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Source link: http://archive.mises.org/17519/will-durant-and-the-river-of-history/

Will Durant and the River of History

July 3, 2011 by

Cross-posted at the Mises Academy Blog.

Many people have come to be Mises Academy students through discovering and coming to love the works of Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard.  It is easy to acquire, from reading the classically educated Mises and the consummate scholar Rothbard, a passion for erudition and western civilization in general.  Modern-day schooling and writing are both starved of this spirit.  One can scarcely find it in present-day classrooms or bookstores.  But if you know where to look, you can find it in certain corners of the internet.  In one corner, on the Internet Archive web site, you can find, free of charge, the complete 11-volume series, The Story of Civilization, by Will Durant, in audiobook, PDF, and ePub ebook format (see links below).  Since discovering this series a few months ago, Durant has become by far my favorite historian.  I simply can’t put the Story of Civilization down (in a figurative sense, since I’m reading it by listening to the audiobook). Since January, I’ve already read the first 5 thick tomes of the series, and I am well into the 6th.

The most evident among its charms is how Will Durant’s encyclopedic erudition and insightful brilliance are communicated through a masterful and elegant style, shot through with delightfully quotable epigrams.  Durant’s writing even earned generous praise from one of the 20th century’s best stylists, Rothbard’s favorite wordsmith, H.L. Mencken:

I have just finished Caesar and Christ. What a book! It is not only the best thing you have ever done yourself; it is the best piece of historical synthesis ever done by an American. I can imagine no improvement in it. It is clearly and beautifully written, and it shows a hard common sense in every line. I have never read any book which left me better contented.

Yet the most lovable thing about Durant as a historian is his earnest humaneness.  In the preface to the first volume of The Story of Civilization, Durant discusses his initial ambitions for the project.

“I have tried in this book to accomplish the first part of a pleasant assignment which I rashly laid upon myself some twenty years ago: to write a history of civilization. I wish to tell as much as I can, in as little space as I can, of the contributions that genius and labor have made to the cultural heritage of mankind-to chronicle and contemplate, in their causes, character and effects, the advances of invention, the varieties of economic organization, the experiments in government, the aspirations of religion, the mutations of morals and manners, the masterpieces of literature, the development of science, the wisdom of philosophy, and the achievements of art.”

What is refreshing in Durant’s plans for his series, is that chronicling violence is only one part of many (the “experiments in government”).  In too much of historical scholarship, the domestic and foreign doings of states have played an outsized role in the tale, to such an extent that Voltaire characterized history as “nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes”.

Durant consciously sought to avoid this tendency.  He wrote:

“The history of civilization is a river on whose waters soldiers and politicians are fighting and shedding ballots and blood; but on the banks of the river, people are raising children, building homes, making scientific inventions, puzzling about the universe, writing music and literature.”

As a historian, Durant tried to give overdue attention to the “riverbank people”, these Atlases whose productivity and genius have ever borne the weight and parasitism of the political class.  This distinctly libertarian endeavor is one of the innumerable charms of the writings of this (non-libertarian) author.

I cannot think of a more artfully crafted introduction to the full scope and sweep of history than Will Durant’s The Story of Civilization, which is available, in full and free of charge, from the Internet Archive:

{ 17 comments }

B.K. Marcus July 4, 2011 at 5:50 am

I very much appreciate the recommendation, Danny. Downloading part 1 now.

Eric Parks July 4, 2011 at 7:31 am

Thanks! I can’t believe it’s available for free and on audio!

I heard that wonderful river quote mentioned in a Ralph Raico lecture and had been trying to find it. Thanks again!

Paul Vahur July 5, 2011 at 8:45 am

Danny, how can these audiobooks be downloaded to iTunes?

Danny Sanchez July 5, 2011 at 8:53 am

Hi Paul, The best way is to create a new iTunes playlist for them. Then download all the files into a folder on your hard drive. Then drag and drop the files onto the playlist to import them.

