This weekend, C-SPAN’s Book TV will broadcast a talk by my friend Arthur Herman, author of To Rule the Waves: How the British Navy Shaped the Modern World. I’m pretty sure this will be from the presentation he gave (and which I attended) at a D.C. bookstore last week. It hardly matters: Arthur is brilliant and eloquent and To Rule the Waves is very, very good. It’s partly a military history of the Royal Navy, but it’s also the story of how British admirals and sailors became a powerful force for globalization, and how their influence is still being felt today. NRODT readers will know Arthur for his book reviews–and they’ll also know that our current issue includes a big thumbs-up review of To Rule the Waves. I recommend it highly.