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Century: One Hundred Years of Human Progress, Regression, Suffering and Hope, 1899-1999. Small Edition | 
 enlarge | Author: Bruce Bernard
Publisher: Phaidon Press Ltd
Category: Book
List Price: £9.95
Buy New: £0.98
You Save: £8.97 (90%)
New (36) Used (24) from £0.02
Rating:  25 reviews
Sales Rank: 21746
Media: Hardcover
Edition: New Ed
Pages: 1236
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.3
Dimensions (in): 5.1 x 4.9 x 2.7
ISBN: 0714842796
Dewey Decimal Number: 909.820222
EAN: 9780714842790
ASIN: 0714842796
Publication Date: September 30, 2002
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: HARDBACK - Excellent condition . Appears to be UNUSED and UNREAD. Fresh, tight, sharp pages, with no creasing, etc., and virtually no signs of handling.
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Amazon.co.uk Review
The 20th century has, more than any other period in history, forced those who lived through it to become brutally aware of their times. The huge impact of photography, with its permutations and manipulations, has created incredible images of human hope and suffering. Inured as we are to the sights of our age, anyone who leafs through the astonishing chronicle that is Bruce Bernard's Century cannot fail to be impressed and moved by this vast visual document of the last 100 years. Weighing 6kg and containing 1,100 black-and-white and colour photographs, Bernard's 30 years' experience as a picture editor with the Sunday Times Magazine have resulted in this significant document of human history. Divided into six sections--"1899-1914 High Hopes and Recklessness"; "1914-33 Self-Inflicted Wounds Remain Infected"; "1933-45 Rise and Fall of the Unspeakable";"1945-65 Atomic Truce Walks a Tightrope"; "1965-85 Vietnam to the Moon to Soviet Collapse" and "1986-99 Chaos and Hope on a Burdened Planet"--with accompanying text and quotations, Century displays an average of 10 images for each year, from the banal to the brilliant. And so in 1921 we can witness Claude Monet overseeing his glorious water-lily gardens next to an image of starving children in the Russian famine that followed the end of World War I; the young Princess Elizabeth walking her corgi in London's Hyde Park in 1934 while the facing page shows the moment of King Alexander I's assassination in Marseilles. American GIs laugh with girls on a German beach in 1946, a couple of pages on from the recently revealed horrors of the concentration camp at Auschwitz. Three decades later, and 1977 brings us the Sex Pistols in concert at the advent of punk rock, while anti-apartheid leader Steve Biko lies murdered by police in his South African cell. By turns harrowing and humorous, Century is a magnificent photographic testament to 100 years of human advancement, futility, acts of heroism and episodes of unspeakable cruelty. Ending on a note of hope with a still from a 1999 German production of Beethoven's opera Fidelio,a triumph of goodness over evil, it is hard to erase the preceding images of refugees fleeing Kosovo in the same month and the same year, history's hour of darkness come round once more. --Catherine Taylor
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| Customer Reviews: Read 20 more reviews...
 Brilliant March 16, 2008
Jl Adcock (Ashtead UK)
Century is a clever little book. If you wanted to own just one book that told the story of the 20th Century, or showed the advance of photography in the space of 100 years - this would have to be at the top of the list.
The beauty of the book lies in the fact that it steers away from those iconic, over-familiar pictures that a more orthodox complilation would come up with. Instead, images here are pretty unknown - and they are all the more powerful for that.
The accompanying text (contained in separate sections so the flow of the pictures is unbroken) - is pithy and concise, and no mere after-thought to the photos that have been selected.
All in all - this book makes you wonder about life - the harshness, cruelty and beauty of being alive in a tumultuous century of change. It will make you think long after you put it down - how many other books do that?
The small version of the book packs as much punch as the original edition (which frankly is too heavy to look at on a regular basis!) - and at under 10 is ridiculously good value for money. Simply essential.
 Amazing pictures, but not in the right sense December 18, 2006
Stuart Matthews (UK)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
I bought this book mainly from a photographic perspective. There are some truly great photographs, but I tend to agree with the person that awarded this book 1 star, on the basis that the book does take a negative/depressing stance. If Zorg from the planet krypton came across this book one might predict he'd think planet earth was all about poverty, war and depression. This would be the case if I were a manic depressive, but most people aren't. It does indeed contain some shocking pictures, but there aren't enough 'happy' ones to tip the scales more evenly. The 20th Century wasn't all doom and gloom, so lets publish a brighter, more cheerful 'Century'.
 Not your average coffee table book January 19, 2006
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
By now you'll all have read the earlier reviews and will probably have made up your minds anyway. But if there's anything more that can be added, it is to say that this book will never provide an easy afternoon of mindless page turning - it will shock, stimulate, challenge and uplift in equal measure. Sure, the pictures aren't always of great quality (or always particularly interesting), nor are they perhaps the classic images that one might already associate with the century's biggest events. But they provoke reflection and thought.I agree with other reviewers that the overall picture can appear bleak, but the occasional uplifting image should remind readers of some genuinely awe inspiring events in recent history and the individuals who helped to shape where we are now. Another reviewer mentioned keeping this book in their family for generations - I couldn't agree more. And the bleaker images are a reminder of what we can't afford to forget..."Those who do not learn from history...(etc)" My only criticism is with the captions. There is clearly an agenda behind the overall commentary, with some questionable descriptors cropping up every now and then. But read beyond this and immerse yourself....And if you're looking for an ideal gift, buy this for someone you know, not as an easy purchase - pretty pictures - coffee table book.
What an amazing book July 21, 2003
Richard T. Martin (Bristol UK)
This book is breath taking it has it all, you can look at it for hour and hours. True some images are hard-hitting and perhaps gruesome but that was the last century. I feel it is a clear reflection of the world warts and all.
PS You don't get the full affect from the pocket-sized version.
A EXCELLENT BOOK...FOR EVERYONE May 29, 2003
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Although some feel this book is to heavy (eg above) it is a full review of the Century. Sure the century we lived through has not been all 'rosey', and this shows it, but it does also show hope and honour of some. Sadly the century has not been all loving and the sooner people like rachel turn o ntheir TV's and read the papers, the sooner we can all realise the horrors of history and hope to stop it happening again, because blindness and ignornace of it, lets it breed more.ANYWAY AN EXCELLENT BOOK 5/5 ALL DAY LONG!!!
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