Rating: 
Summary: Good Introduction to the Middle Ages, but ....
Review: As a newcomer to the history of the Middle Ages, this book was my first in the subject (other than textbooks from college on Western Civilization). I have truly enjoyed it and it has given me a decent overview of the vast era (and he has an excellent list of further reading, including movies!), but it definitely wasn't what I was expecting, as it is more of a narrative than a simple laying out of the facts. Being a narrative has its advantages (it makes for a more interesting read, almost like a novel at times), but it can certainly be confusing. As expected, the book has a general trend of moving chronologically forward from the disintigration of the Roman Empire to the beginnings of the Renaissance, but the subjects are organized more by theme than date, and this can be very confusing for a newcomer to the field. As one reviewer mentioned, not having any maps and some sort of timeline to put everything together is a big problem, something which is really needed to give the book cohesion.I found the way Cantor introduced the Middle Ages to be highly enlightening. He starts from the late Roman Empire and seamlessly flows into the Middle Ages, so seamlessly that I didn't even realize the "introduction" had ended and that I was now into the Middle Ages. I was expecting it just to start abruptly like most history books, but Cantor spends the first 4-5 chapters developing the background from which the Middle Ages sprung. It makes it clear how hard it is to define the beginning of the Middle Ages (like almost any age of history). Cantor's style of writing tends to use long, run-on sentences and many different terms for referring to the same concept or idea (have a dictionary handy!), so it sometimes requires more effort than needed to understand what he's saying. And like any historian, his own personal bias slips in at times, but I didn't find it over-bearing at all. He undoubtedly knows his stuff, but he could use an editor who could give it some cohesion via maps, a timline, and footnotes to explain concepts he often blows over. Nonetheless, I recommend this book for any newcomer to the field.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent introduction to the Middle Ages
Review: Cantor combines deft argument with enjoyable readibility to make this book an excellent introduction to the Middle Ages. An great improvement over his previous "Miedieval History" (1963), he gives greater attention to the influence of the heritage of the ancient world on what Cantor calls "the preconditioning of the medieval civilization." While one could develop this even further than he does, that would require a much longer book. Invaluable alone is the extensive bibliography for those new to the field of Medieval Studies. He separates a "short list" which would give one a crash course on medieval civilization from the "long list", providing a core bebliography in medieval studies. But the most endearing qualities of the book are not only its readibility, making it a truly enjoyable read (in contrast to most studies of the medieval period - or history texts in general), but the way he deftly explains the major events and connects them in a way that leaves the reader with a comprehensive understanding of the period rather than a depository of facts and events. Highly recommended for those with no background of the period and need a humane introduction to it.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent introduction to the Middle Ages
Review: Cantor combines deft argument with enjoyable readibility to make this book an excellent introduction to the Middle Ages. An great improvement over his previous "Miedieval History" (1963), he gives greater attention to the influence of the heritage of the ancient world on what Cantor calls "the preconditioning of the medieval civilization." While one could develop this even further than he does, that would require a much longer book. Invaluable alone is the extensive bibliography for those new to the field of Medieval Studies. He separates a "short list" which would give one a crash course on medieval civilization from the "long list", providing a core bebliography in medieval studies. But the most endearing qualities of the book are not only its readibility, making it a truly enjoyable read (in contrast to most studies of the medieval period - or history texts in general), but the way he deftly explains the major events and connects them in a way that leaves the reader with a comprehensive understanding of the period rather than a depository of facts and events. Highly recommended for those with no background of the period and need a humane introduction to it.
Rating:
Summary: A Solid Overview
Review: Cantor's "The Civilization of the Middle Ages" is a fine overview of a criminally ill-defined period. His accomplishment is even more profound when you consider, for a moment, the time span covered. Libraries are filled with volumes covering the the Roman Empire and the Renaissance, epochs that abut the medeival era. Meanwhile a full millennium of European history is marginalized and disparigangly referred to as "dark". For anyone interested in illuminating themselves in regards to some thousand years of history this is a good start. As readable and engaging as this book is, its focus on the broad sweep of history sometimes leaves much to be desired. By design the history focuses on themes and motivations and less on concrete year to year narration--a style with problems all its own. As an entry point, this is an excellent text and the helpful bibliography serves to point readers in the direction in which their curiosity has been peaked.
Rating:
Summary: Time Well Spent
Review: Cantor's book covers the civilization of the Middle Ages from ca 300 CE to 1500 CE but most of it is spent in the period from ca 500 CE to 1450 CE. It does provide, however, a good chapter on each of the following: (1) a very short summary of the classical Greek, Roman and Hebrew heritage, (2) a very short history of the early Christian church plus (3) an overview of the Roman Catholic church through Pope Gregory VII, and a short overview of the barbarian invasions that helped bring down the Roman Empire. He then used the remainder of 443 pages to describe what his view is of the process of building a civilization in Europe from the ashes of the Roman Empire and the largely illiterate population of Europe. His practice is to look at several different periods of time from both the government building,the development of the Roman Catholic church and human developments in literature, philosophy, the arts, etc. This leads to some repetition as the same people have an impact in more than one topic. For me this repetition was good as it reinforced my learning about some of the more important people and movements of the Middle Ages. It was my impression that Cantor is inclined to be much easier in his judgement of the failures of the officials of the Roman Catholic church and kings in the roles they had in suppressing the people of Europe as they pursued a goal of controlling temporal as well as the spiritual lives of Europeans. He is a good historian, however, and as he describes the activities of kings and popes, their oft times ruthless actions are detailed to the point where he contradicts his claim that historians in general have been too severe in their judgements. He clearly shows how these leaders at times formed unholy alliances for mutual support. At times he seems Nietzschean in his defense of ambitious popes, the Inquisition, and kings who were ruthless in the pursuit of their
goals of nation and church building. He does a good job of showing how the ambitions of kings and popes influenced the course of civilization. However, after having read about the horrendous behavior of the kings and nobles of England and Germany and their impact on the peasantry of France during the Hundred Years War as detailed by other authors, I was surprised that Cantor almost dismisses it as just another war in an almost continuous state of war during the Middle Ages. Like too many good books on history, this one could use some maps and some tables summarizing developments. Overall, however, this un-professional history reader enjoyed reading this book and learned a lot from it but not always from the same viewpoint as that of the author.
