Davis, James C. 1931-
(James Cushman Davis)-

PERSONAL:

Born April 7, 1931, in Orange, NJ.

ADDRESSES:

Agent—c/o Author Mail, HarperCollins Publishing, 10 E. 53rd St., New York, NY 10022.

CAREER:

Historian, educator, and writer. University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, 1960-c. 1994, became professor of history, 1977. Former Fulbright professor at the University of Perugia.

WRITINGS:

The Decline of the Venetian Nobility as a Ruling Class, Johns Hopkins Press (Baltimore, MD), 1962.

(Editor) Pursuit of Power: Venetian Ambassadors' Reports on Spain, Turkey, and France in the Age of Philip II, 1560-1600, Harper & Row (New York, NY), 1970.

A Venetian Family and Its Fortune, 1500-1900: The Dona and the Conservation of Their Wealth, American Philosophical Society (Philadelphia, PA), 1975.

Rise from Want: A Peasant Family in the Machine Age, University of Pennsylvania Press (Philadelphia, PA), 1986.

The Human Story: Our History, from the Stone Age to Today, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2004.

SIDELIGHTS:

Historian James C. Davis has written several history books focusing on Venice, the formation of European nations, and the lives of the underclass and blue-collar workers. In The Human Story: Our History, from the Stone Age to Today, the author provides a comprehensive but condensed history of the human civilization, with a primary focus on Western civilization. In the course of his history, James discusses a wide range of topics, including religions and disease, modern inventions such as the computer, and groundbreaking scientific advances such as the discovery of DNA. Writing in Booklist, Gilbert Taylor called Davis "a reliable pathfinder to the central facts and narrative of unfamiliar terrain." In a review in the Library Journal, Robert J. Andrews wrote that the author "has performed a small miracle by writing a history of humanity in … [under] 500 pages." A Publishers Weekly contributor commented: "It is refreshing to have a treatment of human life at once learned and optimistic."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, June 1, 2004, Gilbert Taylor, review of The Human Story: Our History, from the Stone Age to Today, p. 1689.

Library Journal, September 15, 2004, Robert J. Andrews, review of The Human Story, p. 67.

Publishers Weekly, May 10, 2004, review of The Human Story, p. 45.