Victorian Reading material

[Sinewgrab]

Alright, gentlemen. You dirty rotten scoundrels have piqued my interest. Now you have to help me - can any of you give me a good list of reading material that would be good for me to get a better grasp of the time period? I am an American, and all of our schools tend to go into the Civil War and ignore the rest of the world during that period, at least until our steel magnates took over the rest of the world with their ridiculous wealth, and in college, I specialized in medieval history and literature. So, suggestions?

[odd duck]

Well for the sf part of vsf Jules Verne is a good start especialy some of the newer translations, and for the Victorian part the Flashman novels by George Mcdonald Fraser are entertaining and historicaly accurate.Not exactly sure what you're looking for though, do you want a overview of european history in the victorian era? or just the military side?

[JollyBob]

Sherlock Holmes stories.

I honestly can't think of anything better.  

[leadfool]

Queen Victoria's Little Wars by Byron Farwell.

[answer_is_42]

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tale-Great-1871-1914-Still-Come/dp/0815603584/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232616676&sr=8-2

That. 16 Victorian era 'invasion stories', written between 1871 - 1914. France invades Britain, Germany invades Britain and Britain invades America, plus various other 'invasion' plots. Land Ironclads, airships and submersibles are much in evidence. It’s almost all you need to know about VSF in a single volume.

For further reading try H.G. Well's "The War In The Air" and "The Land Ironclads", they're very good.

[Bugsda]

Flashman, no error.

[Dr DeAth]

Flashman, no error.

I agree, the Flashman novels are superb. Plenty of historical details, lots of humour and ideas a-plenty for wargames scenarios.

If you can get hold of a copy, watch the Flashman movie which is also excellent and pretty close to the books.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Royal-Flash-REGION-1-NTSC/dp/B000MQ54MQ

[Sinewgrab]

Well for the sf part of vsf Jules Verne is a good start especialy some of the newer translations, and for the Victorian part the Flashman novels by George Mcdonald Fraser are entertaining and historicaly accurate.Not exactly sure what you're looking for though, do you want a overview of european history in the victorian era? or just the military side?

Actually, I am kind of looking for both an overview and military history - to try and grasp the era a bit better.

[terrain_sherlock]

The Professor Challenger series (3 books) by Conan Doyle (also author of Holmes..)

[Svennn]

Anything by Lee Jackson (also uses L M Jackson). Great stories meticulously researched as shown by the website

http://www.victorianlondon.org/

[Cory]

Kipling's The Man Who Would be King is a must.

[Hammers]

Alan Moore's "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" is rife with references to Victorian litterature. Get the annotations to.