CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - Atlantic magazine named "Evening's Empire," by University of Illinois history professor Craig Koslofsky, as one of the 15 best books reviewed by the magazine or published in 2012. Benjamin Schwarz, the magazine's literary editor, assembled a top-five list for the year, followed by a list of 10 runners-up, where Koslofsky's book appeared.
Schwarz described "Evening's Empire" as an "engaging work" in which Koslofsky "mines rich and varied sources to probe with dexterous imagination a long-overlooked historical development - the transformation in nighttime activities and attitudes toward the night in 17th- and 18th-century Europe - and rightly pronounces it a cultural 'revolution.' "
The book, published in 2011, was reviewed in the April 2012 issue of the magazine.
This is not the first significant recognition for Koslofsky's work. In January it was named as the Longman-History Today Book of the Year for 2011. One criterion for the award is accessibility for the general reader of history. The book also has been reviewed or cited in The Times Literary Supplement, New York Magazine, The Guardian, and the BBC News Magazine, among others.
More about the book can be found in an August 2011 U. of I. news release.