Someone once said that the English Channel is 10 miles wide and 1,000 years deep. Merde! 1000 Years of Annoying the French takes a penetrating look into those murky depths. A sort of Totally Biased History of England, it takes us through all the times when Britain and France have been at war - or at least glowering at each other across what we Brits provocatively call The English Channel. Starting with the bloody battles of the Norman Conquest and going right up to the more civilised but no less conflictual present, when a state visit by the French President becomes a series of hilarious historical insults, Merde! 1000 Years of Annoying the French is a light-hearted - but impeccably researched - account of all those conflicts and their protagonists, If you think you know all about William the Conqueror, Joan of Arc, Agincourt, Waterloo and all the other flash points in Anglo-French relations - think again! While basing itself strictly on historical fact, this book tells the hidden history of our rivalry. In fact, you’ll come to see that, from a French perspective, the last 1,000 years have been one long British campaign to infuriate our Gallic neighbours.