Book Description
The most comprehensive and authoritative reference book of its kind, The Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea is a completely revised and updated edition of a classic volume that was first published in 1976 to huge acclaim, hailed as 'a beguiling book' (Daily Telegraph), 'marvellous' (The Times), and 'totally absorbing' (Financial Times). It brings together more than 2,600 entries on every imaginable aspect of the seas and the vessels that sail on them, from shipbuilding, yachting, diving, and marine mammals, to tidal power, piracy, and the literature and language of the sea. This second edition provides significant new material on topics that have come to prominence in recent times, such as oceanography and marine archaeology: key contributions on these subjects from marine expert Dr Martin Angel at Southampton Oceanography Centre include climate change, environmental issues, marine pollution, and marine wildlife. Among the many brand new entries to this edition are up-to-the-minute articles on underwater vehicles, tsunamis, warfare at sea, marine pollution, the Economic Exclusion Zone, and ship preservation. This Companion also includes authoritative and fascinating entries on maritime history: its naval battles, including Pearl Harbor and Trafalgar; its great ships, from Noah's Ark and the Bounty to the Titanic and the Mary Rose; and its most famous individuals, both real and fictional, including Christopher Columbus, Horatio Nelson, and Robinson Crusoe. Entries are fully cross-referenced, and the text is illustrated with over 260 detailed drawings, making it more accessible than ever before.
Customer Reviews:
Ahoy, you landlubbers!.......2007-07-18
If you want the history and particulars about seafaring since time began then this is just the book. Rag sailors to plastic pushers, it's all in there. A serious research source for writers, teachers, etc. I give them away as gifts to my psuedo-seafaring friends (hoping they will learn the difference from port and starboard).
Disappointment.......2007-01-16
Oxford's earlier paperback of this title had larger type, larger page size, better pictures. I had expected the same book. Now I think the hardbound is a much better buy.
An Encyclopaedia of Ships and the Sea........2005-01-16
Every time I pick up this book I find myself being drawn into reading far more than was either planned or expected. It is a beguiling book because each fact explained seems to lead to another which must also be found and read. But, in turning the pages one is constantly hijacked by something of interest which has simply caught the eye - and so it continues.
Laid out in true encyclopaedic form, this book contains almost one thousand pages of facts - many of which are supported by black and white graphics or photographs. The only exception is the colour used right at the end to show; Ships flags, ships lights, Buoys and Buoyage - all of which are, of course, wholly dependant on colour in order to be fully explained.
The bookshelf of anyone engaged in the research of ships and shipwrecks would be empty without a copy of this excellent and most useful publication.
NM
Best possible reference.......2000-04-04
With an encyclopedic format, this book provides the reader with a wide array of very well written definitions, explanations and anecdotal references to all things nautical. It also includes a significant amount of biographical information on sailors of historical renown and those of more recent times. It is written in such a way as to be captivating on its own - I often find myself looking up a nautical reference and then spending many more minutes or even hours engrossed in the book because of the other items I see when looking up the first. In each entry, the terms used to describe the entry are asterisked if those terms are further defined elsewhere in the book. I found this extremely useful for knowing where else to look for more information related to the particular entry reading. An excellent reference book for novice and expert.
An indispensable guide.......2000-02-04
I am a lay reader, not a student of nautical history, and I found this guide absolutely essential while reading the Aubrey-Maturin novels of Patrick O'Brian.
Customer Reviews:
An Encyclopaedia of Ships and the Sea........2007-05-11
Every time I pick up this book I find myself being drawn into reading far more than was either planned or expected. It is a beguiling book because each fact explained seems to lead to another which must also be found and read. But, in turning the pages one is constantly hijacked by something of interest which has simply caught the eye - and so it continues.
Laid out in true encyclopaedic form, this book contains almost one thousand pages of facts - many of which are supported by black and white graphics or photographs. The only exception is the colour used right at the end to show; Ships flags, ships lights, Buoys and Buoyage - all of which are, of course, wholly dependant on colour in order to be fully explained.
