Another short history that fails to deliver

A little bit of background📃

I am a Europhile at heart and at this point in my life, I appreciate that I have the time to read voraciously and return to my love of history. I am interested in the people who came before me, how our world has evolved, and how languages, religions, nationalities and cultures came to be. I am still looking for that elusive book that provides me with a proper understanding of Europe's history. Is there such a thing? A short history of Europe: From Pericles to Putin definitely isn't the book I seek. Read on to find out why.

A short history of Europe: From Pericles to Putin | Published November 2018 | Read August 2026

The author✏️

Sir Simon Jenkins (born 1943) is a British author, newspaper columnist and former editor of the Evening Standard and The Times. He has also been chairman of the National Trust and English Heritage. Sir Simon read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Cambridge University. He has written several books on the politics, history and architecture of England. Simon became Sir Simon in 2004, knighted for his services to journalism.

The subject matterℹ️

As expected from the book's title, A short history of Europe is a short history of Europe. Sir Simon condenses the history of a huge and important part of the world into 305 pages. There are 23 chapters and an epilogue, beginning in 2500 BCE and ending with the fall of the Iron Curtain. Jenkins makes his stance clear in the Introduction, that he is taking a great-men-of-history approach to keep the book short, and you have to give him props for owning that stance. The book sets out what Jenkins has chosen as the headlines of main events in European history, relying on people, politics and battles to tell the story. Further to that, Jenkins situates his history in Western Europe, not only placing the continent's history in one part of it but also omitting to explore Europe's history in the context of the world.

My thoughts on the book💭

I am still yearning for a better understanding of how Europe evolved and how one giant landmass ended up with such a rich diversity of cultures, languages, and architecture. A short history of Europe is very much a conversative (dare I say, old white man) approach that takes a narrow view of history, reporting facts without analysis, without heart, and without any sense of social, economic or cultural conditions and how they changed and developed over time. I saw one Goodreads reviewer write that the book suffers from "list-of-battle-and-treaty-itis" and I completely agree. Other reviewers have claimed that Jenkins has a lot of his facts wrong. I might go back to the book at some stage and check everything, comparing the book's explanation with other sources. That might actually help me learn something!

My key learnings🪴

If you read A short history of Europe and absolutely nothing else about the history of the continent, you'd come away thinking it is all about wars and shifts of power and important men (very few women). You'd also think that Europe only exists in Germany, France and Russia, and...England, and that the continent developed in a vacuum. I powered through to the end of the book but it hasn't left a lasting impression on me. I need to go back and make notes! The lack of analysis and exploration of how cultures and languages came to be, later forming nation states, makes it hard to write about my learnings. I felt quite exhausted at the end of my reading journey from battling through all the battles and treaties. That's what I learnt! That European history is all about war and conflict and power and land grabs. And treaties that don't seem to do much to bring about peace.

In sum📝

My three-star rating is generous. In workshopping this generosity in my head, I suspect it's because I purchased the book without reading any reviews first and now it sits in my library. I feel some sort of weird loyalty to it as a reference point. Sadly, though, A short history of Europe is merely a bunch of events strung together, almost devoid of analysis and no sense of cause and effect. I may have to give up hope that a single volume can give me what I am seeking. Where are the historians who look beyond dates, names and facts?

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