Book Discussion With Myself

Deephaven by Sarah Orne Jewett (1877)

2012-01-25T14:14:00.000-08:00

I think I first read something by Sarah Orne Jewett in college - 20 years ago or so - but what that something was I can't remember. I have to admit, I was actually sort of hesitant to read this book; for some reason, it seemed intimidating (related, perhaps, to that long ago college experience). What a pleasant surprise I had - Deephaven was delightful. I checked out a Library of America version of this very short novel that also included many others of Sarah Orne Jewett's works, which I'm definitely going to return to sometime in the future. The story, about two twentysomething Boston girls spending the summer in a small Maine town, is told from Helen's point of view. I thought it was a bit odd that two unmarried girls in 1877 would spend the summer unchaperoned in Maine, but as I read more about Sarah Orne Jewett's personal life, I started filling in more of the blanks. Sarah Orne Jewett was a lesbian; she spent 30 years in a "Boston marriage" with another (older) woman. And while "scholars" may speculate on the exact nature of this relationship, I want to roll my eyes and say "Come on." Of course the relationship was sexual as well; it's silly (and quite frankly sexist) to think it wasn't. But whatever; there are always going to be some scholars that go out of their way to prove these old authors weren't gay. It sounds like Sarah wasn't even all that closeted about their marriage.

So if you paint that veneer over this story, the fact that two women spend the summer alone together in Maine makes more sense - they were in love. Here is this beautiful scene:

"When we came down from the lighthouse and it grew late, we would beg for an hour or two longer on the water, and row away in the twilight far out from land, where, with our faces turned from the Light, it seemed as if we were alone, and the sea shoreless; and as the darkness closed round us softly, we watched the stars come out, and were always glad to see Kate's star and my star, which we had chosen when we were children. I used long ago to be sure of one thing,—that, however far away heaven might be, it could not be out of sight of the stars. Sometimes in the evening we waited out at sea for the moonrise, and then we would take the oars again and go slowly in, once in a while singing or talking, but oftenest silent."

Okay, I think this is heartbreakingly romantic - they chose stars together. They sit and talk and sing. If that isn't something lovers do, I don't know what is. They also spend the novel doing things respectable females (at least in other Victorian books) don't do - fish, tramp through the woods in old clothes, visit and talk with various old men along the seafront. They are far from the society that knows them (and condemns them, lets not forget, in ways both subtle and specific). In Deephaven, they can be themselves, and they can be a couple.

Exceptionally well written, vivid lovely descriptions, regionally romantic - Jewett made me want to visit Maine -- a Maine that was even then vanishing (the whole point of this set of related stories). Nostalgic, and more than a little sad.

The most beautiful story was "Miss Chauncey" about the crazy woman whose house is falling around her.

Something I wanted to note is that this book was written at approximately the same time as Mark Twain's The Gilded Age. I remember Twain and Warner's bet with their wives about writing a novel, and the reason they wanted to do so - that so much of what was being published at that particular time was feminine in nature. Louisa May Alcott and Harriet Beecher Stowe were two examples; Sarah Orne Jewett was another. This book might be lovely, but it's definitely from a more feminine point of view, and it's night and day away different from The Gilded Age in everything except that core issue of change. Twain and Warner were capturing a change in society, in which old things were being replaced by something new; I think Jewett even more obviously was writing about this as well.

Another thing I liked - Willa Cather was inspired by Sarah Orne Jewett.

Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond (1997)

2012-01-23T13:00:00.000-08:00

I think I've read this book before - the premise was certainly a familiar one; the chapters on domestication of animals was also very familiar. I vaguely remember starting the book, and then having to return it to the library because the spine was broken - and then never finishing it.

Jared Diamond is an excellent writer, very clear and precise, very readable. His treatise, premise is plainly written without hyperbole or jaw-crackery -- and he carefully and successfully avoids any pitfalls. I guess when you work in the field he does and are writing about "civilization" and "society" you learn to be very careful to remain balanced at all times so as to not come across as racist or bigoted.

Rubicon by Steven Saylor (1999)

2012-01-11T18:28:00.000-08:00

Saylor's historical research and descriptive phrases of the ancient world are superb. Rubicon really captures the urgency and fear involved with all wars and invasions. The mystery itself seemed to be slightly ho-hum - set against a magnificent backdrop of war and intrigue. But then Saylor went all Hercule Poirot on us - there is definitely nothing ho-hum about the whodunnit. Great, great fun (fun magnus).

Chester Alan Arthur by Zachary Karabell (2004)

2012-01-09T14:44:00.000-08:00

I like the Guilded Age for it's repressed sexuality and shifty politics. The political life of Chester Arthur was filled to the brim with shifty politics; as for repressed sexuality, we'll never know - the Athur papers were all burned at his death, leaving us with an unfinished portrait of who Arthur really was.

In a succession of likable yet forgettable presidents who pretty much did and said (0r didn't do and say) the same things, Arthur is mostly memorable as a guy who didn't want to vice president, who ended up becoming president because of an assassin's bullet. I liked the author's quote from Thomas Wolfe, which pretty much sums up Gilded Age presidents:"Their gravely vacant and bewhiskered faces mixed, melted, swam together in the sea-depth of a past, intangible, immeasurable, and unknowable... and they were lost. For who was Garfield, martyred man, and who had seen him in the streets of life? Who could believe that his footfalls ever sounded on a lonely pavement? Who had heard the casual familiar tones of Chester Arthur? And where was Harrison? Where was Hayes? Which had the whiskers, which the burnsides; which was which?" (this from a short story I found sort of dull). Amazingly, this was written in a time when people were alive who actually could remember the Arthur administration, yet was still considered lost... Arthur, by the way, had the burnsides.

I'm not sure what more can be said about this semi-milquetoast president. He presided over a time of peace and prosperity, without much to do. There weren't any wars, and Guiteau wasn't part of a bigger plot or intrigue; he was just mentally ill. Our enemies were few and far between. We still kept mostly to ourselves in the world. The Gild was coming off the Gilded Age, but just beginning.

There were parallels between then and now. A quote: "The Republican factions in Chicago were divided by personalities, not by beliefs, and the Democrats did not offer a dramatically different version." Sounds very, very familiar. Chester Arthur, rich, well dressed ,well connected, well lived, surrounded by similar types. The modern Republican party, sans Christians, would feel right at home. Obama = Cleveland (maybe; that will be my next book in the series) ?

Chet Arthur was incredibly well dressed, loved to eat good food, loved stylish comfort. Tiffany redecorated the White House during his administration, personally hired by the president himself. He "was the closest thing to Jacqueline Kennedy that Washington would see until Jacqueline Kennedy. He set trends for stylish living emulated by thousands who could afford it and envied by millions who could not." That quip was worth the whole book, and proof of Karabell's great writing skills. A book about a - let's face it - boring president was made incredibly interesting by good, good writing.

"For those who bemoan the growth of government in our day, the Pendleton Act" -- which created our modern civil service based on merit rather than patronage -- "might be seen as a step down the road to perdition. After all, it facilitated the vast expansion of the federal bureaucracy. Even those who don't like government, however, can probably appreicate that insofar as some government is a necessary evil, it's better for society that it be administered in a professional manner. Competenance is desirable as well, but corruption is not a recipe for a stable society." A gentle chide to libertarians to remember our history.

I think the last paragraphs deserve special note, and an example of Karabell's fine writing. "In everything he did, Chester Alan Arthur was a gentleman, and that is rare and precious. It reminds us that adversaries can be treated with respectt, that democracy can survive differences, and that leadership isn't just great words and deeds. Arthur manged to be a decent man and a decent president in an eara when decency was in short supply.

"For those who want presidents to be heroes, and, failing that, villains, for those who expect them to be larger-than-life figures, Arthur's tenure in office isn't satisfying. The nature of our expectations would have to change dramatically for Arthur to be reevaluated as one of this country's best presidents. And yet, in spite of what Shakespeare wrote, some men are neither born great, nor achieve greatness, nor have it thrust upon them. Some people just do the best they can in a difficult situation and sometimes that turns out just fine."

Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson (2008)

2012-01-06T14:03:00.000-08:00

Thoroughly enjoyed this work of historical fiction. Madam Lockton is definitely one of those evil characters from literature who is very memorable; Anderson does a great job of at least making her a little bit sympathetic. In fact, the personal morals and societal mores of Chains isn't black and white but shifting and ambiguous. Madam Lockton violently abuses her slaves, is petulant, probably mad, and has the morals of a hyena. But she's also scared for her life and fortune, violently abused by her husband, and living in a society with strictly enforced hierarchy. The Americans mouth freedom, but they aren't especially interested in destroying the existing code. The British are willing to free the slaves of rebels, but not those of loyalists. It's this ambiguity that makes for a terrific story and adds to the struggle poor Isabel must face on a daily basis.

I'm excited to read Forge, and find out what happens to Isabel and Curzon, and if they find little Ruth or not...

Candide by Voltaire (1759)

2012-01-03T18:05:00.000-08:00

The best of all possible worlds, eh? Not for Candide and company. Reams and reams have been written about Voltaire's famous satire, and I don't think I'm able to add anything amusing, compelling or even a bit interesting to the mix. From a personal viewpoint, it's long (amazingly for such a short book) and episodic, and people kept appearing and disappearing at random, which I suppose is kind of funny but also kind of annoying. Why or how this was turned into musical theater is a bit beyond me (I've never actually seen it live, and only seen a bit of it on television). I don't remember Cunegonda ever saying "Glitter and Be Gay." For something written in the 18th century, it was kind of risque; those French. Martin is probably my favorite character - the precursor to Eeyore.

I did think Pangloss represented that crazy kind of fantatic that no matter what the world (God, the fates, Zeus) may throw at him to get them to move, they still remained stuck in one spot, mind closed forever to anything but black and white. So I guess I have at least one take away.

Whatever Happened to Tanganyika? by Harry Campbell (2007)

2012-01-03T18:03:00.001-08:00

A bathroom book, pretty standard, well written but nothing amazingly interesting.

The First Century: Emperors, Gods and Everyman by William K. Klingaman (1990)

2012-01-03T17:38:00.001-08:00

Completely and utterly disappointing. It's a pretty big topic to tackle anyway - but this just felt so unconnected. The subtitle hit and miss the narrative. There were chapters about emperors, some about gods (Jesus), and a few about everyman. With China thrown in for good measure, I guess. If you are going to throw in China, why not also include Japan, Africa, India, the Americas... I kept hoping the chapters on Rome would tie in someway at the end to the chapters on China, but no dice. This felt like (at least) three books that were cut apart and then reassembled as one book - but without any transition between the three. To add insult to injury, for whatever reason, Klingaman completely cut out most of the sexy gossip (Tiberias the pedophile with his little fishes, for example).

Old Christmas by Washington Irving ; illustrated by Randolph Caldecott (1819)

2011-12-27T13:04:00.001-08:00

Old Christmas: From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving by Washington Irving

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I picked this up for several reasons. I read an article here -- http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dick... that detailed how Old Christmas was the father of Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol. I read another essay that while Washington Irving didn't invent Christmas, he certainly "dressed it up." And finally, it was Christmas weekend and I wanted something new but delightfully old fashioned to read. This certainly fit the bill. If you read Dickens every holiday season, consider adding Washington Irving to that list. You won't be disappointed. The first few paragraphs of the first story are my favorite - poignant and moving. Even here in sunny summery southern California, Irving made me feel the chill bite of winter and longed for a hearth to huddle by. I loved the character of Master Simon, the bachelor reletive who sings, tells the best stories, and makes the young girls giggle at inappropriate times and gossips with the old widows. He's definitely an archetype. The Randolph Caldecott illustrations - he of the medal fame - are whimsically fantastic.

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Old Christmas by Washington Irving ; illustrated by Randolph Caldecott (1819)

2011-12-27T12:27:00.000-08:00

Old Christmas by Washington Irving, with illustrations by Randolph Caldecott, is part of the larger work The Sketch Book which includes the most famous Irving stories, "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." "The Christmas Dinner," the fourth in the Christmas stories, was the story of the week from The Library of America, the introduction of this (to me unknown) set of stories led me to another short essay (http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dickens/xmas/kelly2.html) on the direct line from Washington Irving's Christmas to Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol. In 1876, Randolph Caldecott (he of the medal fame) illustrated Irving stories, and that was the version I read (online), although I also read the Library of America hard cover version (sans illustrations). I'm not a huge fan of the online reading experience and like the feel of a real book in my hands.

Old Christmas was a perfect holiday weekend read. Irving has some poignant and moving passages in the book regarding the Christmas season. Although I enjoyed reading all four stories, the following I consider the most lovely and moving. It certainly helped keep me in the holiday mood:

"There is nothing in England that exercises a more delightful spell over my imagination than the lingerings of the holiday customs and rural games of former times. They recall the pictures my fancy used to draw in the May morning of life, when as yet I only knew the world through books, and believed it to be all that poets had painted it; and they bring with them the flavour of those honest days of yore, in which, perhaps with equal fallacy, I am apt to think the world was more home-bred, social, and joyous than at present. I regret to say that they are daily growing more and more faint, being gradually worn away by time, but still more obliterated by modern fashion. They resemble those picturesque morsels of Gothic architecture which we see crumbling in various parts of the country, partly dilapidated by the waste of ages, and partly lost in the additions and alterations of latter days. Poetry, however, clings with cherishing fondness about the rural game and holiday revel, from which it has derived so many of its themes,--as the ivy winds its rich foliage about the Gothic arch and mouldering tower, gratefully repaying their support by clasping together their tottering remains, and, as it were, embalming them in verdure.

"Of all the old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens the strongest and most heartfelt associations. There is a tone of solemn and sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality, and lifts the spirit to a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment. The services of the church about this season are extremely tender and inspiring. They dwell on the beautiful story of the origin of our faith, and the pastoral scenes that accompanied its announcement. They gradually increase in fervour and pathos during the season of Advent, until they break forth in full jubilee on the morning that brought peace and good-will to men. I do not know a grander effect of music on the moral feelings than to hear the full choir and the pealing organ performing a Christmas anthem in a cathedral, and filling every part of the vast pile with triumphant harmony.

"It is a beautiful arrangement, also derived from days of yore, that this festival, which commemorates the announcement of the religion of peace and love, has been made the season for gathering together of family connections, and drawing closer again those bands of kindred hearts which the cares and pleasures and sorrows of the world are continually operating to cast loose; of calling back the children of a family who have launched forth in life, and wandered widely asunder, once more to assemble about the paternal hearth, that rallying-place of the affections, there to grow young and loving again among the endearing mementoes of childhood.
There is something in the very season of the year that gives a charm to the festivity of Christmas. At other times we derive a great portion of our pleasures from the mere beauties of nature. Our feelings sally forth and dissipate themselves over the sunny landscape, and we "live abroad and everywhere." The song of the bird, the murmur of the stream, the breathing fragrance of spring, the soft voluptuousness of summer, the golden pomp of autumn; earth with its mantle of refreshing green, and heaven with its deep delicious blue and its cloudy magnificence, all fill us with mute but exquisite delight, and we revel in the luxury of mere sensation. But in the depth of winter, when nature lies despoiled of every charm, and wrapped in her shroud of sheeted snow, we turn for our gratifications to moral sources. The dreariness and desolation of the landscape, the short gloomy days and darksome nights, while they circumscribe our wanderings, shut in our feelings also from rambling abroad, and make us more keenly disposed for the pleasures of the social circle. Our thoughts are more concentrated; our friendly sympathies more aroused. we feel more sensibly the charm of each other's society, and are brought more closely together by dependence on each other for enjoyment. Heart calleth unto heart; and we draw our pleasures from the deep wells of living kindness, which lie in the quiet recesses of our bosoms: and which when resorted to, furnish forth the pure element of domestic felicity.