The bookshelf of anyone engaged in the research of ships and shipwrecks would be empty without a copy of this excellent and most useful publication.
NM
Average customer rating:
- An Encyclopaedia of Ships and the Sea.
|
Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea
Manufacturer: OXFORD UNIVERSITY PR
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000GQT8HY |
Customer Reviews:
An Encyclopaedia of Ships and the Sea........2007-05-11
Every time I pick up this book I find myself being drawn into reading far more than was either planned or expected. It is a beguiling book because each fact explained seems to lead to another which must also be found and read. But, in turning the pages one is constantly hijacked by something of interest which has simply caught the eye - and so it continues.
Laid out in true encyclopaedic form, this book contains almost one thousand pages of facts - many of which are supported by black and white graphics or photographs. The only exception is the colour used right at the end to show; Ships flags, ships lights, Buoys and Buoyage - all of which are, of course, wholly dependant on colour in order to be fully explained.
The bookshelf of anyone engaged in the research of ships and shipwrecks would be empty without a copy of this excellent and most useful publication.
NM
Customer Reviews:
An Encyclopaedia of Ships and the Sea........2007-05-11
Every time I pick up this book I find myself being drawn into reading far more than was either planned or expected. It is a beguiling book because each fact explained seems to lead to another which must also be found and read. But, in turning the pages one is constantly hijacked by something of interest which has simply caught the eye - and so it continues.
Laid out in true encyclopaedic form, this book contains almost one thousand pages of facts - many of which are supported by black and white graphics or photographs. The only exception is the colour used right at the end to show; Ships flags, ships lights, Buoys and Buoyage - all of which are, of course, wholly dependant on colour in order to be fully explained.
The bookshelf of anyone engaged in the research of ships and shipwrecks would be empty without a copy of this excellent and most useful publication.
NM
Customer Reviews:
An Encyclopaedia of Ships and the Sea........2007-05-11
Every time I pick up this book I find myself being drawn into reading far more than was either planned or expected. It is a beguiling book because each fact explained seems to lead to another which must also be found and read. But, in turning the pages one is constantly hijacked by something of interest which has simply caught the eye - and so it continues.
Laid out in true encyclopaedic form, this book contains almost one thousand pages of facts - many of which are supported by black and white graphics or photographs. The only exception is the colour used right at the end to show; Ships flags, ships lights, Buoys and Buoyage - all of which are, of course, wholly dependant on colour in order to be fully explained.
The bookshelf of anyone engaged in the research of ships and shipwrecks would be empty without a copy of this excellent and most useful publication.
NM
Customer Reviews:
An Encyclopaedia of Ships and the Sea........2007-05-11
Every time I pick up this book I find myself being drawn into reading far more than was either planned or expected. It is a beguiling book because each fact explained seems to lead to another which must also be found and read. But, in turning the pages one is constantly hijacked by something of interest which has simply caught the eye - and so it continues.
Laid out in true encyclopaedic form, this book contains almost one thousand pages of facts - many of which are supported by black and white graphics or photographs. The only exception is the colour used right at the end to show; Ships flags, ships lights, Buoys and Buoyage - all of which are, of course, wholly dependant on colour in order to be fully explained.
The bookshelf of anyone engaged in the research of ships and shipwrecks would be empty without a copy of this excellent and most useful publication.
