Nicholas Popper – författare

Imprisoned in the Tower of London after the death of Queen Elizabeth in 1603, Sir Walter Ralegh spent seven years producing his massive History of the World. Created with the aid of a library of more than five hundred books that he was allowed to keep in his quarters, this incredible work of English vernacular would become a best seller, with nearly twenty editions, abridgments, and continuations issued in the years that followed. Nicholas Popper uses Ralegh's History as a touchstone in this lively exploration of the culture of history writing and historical thinking in the late Renaissance. From Popper we learn why early modern Europeans ascribed heightened value to the study of the past and how scholars and statesmen began to see historical expertise as not just a foundation for political practice and theory, but as a means of advancing their power in the courts and councils of contemporary Europe. The rise of historical scholarship during this period encouraged the circulation of its methods to other disciplines, transforming Europe's intellectual-and political-regimes.More than a mere study of Ralegh's History of the World, Popper's book reveals how the methods that historians devised to illuminate the past structured the dynamics of early modernity in Europe and England.

Imprisoned in the Tower of London after the death of Queen Elizabeth in 1603, Sir Walter Ralegh spent the next seven years producing his massive "History of the World". Created with the aid of a library of more than five hundred books he was allowed to keep in his quarters, this incredible work of English vernacular would become a best-seller, with nearly twenty editions, abridgments, and continuations issued in the years that followed. Nicholas Popper uses Ralegh's History as a touchstone in this lively exploration of the culture of history writing and historical thinking in the late Renaissance. From Popper we learn why early modern Europeans ascribed heightened value to the study of the past and how scholars and statesmen began to see historical expertise as not just a foundation for political practice and theory, but a means of advancing their power in the courts and councils of contemporary Europe. The rise of historical scholarship during this period encouraged the circulation of its methods to other disciplines, transforming Europe's intellectual - and political - regimes.More than a mere study of Ralegh's book, Popper's book reveals how the methods historians devised to illuminate the past structured the dynamics of early modernity in Europe and England.

An exploration of the proliferation of paper in early modern Britain and its far-reaching effects on politics and society.  We are used to thinking of ourselves as living in a time when more information is more available than ever before. In The Specter of the Archive, Nicholas Popper shows that earlier eras had to grapple with the same problem—how to deal with too much information at their fingertips.  He reveals that early modern Britain was a society newly drowning in paper, a light and durable technology whose spread allowed statesmen to record drafts, memoranda, and other ephemera that might otherwise have been lost, and also made it possible for ordinary people to collect political texts. As original paperwork and copies alike flooded the government, information management became the core of politics. Focusing on two of the primary political archives of early modern England, the Tower of London Record Office and the State Paper Office, Popper traces the circulation of their materials through the government and the broader public sphere. In this early media-saturated society, we find the origins of many issues we face today: Who shapes the archive? Can we trust the pictures of the past and the present that it shows us? And, in a more politically urgent vein: Does a huge volume of widely available information (not all of it accurate) risk contributing to polarization and extremism?

An exploration of the proliferation of paper in early modern Britain and its far-reaching effects on politics and society.  We are used to thinking of ourselves as living in a time when more information is more available than ever before. In The Specter of the Archive, Nicholas Popper shows that earlier eras had to grapple with the same problem—how to deal with too much information at their fingertips.  He reveals that early modern Britain was a society newly drowning in paper, a light and durable technology whose spread allowed statesmen to record drafts, memoranda, and other ephemera that might otherwise have been lost, and also made it possible for ordinary people to collect political texts. As original paperwork and copies alike flooded the government, information management became the core of politics. Focusing on two of the primary political archives of early modern England, the Tower of London Record Office and the State Paper Office, Popper traces the circulation of their materials through the government and the broader public sphere. In this early media-saturated society, we find the origins of many issues we face today: Who shapes the archive? Can we trust the pictures of the past and the present that it shows us? And, in a more politically urgent vein: Does a huge volume of widely available information (not all of it accurate) risk contributing to polarization and extremism?

An illuminating exploration of the new frontiers—and unsettled geographical, temporal, and thematic borders—of early modern European history.The study of early modern Europe has long been the source of some of the most creative and influential movements in historical scholarship. New Horizons for Early Modern European Scholarship explores recent developments in historiography both to exhibit the field's continuing vibrancy and to highlight emerging challenges to long-assumed truths. Essays examine • how key ideas and intellectual practices arose, circulated through scholarly culture, and gave way to subsequent forms • Europe's transforming relationship with Asia, the Americas, Africa, and the rest of the world• how overlooked evidence illuminates vital but obscured people, practices, and objects • connections between disciplines, types of sources, time periods, and placesOpening up emerging possibilities, this book demonstrates that early modern European scholarship remains a source for groundbreaking historical insights and methodologies that would benefit the study of any time and place. Contributors: Alexander Bevilacqua, Ann Blair, Daniela Bleichmar, William J. Bulman, Frederic Clark, Anthony Grafton, Jill Kraye, Yuen-Gen Liang, Elizabeth McCahill, Nicholas Popper, Amanda Wunder

The long conflict that culminated in the American Revolution and the founding of the U.S. Republic upended the lives of men and women throughout the colonies. In a time of upheaval and uncertainty, they reinvented their lives, their communities, and their vision of the world. Drawing from the pathbreaking scholarship published by the Omohundro Institute over the past fifty years, these essays reflect on the experiences and legacies of the struggle for American independence, from the first inklings of the imperial crisis through the war’s global aftershocks. Contributors include David Armitage, Christopher Leslie Brown, Katherine Carté, Eliga H. Gould, Woody Holton, Rhys Isaac, Michael J. Jarvis, Maya Jasanoff, Linda K. Kerber, Cynthia Kierner, Michael A. McDonnell, Johann N. Neem, Mary Beth Norton, Robert G. Parkinson, Benjamin Quarles, John A. Ruddiman, Manisha Sinha, and Alfred F. Young.