Around the World in Eighty Days is a fantastic journey by an Englishman and his manservant in 1873. The story is a comedy filled with exotic locations, cultures, and suspense along the way. Phileas Fogg, an Englishman, with his French manservant, Passepartout, create an unusual pairing with their distinct cultural backgrounds. The journey challenges both Phileas Fogg and Passepartout in many ways, but both men come out as winners in the end. Fogg and Passepartout journey around the world to win a simple wager, but they leave an incredible story about loyalty and friendship in their wake.

It is one of the most important dates in the history of the Western world: 1066, the year William the Conqueror defeated the English at the Battle of Hastings and changed England and the English forever. Yet the events leading to-and following-this turning point in history are shrouded in mystery and distorted by the biased accounts written by a subjugated people, and many believe it was the English who ultimately won, since the Normans became assimilated into the English way of life. Drawing on a wealth of contemporary sources, David Howarth gives us memorable portraits of the leading characters and their motivations. At the same time he enables us to see the events of that year from the viewpoint of common Englishmen, and along the way we learn how they lived, worked, fought, and died-and how they perceived from their isolated shires the overthrow of their world.

When Norwegian Vikings first raided the European coast in the 8th century AD, their leaders were from the middle ranks of warriors known as hersirs. At this time the hersir was typically an independent landowner or local chieftain with equipment superior to that of his followers. By the end of the 10th century, the independence of the hersir was gone, and he was now a regional servant of the Norwegian king. This book investigates these brutal, mobile warriors, and examines their tactics and psychology in war, dispelling the idea of the Viking raider as simply a killing machine.

There is an extraordinary but largely unnoticed phenomenon in higher education: by and large, students persevere and complete their studies. How should we interpret this tendency? Students are living in uncertain times and often experience anxiety, and yet they continue to press forward with their studies. The argument here is that we should understand this propensity on the part of students to persist through a will to learn. This book examines the structure of what it is to have a will to learn. Here, a language of being, becoming, authenticity, dispositions, voice, air, spirit, inspiration and care is drawn on.As such, this book offers an idea of student development that challenges the dominant views of our age, of curricula understood largely in terms of skill or even of knowledge, and pedagogy understood as bringing off pre-specified 'outcomes'. The will to learn, though, can be fragile. This is of crucial importance, for if the will to learn dissolves, the student's commitment may falter. Accordingly, more than encouraging an interest in the student's subject or in the acquiring of skills, the primary responsibility of teachers in higher education is to sustain and develop the student's will to learn. This is a radical thesis, for it implies a transformation in how we understand the nature of teaching in higher education.