Rating: 
Summary: Solid historical timeline
Review: Although it takes a few minutes to orient oneself with the structure of this timeline reference book, the huge amount of information it contains is readily accessible. Beginning in the 5000 BC and going to contemporary times, the timeline contains a year by year (or age by age, for the earliest entries) list of major occurrences in history/politics, literature/theater, visual arts, music, science and technology, and "daily life." Obviously, not all years contain entries across the board, and several years have packed grids. As the years get closer to the present, huge lists of events can take an entire page for a single year. Although heavily biased toward European and North American culture, the entries are not exclusively western. While helpful in determining the events in a specific time frame, this volume is strictly a timeline without reference to specific trends and without analysis.I highly recommend this book to anyone putting together a collection of easy-to-access reference books.
Rating:
Summary: Solid historical timeline
Review: Although it takes a few minutes to orient oneself with the structure of this timeline reference book, the huge amount of information it contains is readily accessible. Beginning in the 5000 BC and going to contemporary times, the timeline contains a year by year (or age by age, for the earliest entries) list of major occurrences in history/politics, literature/theater, visual arts, music, science and technology, and "daily life." Obviously, not all years contain entries across the board, and several years have packed grids. As the years get closer to the present, huge lists of events can take an entire page for a single year. Although heavily biased toward European and North American culture, the entries are not exclusively western. While helpful in determining the events in a specific time frame, this volume is strictly a timeline without reference to specific trends and without analysis. I highly recommend this book to anyone putting together a collection of easy-to-access reference books.
Rating: 
Summary: Crying for an update
Review: For those of us who want a chronology of history--just the facts, man--clearly showing wars awaging in conjunction with writers writing, musicians making music, daily doings, etc., THIS is the book. Alas, I have the 1991 edition you offer. Time for an update?
Rating:
Summary: Great reference tool, but.....
Review: Great book! It really puts history into context in order to better understand the world as a whole. However, I was very dissapointed to see no mention of Australia before Cook "discovered" it, or of the Aboriginies living there thousands of years before the prisoners landed from England. Nor was there enough imformaiton about the native populations of the Americas. Furthermore, I think that the last 50 years focus on American culture too much...do we really need to know the superbowl scores? Overall though, this book is a great reference tool and the daily life protion is very entertaining and fun.
Rating:
Summary: I LOVE this book!
Review: I bought this to do research for writing an historical book about Asia. It is certainly a wonderful reference and puts the events together like no other book around. However, in pouring over a small span of dates, I did note a number of discrepancies, most involving the listing of an event more than once in different years. Also, (as the authors do admit up front) the book is heavily weighted with Western European and U.S. events. Overall, it is really fun to just page through it and see what was going on when, but if you need real accurate detail, especially about non-Eurocentric and American events, you are going to have to look further elsewhere.
Rating: 
Summary: One of a kind, but has its flaws
Review: I bought this to do research for writing an historical book about Asia. It is certainly a wonderful reference and puts the events together like no other book around. However, in pouring over a small span of dates, I did note a number of discrepancies, most involving the listing of an event more than once in different years. Also, (as the authors do admit up front) the book is heavily weighted with Western European and U.S. events. Overall, it is really fun to just page through it and see what was going on when, but if you need real accurate detail, especially about non-Eurocentric and American events, you are going to have to look further elsewhere.
Rating:
Summary: An excellent source for students and fans of history
Review: I can't tell you how many times I've used this book for my studies. Not only is the book crammed with interesting dates, but also it's organized in a manner that makes it easy to find any item. First of all, the general structure of the book is like a giant Excel program with the years listed on the side. Each square is separated into different categories such as Politics, literature, art, science and so on. For example, if you want to know the winner of the 1965 World Series, you just find the page for 1965, and look under the appropriate category. The index is also helpful. For each entry, it lists each year the item is mentioned and which category. I find this book helpful in that it gives one a perspective on historical events. For example, for a history project involving the years 1900- 1910, I noticed that there were a great deal of scientific, social, and artistic events that radically changed our way of life that all happened in this short period of time. I was able to make connections very easily with the aid of this book. I would recommend this book for literary and theatre students who need to research a time period as well as fans of movies who wish to have a better understand of the era in which their film is set.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful source for putting events in perspective.
Review: I first came upon this book in the German edition and was fasinated by the format and the amount of information it contained. I am doing research on a 12th century German saint, Hildegard of Bingen, and it was very helpful to me. However, when I returned and bought the English edition, Hildegard was omitted. That was disappointing. At any rate it is certainly worth the price.
Rating:
Summary: chart like summary of world history events
Review: I found this book to be thoroughly helpful to me. I was planning a SPECIAL presentation for my parents 50th WEDDING ANNIVERSARY and used this book for research. As I could not find a newspaper front page for each year they were married, I used the interesting information in this book as material for rhyming poems summarizing EACH Married year. This book is "Chart-like" and broken into areas such as: A-HISTORY/POLITICS; B-LITERATURE/THEATRE; C-RELIGION/PHILOSOPHY/LEARNING; D-VISUAL ARTS; E-MUSIC; F-SCIENCE/TECHNOLOGY, GROWTH/ and G-DAILY LIFE. I chose things which I thought would be well-known and important and used these in my rhyming poems (one for each year starting from 1948); e.g. Harry S. Truman elected President of the U.S., James A. Michener's TALES OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC; Films: Hamlet Academy Award (Olivier); Popular songs All I want for Christmas is My two Front Teeth; Idlewild airport on Long Island NY dedicated by President Truman; Cleveland wins World Series over Boston (4-2). I wasn't able to complete them as the book ends in 1991, and I could NOT find such similar material from other sources, although I did try to web for time capsules etc., The information from this book is interesting and compiled in an easy-to-read summary without having to study and search many sources. It is an enormous task undertaken by the authors to amass so much knowledge into such a concise and wonderful book. I found them to be most thorough and comprehensive. I truly recommend this excellent book for those of you who require such research on a yearly basis. It is truly a necessary research tool! Kathryn in New York City
Rating:
Summary: Not enough current data
Review: I was disappointed to learn that the book does not cover the 1990's. I'm writing a family history and am working backwards, so once I get to the 1980's I'll be able to use this reference. I hope that the editors update this book soon.
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