‘The best memoir by a senior politician for years.’ Simon Jenkins, Sunday Times

This year marks the twentieth anniversary of one of the most momentous general elections this country has ever seen. John Major's defeat in 1997 ended a record eighteen years of Tory government, prompting accusations of failure and ignominy. A controversial leader, Major oversaw numerous crises in international and domestic policy. Between 1990 and 1997, he presided over Britain's participations in the Gulf War, the start of the Northern Ireland peace process, the Maastricht Treaty negotiations and, famously, Black Wednesday and Britain's exit from the ERM. Towards the end, Major's government was split over Europe and ridden with allegations of sleaze. Widely criticised by the media and politicians from all parties, Major went on to be crushed by Tony Blair and New Labour in the 1997 general election. An Unsuccessful Prime Minister? is the first wide-ranging appraisal of John Major's government in nearly two decades. This book reconsiders the role of John Major as Prime Minister and the policy achievements of his government. Major's government faced many more constraints and left behind a more enduring legacy than his critics allowed at the time or since.

John Major's rise to leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister was meteoric and surprising. When he became Chancellor in 1989 few voters knew his name and his replacement of Margaret Thatcher seemed even more bewildering. This book provides an overview of John Major's premiership.

Ancient China: A History surveys the East Asian Heartland Region – the geographical area that eventually became known as China – from the Neolithic period through the Bronze Age, to the early imperial era of Qin and Han, up to the threshold of the medieval period in the third century CE. For most of that long span of time there was no such place as "China"; the vast and varied territory of the Heartland Region was home to many diverse cultures that only slowly coalesced, culturally, linguistically, and politically, to form the first recognizably Chinese empires. The field of Early China Studies is being revolutionized in our time by a wealth of archaeologically recovered texts and artefacts. Major and Cook draw on this exciting new evidence and a rich harvest of contemporary scholarship to present a leading-edge account of ancient China and its antecedents. With handy pedagogical features such as maps and illustrations, as well as an extensive list of recommendations for further reading, Ancient China: A History is an important resource for undergraduate and postgraduate courses on Chinese History, and those studuing Chinese Culture and Society more generally.

John Major's rapid rise to power has left people of all political persuasions asking, "Who is the Prime Minister?". This book provides the answer. It tells the story of Major's political career as it developed, in the words of the journalists who wrote about him all the time. All the articles - from both the national and the regional press - represent the original coverage of events as they happened, viewed both from Fleet Street and from Major's Cambridgeshire constituency.;From Major's entry into Parliament in 1979 as MP for Huntingdon, through his first ministerial appointment, in the Department of Health in 1985, to his sudden elevation to the premiership in 1990, all the details are here: the facts and the figures, the campaigns and the policies, the modest successes and the blazing triumphs. Reports and features covering his early life, his political infancy as a Lambeth councillor and his initial attempts to win a parlimentary seat in the general election of 1974 are also included.;Illustrated with 60 photographs spanning the full eleven and a half years of his parliamentary career, this book is enlivened by newspaper headlines and Press Association timed newsflashes. It provides an assessment of the man whose meteoric ascent through the House of Commons has made him the nation's youngest Prime Minister since Lord Rosebery.

The former Prime Minister examines the early history of one of the great loves of his life in a book that sheds new light on the summer game’s social origins.

This book details British Major John André's negotiations with Benedict Arnold for West Point during the Revolutionary War. Instead of handling his mission with diplomacy and contrary to the orders of his mentor, General Henry Clinton, Andre crossed enemy lines and was captured carring incriminating papers. André was hanged by the Americans.