Dimensions
162 x 242 x 43mm
The modern world was made in an unruly age of tremendous possibility. And this is the story - an epic of sweat and science, full of bloody-minded, brilliant and heroic characters.
It is about men, animals and machines, about the seafarers, engineers, inventors and trailblazers who built the sinews of transport and communication that enabled the British to hold together an empire across vast oceans, deserts, mountains and forests. It was a wonder of technique, logistics and nerve.
Trevor Fishlock puts the reader before the mast, on the dusty road, on the sledge, in the howdah and aboard the clanking steamer.
Here are the men of the Arctic ice, the desert fire, the jungles and the seas. Here are the engineers who bridge the chasms, build the roads and railways, fashion the machines, lay the cable and string the telegraph wires. Here, too, are the doctors groping for answers to terrible diseases, surveyors and cartographers slowly making sense and shape of the world, the unsung armies of labourers, and the artists and photographers who bring the stories home.
This book celebrates courage, energy, innovation, resourcefulness and grand ideas. It wonders at the imperatives, beliefs and sheer confidence that powered extraordinary achievements. It looks at the legacy and reflects on the astonishing adventure of it all.
