The Outline of History The Roman Empire to the Great War

With The Outline of History Wells started a craze that lasted throughout the 1920s for copycat "outlines" on every conceivable subject. Coming right after the carnage of World War I, the Outline was neither unduly pessimistic and cynical about the human condition nor Pollyannaish about humanity's future. Instead, it offered an account of the development of the world's civilizations up to the present, showing its readers that an enlightened future depended on a clear, unprejudiced view of the past.