Paul Vahur July 5, 2011 at 6:15 pm

Podcasts in iTunes are so much more convenient than playlist. I guess I need to setup my own podcast for these books.

MB July 5, 2011 at 10:21 am

You left out his “Story of Philosophy”, which is also at that site.

Danny Sanchez July 10, 2011 at 9:31 pm

Yes, Story of Philosophy is fantastic. Durant particularly shines when he summarizes philosophical doctrines. That was the book that first made his name (as well as first put Simon and Schuster on the map), and which led to his writing The Story of Civilization.

Stephen MacLean July 5, 2011 at 1:31 pm

Many thanks for sharing these Durant links; I’ve often referred to Archive.org for ‘historical’ texts—i.e., out of copyright protection—but had never considered looking for Durant’s opus. I recommend anyone interested in the classics to type in either author or title and see what comes up. This is a true on-line archive of treasures!

MB July 5, 2011 at 2:22 pm

I remember for years, some book club always included a hardback set of this series to those who joined (as one of 2-3 choices for doing so).

byafi July 15, 2011 at 7:20 am

That was the Book-of-the-Month Club, and it’s where I got my copy. Until recently, though, I never knew anyone who had read the entire set. This looks like a much better way to go.

Paul Vahur July 7, 2011 at 5:00 am

Here you go, subscribe to podcast of Volume 1: Our Oriental Heritage by copying address below to
iTunes>Advanced>Subscribe to Podcast…

Podcast feed address: http://vahur.com/tsoc1.xml

The feed file is nothing more than instructions for iTunes (and other feed eaters) of how to label and from where to download the files. The files are still at archive.org. I will do the other audiobooks as podcasts too but it will take while. As the first one is about 36 hours I guess I have a good head start ;-) . Enjoy!

P.S. It could be that your iTunes will not start downloading the files. In that case Unsubscribe and Subscribe to the feed (without deleting it) or if that does not work delete the feed and start over.

Danny Sanchez July 10, 2011 at 9:29 pm

Thanks Paul! iTunes podcasts are indeed better in a couple ways. On the iPod you have a little 30-second jump-back tool that you don’t have with non-podcasts. And both the iPod and iTunes remembers where you left off with podcasts (and with audiobooks) but not with regular audio files. The only downside to podcasts is that I can’t figure out how to get multiple episodes to play continuously in iTunes.

I eagerly look forward to more Durant podcast conversions!

Paul Vahur July 21, 2011 at 6:00 pm

Ok, got them done and tested. Here are the podcasts:

http://vahur.com/tsoc1.xml
tsoc2.xml
tsoc3.xml
tsoc4.xml
tsoc5.xml
tsoc6.xml
tsoc7.xml
tsoc8.xml
tsoc9.xml
tsoc10.xml
tsoc11.xml

I plan to leave the files there but I can’t guarantee that they stay there forever or that the site will be available. If anyone wants to host the files themselves, they are welcome. The name of the files and their location is not important. Contact me through my website.

Paul Vahur July 21, 2011 at 6:02 pm

I tried to post it with 10 links but these posts never went through, so I edited the post to make only 1 link. I hope everyone understands that he/she/it needs to replace the file name in the link.

Danny Sanchez July 22, 2011 at 7:21 am

Awesome, works like a charm. Thanks so much.

Aaron Spurling November 4, 2011 at 6:38 pm

The files seem no longer to be available on the Internet Archive. Does anyone know what happened to them and where else one could get them?

Stephen MacLean December 5, 2011 at 7:23 am

Perhaps, if copyright issues can be resolved, the Mises Institute could host these PDFs on its website?

I am writing a monograph looking at the similarities between the fall of Rome and the current economic meltdown—disregard for sound money and fostering a clientele state—and went looking for Durant’s Caesar and Christ for his perspective on Rome’s demise and poof! No Durant to be found. :(

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