"The pitchy gloom without makes the heart dilate on entering the room filled with the glow and warmth of the evening fire. The ruddy blaze diffuses an artificial summer and sunshine through the room, and lights up each countenance into a kindlier welcome. Where does the honest face of hospitality expand into a broader and more cordial smile--where is the shy glance of love more sweetly eloquent--than by the winter fireside? and as the hollow blast of wintry wind rushes through the hall, claps the distant door, whistles about the casement, and rumbles down the chimney, what can be more grateful than that feeling of sober and sheltered security with which we look around upon the comfortable chamber and the scene of domestic hilarity?"

It's rare, I think, to read an old book or classic and not have some trouble with the language, particularly stilted language or overly descriptive phrases without much action. But Old Christmas didn't feel that way at all - mostly easy to read and "regular" language.

My favorite character described in the book is Master Simon, the old bachelor who is friends with all the widows, knows all the best stories and jokes, and performs on command, whether dressing up in costume or singing in the church choir. He's some sor to ancestral gay guy, the orginal old archetype of everyone's elderly gay uncle.

The Rescuers (1959) and Miss Bianca in the Salt Mines (1966) by Margery Sharp

2011-12-19T17:53:00.000-08:00

Why are there so many books written for children that have mice as the central characters? In addition to the two I finished over the weekend, we've also got The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Pleasant Fieldmouse, Angelina Ballerina, Lily's Purple Plastic Purse, Despereaux, Redwall, Geronimo Stilton, Poppy... I could continue ad nauseum. What is it about mice and kids? No one wants a mouse in their house (and I can only think of one famous rat, Templeton, and he was, well, a rat). I would hazard a guess that many suburban kids haven't seen a mouse outside a pet store, what with the advent of exterminators. Yet the houses of children's literature are filled to the brim with talking, clothes wearing, mice.

The Rescuers and the world of Miss Bianca in general is pretty sophisticated for a children's book. The language is hard - I stumbled over words. And to be really honest, it's not all that interesting. Which is funny, because I thought of these are beloved classics from my childhood. But I don't recall reading any others in the series besides these two. I thought maybe that was because I didn't have access to them as a kid, but in reality it may have been because - well - they are kind of boring. Maybe mice are just for kids. Or maybe The Mouse and the Motorcycle will hold up if I re-read it. I don't think this holds up all that well over the years, but maybe that's looking at it with the jaundiced eye of a grownup?

Miss Bianca and Bernard's relationship is old fashioned to say the least. Miss Bianca is always so prim and ladylike, and she's always stuck with hypermasculine other mice (Nils the Norwegian mouse, the two professors). She's kind of snobby too. And maybe that's just the kind of character she's meant to be, and I'm reading way to much into her. Her pictures by Garth Williams are pretty though.

Rutherford B. Hayes by Hans L. Trefousse (2002)

2011-12-19T12:21:00.000-08:00

A low-gloss take on a likable but bland president. Trefousse concentrates much attention on Hayes's early life and Civil War career, much attention on the disputed election of 1876 - but makes light work of the actual administration. That may be because not a whole lot happened during the tenure of Rutherford B. Hayes. His election was the peak interesting point, of perhaps his entire career. He certainly comes across as a middle of the road kind of guy, fiscally conservative, moderately liberal on the social issues of the time. Certainly the kind of Republican that doesn't really exist anymore - Rutherford B. Hayes would most likely be a Democrat today.

East Side Story by Louis Auchincloss (2004)

2011-12-15T17:34:00.000-08:00

I had some trouble figuring this one out. It was pretty dry and straightforward, and the chapters were only loosely connected. They almost read like short biographical sketches crossed with a short story. I wasn't exactly sure what the point was. I liked the story about Alida the best - her husband was a heavy drinker, who gave up drinking when he joined a quasi-cult. But the cult leader was money grubbingly greedy, so Alida thought she would pull one over on her husband and get him drinking again so he would stop going to church. But the husband had the last laugh - he left most of his money to the cult. The black humor of that story made up for the dryness of other stories. I was disappointed, because I like Auchincloss's nonfiction so much. I don't know if I want to try another fiction book or not. I hate it when I don't "get" a book too, especially a literary book - I always feel so dumb.

Images of Early Pomona by Mickey Gallivan (2007)

2011-12-14T18:25:00.000-08:00

This is sort of a coffee table book in miniature and in paperback of what I - at least for now - consider my "home town." Pomona, for all its (somewhat deserved) piss poor reputation, is an old city with a rich history, and this little book proves it. The earliest settlers in Pomona were arrived in 1837 - and built a house (the Casa Primera) around the block from my current house. This is far older than my actual hometown in Kansas; it's almost (but not quite) "East Coast" old. Easterners and Midwesterners forget that history was happening often simultaneously out west.

The book wasn't chock full of gems - there are quite a few pictures of people I don't know in old clothes. But there were several interesting tidbits. The pictures of Ganesha Park were interesting; the fact that Garey, White and Holt Avenues were all named after founding fathers of Pomona was another interesting fact. The Padre Oak at 459 Kenoak Place was "believed to have been the stoppiogn place of the mission fathers when they traveled through in 1832. It was under this tree that the first Christian religious service in the Pomona Valley was held. Tomas Palomares" - another street name - "built his adobe home on this site just north of the oak tree." I could almost spit on this tree if it wasn't for the 10 Freeway; I've probably walked by or under it and didn't even realize it was there.

Sandhill Sundays and other recollections by Mari Sandoz (1970)

2011-12-14T16:05:00.000-08:00

Mari Sandoz reminds me somewhat of the gritty female descendants of pioneers that I grew up with - the picture on the back of the book could be Mrs. Belton, my art teacher from high school (granddaughter of Czech pioneers). Sandoz's recollections are from the house next door to Little House on the Prairie, where everything was even tougher, and the dad was crazy mean. I have to be honest - the book lost steam somewhere in the middle. The recollections became too abrasive and unpleasant.

Joseph Smith by Robert V. Remini (2002)

2011-12-13T18:32:00.001-08:00

Joseph Smith by Robert V. Remini

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

According to a wise sage (Maureen O'Hara), "Faith is believing in something when common sense tells you not to." The story of Joseph Smith certainly requires a leap of faith. I thought Remini did a pretty good job of remaining neutral about some of Joseph Smith's more questionable revelations and actions. Regardless of whether you believe Smith pulled off one of the greatest scams of all time or was indeed a prophet of God (I guess this all depends on who you ask), you have to admit that he was a mover and shaker of men and ideas. I guess religions are generally based on those kinds of men.

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Joseph Smith by Robert V. Remini (2002)

2011-12-13T18:14:00.000-08:00

As a famous person once said, "Faith is believing in something when common sense tells you not to." (that famous person was Maureen O'Hara in A Miracle on 34th Street, which may instantly negate the seriousness of this post, but oh well). You gotta have some pretty deep seeded faith to believe a man walks on water or turns water into wine (or comes back from the dead). You gotta have some faith to believe statues can both cry and cure you. You gotta have some faith to believe that you can die and come back as a houseplant or a spider or Shirley MacLaine. Faith is what it takes to believe in Joseph Smith, because a doubter can certainly call him a charlatan and a trickster. He's either is a prophet who talked to God, or pulled the best and longest running hoax ever known to man. His revelations - particularly the ones dealing with women (and especially the one dealing with his postpartum depressed, royally pissed off, feeling neglected wife) certainly can come across as a bit self serving. Regardless of whether you believe Joseph Smith is a charlatan who ran a scam worthy of the Nigerians, he certainly knew what it took to move and motivate people and bend them to his will. I guess the founders of all religions possessed the same gift.

I appreciated Remini providing a backdrop of the history of Jacksonian American Smith's story. This definitely provided a context for why people were so rabid in their passions for and against Mormons. The rough and tumble Second Great Awakening America was not a time for the faint of heart, particularly on the frontier.

How To Become a Great Boss by Jeffrey Fox (2002)

2011-12-08T15:17:00.001-08:00

One of my former employees said I'm already a great boss. But one can always add to the toolbox. Although the tools in this one were pretty simple. An "airplane" book - and for someone other than me.

The Buccaneers by Edith Wharton (1993)

2011-12-07T16:17:00.000-08:00

The Buccaneers was Edith Wharton's last book, left unfinished and then initially published on her death in 1937; Marion Mainwaring (a Wharton scholar) added her own ending (apparently based on a Wharton outline) in 1993. Which shows, but doesn't necessarily detract from the book.

The novel takes place during the height of the Gilded Age; the "buccaneers" are five American girls of wealth (but not New York society, a bone of contention among one of their mothers) who marry (or are scheming to marry, at the end of the book) British peers / gentry (with many, many direct nods to the sad story of Alva and Conseulo Vanderbilt).

Saratoga, very unfashionable, is where the novel begins, with two of the sisters, Virginia and Nan, befriending the other three - Lizzy and Mabel Elmsworth (whose mother is vulgar and loud) and Conchita, who was clearly based on the woman for whom Conseulo Vanderbilt was named, Consuelo, Duchess of Manchester who was Cuban, not Brazilian. Conchita is the "dangerous" one, who marries into the nobility first. The other girls are assisted in this by the Nan St. George's Italian turned English government, Miss Testvalley, and Jacky March, an American who was jilted by a British lord but continues to live in England, apparently matchmaking (and being part of schemes). Virginia eventually marries a marquis (as part of the best scene in the book); Lizzy marries an up and coming British MP; Mabel marries an elderly "cereal king" who leaves her the richest widow in the world; Nan marries the Duke of Tintagel, who is vaguely and mysteriously awful to her. This relationship is the flip side of The Age of Innocence marriage of the Count and Countess Olenska. But, like The Age of Innocence, we get only a taste of why the marriage is a bad one. At least with TAOI, the marriage plot was overseas and while necessary to the plot, the details weren't necessarily integral; The Duke of Tintagel, on the other hand, doesn't seem at all that bad (he's certainly not as wicked as the Duke of Marlborough).

That's part of the overall flaws of this book. There is a skeleton, some muscle tissue, some sinews - but not a complete body. In fact, occasionally it's like the bones of five bodies thrown together, and Wharton was trying to rebuild them as one. Even that skeleton, though, is incredibly well written, with vivid characters.

(It's almost like some characters have two or three skeletons though - Mrs. St. George, for example, seems to shift slightly throughout the book. She's much more languid at the beginning and much more Alva Vanderbiltish at the end.).

I guess another problem I had was that I wanted more, and even with Marion Mainwaring (a name that sounds like it came from a Wharton book) it still wasn't quite enough. Telling the interconnected stories of five beautiful girls was going to take a longer book than this one - maybe even several.

Books I'm Going To Read

2011-12-07T10:47:00.001-08:00

FICTION

All About Emily by Connie Willis
Hex Hall by Hughes
Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James
The Magicians by Lev Groosman
Novels and Stories by Sarah Orne Jewett
The Sketch Book by Washington Irving
Bracebridge Hall by Washington Irving; illustrated by Randolph Caldecott
Forge by Laurie Halse Anderson
Supervolcano by Harry Turtledove
Song of the Lark by Willa Cather
Half Brother by Kenneth Oppel
The Cat's Table by Michael Ondaatje
O Pioneers by Willa Cather
The Map of Time by Felix Palma
Collected Stories by Katherine Anne Porter
Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld
Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
Wildwood by Colin Maloy
The Longest Journey by E.M. Forster
Barbarian Nurseries by Hector Tobar
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster
The Legacy by Katherine Webb
The Life to Come by E.M. Forster
The Machine Stops by E.M. Forster
Lady of the Rivers by Philippa Gregory
Metropolitan by Walter Jon Williams
City on Fire by Walter Jon Williams
The American Heiress by Daisy Goodwin
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
The Ambassadors by Henry James
Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley
The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain
The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams
A Flaw in the Blood by Stephannie Barron
Complete Works of O. Henry
Distant Waves by Suzanne Weyn
My Antonia by Willa Cather
Elizabeth by Margaret George
Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham
Echo House by Ward Just
Death in Venice by Thomas Mann
Spiral by Paul McEuen
Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
Trinity Six by Charles Cumming
The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington
Lesson in Secrets by Jacqueline Winspear
Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis
Caleb's Crossing by Geraldine Brooks
The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh
Fall of Giants by Ken Follett
Lost Horizon by James Hilton
The Postmistress by Sarah Blake
An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
Lionheart by Sharon Kay Penman
All the Kings Men by Warren
Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier
Portable Dorothy Parker
The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland by Catherynne Valente

Steven Saylor - Roma Sub Rosa series

Last Seen in Massilia * A Mist of Prophecies * Judgment of Caesar * Triumph of Caesar *

Liz Williams - Inspector Chen series
The Iron Khan * Morningstar

American Presidents
Grover Cleveland by Henry Graf
Benjamin Harrison by Charles Calhoun
William McKinley by Kevin Phillips
Woodrow Wilson by H.W. Brands
Warren Harding by John Dean
Calvin Coolidge by David Greenberg
Herbert Hoover by William E. Leuchtenberg
Franklin D. Roosevelt by Roy Jenkins
Harry S. Truman by Robert Dallek
Dwight D. Eisenhower by Tom cker
Lyndon Johnson by Charles Peters

Penguin Lives
Julia Child by Laura Shapiro
Winston Churchill by Jane Smiley
Napoleon by Paul Johnson
Buddha by Karen Armstrong
Jane Austen by Carol Shields
Virginia Woolf by Nigel Nicolson

NONFICTION
Clover Adams by Natalie Dykstra
The End by Ian Kershaw
Third World America by Ariana Huffington
Destiny of the Republic by Candice Millard
1491 * 1492 * 1493 by Charles Mann
A Hawaiian Reader edited by A Grove Day
The Islands by W Storrs Lee
Sex on Six Legs by M. Zuk
Island World by Gary Okihiro
Hidden Life of Deer by Elizabeth Thomas
Mary Boleyn by Alison Weir
Ancient Guide to Modern Life by Natalie Haynes
Inferno by Max Hastings
The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris by David McCullough
The Swerve by Stephen Greenblatt
Midnight Rising by Tony Horowitz
December 1941 by Craig Shirley
Pickled, Potted, and Canned by Sue Shephard
Wheels of Change by Sue Macy
The Great Wave by Christopher Benfey
Peace Be Upon You by Zachary Karabell
Greater Journey by David McCullough

