Read and test everything
Once I got over the missing end notes and misleading fact-bending throughout, I thoroughly enjoyed this romp through Europe 500 years ago. "Tabloid History" [as one other reviewer calls it] indeed.

Christians be wary of taking offense at Manchester's many jabs. I prefer to think he is scaring us out of our demonizing tendencies. In the end, you will have a better view of the reformation than most college courses in the subject provide AND you may even wonder how the same popes that appreciated Michelangelo could get their politics and economics so badly wrong.

Read "Pillars of the Earth" for a slightly darker view and "Van Loon's Lives" for an even better take on Erasmus. However, Manchester's Luther is worth the price of the book.

The flavor of the middle ages
I was expecting a history book. I love history books. This was more of a history story, a fireside tale of history. That's ok -- I can take that. It reminds me of Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose -- about the Lewis and Clark expedition.

While *not* a comprehensive history of the Middle Ages, this was a great read. Manchester sketched the time period so clearly. And through this portrait, he brings some of the major thinkers and ideas that quickened into the Renaissance.

The book gives you context for all else you may read about the fall of Rome, the crusaders, the Moors, the scientists, and the explorers. I thought the most memorable character highlighted was Magellan.

And throughout, I considered the book very aptly titled: a world lit only by fire. What can human imagination, human passion, human determination not accomplish?

A book lit only by fame
I read this book when it first appeared, and have since carried pleasant if rather vague memories of it. Rereading it some 16 years later, I'm horrified by how bad it is in places, and wonder what in the world I saw in it the first time around.

The opening section entitled "The Medieval Mind" is especially, embarrassingly, bad. In it, Manchester reduces an entire millennium to a quick and spotty sketch (this must account in part for the vagueness of my memories) which is full of over-generalizations (the medieval world wasn't a bona fide "civilization"), simplifications ("there was no room in the medieval mind for doubt; the possibility of skepticism simply did not exist"), and absolute howlers (medieval peasants went naked in the summer; the medieval mind had no spatial and temporal awareness or self-consciousness).

Less bad--but still bad--are the succeeding two sections, both much longer than the opening one on the medieval period (this, despite the book's subtitle). One of the sections is on the Renaissance and Reformation, the other focuses on Magellan and the European "discovery" of the New World (which Manchester tells us was the germ from which the entire book grew). There are some interesting biographical vignettes in the Renaissance section that probably account for my pleasant memories--Savonarola, da Vinci, and Erasmus in particular--but there's no real effort on Manchester's part to wrestle with the meaning of the new humanism that fueled the Renaissance or to explore the intricacies of the Reform revolt against Rome. Instead, he falls back on tired stereotypes; his long account of Martin Luther is especially hackneyed. Manchester's concluding account of Magellan's voyage, with its brief nod to Renaissance astronomy and the science of navigation, is enthusiastic and lively, and is probably the best--or least bad--part of the book. But again, it's sketchy and breathless.

So what accounts for the remarkable popularity of this book? Its quality should've landed it on the out-of-print shelve long ago. My only guess is that Manchester's well-deserved fame for his contemporaneous histories (WWII, Winston Churchill, Douglas MacArthur) bestows a borrowed and undeserved aura of authority on this one. But authors (and their agents and editors) really ought to know when they're in over their heads, and refrain from writing bad copy just because they know they can get it published.

Oh Dear god
This book is really bad. It plays on every sterotype possible.

I can see why people like it because the author is a good writer. BUT, there is so much wrong with this book its absurd. I literally wanted to rip some of the pages out of this book.

A Great Read !!
In my book, "Astronomical Symbols on Ancient and Medieval Coins", I devote a number of chapters to the astronomical symbols that were depicted on medieval coinage as signs of divine right to sovereignty. As part of my research, I read numerous books on medieval history, and I found that Manchester's book, "A World Lit Only By Fire," was of great value.

In additon to many items of interest that added to my understanding of the history of this period, I found that the book was also a great read. It was hard to put down.

I recommend this book to all who are interested in reading about medieval history.

Marshall Faintich