Religion strong on Cundill History Prize longlist

Related Link Click HERE for the  Cundill History Prize website. 

The Cundill History Prize has revealed its 2017 longlist which explores topics ranging from economic history and Christianity to the Islamic world and Vietnam.

The $75,000 (£55,480) international prize rewards the best history writing in English. The two runners up each receive a Recognition of Excellence Award worth $10,000 (£7,400).

The jury of five, under the chair of Margaret MacMillan, has chosen 10 historians from five countries to be in the running for the prize in its 10th anniversary year.

MacMillan said: “Our longlist reflects the exciting and varied state of history today. The books on it cover subjects from Vietnam to Native American history and range in time from prehistory to the present. Their outstanding men and women authors come from around the world. It certainly wasn’t easy for our jury to whittle down over 300 entries into 10 but I am happy that we have come up with such a strong and interesting selection.”

The theme of religion features strongly on the list: in The Islamic Enlightenment: The Struggle Between Faith and Reason, 1798 to Modern Times (WW Norton), Christopher de Ballaigue challenges "what we thought we knew about the history of the Islamic world", and in the year that marks 500 years since reformation, Lyndal Roper’s Martin Luther (Bodley Head) reveals the often contradictory psychological forces that drove the man whose small act of protest turned into a battle against the power of the Church. In The Evangelicals (S&S US), the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and historian Frances FitzGerald tells the story of how the Christian evangelical movement has come to play such an influential role in the culture and politics of the USA. ...