Rating:
Summary: Time Well Spent
Review: Cantor's book covers the civilization of the Middle Ages from ca 300 CE to 1500 CE but most of it is spent in the period from ca 500 CE to 1450 CE. It does provide, however, a good chapter on each of the following: (1) a very short summary of the classical Greek, Roman and Hebrew heritage, (2) a very short history of the early Christian church plus (3) an overview of the Roman Catholic church through Pope Gregory VII, and a short overview of the barbarian invasions that helped bring down the Roman Empire. He then used the remainder of 443 pages to describe what his view is of the process of building a civilization in Europe from the ashes of the Roman Empire and the largely illiterate population of Europe. His practice is to look at several different periods of time from both the government building,the development of the Roman Catholic church and human developments in literature, philosophy, the arts, etc. This leads to some repetition as the same people have an impact in more than one topic. For me this repetition was good as it reinforced my learning about some of the more important people and movements of the Middle Ages. It was my impression that Cantor is inclined to be much easier in his judgement of the failures of the officials of the Roman Catholic church and kings in the roles they had in suppressing the people of Europe as they pursued a goal of controlling temporal as well as the spiritual lives of Europeans. He is a good historian, however, and as he describes the activities of kings and popes, their oft times ruthless actions are detailed to the point where he contradicts his claim that historians in general have been too severe in their judgements. He clearly shows how these leaders at times formed unholy alliances for mutual support. At times he seems Nietzschean in his defense of ambitious popes, the Inquisition, and kings who were ruthless in the pursuit of their
goals of nation and church building. He does a good job of showing how the ambitions of kings and popes influenced the course of civilization. However, after having read about the horrendous behavior of the kings and nobles of England and Germany and their impact on the peasantry of France during the Hundred Years War as detailed by other authors, I was surprised that Cantor almost dismisses it as just another war in an almost continuous state of war during the Middle Ages. Like too many good books on history, this one could use some maps and some tables summarizing developments. Overall, however, this un-professional history reader enjoyed reading this book and learned a lot from it but not always from the same viewpoint as that of the author.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding
Review: Cantor, a former student of the greatest American medievalist, Joseph Strayer (whose survey book is the best there is, but is almost impossible to find), has put together the best survey of the Middle Ages in print. If you read this book and the top ten list Cantor has in the back, you will be ready to move on to more specialized topics.
Rating: 
Summary: For a specialized audience only . . .
Review: For the most part I enjoyed the book, but I started with a strong interest in the history of the middle ages. This book absolutely does NOT read like a novel as other reviewers state. "Stong narrative flow" according to one of the editorial reviews? Pullease! If so, I'd hate to read a book with a weak narrative flow. If you aren't already interested in the middle ages, this book is not for you. It is not a good survey or introduction, as other reviewers state. It focuses deeply and narrowly on church history - specifically the Roman Catholic church. It is extremely western-european centric. My goodness - the Mongols, who conquered a greater percentage of the globe than any people in history, are dismissed in 2 sentences as "the latest Asian horde" as if they were of little importance. I guess that's because they didn't conquer Western Europe? I don't mean to be overly critical, but I stress these points since I find many other reviewers to be unbalanced in their remarks in favor of the book. If you already appreciate the history of the middle ages, you will likely enjoy this book and find the author's obvious fascination with the topic and unconventional approach infectious. If not - stay away.
Rating:
Summary: For a specialized audience only . . .
Review: For the most part I enjoyed the book, but I started with a strong interest in the history of the middle ages. This book absolutely does NOT read like a novel as other reviewers state. "Stong narrative flow" according to one of the editorial reviews? Pullease! If so, I'd hate to read a book with a weak narrative flow. If you aren't already interested in the middle ages, this book is not for you. It is not a good survey or introduction, as other reviewers state. It focuses deeply and narrowly on church history - specifically the Roman Catholic church. It is extremely western-european centric. My goodness - the Mongols, who conquered a greater percentage of the globe than any people in history, are dismissed in 2 sentences as "the latest Asian horde" as if they were of little importance. I guess that's because they didn't conquer Western Europe? I don't mean to be overly critical, but I stress these points since I find many other reviewers to be unbalanced in their remarks in favor of the book. If you already appreciate the history of the middle ages, you will likely enjoy this book and find the author's obvious fascination with the topic and unconventional approach infectious. If not - stay away.
Rating:
Summary: I would have loved to hear the cassette, but......
Review: GEEEEZZZZ, WHAT A PRICE, as are all the cassettes.
| 
