Andrew Smith's Reviews > A Little History of the World

Written for children by an Austrian-born historian in 1935, this book was subsequently updated in the 1980’s. It tells the history of man since the Neolithic Age, when humans humans first inhabited this planet. There’s a brief section on the subsequent evolution of our species before the author embarks on a journey through the ages. The length of the book (I listened to an audio version of some 9 hours) dictates that it’s something of a whistle stop tour.

A few things to note:

1. Previous histories I’ve come across have been written by British or American historians – this telling focuses more on central European history than others (there’s actually relatively little here on Britain), with particular focus on Germany. I don’t mean this as a criticism, and in fact it opened my eyes to events of which I’d been previously been unaware.

2. There is a lot of focus on wars. I’d go as far as to say that the book is dominated by the various conflicts that have drawn and re-drawn the borders of the world.

3. Oddly, very little here on science, technology, art and religion.

I prefer the style over the substance here, though I do think this is an engaging introduction to history for children. If nothing else, it’ll enlighten them as to the perils of conflict and war – something we could well do with less of in our future than in our past.