NM
Average customer rating:
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Sandcastles, Arabs in Search of the Modern World
Milton Viorst
Manufacturer: Knopf
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0224033239 |
Customer Reviews:
A book that holds up over time.......2005-02-11
I haven't read a better book on the middle east. I especially enjoyed the part where he told how Bill Clinton killed the one woman who represented what we Americans would like to see all women in Iraq become. In 1986 Saddam built an eight story art center. To run it he appointed Leyla al-Attar. The author who met Attar at the museum describes her as the most stylish, most modern woman he met in the Arab world. She was in her mid forties, small, attractive with her hair in a pony tail. An artist she had a picture she drew of a nude woman with long hair half concealed in a grove of leafless trees on exhibit. Attar's husband was a businessman and she had three grown children. Neither she or her husband were Bathists. She had survived in Saddam's Iraq by being scrupulously non political. All her efforts were devoted to promoting the western oriented artists, writers and musicians who were her friends. Saddam indulged them in the hopes that they would bring him approval from the west. In the first Bush war with Iraq her home was bombed and many of her paintings destroyed. Fortunately the family was not home at the time. She moved with her husband and children to her sister's house. There in June of 1993 a missile fired under Clinton's orders as a response to the attempted car bombing of former president George Bush in Kuwait demolished the house killing Attar, her husband and one of her children.
A useful counterbalance to the neocon view of the Arab world.......2004-10-17
Although this book has some flaws I am giving it the highest rating to compensate for the undeserved lowest rating bestowed upon it by the previous customer review.That review was deliberately misleading and defamatory, juxtaposing seemingly contradictory statements taken out of context, but what do you expect from a pro? Mr. Pipes does that sort of thing for a living.
Viorst is not an inexperienced novice in the Middle East who only interviewed "a few leaders". This book is the fruit of 20 years of newspaper and magazine reporting on the Middle East and foreign affairs and hundreds of interviews with people from every station in life.Far from being ignorant about the region, Viorst brings to light many aspects of the Muslim fundamantalist movement which the neocons and the Muslim Brothers would probably wish would remain quite obscure to the western public, all the better to exploit its excesses and use it as the justification for Israeli expansionism and furtherance of the US/British/French neo-colonialism which stunted the region's socio-political development in the first place.
If Mr Pipes had read beyond the chapters on Turkey and Syria, he would have found many other objectionable assertions, such as the fact that the returning Kuwaiti aristocrats massacred one thousand Palestinian residents of Kuwait in 1991 for cooperating with the Iraqi occupiers.
The aspect of SAND CASTLES that I found most remarkable was Viorst's construction of a very solid case - using sources in Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Israel and the US - that the Reagan administration deliberately prolonged the Iran-Iraq war as long as possible and that the Bush administration deliberately provoked the series of events which led to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait (though April Glaspie is innocent, in as much as a scapegoat is innocent by definition).
There are many other very significant observations in the book which are well worth knowing about, though I found the absence of a chapter on Saudi Arabia lamentable.Viorst's obvious sympathy for the Jordanians and Palestinians and his sympathy for the aims of the Baathist ideology, if not its leadership, is commendable.
Sandcastles: The Arabs in Search of the Modern World.......2001-07-17
Viorst, a reporter who has traveled in recent years to the Middle East for The New Yorker, can snag the startling quotation (a Gazan told him "The Arabs say they're our friends, and treat us worse than the Israelis do") and he can write incisively (President Hafiz al-Asad of Syria is a man for whom "an air of enigma is an instrument of state"). But the odd insight does not save a book chock-full of pretension, factual mistakes, cultural incomprehension, and political bias. The pretension starts with the subtitle: somehow, Viorst flatters himself into believing that a few trips to the Middle East and some interviews with Middle Eastern politicians gives him a base for interpreting the Arab experience with modernity. Some of his errors make one doubt that Viorst had his eyes open while traveling. How could a repeat visitor to Damascus assert that President Asad "shunned the creation of a personality cult"? In fact, Asad's representation is ubiquitous within Syria. Sandcastles contains illogical passages. We learn on one page that Asad has faced no challenge to his rule since 1970; seven pages later, Viorst reports on the carnage at Hama in 1982 that resulted from precisely such a challenge. Though he treads light on politics, Viorst betrays an all-too-familiar outlook throughout his account: stick it to America's allies (in this case, Turkey, Kuwait, and Israel), portray its opponents favorably. For example, his chapter on Turkey (not usually known as an Arab country, but included here anyway) bristles with antipathy. He describes Istanbul (in an ungrammatical flourish) as a "melancholy city" and exploits the bad weather during his visit as a metaphor for Turkey's unattractiveness.