OTHER

The Expats by Chris Pavone
The Company of the Dead by David Kowalski
The Dressmaker by Kate Alcott
Sugar Changed the World by Marc Aronson
Long Night by Steve Wick
Taming the Gods by Ian Buruma
Lantern Bearers by Rosemary Sutcliffe
Bootleg by Karen Blumenthal
Mrs. Nixon by Ann Padgett
My Life and Hard Times by James Thurber
America Aflame by David Goldfield
The Food of the Gods by H.G. Wells
Quarter Acre Farm by Spring Warren
The Dragonfly Pool by Eva Ibbotson
Great A & P by Marc Levinson
We Sure Can by Susan Hood
Scoop by Evelyn Waugh
American Oracle by David Blight
No Passion Spent by Vita Sackville-West
Concerning E.M. Forster by Frank Kermode
Ghosts by Gaslight by Jack Dann
Book of Books by Melvyn Bragg
This Is Our Life by Ellen Glasgow
Camp Nine by Vivienne Schiffer
The Great Meadow by Elizabeth Madox Roberts
Little Big Man by Thomas Berger
Collected Stories by Jean Stafford
Best American History Essays
The Group by Mary McCarthy
The Company She Keeps by Mary McCarthy
Best American Essays
The Detective as Historian by Browne and Kresier
Awakenings by Edward Lazellari
Alison Wonderland by Helen Smith
Fierce Radiance by Lauren Belfer
Guide to the Birds of East Africa by Nicholas Grayson
To Visit the Queen by Diane Duane
Under the Harrow by Mark Dunn
Dangerous to Know by Tasha Alexander
Antony and Cleopatra by Adrian Goldsworthy
The Tower, The Zoo, and the Tortoise by Julia Stuart
American Caesars by Nigel Hamilton
Prehistoric Clock by Robert Appleton
The Strangers Child by Alan Hollinghurst

James A. Garfield by Ira Rutkow (2006)

2011-12-01T15:38:00.000-08:00

Among presidents, perhaps James A. Garfield holds the most "what might have beens." You can certainly say that about any of our leaders who were slain or died while in office; but Garfield had just begun to serve when he was shot by the (clearly) mentally ill Charles Guiteau, stuffing Garfield into the box of historical footnotes. Garfield was president in the height of the Gilded Age (his previously dealings and writings has him as certainly the proto-typical pro-business Republican - "a leader on the fiscally conservative side of the political debate"). Reconstruction had died a tragic death under the administration of Rutherfurd B. Hayes (more on him later; I accidentally read my presidents out of order); Garfield, whose views on African Americans (as with many of the post Civil War politicians) had evolved over time; he might have been a better friend to the former slaves and foe to the south than Chester Arthur (we'll see when I read about Arthur!). Rutkow's Garfield is young, intellectual, politically savvy (come on - you don't just fall into the nomination; it's clear he was playing all sides), lusty (hints of numerous affairs resound throughout Garfield's adult life). The story of the death of James Garfield couldn't be told without the story of Gilded Age medicine, its advances, and the opponents of those advances (who ministered to Garfield during his agonizingly long, painful death), and Rutkow's account of Garfield's last days includes many interesting side notes on what was then considered modern medicine (which would make sense, considering that Rutkow is a surgeon). The short, poignant epilogue briefly notes that Ronald Reagan was similarly shot by a madman and survived (history, though, has argued since then that Reagan probably did not survive completely unscathed) and imagines that Garfield, if shot today, would probably have been home that same evening, scared but recuperating.

The time machine transports Garfield to the 21st century White House - how would he react to the top political, social and international issues facing us today?

The top news right now, from the New York Times website.

European debt crisis. No bail outs here. Garfield was a laissez-faire Republican, with a mistrust of Europe and its entanglements. His biggest foreign policy missions during his brief presidency were aimed at strengthening ties with our South American neighbors. Stories about Iran and Myanmar followed that of the European debt crisis - I think his reaction would have been ditto to the Europeans, although he did sign a treaty with Madagascar!

A story about illegal immigration, President Obama, and Arizona. Garfield was trying to keep the Chinese out of the U.S. ("the yellow peril") and I can't imagine he'd be any more friendly to undocumented aliens today (although his wanting to strengthen relations with our neighbors to the south might bode well for a different opinion - perhaps he would have encouraged Mexican immigration as something more favorable to Chinese immigration).

Gingrich as lobbyist. Garfield would have been right at home in the new Gilded Age; although not corrupt himself (or not alive as president long enough to be given the chance), there were cries of foul because he continued working as a lawyer in addition to serving in Congress. He certainly would have been right at home in our time of divided government - but have we ever had a time when our government wasn't bitterly divided over something?

The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare (1961)

2011-11-28T19:31:00.000-08:00

Elizabeth George Speare, if anything, is a meticulous writer. After all, she only wrote four books - two of which won the prestigious Newbery Award. I enjoyed The Bronze Bow in spite of myself - Christian historical fiction would not usually have been my first choice of subject matter, but I had read somewhere it was a good book (it was indeed) and came away pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed and how moving I found the book. I thought Speare did a great job of capturing what it meant to be a "rebel with a cause," the abused teenager Daniel who runs away from a horrible indentured servant hood / slavery to join what he thinks is a rebellion against the Roman Empire in Palestine. Daniel, like many teens, is surly, mistrusting of authority, fanatic in his hatred, and seeking something different in his life. He thinks he's found it in Rosh, a so-called rebel who is essentially a bully and a thug. Under Rosh's auspices, a group of boys eventually form a secret cabal against Rome that has the same quality as modern gangs or boys' clubs throughout the ages - secret passwords and codes, special clothes, and a ringleader. That Daniel is ultimately swayed by a new teacher and preacher, Jesus, Speare also made believable. I have read about some of the controversy surrounding the book - that it's one sided and that it portrays Judaism in a negative light. I suppose it could be seen that way - but I do think something must have been going on during that time to lure at least some Jews (but obviously not all) into seeking something different, whether that be a path of peaceful resistance, or active rebellion, or something else. Elizabeth George Speare tapped into that.

Death in Devil's Acre by Anne Perry (1985)

2011-11-23T12:24:00.000-08:00

This is #7 of the 27 books in the Pitt series. It's been a while since I picked up an Anne Perry, but someone donated fifteen or so paperbacks in the series to the library, which I promptly snatched up and bought. Anne Perry is formulaic to say the least, but in a very good way - I certainly haven't been bored. I didn't think much of the mystery in this one - or the dénouement/resolution for that matter (too abrupt and a tiny bit too deus ex machina for my taste), but it certainly was exciting. I like the descriptive feel of Anne Perry - you certainly feel like you are a mouse in the pocket of these Victorians. There's nothing particularly wonderful or memorable about these novels, other than a definite sense of character, time, and place (and even some character growth from novel to novel). You know Pitt and Charlotte, and their circle wide and small. But you don't learn any great truths or something new about yourself through this - or probably any - detective story. That's certainly not a good reason to stop reading them though!

American Nations by Colin Woodard (2011)

2011-11-23T12:17:00.000-08:00

The premise is really interesting - but this felt like a cross between a really long magazine article, a textbook, and someone's doctoral thesis. A really light re-telling of American history from this very specific point of view. For me at least, this lacked some depth and personality. I understand what he's trying to do and say, but I'm just not sure it needed a whole book.

Naughty in Nice by Rhys Bowen (2011)

2011-11-17T12:48:00.001-08:00

Naughty in Nice by Rhys Bowen

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Rhys Bowen's "Royal" just gets better and better. Naughty in Nice is a screwball comedy of manners as well as a dead body-laden (in the good old fashioned Christie-an style) whodunit. A perfectly fun little murder mystery. It's like everybody on the Orient Express switched trains, went to Nice, and developed a sense of humor and sex appeal. Russian princesses, French aristocracy, the British Royal family, West End actresses, Coco Chanel - this could not have been any better. When's the BBC making this into a sumptuous Mystery?

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Naughty in Nice by Rhys Bowen (2011)

2011-11-17T12:29:00.000-08:00

Another entry in one of my favorite mystery series. Each one has been a gem, but I remember not liking Royal Blood (the predecessor to Naughty in Nice) quite as well as previous entries. Naughty In Nice took me right back to five stars. A total screwball comedy of manners crossed with a mystery, very Agatha Christie only turned up a notch for the 21st century. I hardly ever read and book and think "I'd like to see this as a film" but Naughty in Nice would make a great mystery masterpiece. I love the juxtaposition of real people and historical situations with fictional characters - I hope Coco Chanel and her friend Vera make another appearance in a future Royal novel - I was also hoping we'd head to Nazi Germany and chase spies through the Alps! Tres bien!

Travels In Siberia by Ian Frazier (2010)

2011-11-17T12:23:00.000-08:00

This is due back at the library before I can get it finished, but I really enjoyed what I read. A mix of journalism and history - almost like a long, long magazine article. I'm in the middle of reading about Genghis Khan and what a dick he and all of his Mongol horde were to the rest of the world. I also heard part of this story on a Radio Lab short one afternoon, but didn't realize it until I read that part in the book (the part about Tic Tac Toe) -- a pleasant surprise!

The Chili Queen by Sandra Dallas (2002)

2011-11-11T12:22:00.000-08:00

Utterly disappointing. Flat, cardboard characters, a strange plot. I read ahead to see what was going to happen, and it felt like a storyboard. What makes a good book good and a flat book flat? I can't explain my meta-reading well enough to intelligently state why I liked Tallgrass or The Persian Pickle Club and disliked The Chili Queen.

Goodreads review:

The Chili Queen by Sandra Dallas

My rating: 1 of 5 stars

If you look up "disappointed" in the thesaurus, you see disgruntled, disenchanted, disgruntled, disillusioned, disconcerted - and most useful of all, dashed hopes. My hopes were dashed indeed - I loved the first two Sandra Dallas books I had read, and I was looking forward to The Chili Queen. Dashed, dashed, dashed. The characters felt like cardboard cutouts, the plot went here there and everywhere - but also nowhere. I will certainly give Ms. Dallas another shot, but The Chili Queen left me cold.

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The Gilded Age by Mark Twain & Charles Dudley Warren (1873)

2011-11-10T14:48:00.000-08:00

The Gilded Age was written in the 1872-1973s, according to the introduction, sort of on a bet. Sam and Olivia Clemens were having dinner with their neighbors the Charles Dudley Warrens one evening in Hartford. The husbands, both writers, began arguing with their wives about the state of popular fiction, particularly, novels, which were mostly written by women in a very feminine way during this time period (think of Little Women). The women charged their husbands to write a better novel, and The Gilded Age and the career of Mark Twain as a renowned novelist were born. The two men split the writing between them (which I think shows). They finished the book in 3 months (which I also think shows). Their novel, with its plot of land speculation, government corruption, benign federal oversight, and greed, was not only a bestseller but gave the name Gilded Age to the an era that reflected what was going on in the book.

The book is melodramatic, with its orphaned heroine and exploding steamships and racy murderous love gone wrong. The introduction quotes the base on which the plot - really two or more loosely connected plots - of the book is built,

Beautiful credit. The foundation of modern society. Who shall say that this is not the golden age of mutual trust, of unlimited reliance upon human promises? That is a peculiar condition of society which enables a whole nation to instantly recognize point and meaning in the familiar newspaper anecdote, which puts into the mouth of a distinguished speculator in lands and minds this remark: -- "I wasn't worth a cent two years ago, and now I owe two millions of dollars.

Marvin Felheim, who wrote the introduction (and who apparently taught at the University of Michigan in the 60s 70s and 80s, according to the first three or four hits on Google), also wrote that the novel "rises to a minor climax of comedy and irony" and melodrama - you just needed the beautiful Laura to be tied to the train tracks.

My biggest complaint about the book is that loose collection of plots. Good old Felheim - I'm so glad for his introduction by the way, or I would have been lost some of the time, writes:

For all it's faults, The Gilded Age is a remarkably consistent work. Many groups of chapters... contain... combinations of characteristic elements: the mixture of comedy, farce and satire, which conveys the author's point of view; and the use of melodramatic devices -- letters, parallel plots, sentimental and hopeful speeches, and a busy narrative pace -- by which the authors project the meretricious and manic temper of the age.

Meretricious means: Apparently attractive but having in reality no value or integrity, which may actually describe my feelings about the novel. He goes on state that a line can be drawn through the literature of the age, including Dickens and Harriet Beecher Stowe, and that a commonality among them all was their improvisational style. That's what drove me batty - nothing felt connected, and the parallel plots were like like rivers that met - and then unmet and meandered off, but always close enough to meet again. There weren't any "a-ha!" moments in these parallel plots where I thought "That's why Ruth Bolton is in the book!" Other than the fact I really liked her as a character, and that her father was a speculator, and that he lost all their money - I wasn't sure what their connection to the Hawkins family or Colonel Sellers even was. I guess The Gilded Age was consistent in its inconsistency, and Marvin Feldheim must really be Yoda.

Okay, each of the parallel plots was interesting in itself, and perhaps if I'd just allowed myself to fall into each world without trying to find a common thread, I may have enjoyed the book more.

Certainly, the book was a satire on the greedy capitalism and corruption of the 1870s, and there were so many commonalities between then and now, I don't even think it's particularly surprising. I wonder if other ages -- the 1920s or the 1970s - thought to themselves "We're in the new Gilded Age?" Quotes abound in the book that could have been written about 2011: "Ruth had an idea that a portion of the world lived by getting the rest of the world into schemes. Mr. Bolton could never say no to any of them." (Replace coal mines and Tennessee land speculation with gold and real estate and the Nigerian lottery). "I wasn't worth a cent two years ago, and now I owe two millions of dollars." That strikes close to home, and could also be talking about Greece or Italy.

Mark Twain's humor can be a bit broad and in your face, but his wicked wit is always there to delight as well. When Laura's beau hears rumors about her paternity and stops seeing her, she's pretty upset at first, but then writes him off, in Mark Twain's bitchy best: "Mr. Ned Thurston... is well favored in person, and well liked too, I believe, and comes of one of the first families of the village. He is prosperous, too, I hear; has been a doctor a year, now, and has had two patients -- no, three, I think, yes, it was three. I attended their funerals." You go girl!

I have to admit, that whenever Laura took center stage, she was almost dazzling - but kind of empty. Ruth, Philip, Harry, Washington - they all seemed like that. Perhaps "gilded" referred to their characters as well?

To Timbuktu by Casey Szieszka and Steven Weinberg (2011)

2011-11-09T13:42:00.000-08:00

To Timbuktu: Nine Countries, Two People, One True Story by Casey Scieszka

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Although mostly an engaging travelogue, this is also a little bit graphic novel (I love Weinberg's illustrations), some coming of age (being 23 and just out of college is tough no matter where you are, let alone Mali), a little bit love story (new couple exploring each other with an international backdrop), some personal exploration, and a taste of American and other geopolitics - none of which is very deep (which happened to be fine by me). And Jon Scieszka, the hilarious children's author and advocate of boy literacy, is Casey's dad and makes several cameo appearances (neat!). The moral of the story may be that everyone should get the opportunity to explore another culture in depth, and that do-goodery can be a mixed bag of emotions and help.

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To Timbuktu by Casey Szieszka and Steven Weinberg (2011)

2011-11-09T12:56:00.000-08:00

This was a suggestion from a colleague that I'm glad I picked up. Casey and Steven are studying abroad in Morocco - which brings me to my first digression in this delightful book -- what is it with some much "studying abroad" now? I don't recall knowing anyone who ever "studied abroad." A total twenty something phenom, or something I just missed out on? Or is it because I was neither rich nor went to a school for rich people? Or was I just too lazy? Anyway, they are studying abroad in Morocco - post 9-11 too (brave!), and meet and fall in love, and carry on a long distance relationship. He's finishing college in Maine, and she's finishing college at Pitzer - which means I've probably seen her at the farmer's market, or at the yogurt place, or seen a movie with her, or whatever. They decide after school they are going to find something to do that allows them to travel and to be together. They start off teaching English in China to kids - oh yeah, did I mention that she's Jon Scieszka's daughter? Yeah, the famous children's author. Anyway, they love China, particularly the food. Next is an extended vacation in southeast Asia - Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand. Casey ends up getting really sick, and at some point they have one of those "first fights" over her illness, which is interesting to read about but brings back too many memories of first, second and third fights. They finally end up in Mali (hence the Timbuktu), where she has a Fulbright where she's studying the influence of Islam on schools, and he's working on his art (who PAYS for all of this?). China sounded like heaven to visit and temporarily live (particularly the food), and southeast Asia sounds okay (they thought Thailand was too touristy, which would have probably appealed to me). But North Africa (which they loved in Morocco) sounds hideous to me. Timbuktu was the worst. Everyone there, particularly the kids, see two white Americans as nothing more than cash cows, which I guess is how we are perceived in the world. Rich, rude, and always willing to buy other people's crap. The Timbuktu chapters were particularly depressing, and like them I wished we were back in China.

