Doubleday, 1949, $?, ISBN-, 430 pages, hardback

Constain is a novelist, and his book seems the first of 12 volumes recounting the history of Britain. It’s written in novel form--no footnotes, references, or other credits. It must have driven academics wild with frenzy, screaming with frothed mouth, shaking fists and dire denouncements of plagiarism. Or maybe they considered it one long magazine article.

In any case, Constain notes that to make history “not of dry bones and locks of hair which crumble at a touch, but of blood and muscle and flesh with a tint of life,” he concentrates on minor characters, upguns scenery descriptions, and dramatizes events surrounding kings, queens, archbishops and other major characters.

As an overview of the period 1066-1215, The Conquerors moves right along and discharges its history with a little bit of flair. It’s a great romp that has a flow and knack for moving along.

It’s one great failing is a lack of dates. All of Corstain’s hard work becomes undone because he refuses to insert a year into his prose. He covers about 150 years, and hardly a date to be found. Even the maps, which are quite good, often fail to include dates. Now, I’m all for ignoring footnotes with the repetitious Ibid, but ignoring dates in a history text? Maybe that's why I found this at a book sale for 25 cents.

I like the idea of history “light” as an introduction to a less well known era, but a lack of dates makes this a history too light. I enjoyed reading the book, but felt increasingly lost without the signposts of dates to guide the information.