Middle East Quarterly, September 1994
Average customer rating:
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A Sand County Almanac Illustrated
Aldo Leopold
Manufacturer: Trails Media Group
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0915024152 |
Product Description
152 pages
Amazon.com
Published in 1949, shortly after the author's death, A Sand County Almanac is a classic of nature writing, widely cited as one of the most influential nature books ever published. Writing from the vantage of his summer shack along the banks of the Wisconsin River, Leopold mixes essay, polemic, and memoir in his book's pages. In one famous episode, he writes of killing a female wolf early in his career as a forest ranger, coming upon his victim just as she was dying, "in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes.... I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, no wolves would mean hunters' paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view." Leopold's road-to-Damascus change of view would find its fruit some years later in his so-called land ethic, in which he held that nothing that disturbs the balance of nature is right. Much of Almanac elaborates on this basic premise, as well as on Leopold's view that it is something of a human duty to preserve as much wild land as possible, as a kind of bank for the biological future of all species. Beautifully written, quiet, and elegant, Leopold's book deserves continued study and discussion today. --Gregory McNamee
Book Description
This special edition of the highly acclaimed A Sand County Almanac commemorates the one-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Aldo Leopold, one of the foremost conservationists of our century. First published in 1949 and praised in The New York Times Book Review as "full of beauty and vigor and bite," A Sand County Almanac combines some of the finest nature writing since Thoreau with an outspoken and highly ethical regard for America's relationship to the land. The volume includes a section on the monthly changes of the Wisconsin countryside; another section that gathers together the informal pieces written by Leopold over a forty-year period as he traveled around the woodlands of Wisconsin, Iowa, Arizona, Sonora, Oregon, Manitoba, and elsewhere; and a final section in which Leopold addresses more formally the philosophical issues involved in wildlife conservation. As the forerunner of such important books as Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Edward Abbey's Desert Solitaire, and Robert Finch's The Primal Place, this classic work remains as relevant today as it was forty years ago.
Customer Reviews:
My view.......2007-10-07
Well written book. A. Leopold was an early messenger regarding people`s influence on nature and the risk of damage because of short-sighted politics/business. His description of his surroundings is vivid. One wonders how "his" landscape looks today!
A sand county Almanac: and sketches Here And there by Aldo Leopoid.......2007-02-27
was not a hard covered book recieved a paper back. I kept it only because I wanted to read it. arrived in good condition and in about 10 days
First Time User.......2007-01-16
The whole process went great. It took a few minutes extra at the beginning as it was my first time. Since then, I have bought another book and some other items. It's truly a great way to get a good deal on thing you would never think were available on line. Have plans for many other items that I have been checking out as my budget allows.
an excellent edition of an outstanding book.......2007-01-16
Book worth reading and re-reading for anyone interested in ecology, also professionally, or who has respect for the natural world. In a way it is pity that the book is as vital now as it was. Our undersanding of ecology and needs for looking after our environment increased alongside with the rate of its destruction
book revisited.......2007-01-13
except for about 3 missprinted words in this book,it is just as good a read as it was for me in high school.A true conservation and nature classic.
Average customer rating:
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The First Dinosaur Book: Richard Owen on British Fossil Reptiles (1842) (History of Earth Sciences Series)
Manufacturer: Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0820115266 |
Average customer rating:
- Fossil Reptiles of Great Britain. M.J.Benton & P.S.Spencer
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Fossil Reptiles of Great Britain (Geological Conservation Review)
M.J. Benton , and
P.S. Spencer
Manufacturer: Springer
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0412620405 |
Book Description
British Fossil reptile sites are of international importance since they include remains that fill the time gaps poorly known elsewhere. They include rich classic reptile beds which have been the source of dozens of important specimens. This volume details all those sites that have yielded fossil reptiles. The fifty most important localities are described in detail and an extensive bibliography of everything published on British Fossil reptiles since 1676 is provided.