This is certainly a travelogue. It's also a tiny bit graphic novel - almost every page has one of Steven Weinberg's really cool charcoal drawings (I love them). It's a love story too - a couple in love getting to know one another with the world as their back drop. None of this is particularly in depth, which in the end is okay with me - I love travelogue and detest in depth me-me-me memoirs.

It did make a bit nostalgic for my twenties. I don't recall enjoying those first years out of college all that much - an opportunity like this might have been fun and certainly life changing.

Crazy Horse by Larry McMurtry (1999)

2011-11-06T11:09:00.001-08:00

Crazy Horse by Larry McMurtry

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

McMurtry paints a stark but engaging (like the Great Plains themselves) portrait of Crazy Horse and the time and place in which he lived. He allows both the real man and the legend to share the stage, giving us a impression of who Crazy Horse might have been (because we'll never know the truth) and who people thought he was. The story of Native Americans during the 19th century is definitely one of incredible sadness, misunderstanding, greed, power politics and bigotry, skating along the line of genocide. The life and death of Crazy Horse is a tragedy in the highest, saddest sense. McMurtry says his last days, hours and minutes could have been written by the Greek or Shakespeare, which is definitely true; his romantic relationships could have been written by Danielle Steele. McMurtry is a powerful wordsmith, fully worth of writing a biography of someone who should be considered a American tragic hero.

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Crazy Horse by Larry McMurtry (1999)

2011-11-06T10:19:00.000-08:00

I've never read anything by Larry McMurtry before, although I've certainly heard of Lonesome Dove and The Last Picture Show (I've seen part of this movie, long long long ago). If Crazy Horse is representative of Mr. McMurtry's style, then I will definitely add one or both to my list of things to read. Crazy Horse wasn't meant to be an in depth biography - it's in the Penguin Lives series -- but a sketch of the life of the Sioux warrior. As McMurtry does an excellent job of illustrating, we don't know very much about Crazy Horse. The biographies depended much on hearsay and the reminiscences of old men many years later. McMurtry compared Crazy Horse to Zelig - Crazy Horse apparently was in the background at every big battle and event in the 1970s between Indians and whites, but no one quite remembers what he did or why he was even there.

McMurtry paints a stark but engaging (sort of like the Great Plains themselves) picture about what we do know about Crazy Horse. The actual man as well as the legend are both prominent in the book; McMurtry allows both to have a place at the table (or around the campfire). His crazy love affair with a married woman (I wish we knew more about her!) makes for some interesting reading. If McMurtry says Crazy Horse's death is like Greek Tragedy or Shakespeare, his love affair is definitely either 19th century romance or a modern Harlequin potboiler.

One particularly beautiful line McMurtry writes about Crazy Horse's tragic murder. According to a prophetic dream or vision, Crazy Horse could only be wounded or killed if held by his own people. In military prison for a misunderstanding, his people turned against him - not for any discernible reason either, except the madness of the time overcame them -- and while being held by his own people,he was bayoneted to death by a US cavalry man. "No shot was fired," McMurtry elegantly writes. "And Crazy Horse -- a man who had lost his brother, his daughter, the woman he loved, several friends, his way of life, and even, for a time, his people -- began his leaving as a man and his arrival as a myth, a man around whom stories that are like little gospels accumulate." Poignant and beautiful.

The other story McMurtry relates is just as beautiful, and deals with the last days of Crazy Horse as well. "Not long before Crazy Horse left for the Spotted Tail agency he had a much-reported conversation with this old friend He Dog. Crook [the U.S. general in charge] wanted all the Sioux at Red Cloud to move across the creek... so he could have them handy for a big council. Crazy Horse didn't want to move across the creek, but He Dog thought it might be best to do as he was told. He was nervous, though, about what this move might mean for their friendship, so he asked Crazy Horse if such a move on his part would mean that they were enemies now. Crazy Horse laughed, perhaps for the last time [oh how sad, how tragic]; he then reminded He Dog that he was not speaking to a white man. Whites were the only ones, he said, who made rules for other people. Camp where you please.

So it is with the death of Crazy Horse: the reader is invited to camp where he or she pleases amid the many recollections and recountings."

This story sums up what Crazy Horse meant and still means to many people. There is certainly a contrast and clash between three cultures: traditional Sioux culture (in which everyone was essentially a leader, a true democracy of sorts), the new Sioux culture (in which the whites were in charge and told the Sioux where to camp and what to do) and the white culture (in which there were rules for everything, always in favor of the whites). McMurtry also paints Crazy Horse as almost a Jesus like figure - murdered for his people, surrounded by myth and gospel, and a story that allows people today to make Crazy Horse whatever kind of hero they need in their life.

Ulysses S. Grant and Crazy Horse were contemporaries. Having just finished a sketch of Grant as part of my presidential history binge, it's interesting how little the two have in common as leaders or warriors. It's definitely a case of completely different worlds and cultures. Grant lead hundreds of thousands of men and fought in huge modern battles; Crazy Horse led no one, fought in battles consisting of just a few thousand men, and like a knight of old placed personal valor and bravery far above "winning." Crazy Horse was challenged by that same vision to be always charitable to those less fortunate than him, and that was always a part of his leadership. Grant, too, had some charity in his heart, particularly regarding slavery. Both were quiet loners.

I have to admit here that I still love James Michener (I wish he were still alive and churning out a tome every three years), and reading Crazy Horse made me think quite a bit about Centennial (which I still love too). Crazy Horse might not be a character in Centennial, but his spirit definitely haunts the chapters dealing with Indian wars and massacres in Colorado. I wonder how much his spirit still haunts Wyoming, Montana, the Dakotas - and yes Kansas. As a Kansan, I had no idea that Crazy Horse and his people roamed the plains of my state. That's a shame - his story should be a Kansas story too. Maybe it is now.

Ulysses S. Grant by Josiah Bunting III (2004)

2011-11-03T17:59:00.000-07:00

Ulysses S. Grant by Josiah Bunting III

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

If we are in a new Gilded Age, then it may be time for us all to revisit the administration of Ulysses S. Grant. Bunting does a superb job of deconstructing and reconstructing Grant. Was he a drunk? Sometimes, but he also had some bad press. Was he a butcher? Sometimes, but for good reason - he wanted to end the civil war. Did he preside over a scandal ridden adminstration? Somewhat, but government was under the spoils system back then and worked differently than it does now. Bunting's Grant is a capable, brave general who won the Civil War and wanted to win Reconstruction as well, or the war would have been fought in vain. Grant's fairer treatment of Native Americans(than previous or subsquent administrations) is also a plus in Grant's favor, which Bunting points out has been ignored in our history. Still, in the end Grant could move armies but not his friends and colleagues. "There is little evidence that the Black Friday episode served to put the president on his guard against such future attempts to hoodwink or manipulate the administration or other agencies of government," Bunting writes. "Early on, the country was learning something of the president's style: he was a delegator, loyal to subordinates and probably naive in his judgments of politicians, slow to anger and only rarely given to censure, and reluctuctant to dismiss subordinates under almost any circumstances." And, sadly, "The last man to leave the battlefield at Belmont and the only man not to flinch while sitting on his horse in direct view of enemy soldiers was the same man who could not say no to a friend, and not even a very good friend at that." Amazing how power can all come down to the personal, then and now. "In American politics, then as now, shrinking from saying things that others may not like is at the root of no end of trouble." Gilded Age then and now indeed.

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Ulysses S. Grant by Josiah Bunting III (2004)

2011-11-03T16:57:00.000-07:00

This was a more linear look at Grant than others in this series, and dwelt more heavily on the earlier parts of his life rather than his administration than other books in this series. Bunting certainly makes a valid point that over the years, Grant hasn't always got the appreciate her deserves, particularly with his dealings with Reconstruction and Native Americans. He writes to his good friend and colleague General Sherman about his run for president: "I was forced into it in spite of myself. Backing down would leave the election to be contested between mere trading politicians, the elevation of whom, no matter which party won, would lose us, largely, the results of the costly war which we have just gone through." Grant may have won the war, and really tried to win Reconstruction as well, but the odds just weren't in his favor. The same thing held true for his dealings with Native Americans; he had really good intentions but was unable to exert political will to make them happen. A commonality with many of those 19th century weak executives; history just wasn' t on his side.

Bunting points out - rightly - that most people think of Grant as a drunk (true at times) and a butcher (true at times, too - but he wanted the war to end) and presiding over an administration full of scandals (also true, although Bunting makes a good point that what we call scandal now was practice back then in the days of political patronage). The author can try to save Grant from these labels, but he can only go so far - Grant might have been a mover of armies, but he wasn't a mover of men, particular close friends or colleagues. "There is little evidence that the Black Friday episode served to put the president on his guard against such future attempts to hoodwink or manipulate the administration or other agencies of government," Bunting writes. "Early on, the country was learning something of the president's style: he was a delegator, loyal to subordinates and probably naive in his judgments of politicians, slow to anger and only rarely given to censure, and reluctuctant to dismiss subordinates under almost any circumstances." And, sadly, "The last man to leave the battlefield at Belmont and the only man not to flinch while sitting on his horse in direct view of enemy soldiers was the same man who could not say no to a friend, and not even a very good friend at that." Amazing how power can all come down to the personal, then and now. "In American politics, then as now, shrinking from saying things that others may not like is at the root of no end of trouble." Maybe our current batch of politicians need to take some lessons from that other Gilded Age.

Grant's age struck me. Grant started the Civil War at the same age as I am now, reading this book. I loved how Bunting ended this chapter on Grant's pre-Civil War service and life: "He had left Galena, a quiet civilian walking alongside the volunteer infantry company he had helped organize, only thirty-three months earlier. He was forty one."

"In reelecting Grant, the people were voting for someone with whom they were comfortable, someone they liked. His hold on their affections was not dissimilar to that of Ronald Reagan, however baffling that bond between ordinarhy citizen and president might have seemed to his opponents." That made me think that, like Grant, we may reevaluate Reagan considerably in 150 years when everyone who served under him and loved him personally is dead and gone.

The past presidents, I've taken some major issues of the day and tried to guess how they would have solved them. I'm going to try something different with Grant - I'm goin to take the top five or six or so stories today from The New York Times and NPR on my Iphone, and try to see how Grant would have responded to them (knowing only what I know from this book and anything I can find in Wikipedia about Grant's policies).

Greek Leader Calls Off Referendum on Bailout Plan. Greece was a kingdom back in the 1870s. I'm not sure what our diplomatic relationship was with Greece way back then, but we probably didn't hold much sway over how they ruled. He did appoint Hamilton Fish, who is considered one of the best Secretary of States of all time. Grant was interested in annexing the Dominican Republic, and tussled with Spain and Britain. Still, Henry Cabot Lodge wrote in 1889 - Grant was dead by this time - about American interest in foreign affairs, particulary those outside our hemisphere: "Our relations with foreign nations today fill but a slight place in American politics and excite... a languid interest. We have separated ourselves so completely from the affairs of other people." Grant would be highly unlike to attend a G20 conference.

Many Alarms Rang Before MF Global Crashed. As Grant seemed to preside benignly over several financial scandals, and ultimately over one of the worst depressions in American history, I'm not sure our financial scandals and quandaries and scares today would elicit much response. He certainly vetoed a bill that would have increased circulation of greenbacks, which farmers and westerners were desperate for, because he thought U.S. credit would collapse.

Cuba to Allow Buying and Selling of Property, With Few Restrictions. Grant looked at Cuba with the hungry eye of a conqueror, and probably would have annexed the island back then. He certainly would be interfering there now. Well within the confines of the Monroe Doctrine.

Texas Senate Investigates Pay to Play Allegations. This story has to do with a Rick Perry scandal. See "benign" entry above.

Poor Inreasingly Cluster in Impoverished Areas. Grant seems pretty laissez-faire, when all is said and done, and I'm not sure he would use the government to help out the poor, although he did at least try to help freed slaves and Native Americans.

When all is said and done, though, I think Grant would be at home in the business oligarchy that's currently our federal government today. As would many of his corrupt cabinet members and officials. We're in a new Gilded Age.

The American Transcendentalists : Their Prose and Poetry edited by Perry Miller (1957)

2011-10-30T21:59:00.000-07:00

I picked this out of our donations at work because it had such a cool cover. The book could have been someone's college textbook, only read just the once. It's only had a bit of use, and has that incredible old book smell that I love (but that some people hate - I just don't get that!). Inscribed on the inside: Marilyn (Marily?) McEvoy Walk (Walsh?), June 23, 1964 in old lady script.

I loved Emerson and Thoreau in college.

"A man is entitled to pure air, and to the air of good conversation in his bringing up, and not, as we or so many of us, to the poor-smell and musty chambers, cats and fools." Ralph Waldo Emerson, Historic Notes of Life and Letters in New England. Amen, brother. Good conversation is everything. I don't know why the dig about cats, but too many damn fools, too many.

Andrew Johnson by Annette Gordon-Reed (2011)

2011-10-26T22:40:00.001-07:00

Andrew Johnson by Annette Gordon-Reed

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Andrew Johnson portrayed by Annette Gordon-Reed is a racist pig-headed son of a bitch, and who I am to question her theory? I hardly knew anything about the man coming into this book, other than he followed Lincoln at the beginning of the Civil War, and that he was impeached - and I kind of forgot that until I was half way through the book. Thaddeus Stevens, the Radical Republican from Pennsylvania, called him a "damned scoundrel" and he pretty much was. Gordon-Reed convincingly makes the case that many of Johnson's stupid racist decisions haunted us for a hundred years. Not even four years of having a dumbass as a president, and it wasn't until a hundred years and another Johnson later that the messes he assisted into creation were finally laid to rest. What will we say 100 years from now about our last two or three presidents? Gordon-Reed is a fine writer, crisp and clean, and her sketch of Andrew Johnson is well worth reading.

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Doctor Dolittle's Zoo by Hugh Lofting (1925)

2011-10-26T22:13:00.000-07:00

Like Doctor Dolittle's Post Office, I remember enjoying this one as a child, but found it slow and hard to read as an adult. The concept of the zoo run by the animals is fascinating, but it was essentially a bunch of stories loosely tied together by this concept. Not one of my favorites.

Andrew Johnson by Annette Gordon-Reed (2011)

2011-10-26T21:43:00.000-07:00

Thaddeus Stevens, Radical Republican representative from Pennsylvania, and total Andrew Johnson hater, called him "at heart a damned scoundrel." The Johnson portrayed by Gordon-Reed is a very unlikable, racist, opportunistic assholic politician of the lowest kind (and who I am to doubt her assessment? I knew next to nothing about Andrew Johnson except he succeeded Lincoln and was impeached, and even that fact I forgot until I read this biography). The 19th century was a high time for politicians and presidents, wasn't it? We have Pierce the weak, Buchanan the arrogant, Johnson the asshole... it's no wonder we went to war against ourselves. We couldn't find anyone good to elect. But lo and behold, we also elect our greatest president in the middle of all these bozos (I'm going to give Bozo a bad name here).

