In the Wake of the Plague
The Black Death and the World It Made

In the Wake of the Plague: The Black Death and the World It Made by Norman F. Cantor is a lecture-type book filled with some interesting facts and amusing side stories; it is easy to read at only 220 pages long and does not have a single footnote. While it might not be the in-depth analysis that med......more

Cantor took a fascinating subject and basically threw away all the options he had to be interesting and craft a narrative with impact. His writing is basically what you'd expect from an academic (i.e., NOT a writer) trying to write for the popular market - he tries to engage the reader with stories......more

Interesting how much this book parallels what's happening today - which I am now convinced is not unique, but has happened numerous times over hundreds of years. The decrease in workers as a result of a pandemic gives them room to renegotiate their conditions and pay. History could be seen as a seri......more

Well written and absorbing. This book offered me a lot of insights into not just what the plague did to Europe, but how it changed social structure, especially in regard to the role of wealthy women. Recommended highly.......more

Norman Cantor’s slim little volume the Black Death is a great example of how to write a popular history. His main goal is to tell us, in broad strokes, what he thinks. He’s the well known professor out on the lecture circuit, not the Ph.D. candidate defending his thesis. There’s not a footnote in si......more