Michael Wood

Michael Wood is this British historian who had made the two fantastic documentaries that I got to watch through PBS - In the footsteps of Alexander The Great and Conquistadores. It combines history with travel. Essentially he follows the route of Iskander and also Pizarro giving you historical information and anecdotes. Wonderfully done and his enthusiasm is infectious. I would say he is the equivalent of David Attenborough for history. Recently I read two books written by him. I was looking for some good book on English history and I landed upon Domesday: A search for the Roots of England written by him. Domesday was written circa 1050 AD under the instruction of William the Conqueror. It was essentially a record of all tax payers during that time and the record contains their wealth as well as a wealth of information when researched by Wood. Through that record he has speculated the life of ordinary people in England as well the structure of society. He goes back to Iron Age, Roman Empire, Viking Invasions, Normans and finally Anglo Saxons. Interesting read.

The second book I read by Michael Wood was Smile of Murugan. It is a kind of travelogue in Tamil Nadu with glimpses of history. For long I have been desperately looking for a readable history of Tamil Nadu and other south Indian states. The south, I feel, gets a step motherly treatment amongst all historians either Indian or otherwise. I can't imagine how terrible it must be for the north east. I have not seen any treatment at all (motherly or step motherly) of say Assam or Manipur in our history texts. Anyway, I think Smile... is a very sympathetic view of the Tamil culture (sometimes too sympathetic) but is well written except for a few glaring editorial glitches (IIT is refered to as ITT and Kamban sometimes as Kampan and sometimes as Kamban). Nevertheless it is a very charming rendition of Tamil Nadu, its temples and its peoples. Some of the less known temples mentioned in the book seems worth visiting. I am including that in my plans for late January/early February.