Poignant point: Johnson (who may or may not have a been a souse), was falling down drunk at his vice presidential inaugural. Secretary of State Seward and Secretary of the Navy Welles looked on blandly as Johnson stumbled embarrassingly through his speech; Secretary of War Stanton seemed petrified; Attorney General Speed closed his eyes; Postmaster General Wilson was flushed; Senator Sumner looked on with a "saturnine and sarcastic smile" (no lover of Johnson he either). Justice Samuel Nelson's "lower jar dropped in sheer horror." Lincoln "just looked terribly sad." Poor Lincoln. What'll he do? Surrounded by idiots, and a crazy wife - always.

To give Johnson a little slack, the time in which he served as president would have tried even a great man's soul, and we have no idea what would have become of Lincoln, whose popularity at the time waxed and waned as with all presidents. He certainly was the wrong man for the job, and Gordon-Reed convincingly argues that many of his racist decisions haunted the United States for a century. But attitudes weren't going to instantly change; slavery wasn't going to just be swept under the rug. And government wasn't the tool it would later become under a Roosevelt or future Johnson; a whole generation of laissez-faire Democrats in power who did everything they could to lessen the power of the federal government in favor of the states set a tone that would have been difficult to change. Johnson might have been more overtly racist than his Democratic predecessors, but I don't think he was any more or any less in favor of a strong federal government.

He was still an asshole though. What a totally unpleasant man.

His twentieth century biographer Hans Trefousse, said "Johnson was a child of his time, but he failed to grow with it." That's a sad statement, and could be used to describe so many politicians today who can't seem to adapt to a changing world.

If Andrew Johnson was picked up and plopped down in Washington DC 2011, what would he do?

1. Economic crisis. Andrew Johnson was pretty much a chameleon, perhaps the first flip flopper. He did have a passion for helping the little man (as long as he was white). But he was also cheap, and hated spending federal money on anything. Bailing out banks would probably have been out, but figuring out ways to help poor whites would have probably been something he would have at least paid lip service too.

2. Tea Party. You have to give him this - he played both side of the fence pretty damn well. He's a Democrat, who turns against his party, and ends up being elected with a Republican, and then when he becomes president, turns against the Republicans and becomes beloved by (racist) Democrats. I think he would have slipped right into the ranks of the Tea Party - and then turned around and protested with the 99%ers. The man was like the serpent in the garden.

3. Health care. Again, hated spending money but loved poor white people. A rabble rouser when it came to the rights of poor whites. Would probably have done something, but who knows what.

4. Israel, Afghanistan, Iraq. I have no idea, but he did buy Alaska (or at least his Secretary of State bought Alaska) and strutted about on the Mexican border trying to force the French out (they eventually left).

5. Immigration. Definitely would have been against any kind of brown people coming over the border taking jobs from white people

6. Divided government. He would have been right at home in our current mess, and not in a good way. He definitely thrived in the chaos of a divided country and government.

7. Climate change. Wouldn't have spent federal money on this, unless in some way it could help him personally or help poor whites.

Abraham Lincoln by George McGovern (2009)

2011-10-21T22:25:00.000-07:00

Abraham Lincoln by George S. McGovern

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

There's been some really great stuff written about Abraham Lincoln since 1865 - masterful works of history and moving poetry, music and stage and film and you wouldn't think we'd need yet another book. It's 150 years later, and I'm glad to have read this. We still have much to learn from Lincoln. As McGovern points out, his writing alone is probably the best of all of our presidents. He was a brilliant mover of men, an adept maker of war who valued peace, a flexible politician who knew when to stand firm and when to skedaddle (move sideways is more like it). Lincoln is a man of all parties, and liberals and conservatives both can claim him - but I think McGovern does a fine job of claiming him for the left. Hater of slavery, beginner of civil rights, the farmer's friend, a president who believed in the Union and that the federal government was there to help people (or at least help people help themselves). McGovern's Lincoln is a Democrat, that's for sure. My only wish is that McGovern could have infused a bit more of his own personal opinions into the book, but that aside, this is a pretty good look at Lincoln's tics and tricks.

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Abraham Lincoln by George McGovern (2009)

2011-10-21T12:52:00.000-07:00

I was a little disappointed by this one. I certainly wasn't looking for or expecting a complete biography of Lincoln, or even a biographical sketch. I guess what I expected was a essay about Lincoln infused with the ideas George McGovern. I think there are two few "injections of McGovern." I can really think of only one example where McGovern seems to be speaking for both himself and Lincoln, when he talks about how Lincoln used the presidency to expand the role of the federal government. "Government would go on to play a much more significant role in the lives of average Americans" after the war. That's certainly a Democratic idea and ideal, although it's also true.

The book is a chronological look at Lincoln or his administration. After two chapters outlining his early life and rise to power ("Humble Beginnings" and "The Making of a Stateman"), McGovern divides the book into three "Lincoln and..." chapters: Lincoln and the Union, Lincoln and Emancipation, and Licoln and Total War. Politics in Wartime (chapter 6) was a foray into the political genius of Abraham Lincoln; Rising Above the Fray: Second Term was a look at what was and what could have been; Victory and Death was a really sad chapter on Lincoln's assassination.

McGovern writes that Lincoln's American Dream was "that all men and women should have equal opportunity to improve their lot." Lincoln certainly changed his mind about African Americans over the years, and while I don't think in any way could his opinions be called modern, they did evolve postively. I would like to think that if Lincoln were president today, he would evolve positively over such hot button issues as marriage equality.

Because Lincoln was a war president - one of the only soley war presidents we have - his domestic achievements are not as evident. But McGovern's Lincoln isn't a tea partier (unlike his immediate two predecessors). He used government to build railroads and passed the homestead act, started the draft and instituted an income tax. He certainly broadened the powers of the presidency both in Washington and federally. States rights vanished (to rise again in 2010). (I think Lincoln may be one of those presidents that everyone claims as their own, liberal or conservative; who wants to be against Lincoln?).

What would Lincoln do?

1. Economic crisis. As a Whig, he believed that government played a role in helping the economy along; he was for a nationalized modern banking system. I'm not sure what he would have done, but it wouldn't have been sitting back and doing nothing.

2. Tea Party. I think most of what the Tea Party stands for - smaller government, no taxes, anti-immigration -- seems to be polar opposite of the ideals of Abraham Lincoln.

3. Health care. Again, his view that government was a tool to solve problems would probably extend to the health care debate.

4. Israel, Afghanistan, Iraq. This is an unfair question to pose to 19th century presidents before McKinley. The United States wasn't interested in anything outside of this hemisphere. But he must have appointed excellent ambassadors and diplomats, because France and England stayed out of the war.

5. Immigration. Let's quote Lincoln himself: As a nation, we begin by declaring that "all men are created equal." We now practically read it, "all men are created equal," except negroes. When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read, "all men are created equal," except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics.

6. Divided government. "A house divided against itself can not stand." But "with malice towards none and charity towards all." This great president with his team of rivals would have hated divided government but been a far better sweet-talker than our current president. I think he could have moved mountains instead of hills.

7. Climate change. Back to those Whig philosophies - use government to fix this problem (or government gives people the tools to fix the problem).

A Murder on the Appian Way by Steven Saylor (1996)

2011-10-17T10:23:00.000-07:00

A Murder on the Appian Way by Steven Saylor

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Like John Maddox Roberts, Steven Saylor often takes real mysteries or murders from Roman history and adds his own twists. The death of Clodius Pulcher takes center stage in this murder mystery, as Gordianus the Finder is hired by both Fulvia (wife of Clodius) and Pompey the Great to find out what exactly happened. This is definitely more of a political thriller rather than a traditional murder mystery - but there are several mysteries (both great and small) that Saylor explores. Who murdered Clodius Pulcher actually comes as somewhat of a surprise, although the explanation seems awfully sudden. However, it's not for the whodunnits that you read Steven Saylor - it's for the incredible attention to historical detail and knowledge. If occasionally it feels like a history lesson, at least its an interesting history lesson full of fascinating characters and a turbulent, interesting time period.

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Robert E. Lee by Roy Blount, Jr. (2003)

2011-10-13T12:53:00.000-07:00

I wish I could adequately describe or capture Roy Blount's style - subtle and droll but never glibly so. He takes his subject very seriously but also injects what I assume from listening to him on NRP's Wait Wait Don't Tell Me is his trademark gentle but pointed humor. Here's just one delightful example, talking about the ever complaining and mostly unpleasant sounding (for good reason though) Mary Lee and the Yankees taking over their house at Arlington. "Many of the Cold Harbor dead were buried in Mary Lee's front yard. That spring, George Meigs, an angry Georgian who had served under Lee before the war but had remained with the Union and become quartermaster general, had turned her old homeplace into a national cemetery. Those people." It's those little aside and humorous (or should I say Humorist) turns of phrase that makes this a delightful little book. Blount's asides and punctures of humor are carefully dropped here, there - and really everywhere - throughout the book, but they never get in the way. Robert E. Lee wasn't someone I knew a whole lot about - probably just about as much as everyone else. Blount's sketch of Lee seems more of an impressionist watercolor in the humorous sense - the closer in your get, the more the image vanishes. That seems to be Lee: from a broad vantage point, he appears on horseback, but as you delve a little deeper you start to lose sight of exactly who the man is. He didn't reveal much for historians to ponder about, but ponder they have done, and the Lee we think we know probably isn't Lee.

"Lee is the moral equivalent of Hitler's brilliant field marshall Erwin Rommel (who, however, turned against Hitler, as Lee never did against Jefferson Davis, who, to be sure, was no Hitler).

"The vexed question of the American citizenry's untrammeled right to bear arms may derive from..." the concern of 200 years of slave rebellions and the need to stay armed against your slaves rising up in the night and (justly) killing you.

I purposely read this Penguin sketch of Robert E. Lee after Buchanan and Pierce but before Lincoln. I've been wondering since I read the political stories of Pierce and Buchanan if the Civil War was inevitable - and more importantly, was emancipation contingent on the Civil War. Blount certainly remarks upon in. "Probably the United States could no longer bear slavery, and it took a cataclysm to wrench that institution out of the system."

Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick, introduction by Jonathan Lethem (2002)

2011-10-10T13:47:00.000-07:00

I started this back in July, and I read almost every story in the book, but somewhere around September I got bored and stopped. They all started to sound the same. I'll bet in the 1950s reading a Philip K. Dick short story in whatever publication - Amazing Stories or the Magazine of Science Fiction and Fantasy or any of the other short story mags - I'll bet each one seemed like a gem. But there was plenty of time and space in between each story, some time to savor and anticipate - that was probably heaven. The stories ARE good - but in small doses. One big dose is too much.

Crossing the Tracks by Barbara Stuber (2010)

2011-10-09T10:38:00.002-07:00

I crossed the tracks and went right back. I love Sandra Dallas, and from the initial plot descriptions - and even the opening few pages - this could have been a read alike to Sandra Dallas for kids. But the characters soon flattened out, the plot went no where, the descriptions were dull, there was no sense of place or time. The spark just wasn't there.

James Buchanan by Jean H. Baker (2004)

2011-10-09T10:38:00.001-07:00

James Buchanan by Jean H. Baker

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Jean H. Baker carves out a convincing argument that the policies of James Buchanan were influenced by his extreme pro-southern attitudes (I'm going to call them crushes), and that it was this, not his dithering or aged mental faculties, which exacerbated the lead-up to the Civil War. The Buchanan that Baker (rightly) paints is a pompous, arrogant ass whose inflexible hate of the Republican Party and his love for southerners fostered a divided government that makes our current situation look like a game of Candyland. "Love" for southerners was most likely the love that dare not speak its name, although I think Baker misses the mark here when she discusses his homosexuality. I agree with her that in the 19th century, the concept of homosexuality as an identity didn't exist. And she's certainly not saying that sexual relationships between men did not exist. We obviously can't prove that Buchanan was someone who liked having sex with men. What happened between he and his "roommate" is up for speculation. Certainly other pols at the time were suspicious, at least of his masculinity, and even President Jackson made allusions to his sexuality (in a veiled way, mind you). But when Baker goes on to write: "The best speculation about the sexuality of the nonshaving Buchanan... is that he had little interest in sex." Whoa there! I think the best speculation to make is that he was probably homosexual but that we'll never actual know - not that he never had sex at all. We can't really know either for sure, but she discounts one (that he probably liked having sex with men) in favor of the other (which is more extreme, I think). Come on, I think we can speculate at least - we can't prove either.

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James Buchanan by Jean H. Baker (2004)

2011-10-09T09:10:00.000-07:00

Franklin Pierce has a one-up on his successor James Buchanan. At least with Franklin Pierce, the reader or historian can argue that we have the hindsight of 160 years, while Pierce had to act (or most often not act) within the confines of the moment. I guess we should be able to say the same thing about James Buchanan, if only he weren't such an unlikable, stiff, arrogant, stupid, proud, peacockish buffoon. Jean H. Baker carefully carves out an argument that Buchanan was effective as a pro-southern president who espoused a love for the Union while at the same time actively working for the favor of the secession. She goes so far as to say that Buchanan came as close to treason as any president in our history, skating right up to the line (and in actuality probably skating over the line, but some documents and papers have conveniently disappeared). The more I read her short sketch of "Old Buck" the more I disliked him. He was the first president to use the office more as an actor and less as an administrator of the will of Congress - but only when he wanted to. When it came to slavery or southern issues, he turned up his hands and said "While I want to do something, the Constitution says I can't." Strict constitutional constructionists are like Bible fundamentalists - they seem to have the magical ability to ignore or adapt parts of the document while stressing the rock solid legality of other parts. Funny how that works.

I kept wondering "What if." What if Buchanan hadn't been a pro-southern strict constructionist but had been able to prevent secession? (Baker herself wonders what would have happened if Stephen Douglas had been elected president in place of Buchanan). Did we need the Civil War in order to free the slaves, or would it have happened anyway? What would the United States have looked like without a defeated South? (Alternative historical fiction is built on these questions).

Let's play the same game we played with Franklin Pierce: if James Buchanan were faced with some of the same challenges that Barack Obama, what would he do?

1. Economic crisis. James Buchanan did have an economic crisis happen on his watch, the Panic of 1857. As Baker points out, "No one expected the president to do much about the economy in these years before government intervention became acceptable practice. And indeed, Buchanan did nothing... announcing in his first annual message that the government was 'without the power to extend relief.'" I'm sure Barack Obama is wishing about right now that he had the same abilities of James Buchanan to do nothing. Buchanan wanted more gold rather than paper money on the market, and -- amazingly for us in these Keynsian times - no federal projects. Baker wryly pointed out "As with many American presidents who promise frugality, during his administration expenses grew by... about 15 percent... Buchanan left Lincoln a deficit."

2. The rise of the Tea Party Movement - and maybe I should now add the 99% Movement as well (We'll see where that one goes though). Franklin Pierce sounded more like a Tea Partier than James Buchanan, but Old Buck still had plenty of Tea Party sentiments. I think he would have felt right at home in the Tea Party.

3. Health Care. This was the president who vetoes the Homestead Act and funding for education. I don't think he would have approved of nationalized health care. That's what charities were for.

