sufferings he and his men endured in the frightful jungle campaigns, is stuffy and limiting; soon he starts dreaming of wider horizons. His adored wife, Ellen, however, is happily rooted in the little northern town where she grew up; their small son, Joe, who has hardly known his father, is bewitched but also terrified of him. How the family works out its fate in the shabby postwar years is Braggs story, and he makes of it something at once endearing and heroic. So many scenes, the regimental reunion, Joe''s efforts to win friends among the tough town kids, a final scene at a railway station as heartrending as the movie Brief Encounter, linger in the mind. The book is a small classic, deeply touching and true. Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade, Yucca, and Good Books imprints, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in fiction—novels, novellas, political and medical thrillers, comedy, satire, historical fiction, romance, erotic and love stories, mystery, classic literature, folklore and mythology, literary classics including Shakespeare, Dumas, Wilde, Cather, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

The Maid of Buttermere

release date: Jun 21, 2012
The Maid of Buttermere
Melvyn Bragg''s highly acclaimed, bestselling historical novel, the story behind one of the 19th century''s greatest scandals. ''This is the story of an impostor and bigamist, a self-styled Colonel Hope, who travels to the North, where eventually he marries "The Maid of Buttermere", a young woman whose natural beauty inspired the dreams and confirmed the theories of various early nineteenth-century writers . . . It is a fine story . . . This is historical fiction with a human face'' Peter Ackroyd, The Times ''A skilled, ornate and convincing examination of a nineteenth-century scandal in Bragg''s own Cumbria'' Thomas Keneally ''A triumph . . . I am overwhelmingly impressed'' Beryl Bainbridge ''Bragg achieves the most difficult of feats, the telling of the changing perceptions and ideals of a radical age . . . He is also as powerful as ever in his description of nature'' Sunday Times

The Sword and the Miracle

release date: Jan 01, 1997
The Sword and the Miracle
Melvyn Bragg''s acclaimed epic novel is set at the tumultuous dawn of Christianity in Britain and Ireland. It is a stunning story of adventure and spirituality, war and romance, but it is deeply rooted in Bragg''s historical studies of the Dark Ages, and it throws into question our modern-day conceptions of faith, hope, and true love. Two people destined to be lovers sacrifice themselves for what they believe to be a greater destiny. For the warrior Padric, a charismatic British prince, it is the salvation of his people and homeland from warring Northumbrian overlords; for Bega, a bewitching Irish princess, it is carrying out her self-imposed commitment to spread the word of God. She, bearing a fragment of the true cross, is gifted with miraculous powers; he is a swordsman without peer. Their disparate missions send them apart as they travel throughout the frigid wilderness of a primitive England beset by terror and villainy. Faith is pitched against doubt, spiritual fulfillment against physical desire, romantic ideals against political expediency and pragmatism against theory. The Sword and the Miracle rose quickly to the top of the British bestseller lists, heralded by critics as an absorbing, wonderfully evocative work, several cuts above contemporary attempts at historical fiction. The reader will find an exciting narrative informed by insight, knowledge and understanding.

Epic Tale of the Dark Ages

release date: Jan 01, 1996
Epic Tale of the Dark Ages
Britain during the Dark Ages is the setting for the fascinating story of Bega, a young Irish princess who became a saint, and her lifelong bond with Padric, prince of the north-western kingdom of Rheged. This dramatic, far-reaching tale brings to life a land of warring kings, Christians and pagans, and tribes divided by language and culture, illuminating a little-known yet critical period in British history.

Now is the Time

release date: Oct 08, 2015
Now is the Time
In this gripping novel, Melvyn Bragg brings an extraordinary episode in English history to fresh, urgent life. At the end of May 1381, the fourteen-year-old King of England had reason to be fearful: the plague had returned, the royal coffers were empty and a draconian poll tax was being widely evaded. Yet Richard, bolstered by his powerful, admired mother, felt secure in his God-given right to reign. But within two weeks, the unthinkable happened: a vast force of common people invaded London, led by a former soldier, Walter Tyler, and the radical preacher John Ball, demanding freedom, equality and the complete uprooting of the Church and state. And for three intense, violent days, it looked as if they would sweep all before them. Now is the Time depicts the events of the Peasants'' Revolt on both a grand and intimate scale, vividly portraying its central figures and telling an archetypal tale of an epic struggle between the powerful and the apparently powerless.

Kingdom Come

Kingdom Come
Episode uit het leven van drie mannen, afkomstig uit een Noordengels arbeidersgezin, die in verschillende omstandigheden ieder hun problemen te verwerken krijgen.

The Book of Books

release date: Apr 07, 2011
The Book of Books
The Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller celebrating 400 years of the King James Bible. The King James Bible has often been called the Book of Books both in itself and in what it stands for. Since its publication in 1611 it has been the best selling book in the world, and many believe, had the greatest impact. The King James Bible has spread the Protestant faith. It has also been the greatest influence on the enrichment of the English language and its literature. It has been the Bible of wars from the British Civil War in the seventeenth century to the American Civil War two centuries later and it has been carried into battle in innumerable conflicts since then. Its influence on social movements - particularly involving women in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries - and politics was profound. It was crucial to the growth of democracy. It was integral to the abolition of slavery and it defined attitudes to modern science, education and sex. As THE ADVENTURE OF ENGLISH explored the history of our language, so THE BOOK OF BOOKS reveals the extraordinary and still-felt impact of a work created over 400 years ago.

Autumn Manoeuvres

release date: Apr 26, 2012
Autumn Manoeuvres
Jimmie Johnston first became a Labour MP in Cumbria when there was a brave new post-war world to build. Now, in the late 70s, another general election looms but he is no longer so optimistic. And as he fights to keep his seat, his family begins to fracture around him and scandal threatens. In this absorbing and fast-paced novel, Melvyn Bragg''s portrait of the mood and politics of the era remains as pertinent today as on its original publication.

Twelve Books that Changed the World

release date: Jan 01, 2006
Twelve Books that Changed the World
In this digitised age of shared information it is easy to take for granted the power of the printed word. Here Melvyn Bragg presents a vivid reminder of the book as agent of social, political and personal revolution. In the fascinating book accompanying the ITV series, Melvyn Bragg takes a look at the most important British books in history, and their long-lasting effects which can still be felt throughout the world today. Far from being a study of dry texts, TWELVE BRITISH BOOKS THAT CHANGED THE WORLD presents a rich variety of human endeavour and a great diversity of characters. From scientific breakthroughs to seminal human rights treatises; from dramatic works of staggering emotional depth to what were at the time seemingly innocuous documents - all these works have shaped the history of Britain and beyond. Definitive, always illuminating and sometimes controversial, the hidden story of these twelve books is a journey through the colourful history of our island and its people.

On Giants' Shoulders Poster

release date: Mar 05, 1998
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