1000 Years of Annoying the French

Stephen Clarke’s hilarious and enlightening history of the love-hate relationship between Britain and France Things have been just a little awkward between Britain and France ever since the Norman invasion in 1066. Over the subsequent thousand years of wars, treaties, and cultural rivalries, the strange relationship between these nations ranged from contentious to comic. From the Hundred Years’ War and Joan of Arc, to the American Revolution and the Louisiana Purchase, to the ascendance of Napoleon Bonaparte and dawning of the Victorian era, Clarke examines with insight and humor the misfortunes and missteps that marked British and French—and sometimes American—relations through the centuries. Fast-paced and endlessly entertaining, 1,000 Years of Annoying the French is a riveting history of western Europe’s oddest couple.