4. Israel, Afghanistan, Iraq. Buchanan was an interventionist, somewhat unlike his predecessor. He sent troops to Paraguay and wanted to buy or invade Cuba. He postured against England and Mexico. The Monroe Doctrine and Manifest Destiny played a major role in his foreign policy decision-making, which would have hampered him now. Still, I think he would have enthusiastically invaded Iraq and Afghanistan (although supporting Israel might be a different story). It's funny how presidents who fail domestically always taut their foreign policy expertise; Buchanan not only proved this rule, he invented it.

5. Immigration. As a legislator, Buchanan wanted to make the process longer to become a citizen and only give native born citizens voting rights. I think he would maybe have responded to Mexican illegal immigration by annexing Mexico.

6. Divided government. Buchanan certainly proved he could not govern effectively with divided government. He was extremely partisan, much more so than any of our modern presidents, who are often forced by public opinion (something that really didn't exist back then) to at least make a show of compromise. He hated and feared Republicans and completely refused to work with them, to the detriment of the country.

7. Climate change. His fiscal policies - or lack of them - and his strict reading of the Constitution (when it suited him) would have tied his hands on climate change.

Essentially, Buchanan was a pompous, arrogant ass who essentially caused the Civil War.

One quibble I had with Baker was about Buchanan's homosexuality. Understandably, no one identified as "gay" or even "homosexual" in that early part of the 19th century. "Men at that time did not have sexual identities" which may or may not have been a true statement - sexual identities weren't just in the closet, they were thrown into the well out back and probably only furtively brought out. But there were boy prostitutes, and places you could go to pick up men, even back then, so even if men didn't identify as gay, they certainly had sex with one another. Buchanan wasn't gay or homosexual in our modern sense. But where there's smoke, there's fire. He lived with the same man for many years, a fellow legislator from the south, and I think his extreme pro-southern attitudes can be possibly attributed to his numerous crushes on southern men. I guess this could have been a "bromance" but I think the likely speculation is that Buchanan was homosexual. Certainly other politicians were disparaging about Buchanan's sexuality, including President Jackson - but interestingly wasn't ostracized for it; it didn't effect his career. I agree with Baker that "Buchanan may have been too ambitious to jeopardize his career in this way." But she goes on to write: "The best speculation about the sexuality of the nonshaving Buchanan... is that he had little interest in sex." Whoa there! I think the best speculation to make is that he was probably homosexual but that we'll never actual know - not that he never had sex at all!

City of Dreams: A Novel of Niew Amsterdam and Early Manhattan by Beverly Swerling (2001)

2011-10-04T17:24:00.001-07:00

City of Dreams: A Novel of Nieuw Amsterdam and Early Manhattan by Beverly Swerling

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

New York felt more like a painted backdrop in front of which a clan of doctors in colonial New York procreated, fought, procreated some more, fought some more, plotted (to further the plot), feuded (for unfathomable reasons), cut people open, vaccinated, procreated some more (graphically), and just plain acted like pieces of trash towards one another. The only line missing was "Which one of you bitches is my mother?" The pot boileth over, as did my patience.

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City of Dreams: A Novel of Nieuw Amsterdam by Beverly Swerling (2001)

2011-10-04T16:53:00.001-07:00

I think this was a potboiler disguised as an epic piece of historical fiction. A family tree of doctors spreads up and through the history of old New York, during which they screw and betray one another, and hate each other, and plot against each other, and the only reason they didn't wrestle around and throw each other into the swimming pool of one or the other's mansion is because they had neither. Nieuw Amsterdam felt more like a painted backdrop - it didn't ever really feel genuine. The pot boiled over again and again, particularly with the sex scenes (which frankly, I didn't really want to read). This would make a great soap but doesn't make a very interesting piece of epic historical fiction. This was no Michener. I did keep wondering if the characters from Edward Rutherfurd's New York ever ran into Beverly Swerling's characters. Quite frankly, Rutherfurd's New York characters - and novel - kicks Swerling's characters' ass.

Franklin Pierce by Michael F. Holt (2010)

2011-09-30T11:15:00.001-07:00

Franklin Pierce by Michael F. Holt

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Holt does an admirable job of exploring the failures (I'm not sure if there were any successes - I certainly don't remember any from the book) of the Pierce presidency. There's actually not a whole lot to say about what Pierce did do during his one term in office, but it sounds like he basically sat back and did mostly nothing. At least some presidents dither and worry - Pierce seemed to just sit. He makes Calvin Coolidge seem like a mover and shaker, that's for sure. Nero at least fiddled while Rome burned. Pierce did a whole lot of nothing. He was a mostly forgettable legislator. If only he were as forgettable a president - he is memorable, but for his proclivity to do nothing. His post presidency, when he could have built a legacy (Carter, anyone?) he spent drinking like a fish. Franklin Pierce will (hopefully always) be the example of what NOT to do as president. Holt made his material as interesting as he could. As Julie Andrews sang: "Nothing comes from nothing." Actually, something did come from nothing: the Civil War. The 1860s say "thanks."

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Franklin Pierce by Michael F. Holt (2010)

2011-09-29T17:23:00.000-07:00

I've gone back in time a considerable way in my quest to read The American Presidents series, edited by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. I'm going to read Pierce through Ulysses S. Grant, with a detour into Robert E. Lee (and the Penguin Lives series) along the way. This is the 160th to 150th anniversary of many of the events described in the book. Michael Holt, the author, is a professor at the University of Virginia, and one web site I read about him said his main interest was antebellum political parties. That's the tack he takes with Franklin Pierce. Holt points out that almost all writers of presidential history rank Pierce at the very bottom of the barrel, rotting along down there with Nixon, Buchanan (he's next for me) and Harding. And most authors blame Pierce because "personal mistakes in judgment and a lack of farsighted statesmanship... Others portray Pierce, for all his amiability, as a fundamentally weak man who craved the approval of his peers and who deferred to stronger personalities in his cabinet and party." (many also blame Pierce's alcoholism, but his hard drinking was more of a problem at the end of his life than during his presidency). Holt showed that all three played a major part in the fall of the Pierce presidency. He also makes a good case for Pierce's desire to keep the splintering Democratic Party from completely falling apart to the detriment of keeping the country together. He was certainly in a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation, but his leadership of the country during this crucial time certainly led the USA down the road to Civil War.

Pierce sounds a bit spoiled to me. He was definitely a political wunderkind, and only JFK has been elected at a younger age (Pierce was 48, Kennedy was 43). He was a strict constructionist, weak executive branch, states' rights Democrat (which sounds more like a Republican to me - how the times have changed). With so much distance between the time of Pierce and now, I think we forget how sectionalized the country was before (and even after) the Civil War. The South is still distinct, but in the antebellum period it was distinct and distinctly politically powerful. The South still votes in a block for the most part, but back then it really was another country, even before they seceded. The executive branch was weak; Congress was all powerful, and Southerners held sway in the Legislative and Judicial branches of government, in the Democratic Party and other parties, and definitely had Pierce's ear and heart. In one sentence, Holt describes Pierce as taking a public stand (over Kansas - Nebraska) that "seemed overtly prosouthern." Even 160 years later, Pierce's actions don't just "seem" prosouthern - they read as prosouthern and I would say are prosouthern. This may have been an attitude he held all along, but more likely as his term progressed his attitudes changed. He comes across as very benign - the country was certainly heading towards war (although no one knew it then), and Bleeding Kansas (the opening salvos of the Civil War) had started under Pierce's watch. His reactions seem almost nonexistent; in Holt's narrative, Pierce seems like an observer, neither actor or reactor. That's certainly probably the main case against Pierce - when he could have done or said something that averted the war, he did not. To give Pierce a bit of credit - no one knew a war was coming (although certainly many probably suspected it), the bully pulpit presidency was a long time coming (Teddy Roosevelt wasn't even born yet), and Pierce was hampered by his own ideology (party over country, legislative over executive, certain conservative action over liberal action). There weren't many alternatives to Pierce. The Whigs were in the process of falling apart; the Know Nothing Party (the party was so secretive that if asked about themselves, members "knew nothing" ala Sergeant Schultz). was strong, but sectional differences splintered that party as well. "General Apathy is the strongest candidate out there" Holt quotes; this would remain the lowest turnout among voters until the 1920s). The slate that year was actually kind of interesting -- including former president Millard Fillmore (Who knew that Millard Fillmore was actually sort of interesting and certainly popular; I'm definitely headed in that direction next), war hero Winfield Scott, and Senator Daniel Webster. The Democrats were able to stand together more than the other gradually eroding parties, and Pierce was the man of the hour. For about an hour, and then everything certainly starting falling apart.

Poor Pierce. A doomed Presidency, the party turned against him and refused to renominate him, turning to James Buchanan instead (another rotten apple at the bottom of the barrel). He was a good sport about it, and still supported the Democrats. As the country started to fall apart, he said some things about how important the Union was, but it didn't seem like he did a whole bunch to keep the country united. His wife was dying at that time, and his drinking had hit a new high. He asked Jefferson Davis to run for president, and predicted the north would also splinter into sectionalized violence once the South seceded. He continued to be more of a Democrat than an American, and was "dismayed" at the breakup of the Democratic Party. There wasn't probably a whole lot Pierce or anyone else could have done at that point to prevent the South from breaking away and from the Civil War starting.

I want to play a game called What Would Pierce Do (WWPD). If we had a time machine, and took it back to 1852, and we picked up Franklin Pierce and brought him to 2008-2011, and then took Barack Obama back to 1852 - WWPD as a 21st Century President? How would he have handled the challenges of the last few years? Here are some challenges Barack Obama has faced, and how I think Pierce would have handled them.

1. Economic Crisis and Fiscal Crisis. Franklin Pierce would not support any kind of government bail out, that's for sure. He was a "strict constructionist" and didn't believe the Constitution allowed any kind of appropriations from the federal government. He vetoed bills for appropriating public works. Actually, the United States was doing really well economically during Pierce's single term in office, but that was probably not due to anything he said or did.

2. Rise of the Tea Party. Democrat Franklin Pierce governed more like a tea partier than most Republicans are even able to think about doing today.

3. Health Care Debate. Again, the strict constructionist Pierce would have been solidly on the side of those espousing anti-national health care views. If slavery was the issue of the 1850s, maybe health care is the similar issue of now. Pierce believed slavery was allowable and defensible because the Constitution said so. The Constitution makes no mention of health care, but does give states various rights over the federal government; I think Pierce would have thrown health care back at the states for them to take care of.

4. The Middle East. Entangling alliances between the United States and foreign countries were a big no-no. Franklin PIerce would have left the Middle East alone as a European problem to solve. I imagine brown people rising up against their government during the Arab Spring would have given him the willies. The problems of Israel would first all make no sense to him, and secondly those pesky entanglements would have prevented him from making any sort of move to help or hinder Israel. The Middle East, you're on your own.

5. Immigration. That whole "brown people" thing would have probably kept Pierce firmly on the side of the tea party and anti-immigration folks. Plus, he probably wasn't a huge fan of Mexicans, having been a general in the Mexican-American War. He was for fiddling around with other governments in our hemisphere and supported the whole Manifest Destiny thing (for example, hinting at wanting to buy Cuba), so I think he would have been actively involved in the Mexican government, and maybe even trying to buy Mexico or Canada. Or invading Cuba.

6. Divided government. Franklin Pierce was completely ineffectual during the divided government - and divided country - of the 1850s, and I think he would have been equally "at home" with the divided government of today. Party before country seemed to be his motto, which to me again sounds more Republican than Democrat.

7. Iraq and Afghanistan. See Middle East.

8. Climate and environment. Once again, the Constitution isn't very specific about preservation of our natural resources or global warming, and I think Pierce would have mostly ignored the problems. I'm not sure FEMA would exist under a Pierce administration.

Doctor Dolittle's Caravan by Hugh Lofting (1924)

2011-09-29T17:22:00.001-07:00

Doctor Dolittle's Caravan by Hugh Lofting

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was my favorite Dolittle book in the series as a kid, and re-reading it as a grown up did not change my feelings about it one bit. As a kid, I don't think I knew anything about opera that wasn't in a Bugs Bunny cartoon; now that I know a little bit more, Lofting's wit and parody is pretty clever. His Canary Opera could be a real opera, complete with a tiny temperamental prima donna, mixed reviews, an Andrew Lloyd Webber-esque set, modern music, royal fans. Setting a fantasy is recognizable time period is one of my favorite conceits, and Lofting plunks Dolittle's Caravan right in the middle of a very believable London of 1838 or 1839. Lofting resented having his books referred to as "juvenile literature", and i>Caravan might be the proof that he was writing sophisticated literature that both parents and children could simultaneously enjoy. Like all books in the series, the Dolittlian digressions are many. But the humor is funny (and punny) and the plot (whenever you make your way back to it) is a joy.

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Doctor Dolittle's Caravan by Hugh Lofting (1924)

2011-09-29T15:58:00.000-07:00

My favorite Doctor Dolittle book as a child is still (so far) my favorite as a grown-up. This starts like the best Broadway stories, with the Doctor as a brilliant impresario discovering Pippinella, the mezzo contralto canary, in a pet shop. After some information about Pippinella to set the scene - her childhood, her various scrapes and adventures with various owners (Doctor Dolittle books are nothing if not episodic and full of stories), the meat of the book begins - in the classic words of Judy Garland and Micky Rooney "Hey kids, let's put on a show." And that's exactly what happens - fresh off the Puddleby Panto, Dolittle and Co. writes, directs and produces the Canary Opera, starring diva Pippinella, and featuring various birds (flamingos, pelicans, wrens, sparrows) in various roles (sailors, cheeky urchins).

I don't think I probably knew a thing about opera outside of Bugs Bunny as a kid. I know more now, and I enjoyed Caravan all the more. Pippinella's voice, referred to a "mezzo-contralto," is an old fashioned term to refer to a certain kind of dark, hefty soprano - an ironically funny way to describe the pure, sweet voice of a little bird. In fact, describing and portraying Pippinella as a (little bit) temperamental and opinionated prima donna takes some witty literary chops. The entire opera plot is not exactly parody - Lofting's Canary Opera is filled with some serious verisimilitude down to the appearance of violin wizard Paganini (probably putting the story in the late 1830s; the reference to the Queen probably makes the Canary Opera premiering in 1838 or 1839). Those touches of realism in a fantasy work make Caravan all the better; fantasy set in a specific time period is always my favorite kind of fantasy (perhaps stemming from my early love of this book).

The other animals in the Dolittle household get their fair share of fun and funniness, particularly Gub-Gub the pig vs. Dab-Dab the duck over the dumbwaiter (the funniest scenes in the book by far). The Princesses dinner party was memorable but too short - this was a missed opportunity by Lofting in creating a "comedy of etiquette."

There is the prerequisite Dolittlian meandering of plot, or, as Michael Cart put it in his book What's So Funny: Wit and Humor in American Children's Literature: "If Lofting has a fault as a writer, it may be a product of his respect for his young readers and an overestimation of their capacity for patience... Lofting... never met a digression he didn't like." I totally see what Cart is talking about - the "release of the blackbirds" -- seemed to majorly punch a whole in the middle of the story that took a long time to fill in again. But I also think these digressions add background, character development, extra-humor to the Dolittle books. Making the books longer didn't stop me from reading them - in fact, the longer books were more delicious, because you could even fall deeper into the rabbit hole. As a grownup I was more annoyed by the digressions in Post Office, but for the most part, the digressions in Caravan never detracted from the epic canary tale.

Some Lofting wit:

Gub-Gub:

"I have day dreams about food - twenty course meals, you know - they are so much better than the lunches and dinners I ever get in real life. Real life, I find, is not nearly so thrilling -- seldom runs to more than boiled beef and cabbage and rice pudding."

