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Thanks to Snorter for setting up the thread.
I don't want to distract anyone from matters like the size of horses' balls but just to raise a broader issue: the general histories of Thailand by the formidable Baker/Phongpaichit duo and by David Wyatt, both of which are well-written, informative and essential as reference texts, nonetheless tend to be a bit wearing to read end to end.
Silkworm Books, the excellent Chiang Mai-based publisher, produces a Short History series - I've read the very readable volume on Laos by Grant Evans and have just got the one on Cambodia - but oddly enough they haven't yet done one on Thailand.
One other way of finding out a little of Thai history is via novels. For example, an award-winning Thai novel of the mid 90s, translated into English more recently,and easily obtainable, is called 'Democracy, Shaken & Stirred by Win Lyovarin.
it covers, as the cover blurb says, 'all the major rebellions and coups between 1933 and 1992' (including the events in Snorter's post #8) told via the retrospective accounts of two old men, one a policeman, the other a bandit turned political activist, who meet in Lumphini Park to recall their decades long conflict. Lyovarin is no Tolstoy but the book has lots of interesting detail and photos of most of the main players in C20th Thai political history.
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