(no subject)

[ewx]

I notice that today is an anniversary of the birthday of Bernardo O'Higgins, the gloriously named Chilean revolutionary leader. (He was the illegitimate son of a Spanish officer of Irish origin.)

I've always been interested in history (though I didn't care much for history lessons), but the last few years my reading has been dominated by history books, and this shows no sign of changing any time soon. I'm currently backlogged by whole cultures worth of reading compared to what I've bought, never mind individual books; and by the time I catch up with that I'll have picked up any number of side-interests along the way.

Comments

[geekette8.livejournal.com]

It is a brilliant name, isn't it? (http://gallery.jifvik.org:9999/gallery/Sligo2002/109_0929_IMG)

[ewx.livejournal.com]

People from all over ended up in South America; there is, or at least was, a significant English-speaking community in Argentina, for instance, who can't have had much fun in 1982. There are lots of Japanese-descended people in Peru and (IIRC) quite a few Arab-descended people in Argentina.

AIUI Argentina once had the same kind of attraction as the USA did as a destination for emmigrants. But it hasn't lived up to its economic promise in the same way...

[mobbsy.livejournal.com]

He plays a bit of a role in some of the later Patrick O'Brian books.

[sparrowsion]

Not to mention the Welsh in Patagonia.

[sphyg.livejournal.com]

I find myself being more and more interested in various bits of history. Which books/cultures do you recommend?

[burkesworks.livejournal.com]

The English-speakers in Buenos Aires are still very much there, though like the Welsh in Patagonia, the numbers are getting fewer. Fascinating to know that BA has a Harrods department store, a well-known restaurant called the London Grill, the Hurlingham Cricket Club and suburbs called Banfield and Glew as well as Hurlingham.
Interesting too, to see the Welsh tea shops in Cwm Hyfryd, up above Puerto Madryn, which look quite unlike anything in Wales!

[ewx.livejournal.com]

What bits are you interested in? I've probably read more about the Romans, Britain, and WWI/WWII than anything else. John Julius Norwhich's three volumes on the Byzantine Empire is very readable (so is Gibbon but he's much more verbose and of course is at a two hundred year disadvantage to modern historians). Come round and pick over my history bookshelf some time if you like.

[sphyg.livejournal.com]

> Which bits are you interested in?

All of it ;P I'll take up your offer in October.

[rmc28]

Bah, you got there first.

What will I do when I finish them?

[mobbsy.livejournal.com]

Probably take a bit of a break from 19^th C. naval historical fiction for a while and then either:

a) Start reading non-fiction about the period
b) Start reading C.S. Forester, Alexander Kent or Dudley Pope
c) Starting again, this time making notes.