"You have a romantic soul," growled Jip. "Food -- always food."

"Well," said Gub-Gub, "there's lots of romance in food if you only knew it. Did you ever hear of Vermicelli Minestrone?"

"No," said the white mouse. "What is it - a soap?"

"Certainly not," Gub-Gub retorted. "Vermicelli Minestrone was a poet - a famous food poet. He married Tabby Ochre. It was a runaway match. But she stuck to him through thick and thin. People said she was a colorless individual and would stick to anything. But he loved her dearly and they were happy. They had two children -- Pilaf and Macaroni. He was a great man, was Minestrone. his library consisted of nothing but cookbooks -- cookbooks of every age and in every language. But he wrote some beautiful verses. His Spaghetti Sonnets, his Hominy Homilies, his Farina Fantasies, well, you should read them. You would never say again there was no romance in food."

"It's sort of a cereal story," groaned Jip... (AND US!)... "mushy."

The Doctor wants to start a bank where animals can save up their earnings, and asks Jip the dog if it should be called "The Cat and Dog Trust Company" :

"No I would have it the Cat-and-Dog anything," said Jip. "That sounds
like a fight to start with. Besides, cats wouldn't go into it. They
have no use for money. They'd never earn any. Cats are not
public-spirited. They are naturally lazy. All they want is a soft
place in the sun or a fire to sleep by."

I must be a cat - that's all I want too.

The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell (2008)

2011-09-23T16:57:00.000-07:00

I feel like I'm suppposed to like The Wordy Shipmates because I so much liked the last two Sarah Vowell's I read - Assassination Vacation and the one about Hawaii (whose name escapes me right now). But whereas her circular peculiar humorist style really intrigued and impressed me in those two books, it annoyed me in this one. I couldn't quite pin down exactly what this book was about -- Pilgrims? 9/11? Ronald Reagan? It all just felt very pedestrian. That may be the subject matter (probably my least favorite historical time is Colonial America) but I have enjoyed other books from that time period (I'm reading a potboiler set in Colonial New York City right now!). So I fear it's Sarah Vowell this time. I'm going to go to Goodreads and read some reviews, and I'll be I'll kick myself for not finishing it, but I can't - I'm just not caring what is going to come next.

One good line: There isn't that much difference between tall tales that start "Listen, my children, and you shall hear" and "Here's the story of a man named Brady." In other words, Americans have learned our history from exaggerated popular art for as long as anyone can remember.

a few minutes later. Literary redemption is sweet. Others felt the same way!

Crow Call by Lois Lowry, illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline (2009)

2011-09-23T16:11:00.000-07:00

I actually watched this as a short film first before reading it. I was incredibly moved by the film. Early one November morning, sometime in the mid-1940s, a father and daughter go out hunting crows together. Right away, the narrator -from the illustrations a young blonde girl with bright inquisitive blue eyes, lets us know that she has an older sister at home asleep (we see this too, sister asleep next to a just vacated bed with dawn breaking through the windows); this journey is just between she and her father. Ibatoulline's illustrations (watercolor and acryl-gouche) set the tone perfectly - muted in that 1940s kind of way, everything looks like a faded old yellowed photograph. Ibatoulline's dedication is in memory his favorite artist, Andrwe Wyeth, and that influence clearly shows. Father is illustrated with just the right touch of old and young; a young man aged from the war, but not destroyed to the point of being unable to enjoy the company of his daughter. Daughter does point out that they are strangers to one another after so long: "The war has lasted so long. He has been gone so long."

The text is poetic, the plot almost magical. A look back at buying the plaid boys hunting shirt together is sweet; their early morning breakfast in the diner is equally so, especially when the waitress (described as groggy by Lowry but looking fresh and clean as a 1940s waitress could be by Ibatoulline) mistakes daughter for a son, causing them both to giggle.

But really the book grabs you - and makes you think - when the two begin their hunt for crows. The crow call of the title is a small device that, when blown, imitates the sounds of crows and makes them rise in answer, which in turn allows a hunter to kill them. Daughter enjoys making the sound of the crows, but isn't so sure about the hunting part. (it's also these midwestern thicket scenes where Ibatoulline really captures the moment of November, the crisp, leafless trees and empty white morning sky; you can almost see their frozen breath, hear the leaves crunching under foot, and smell the Thanksgiving turkey cooking just over the rise). This alone time also gives her a chance to ask some questions she's probably been too scared to ask and also which the idea of hunting and guns has brought up in her mind: "Daddy, were you scared in the war?" "Yes, I was scared." "Of what?" "Lots of things. Of being alone. Of being hurt. Of hurting someone else." "Are you still?" "I don't think so. those kinds of scares go away." (not always) "I'm scared sometimes..." "I know... are you scared now?" She starts to say, but "the word that scares me: hunter." "Maybe a little... I wish the crows didn't eat the crops."

Then profound words: "They don't know any better," he says. "Even people do bad things without meaning to." I read that and thought: yeah, like follow a government that tortures and kills millions of people, invades neutral countries, and seperates families... we all blindly follow sometimes, and end up doing bad things without meaning too. As they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Of course (like war), crows eventually show up. She is delighted that they think that she's a crow and are talking to her, and then she says something incredibly sad. "Look Daddy! Do you hear them? They think I'm their friend! Maybe their baby, all grown up!" And I thought, "you are his baby, all grown up, and you have called to him, and he's answered." Father ends up not hunting any crows that day (which is a good thing) but there aren't any promises made that crows won't be hunted in the future (war will return, and daddies and little girls will be seperated again).

Although tecnically fiction, Lois Lowry writes at the back of the book: "The details of this story are true. They happened in 1945, to me and my father. But parents and children groping toward understanding each other - that happens to everyone. And so this story is not really just my story, but everyone's."

Doctor Dolittle's Post Office by Hugh Lofting (1923)

2011-09-22T12:14:00.000-07:00

Doctor Dolittle's Post Office by Hugh Lofting

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was one of my favorite in the series as a kid, but it hasn't held up as well. It's too meanderingly episodic, and Lofting's fantasy rules don't quite hold water all the time. Doctor Dolittle isn't racist, and according to what I read neither was Hugh Lofting. But he writes in a certain time period when it was considered okay to write about Africans in a derogatory way and that fact certaily rings true in Post Office. Certainly, if this were written today it would have a far different feel. That large complaint aside, I still had fun reading it. I love Gub-Gub the pig; and racist though he may be, Cheapside the Cockney Sparrow can be quite fun. "Jip's Story" is the best of the animal stories; it could certainly stand alone.

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Doctor Dolittle's Post Office by Hugh Lofting (1923)

2011-09-21T18:17:00.000-07:00

It's kind of funny, because I remember Doctor Dolittle's Post Office as being one of my favorites as a kid, but it wasn't nearly as good as Doctor Dolittle's Circus. It's very episodic and meanders here there and everywhere. The timeline is off too. Written after Story and Voyages, it takes place after Story and Circus -- but Circus was written afterwards! It's got some sort of cringing racism -- the illustrations are gruesome -- and "white man saves the colored folk" sort of plotline. Very similar to Voyages, actually. Lofting kind of teeter-totters on his portrayal of black people. On the one hand, they are children who need the White Father to show them the error of their ways and bring them to civilization. But on the other hand, he's (rightly) harsh on the colonial powers treatment of African nations; other white people are portrayed as treating blacks in far worse ways than Doctor Dolittle does.

If you think about the swallow mail, the post office, the weather bureau, and all in too much detail, it all starts to fall apart. This was Lofting's third Dolittle book; I think by Book 4 his "world" is starting to have some clearer rules. He's still developing them in Book 3.

The doctor's family of characters truly resemble themselves now. Gub-Gub - who really comes into his own in Circus -- Dab-Dab, and Too-Too all are more developed. Jip acts gruffer than ever. He tells a story in which he comes off basically as an opportunistic thief, which if you think about it, is how dogs really act - their moral code should obviously be different than our own.

The Doctor is thrown in jail - again. At least this time he doesn't have a shipwreck. Cheapside the Cockney Sparrow - who says some of the most racist things - is still one of my most favorite characters (after Gub-Gub).

Shhhhh... dont' tell...

2011-09-21T17:38:00.001-07:00

I read three pages of Miss Lonelyhearts by Nathanael West and threw the book down. UGH. Maybe later I'll try Day of the Locust. I know I was supposed to read this for some class in college, and distinctly remember not finishing it then.

What's So Funny: Wit and Humor in American Children's Literature by Michael Cart (1995)

2011-09-19T10:35:00.001-07:00

What's So Funny?: Wit and Humour in American Children's Literature by Michael Cart

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I guess literary criticism is most interesting when you've actually read what the author is writing about. When Michael Cart was writing about books I'd read and adored -- Doctor Dolittle, Ramona, Frog and Toad, By the Great Horned Spoon, then I totally dug the book. When he was writing about stuff I hadn't read (such as Freddy the Pig) then it wasn't as interesting (although he's still a great writer). The chapter on tall tales was particularly enlightening - who knew that Paul Bunyan was essentially a creation of marketers?

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What's So Funny: Wit and Humor in American Children's Literature by Michael Cart (1995)

2011-09-19T10:23:00.000-07:00

Literary criticism is much more interesting when you've actually read what the author has written about. The chapters on Doctor Dolittle were rad because I'm currently reading the Dolittle series beginning to end. The chapters on Freddy the Pig, not so interesting - although I'm aware of Freddy the Pig, I've never read any of the books, and really don't have a plan to any time soon (sorry Mr. Cart, you didn't sell me on Freddy). I liked the chapters on Robert Lawson and adored the Frog and Toad chapters (I love, love, love Frog and Toad). The tall tale chapter was interesting - I had no idea that Paul Bunyan was a commercial creation, with Pecos Bill a close second - they aren't technically folktales, and have only been around since the 1920s... who knew?! I love Sid Fleischman, but I haven't read all of his books - one of my favorite books of all time is still By the Great Horned Spoon . I am definitely going to have to read the Ramona books from beginning to end - I didn't realize how dark they become.

The Wilder Life : My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie by Wendy McClure

2011-09-16T17:50:00.001-07:00

All of my colleagues know of my extreme love for Little House on the Prairie; last year, when I re-read the entire series - plus some biographies and literary criticism - I was constantly saying "Did you know that Laura..." and "Did you know that Pa and Ma..." None of the people I work with are as crazy about Laura Ingalls Wilder as I am (and they are all librarians - the nerve!). I guess Laura Ingalls Wilder and her ilk are one of my (many) secret guilty pleasures: I love Prairie Girl stories (don't tell Laura - I think Caddie Woodlawn could definitely take her in a fight). After reading The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie by Wendy McClure (2011), I know that I'm not alone in my love for the Little House. And I'm definitely not a fanatic! McClure's journey to all the sites of the various places the Ingalls and Wilders ended up (they moved around a bunch) is sort of a sad one. Little House is funny(funny strange not funny ha-ha), because nothing AND everything is left. By nothing, I mean that the books were written a long time ago, and they were about a time that took place a long time before that. Rose Wilder Lane (hero or villain? You decide. Certainly interesting, and not necessarily in a good way) was the last direct descendent of Pa and Ma - an only child of Laura -- Mary, Carrie and Grace never had children (interesting, huh?). All the homesteads and sites are kind of gone, some physically gone, and some spiritually gone. Yet at the same time, McClure - and you the reader - find that the cup of Little House is overflowing. Everything is left - rebuilt homesteads, theme parks, sunbonnets galore, Laura look-alike contests, Christian fundamentalists and homeschoolers, pageants and lawsuits over who owns the rights. Laura World (that's what the author calls it, and that's a great description) is jam packed full of people who loved the books, for many, many different reasons. Many people McClure met called the Laura World simple, that the appeal of Laura world lay in its simplicity. I guess I understand that, but talk to someone of a certain age -- 70s and above - who grew up in a rural area about how wonderful simplicity is - and they'll tell you how cold a cows teats are at 5 in the morning and how much chicken shit smells. Life wasn't simple back then - pioneer life was all about eating, a constant struggle to grow or find food. That doesn't sound so simple to me. Our lives are complex - and Laura's life was complex too, just in a different way.

McClure's journey to the Laura World ended up being as much about her and the recent death of her mother; a search for the past (at least that's the way I read it). I guess that's what Laura World is all about. I re-read the series to see if they "held up" (they did) but also as a nostalgic trip down memory lane (it was).

McClure and I must be about the same age - she talks about many of the same seventies "memes" that I remember fondly or otherwise. She did not watch the television show growing up. Now I know we did - I vividly remember many of the episodes. I would have said we watched every Monday. But here's the deal - there isn't a way we could have done that. She had this excellent bit about the differences between family television back in the70s and what family television means today. Today, family television is scrubbed clean of everything. But back then, when households usually had only one television - with three or four channels at the most-- family television meant sitting down and watching a show together. If something weird or unsettling came up -- and Little House was full of weird and unsettling (Remember Albert as a dope fiend? The blind school burning up Mary's baby?) - then during the commercial your mom (never your dad!) would turn to you and say "You understand what's going on, right?" and then you TALKED about it. That was family television. McClure points out that she never watched Little House because her family watched WKRP in Cincinnati. But wait... I think we watched WKRP too... so how did we pick which one we watched? I don't remember - I just remember them both.

Daisy Miller by Henry James (1879)

2011-09-16T17:46:00.001-07:00

Daisy Miller by Henry James

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Do all literary classics have shades of Mean Girls, or just the ones I like? Because Daisy Miller is first of all a carefully constructed novella by Henry James and secondly a subtle look at the differing Gilded Age mores and values between Europeanized Americans and American tourists. But it's also this wicked story of a outsider girl who could have been played by Lindsay Lohan who hangs out with a bad boy, and another boy likes her, but all of these mean rich b****** start all these rumors about her and then give her the cold shoulder. These old stories may have different clothes and hairstyles, they may have grand dames pulling up in horse drawn victorias and have a set of social mores that are completely foreign to us. Like lots of other old stories - Ethan Frome comes to mind -- some of what bothered those old timers isn't so worrisome today, but parts of the story still resonate. We might not have the same type of stratified society we did back then, in which girls are considered "vulgar" if they walk alone with men. But we still have gossip, and flirty girls who are attracted to bad guys, and groups of biddies (young or old male or female) that practice shunning and the art of the cold shoulder in every group (work, church, school, bowling alley, etc). We still have regrets and injustices done that can't be fixed. In that respect it's still a pretty good book.

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Daisy Miller by Henry James (1879)

2011-09-16T16:44:00.000-07:00

The Modern Library edition has a "reading group guide." Since this is a book discussion group - albeit the group consists of myself - I'm going to attempt to discuss.

1. Henry James is as much an international writer as an American. Shortly before his death he became a British citizen in protest of America's unwillingness to come to the defense of Britain and France in the early years of World War I. He spent much of his adult life abroad, observing Europeans, Americans in Europe, and what he called Europeanized Americans, those who had lived for so long in Europe that they had taken on many, although not all, European traits and values. Many of Henry James's novels and stories depict these three types of characters in interplay. How does James explore the American versus-European theme in Daisy Miller? What are some of the ways that the Millers differ from Winterbourne, his aunt, and Mrs. Walker?