Customer Reviews:
Fossil Reptiles of Great Britain. M.J.Benton & P.S.Spencer.......2000-06-26
Published as Volume 10 in the Geological Review Series of the Joint Nature Conservation Committee, the primary task of this commissioned book was to identify and notify geological Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) which would then come under the protection of the Wildlife and Countryside Act (1981).
Professor Benton is a leading academic in the field of British Vertebrate Palaeontology, and this book is an extensive work of original research, fully referenced: over 1,150 literature sources are cited. It is illustrated throughout with geological maps and tables, reptilian specimen drawings and reconstructions, and on-site photographs. It describes in detail his final selection of 50 SSSIs, explaining the special interest, palaeontological significance and heritage value of the specimens which each site has yielded. It goes far beyond the official requirements, providing a valuable reference source on the history of British vertebrate palaeontology, and an authoritative synopsis of current scientific opinion regarding the status and significance of British fossil reptiles.
Average customer rating:
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Huxley at Work
Michael Collie
Manufacturer: Palgrave Macmillan
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0333510593 |
Book Description
The Pleistocene epoch or Ice Age, an extended period of advancing and retreating ice sheets, is characterized by striking climatic oscillations and sea level fluctuations. This age saw the rise and spread of humans and a great extinction of large mammals by the end of the epoch; in fact, the world today is essentially the product of dramatic changes that took place in the Pleistocene. This book, a companion to the author's Pleistocene Amphibians and Reptiles in North America, discusses the Pleistocene amphibians and reptiles in Britain and the European continent eastward through present-day Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, the Yugoslavian republics, and Greece. The book begins with a general discussion of the Pleistocene in Britain and Europe with an emphasis on regional terms used to define Pleistocene chronological events. Next, a look at the pre-Pleistocene herpetofauna of the study area sets the stage for a discussion of Pleistocene herpetofauna. A significant section of the book consists of a "bestiary," a series of annotated taxonomic accounts of Pleistocene herpetological taxa from the region. Following this is the interpretive section, beginning with a discussion of herpetological species as paleoenvironmental indicators and continuing with an analysis of herpetological population adjustments to Pleistocene events in Britain and Europe, and then with a discussion of extinction patterns in the region. Finally, the author compares Pleistocene herpetological events in Europe with those in North America. This volume and its companion together provide an up-to-date and comprehensive review of Pleistocene herpetofaunas across a significant portion of the Northern Hemisphere.
Average customer rating:
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A history of British fossil reptiles
Richard Owen
Manufacturer: Cassell & company limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
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ASIN: B00088ZL9O |
Books:
- The Passing of Armies: An Account Of The Final Campaign Of The Army Of The Potomac
- The Punic Wars: Rome, Carthage, and the Struggle for the Mediterranean
- The Red Horseman
- The Rommel Papers (Da Capo Paperback)
- The Spartan Army (Elite)
- The Wolves at the Door: The True Story of America's Greatest Female Spy
- The Yom Kippur War: The Epic Encounter That Transformed the Middle East
- Two Survived
- Ultimate Sniper 2006 : An Advanced Training Manual for Military and Police Snipers (Ultimate Sniper, 2006 New and Updated!)
- Utah Beach: The Amphibious Landing And Airborne Operations On D-Day, June 6, 1944
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Seafaring Lore and Legend
Chapman The Sailor's Lexicon: The Classic Source for More Than 15,000 Nautical Terms
Nautical Terms & Abbreviations
The Dictionary of Nautical Literacy
The Sailor's Illustrated Dictionary: Full Explanations of more than 8,500 Terms and Phrases Used by Sailors, Boaters, and Seamen
