Volume XI covers a period of contrasts in European and World history, of material expansion and economic depression, of improved conditions and widespread poverty and degradation, a period of armed peace. The text of the volume, first published in 1962, is reprinted unchanged.

‘… a very, very distinguished book which - unlike so many others of its class - does not merely sum up, but also leads on. … the intelligent reader will find in it a vigorous and stimulating introduction to a period in which so much that affects our own generation was stirring into life.'

Geoffrey Barraclough Source: The Spectator

‘… a well-ordered, balanced, scholarly, provocative and, above all, useful book … deserves the highest praise as a worthy continuation of a great tradition. For so crammed an era it is hard to imagine a better guide in this compass.'

Source: The Times Literary Supplement