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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Guest&nbsp; 85555" data-source="post: 8421959">I loved reading the Decline and Fall. Like you say it is outdated and you would want to read something more up to date for some of the specific facts, but it is an important book and one that shaped how history is done. It is worth reading for the prose, the wit, but also to see something that contributed to the discipline of history. When I was a history student it was assigned for one of our classes (and I accidentally read the whole thing because I didn't know we were supposed to read the condensed version---which turned out to be a good mistake because I think reading the whole thing really made a difference for my appreciation of it). When you take historiography* it is one of several key books that come up as significant. Again it isn't current scholarship, and his thesis about why the empire fell isn't widely accepted (but grand theories like generally aren't embraced anymore). It is still considered a classic history book . It has been a long time since I was a student, but I recall one of the big reasons we discussed him in the historiography course was the importance he placed on primary sources. Definitely if you read it, read about its place in historiography and read about what it gets wrong, because it was published around the time of the revolution. With any older history book, you want to understand its context and importance (you do read something like decline and fall differently than you would say a modern history book written on the decline and fall---though even those all belong to a particular school of thought usually, and should still be read critically). *historiography is just the study of history, its history and methods---for example if you read a historiography of middle eastern history it would likely be a book that covers all the important history papers and books about the middle east and describe how approaches and interpretations have changed over the years). I you read a general historiography book or took a general course, you would get an overview of the history of history as a discipline, examine key works, and read about all the different schools of thought. I am sure lots of people know this but I didn't want to just throw a bit of jargon in without explaining it</blockquote>

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