daily-life-detail books

[pico_the_great]

Little Details, I have a question that may or may not fit here. (If it doesn't, mods: please tell me!)

I have found what looks like an excellent book: China's Golden Age: Everyday Life in the Tang Dynasty. This book is, essentially, a book of Little Details - it's got information about every tiny aspect of society, and answers all the sorts of

Comments

[doriscrockford2]

I don't know of anything non-Western (sorry!) but some I've used for Victorian Britain (on the off-chance you or someone else is interested) are:

What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew by Daniel Pool
The Writer's Guide to Life in Regency and Victorian England from 1811-1901 by Kristine Hughes
Daily Life in Victorian England by Sally Mitchell
Enquire Within Upon Everything 1890 (facsimile reproduction by Old House Books)

Another good detail type of book (but perhaps not exactly what you're looking for) are the Mammoth Book of How It Happened series. They cover all types of history and consist of collections of first person accounts of those events. I have and enjoy the Ancient Egypt and Ancient Rome ones.

[bookblather]

I'd be careful with the first one, because they don't always specify whether they're talking about life in the Regency or life in the Victorian era and they are very different modes of being. Still, if you're using it in concert with other sources then it's a good idea.

[burning_night]

The only book I've ever heard of like this is The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England by Ian Mortimer (here on Amazon). Your book sounds great, though; you may just have tempted me to read it! :D

[cat_mcdougall]

This is a Good Reads link, but all/most can be found on Amazon: What life was like books They're Time/Life books and are awesome resources.

[fabulousfrock]

I am also a total sucker for books like this and I collect them whenever I come across them, even if I have no plans to write about the period in question. I'll definitely be adding the one you mentioned to my wishlist! It is very hard to find non-western ones

[bookblather]

Seconding Inside the Victorian Home and everything Liza Picard ever wrote. I came here specifically to recommend them.

[laurose8]

Someone put recc'ed your book with Everyday Life in Imperial China During the Han Period by Michael Lowe.

An earlier version of it was part of a series of Everyday Life in... (published by Dorset) which I admire. It's rather old, and some of them are written on a rather simple level, but worth looking at.

There's also two old children's series, which adults shouldn't scorn. Carousel published Everyday Life..., too. And Peter and AH Quennell wrote on the history of everday life, though that was British history only.

I also strongly recommend van Gulik's Judge Dee series.