History

History is one of my favorite subjects - most of all I like history from more modern times, when more details are available. I am always interested in reading true stories and getting to know a historical period from the point of view of ordinary people. The further I go back in time, the less stories and details I can find. But I am also like to find out about ancient inventions (ones that we use even now or ones that were discovered ahead of their time). It's really amazing to find out that the Colosseum was built using concrete and that it could be filled with water for plays that included sea battles and that the emergency exits were so well planned that all the people could leave within a few minutes. It's this kind of information that interests me most when there are no stories available.

Most of the time I focused on Czech history and also on the history of countries that I had visited. I relied a lot on books (we have a really big library in a close town and we also have a lot of books at home). My parents bought me two books (one about WWII and one about Czech history). Both books are very big and heavy and they contain all sorts of details and information. The history is written in the form of newspaper articles, so it is clearly arranged.

I also listened to radio programmes a lot - there are two very good ones about history in our country. One is called Rambles through Czech history and already has about 900 parts (each part is an hour long). The second one is called Stories of the 20th century and consists of testimonies of people who witnessed historical events in the 20th century. That one is also very interesting.

I found something about Swedish, English, Russian etc. history. For example I was interested in Raoul Wallenberg (a swedish diplomat who saved tens of thousands of Jews). He is not well known in our country and maybe he isn't really famous anywhere because he disappeared at the end of the Second World War and was never heard of again. There were rumors that he was held captive in the Soviet Union but nobody knows anything for sure.

I have read plenty of historical books - true stories and also historical fiction, where the settings are accurate.

Another historical period I was interested in was the Wild West period in America. I enjoyed learning the true story behing all the romantic, adventurous books about cowboys and Indians and settlers.

Two of my favorite books - the first one is about Czech history, the second one is about The Second World War: