To all the people writing bad reviews google search John Merriman and see his exhaustive research in the textbooks of European History, and then go try to get your books published. I enjoy his folksy, informed delivery. He can’t spoon feed all of European history in a hour lecture. He gives the general arc, and expects you to read the dang book for all the details. May his memory be for a blessing.

I listened to the whole thing. Some good information about the era, but clearly tainted by his biases without an attempt at providing alternative perspectives. He spends almost an entire lecture fawning over an anarchist terrorist, and constantly makes quips about how this or that member of the aristocracy was terrible or a bad person. Admits fantasizing about killing a guy who asked a question about what to do about Jews. Avoid.

What a self-absorbed professor, negligent in delivery of an expensive education. A major portion of class time lost with his rambling. Expertise is not excellence in education.

The correct word is HANGED not hung.

The material is very interesting, but the tone, cadence, and general focus of the lectures are just lacking.

Non-factual

“Um, um, umm ah ah, (insert point)” “The, the, the, um, ah, (insert point)” “And, and, and, um, Um-ah, the, (insert important date)” This series is exhausting to listen to solely based on presentation.

Just horrible. Maximilien Robespierre was the entire reason for the revolution all because the king and queen humiliated him as a child by not listening to his stupid poem. Horrible revisionist history. Forget this nonsense.

Made a history lover out of me and that's no easy task. Thank you Professor Merriman! Honored to be "attend" lectures all the way from Indiana!!

I'm a retired professor of Comaprative Literature. I'm well over 85. And I listen to this course on my daily walk. Prof. Merriman does, indeed, have some human stutters in his lecture, but this is one of the best courses I've ever heard--and I've heard very, very many. It's a privilege to listen to him, daily. He's tremendous--and as for his street cred's--just look at the bibliography of his publications. You're in good hands.

If you've read his books, you already know that John Merriman is a leading expert in European history. This is a fabulous introductory course - highly recommend.

I listened to the first 10 lectures and finally gave up. I love history, but the constant vocal tics, the leaning into the mic and shouting, the off-topic inserts (do I need to know about his French neighbor's grandfather's issues???) On the good side, Prof. Merriman's biases are clear; no one will be misled as to where he stands on anything. When he settles down and gets going on a topic, he's one of the best I've heard, but that's all too infrequent. Off to UC Berkeley for me!

This is an excellent overview course for European history in the time period stated. Not being a student of history, I learned many new things. It makes a good follow-on course to Professor Wrightson's course on early modern England, and does presume some knowledge of this topic (e.g., English revolutions). I had many favorite lectures, especially on Peter the Great, Robspierre, the Middle Classes, Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning, and many others. Professor Merriman is an engaging and interesting lecturer, and is passionate about history and showing us all why we should care about it. Having said that, his style may be somewhat an acquired taste. He talks very fast when excited, and I am very glad I did not have to take notes. He also recognizes his own faults, so at least he doesn't go off topic without coming back or apologizing for the aside. I can sympathize: there's just so much and so many stories, he can't cram it all in. Clearly, his favorite subject is France. While I did take away alot of interesting and important information about France, I would have liked to have heard more about eastern Europe and Germany. Also, the lectures are only roughly chronological, and touch on highlights and specific topics rather than detailed chrronological progression. Professor Merriman's political views do become apparent at times, and he does acknowledge this. However, it's a crucial critical thinking skill expected of college students to be able to distinguish his views from the facts, and one must take his views as just that and do one's own research. One more thing to add is that occasionally, it's useful to see the video version of the lectures because he does sometimes show slides. Unfortunately, the video version of these slides is pretty bad and only gives a general idea. Addtional online course materials with these slides would be great. All in all, this was well worth the time spent. The topic is just so big, we can't rely on one person's view of the whole. I will be looking for other similar classes to to get additional perspectives.

Merriman's a pretty good speaker, apart from a few minor tics. The class isn't bad by any means, but after listening I sort of have the same sensation I'd get from watching a survey show on The History Channel. There isn't a sense of a connected narrative in Merriman's lectures - the course has more of the feel of 24 bullet point topics from three hundred years of European history arranged in rough chronological order. And like a TV show, each episode ends, and it's on to the next grouping of anecdotes. Good for a bullet point view but sort of just skimming the surface. Perhaps the depth would be apparent if you were reading the coursework alongside the lectures.

This course gives a good overview of trends in history, and has some interesting perspectives. Unfortunately the professor's delivery gets in the way - too many 'ums' and 'uhs' and an almost comically overdone accent when pronouncing words in French and German interrup the flow. If you can get past these, it is worth listening to.

Enjoyable and informative lecture series. The only downside was that every topic seemed to relate back to France in some manner, and the over-pronunciation of French words became a little distracting.

Professor Merriman is highly knowledgeable about his subject. Unfortunately, in his last lecture he injected an obvious anti-American bias, outrageously stating that Bush and Cheney were responsible for putting America on a list of nations that use torture and that they should be brought before an international tribunal. Remark was entirely gratuitous because it was well outside the scope of the course, Europe 1648-1945. The idea that an American president be subjected to such a tribunal is beyond ridiculous when all he was doing was trying to protect the American people, quite successfully might add. He went on to quote a French friend who stated that "the magic is over" for the U .S. and that Europe no longer looks up to us. This view from a Europe that in the 20th century gave us fascism, communism, socialism, the holocaust, two world wars costing 50 million lives and unspeakable destruction. This kind of anti-American indoctrination of young people is disgusting and unconscionable. Shame on him.

This professor obviously has a dominating command of the information he is presenting, but like the other reviewers have mentioned, his "add-ins" or "catch phrases" are incredibly distracting. "Uh", "um" and his repeating certain words several times before moving on with his sentences can really slow your comprehension of his lecture. I'm not picking, but to me, his speech patterns sound rather similar to Woody Allen's, (or the Sicilian from the Princess Bride- inconcievable!). That thought actually made me enjoy the lectures even more. On the positive side, he is very obviously passionate about the material, and I can imagine if you were sitting in his class, the energy might be contagious.

This guy is ALL over the place. He can't stay on track. In addition his VERY obvious liberal bias is why so many people distrust academia.

Merriman doesn't seem to have a plan. His lecture on Napoleon is all over the place, with little sense of chronology or purpose. He is constantly referring to topics that he "will get to later". Perhaps he brings more cohesion to other subjects, but this was dissapointing.

Obviously the instructor is very intelligent and knowledgeable, but he’s in desperate need of a vocal coach. If I paid tuition for this class, I’d be extremely unhappy that the vast majority of lecture content would be “ah/um/er” or stutters. Every last word is bracketed by lengthy vocal tics and stammers that eat up most of the class time and break up the coherence of the material. I’ve worked on-air in radio, I know how hard it is to speak clearly without any vocal filler tics and usually I’m pretty forgiving of instructors. But this is a really severe case.

Thank you for providing an open door to European history. Much appreciated.

This is a great class. If you are looking for an intro class this is not for you. If you love history and enjoy listening to a great prof weave ideas and events that you would have never connected this is the class for you.

Ah, ah, ah ya know an, an an and ya know this lecture could have taken 15 minutes ah, ah if ah ya know the lecturer would ah have ya know ah just said ah ah ah what meant. There aren't many people who should read their lectures. Here is one.

My experience with Merriman's lectures has varied. Initially, I felt annoyed and found his style out of control - a sort of stream of consciousness babble that left me wondering what he just said and if my playback was at too high a speed. Yet even then I appreciated his breadth of knowledge and his obvious love of the mix and flow of history. I also appreciated his willingness to speak to universal human values and clearly condemn imperialism, elitism and other forms of oppression. Now that I am reaching the end of the series, I admit that I have grown fond of his delivery (watching the video download once helped) and the energy his exudes. I recommend that curious listeners give it a chance.

Good general history of Europe - a balance of social and political history

Mr. Merriman opens doors, windows and an entire universe of thought. I found him engaging, brilliant, rambling, evocative and interestingly emotional (not boring). He enabled me to conceptualize a society of thought no other professor has done. A real treasure and MUST HAVE to anyone remotely interested in how we ended up here. Thank you John!

Professor Merriman's anecdotes about various historical figures are great, and added to what I was already familiar with. But I cannot stand his ceaseless name-dropping of France. I am an American educated in French schools, and therefore love France as much as Prof. Merriman, but I am simply embarassed for him, especially since he tries to pronounce things with a French accent but his accent is simply not very good. It got to the point where I would have to stop listening because I was so annoyed with his pride at owning his own house in France, at telling everyone how "we the French" view things (though he obviously did not grow up there, even if he is now a citizen), etc. When he talks about things not related to France (like Russia), it is much easier to listen to him. His intellect is clear, but he is also a stereotypical intellectual.

I devoured this course. I actually looked forward to getting in the car just so I could listen to John Merriman's passionate, insightful and deeply moving lectures. It doesn't get any better than this.

I want to echo the other complaints about speaking French in class..... Ok, I got it, the guy lives in France.... So what? Well, the so what is that almost every topic is related to France, and to someone he knows, or lives near, visited a few years back. Oh did I mention, the guy lives in France. This should have been a much better lecture. For those that want to learn about European history and not just France, I'd recommend Prof. Wetzel's (?) lecture from UC Berkley.

There is not a single lecture where Prof. Merriman does not feel compelled to remind his audience that he lives in "la belle France", even when speaking about the end of Communism in Eastern Europe. Why? He laces each and every lecture with "Frenchisms" and anecdotes about his village in France, his least favorite chateaux, etc. that add absolutely nothing to our understanding of the material -- it is an endearing but also an embarrassing affectation that really distracts from the lecture topic. He even goes so far as to pronounce German and Russian proper names with a French accent. Someone needs to remind Prof. Merriman that he will always have waht the French call a teutonic accent in French and no matter how hard he tries to make one believe otherwise he will not "pouff!!" become a Frenchman -- "Voila et point", as he would say. He is certainly someone who is better "listened" to in writing. These lectures I gather are supposed to provide a framework for the reading assignments and as such they should help one develop a critical approach to evaluating the different and often competing views about the underlying currents that produced these historical events. Prof. Merriman spends almost no time developing these important views. From this standpoint these lectures are certainly passionate but regrettably anemic.

I wish my university professors were all this engaging when I was in school, but then, I studied Business mostly. I have always enjoyed reading about European history, ever since high school, and Prof. Merriman reminded me how exciting this topic was. At first I was distracted by his lisp, but it seemed to disappear after the second lecture. All in all, a wonderful course in European history for the period it covered and I am going to miss listening and learning during my morning treadmill run.

Other reviewers are correct that Merriman is brilliant. I only wish that his manner of speaking were more fluent. Numerous word whiskers (uh) make these lectures almost impossible to enjoy once you pick up on them. Like the adage of having a face for radio, this speaker has a voice suited for print.

I listen to many different history classes from Itunes U and this is one of the great ones. He has a depth of understanding and a great insight into the subject matter that has you sitting at the edge of your seat waiting to see what comes next and what he thinks of it. Some of my favorites were why no revolution in 1848 britain (I never thought of it that way), Napoleon (he's not a fan), and the one about Peter the Great (he really seems to admire him).

As a student of history on my spare time, these lectures are extremely useful for me to gain a larger perspective of many different areas on which I have read. Please put up more if possible! I for one would appreciate them immensely.

Thanks for put'n this class on itunesU! I rather enjoyed listening to all the lectures, I couldn't stop