There are only two Europeans described in the book in any detail - the courier and Giovanelli. The other two types are different types of Americans: the Millers and then Americans like Winterbourne, Aunt Costello, and Mrs. Walker. The courier seems to be just a servant, but the Millers, particularly Daisy, have developed an unhealthy relationship with him. Henry James doesn't give the servant much personality. Giovanelli doesn't have much personality either, but James at least makes a point that he's of the same middle to upper class status as the Millers, although Italian, so that makes him suspect in the eyes of Mrs. Walker and Co. (why they are in Italy if they don't like Italians is always a mystery - first a Forsterian mystery and now a Jamesian mystery). The Millers are inappropriately friendly with servants, they are loud, they run about alone with strange men. They are vulgar, the Walkers and Costellos of this little world are not.

2. Henry James was always interested in children and young adults, and Daisy Miller is one of his most successful creations. She is more vibrant than sophisticated, a child, as James describes her, of nature and of freedom. Some have argued that her plain name (the unpretentious flower, the common profession) symbolizes her simplicity. Do you agree with this? Why does Daisy Miller make a full-blooded protagonist? Is Daisy Miller an innocent, unaffected young woman? Are there hints of her self-awareness? Does she demonstrate a desire to manipulate others?

What I thought was interesting was that Daisy wasn't her given name. Why did she change her name from the plain "Annie" to the flowery, most interesting "Daisy?" I don't think Daisy is an innocent as she wants people to think. I think some of her responses to Winterbourne about her behavior are ironic statements - she knows exactly what she's doing. She's a free spirit, she's trapped by convention and she's tired of it, she's in Italy, a land of passion and romance, and like Mame Dennis she's going to live, live, live! (and then die, of course). Manipulative - yes. She was dating two guys at once, both kind of wrapped around her little finger. You may argue that Giovanelli (with his string of American heiresses) was an opportunistic gigolo. But she certainly played him off of Winterbourne, who apparently she really liked. Daisy wasn't the evil queen, but she wasn't Snow White either.

3. In discussing the origins of the novella in his Preface to the New York Edition, Henry James tells of hearing the story of an innocent but eager American girl who has recently visited Italy and picked up a Roman of vague identity. What in this secondhand anecdote do you think appealed to James, inspiring him to, as he put it, dramatise, dramatise!? Does James do more than dramatize? Does he moralize?

You can't kill off someone at the end because of something they did to themselves without moralizing. But I'm not exactly sure what the moral is supposed to be. Was it that Daisy, in trying to be free, ended up killing herself? Or that Winterbourne was a douche bag, and that we should appreciate the people around us more and give them support?

4. James describes Winterbourne, an American who resides in Geneva, as having "an old attachment for the little capital of Calvinism." When James introduces him, Winterbourne is in a hotel lobby in Vevey while he waits for his aunt, who is upstairs. Essentially, however, he is waiting for something else. How would you describe Winterbourne and why do you think he is susceptible to Daisy's charms? Is he an honest man? How does his surname fit into James's scheme of identifying characters?

Oh wow, I never thought I should be concentrating on everyone's names having meanings, dammit. Let's see, DAISY can mean she's innocent, that she's always turned towards the sun and light, that she's common like a weed, that even common weeds can be beautiful. WINTERBOURNE, cold - also bringing winter with him, killing the daisies. WALKER, street walker, maybe a shady past herself (okay, I'm just kidding). I think we are supposed to think Winterbourne is kind of dick who can't make up his mind whether he wants to live like the Walkers and Costellos or be free like Daisy. Maybe that's the whole European thing - that Aunt Costello comes to Europe and then lives with a feudal mindset, everyone divided into strict classes and a certain way to behave, and no one can stray from that. And Daisy represents the freedom and light of America, where everyone can pull themselves up by their bootstraps and make something of themselves, and walk around with anyone they damn well want to thank you very much. Only Daisy ended up dying because of it... mmmmm....

He is succeptible to Daisy's charms because she wanted him to be. But also because she represents something new and different, a different type of girl, who speaks her mind and does what she wants - although I don't know, I kept thinking that this whole thing might get kind of old after a while - would he really been able to change appreciate the way she was different, or was that going to be glaringly obvious every time he tried to introduce her into his society from then on?

5. Does James present Giovanelli as a complicated, fully imagined character, or is Giovanelli merely the proverbial mysterious stranger? Does James explore Giovanelli's subtleties with as much insight as he applies to Daisy and Winterbourne? What attracts Daisy to Giovanelli? Is this attraction plausible? Why at the end of the novel does he say, "If she had lived I should have got nothing. She never would have married me?"

I think Giovanelli doesn't have a whole lot of personality beyond being a plot device, although I guess Henry James does try to give him some character. Winterbourne sticks up for Giovanelli (and he certainly doesn't have to) and says, in a nutshell, that while Giovanelli is Italian, he's not that sort of Italian (the greasy sort, ugh, what horrid people), not that it matters to Mrs. Walker. But because of Winterbourne's pro-Giovanelli stand (although it probably has helluva lot more to do with standing up for Daisy), we find out that he's sort of gentry/middle class. Giovanelli has a past full of American heiresses, which makes him sound like a cad. Which, lets be honest, he probably is. But Winterbourne is kind of a cad himself, so there. Giovanelli disappears when Daisy gets sick; maybe he just couldn't stand being there. He does show up at the funeral, and, as a perfect plot device, serves to make Winterbourne feel shitty about the way he treated Daisy. Which is why he uttered those fatal words, "she would never have married me." Subtext: "She loved you! You!" Daisy is attracted to Giovanelli for the same reasons Wintebourne is attracted to her - he's something new. And he takes her to cool places. He's dangerous, almost a bad boy. Some girls are like that, you know?

6. What do you make of Daisy's fate? Why do you think James set the novel's tragic event in the Colosseum?

Daisy's fate is kind of a mystery to me. On the one hand, shouldn't we be celebrating the fact that Daisy "gathered ye rosebuds" and "made hay while the sun shined?" But if the story isn't really about Daisy but more about Winterbourne, then Daisy's fate is HIS fault, really... he could have supported her relationship with Giovanelli, continued to go around with her and maybe then steered her away from the Colosseum and Roman fever. But that's total conjecture; more than once, explicitly and implicitly, we read that Daisy is going to do whatever she wants, to hell with the rest of the world and its conventions. I think no matter what Winterbourne could have said or done, Daisy wanted to see the Colosseum by moonlight and that's what she did. I have no idea what the Colosseum represented to James and was supposed to represent to us. Perhaps Europe - that in the end Europe killed Daisy? "Roman" fever killed her - again an illusion to Europe. If Wintebourne had practiced Daisy's free wheeling attitudes and not been tied down to European strict mores of what's vulgar and non-vulgar, perhaps she would still be alive... I don't know.

Daisy Miller by Henry James (1879)

2011-09-16T16:02:00.000-07:00

Like The Age of Innocence, I thought I had read Daisy Miller in college. In fact, I thought I wrote a paper comparing the two. I vaguely remembered the plot - innocent girl in Rome dies of malaria - but that was about it. Perhaps that's what 20 years does, erases what we read in college. Quite frankly, I can't remember much of what I read. John Donne. Emerson and Thoreau. My Last Duchess. The Light in August, which I hated. Some Dickens. Willa Cather for sure.

The title character, Daisy Miller, is indeed a young girl in Rome - although she starts off in Switzerland. She meets this guy, Winterbourne (Frederick is his first name, but he's always called by his surname), who is there visiting his aunt. The Millers are clearly nouveau riche New Yorkers on a jaunt through Europe to polish themselves off and have stories to tell when they return home. Perhaps they are also escaping from some stories themselves - because Daisy soon reveals herself to be "vulgar." At least according to Winterbourne's aunt, Mrs. Costello, who is a snob. Rudolph, the nine year old son, is "obstreperous" which I had to look up (it means "noisy and difficult to control;" a useful fifty cent word to have around; Henry James is full of jawbreaker words like this). Mrs. Miller is washed out and weak; I pictured her as this sort of frizzled hair Eileen Brennan type of character. Daisy is the most modern girl I think I've read about in a classic, and the situation is familiar - weak parents lead to wild children.

So Winterbourne and Daisy flirt flirt flirt, he bemused, she innocently (yeah, right). They come up with scheme to go see a nearby castle, from a poem by Byron it's where this prisoner spent all of his years alone. Perhaps this has literary symbolism. I'm not sure I'm that deep. Anyway, even I know that a young girl and a man going about alone together in the 1870s is a big no-no, but it must have happened more than we modern folk think - Almanzo Wilder and Laura Ingalls were riding around alone together in the 1880s, weren't they? Judy Garland danced behind the Christmas tree with her beau in 1906. So love will find a way - to be alone and make out. But some old lady is always going to disapprove heartily of the whole thing.

So Winterbourne is called away on business, which pisses Daisy off. She wants him to stay. But he can't. End scene.

Now we are in Rome, and Winterbourne shows up a few months later to find the Millers ensconced in scandal. This is Forster territory we're treading through now - only unlike Lucy Honeychurch, Daisy Miller knows her mind and does whatever she wants, damn the world. Carpe diem, bitches. She's running around with his Italian Giovanelli, who Henry James tries desperately to NOT make a stock Italian character; he still comes off as one, just a bit (again, shades of Forster; or perhaps I should say, Forster is full of shades of James). The Millers have befriended a lady, Mrs. Walker, who I had in my head that Winterbourne had been having an affair with, but now I'm not so sure - it's hard coming off of Vita Sackville-West to not automatically assume everyone is doing it behind everyone else's back. Mrs. Walker and Winterbourne are worried about Daisy's reputation. Winterbourne begins hanging out with Daisy and Giovanelli, I think to try to add some respectability to the whole mess. Mrs. Walker finally decides to take matters into her own hands, and when Daisy and the two gentleman are out walking alone together - a girl and two men! Fast and vulgar! She drives up in her victoria and basically orders Daisy to climb in. Daisy, in her innocently American way, basically flips Mrs. Walker the bird. She's gonna walk with whoever she wants to, thank you very much, her reputation be damned.

Of course, this infuriates Mrs. Walker, and a party later, the old broad gives Daisy and her Italian boyfriend (Henry James calls him Daisy's amoroso, which is Italian for boyfriend) the cold shoulder; as Daisy is leaving, she turns her back on her and cuts her dead (I love that saying, which I think I first read in Gone With the Wind). Daisy doesn't give a fig though. Eventually, everyone is talking smack about her, but she's happy with her Italian. She's running wild through Rome. Winterbourne has almost given up on her as well, especially after he finds her one night walking in the moonlight through the Coliseum. He chides her for doing this, and warns her that she will catch Roman fever is she's not careful. He asks Giovanelli what the hell he thinks by bringing Daisy out so late at night and risking her life - and Giovanelli shrugs. Daisy will make up her own mind, and who can stop her?

Well, death for one thing. Because Daisy Miller does indeed catch Roman fever - malaria - which I guess Henry James didn't know at this point was caused by mosquitoes, because Daisy could have caught malaria at Mrs. Walker's party just as easily, but that would ruin the tragi-romance of the whole story. Winterbourne comes to Daisy's hotel, where some vultures are waiting to watch her die - but not Giovanelli - that's made very clear. Mrs. Miller says that in her more lucid moments, Daisy left a message for Winterbourne - that she was NOT engaged to Giovanelli. Meaning, I supposed, that she really loved Winterbourne. Even if they had only known each other for a few days. Fickle flirt. At the cemetery, Winterbourne runs into Giovanelli, who confirms that they weren't engaged. Winterbourne once again tries to blame Giovanelli for the whole Roman fever thing - but Giovanelli does that whole Italian shrug thing again, "whatever."

Last scene, Winterbourne in Switzerland again with Aunt Costello, and he brings up his guilt over basically dumping Daisy those last few months of her life.

One day he spoke of her to his aunt - said it was on his conscience he had done her an injustice. "I'm sure I don't know --" that lady showed caution. How did your injustice affect her?" "She sent me a message before her death which I didn't understand at the time. But I've understood it since. She would have appreciated one's esteem." "She took an odd way to gain it,"

the old lady harrumphed, and then asked him what he meant. Winterbourne didn't answer, but I think he knew that he'd been a total dick, and if he really liked Daisy, he would have courted her strongly instead of being such a pussy and listening to the all the old biddies cackle about her. Oh, mean girls. Always in the way of love. Even so, Daisy WAS flirting with another guy and playing her own game - the same game girls continue to play and play. The age old story.

The last line was pretty wicked - Winterbourne returns to Geneva, "whence there continue to come the most contradictory accounts of his motives of sojourn: a report that he's studying hard -- an intimation that he's much interested in a very clever foreign lady." So Daisy was his last chance at respectability too, and now he's some rich foreign lady's gigolo.

Like lots of other old stories - Ethan Frome comes to mind -- some of what bothered those old timers isn't so worrisome today, but parts of the story still resonate. We might not have the same type of stratified society we did back then, in which girls are considered "vulgar" if they walk alone with men. But we still have gossip, and flirty girls who are attracted to bad guys, and groups of biddies (young or old male or female) that practice shunning and the art of the cold shoulder in every group (work, church, school, bowling alley, etc). We still have regrets and injustices done that can't be fixed. In that respect it's still a pretty good book.

Doctor Dolittle Circus by Hugh Lofting (1924)

2011-09-12T10:48:00.000-07:00

My original plan was to read all the Dolittle books in order - which I just screwed up; Doctor Dolittle's Circus (which I just read) was written after Doctor Dolittle's Post Office (which I accidentally skipped). I'm going to have to do some back tracking.

I can remember as a child reading Circus and finding the Sophie the seal chapters interesting, but not as interesting as the later chapters about the circus and then about the Puddleby Pantomime. I still agree with that sentiment. I think it's because the Dolittle menagerie with their personality (and conflicts) are more interesting than the cross country scrapes of an escaping seal. This is all degree though - the Sophie chapters are still fun (particularly the night when Sophie escapes and Theodosia knocks Higgins into the seal pool).

The Harlequinade, for whatever reason, was something I loved imagining while reading the book as a child, and still do. In my mind it consumed most of the book - I was actually surprised at how few chapters of the book actually detailed the Harlequinade!

Here are some intriguing or funny notes of interest from Circus. What's most interesting about Hugh Lofting's writing for children is how sophisticated it is.

"But the leader of the bloodhounds, like many highly trained specialists, was (in everything outside his own profession) very obstinate and a bit stupid."

"Toby, the other, was as different from his friend Swizzle as it is possible to be. He was a small dog, a dwarf white poodle. And he took himself and life quite seriously. The most noticeable thing about his character was his determination to get everything which he thought he ought to get. Yet he was not selfish, not at all. The Doctor always said that this shrewd business-like quality was to be found in most little dogs--who had to make up for their small size by an extra share of cheek."

This described our small dog Quincy to a T; when I read this aloud, my partner Scott (who is shall we say more vertically challenged than I) made a (fake) wry face and wondered if was reading it aloud as a reference to HIM.

I like every character - animal and human - in the Dolittle books, but Gub-Gub seems to have a special place in my heart. He's stupid and vain, mostly cowardly and lazy, very childish - but at the same time, incredibly lovable; he gets many of the best lines in most of the books. He can also - very occasionally - be quite philosophical, as with the chutney vs. non-chutneys, which came about as a discussion between Dab-Dab (usually no philosopher herself) and the Doctor about habits:

"Oh, we're traveling to-morrow, Doctor," said Gub-Gub. "It doesn't matter what time we get up. Let us stay a little longer. We have to settle on what play we are going to give."

"No, you don't," said Dab-Dab--"not to-night. The Doctor's tired."

"No, I'm not tired," said John Dolittle.

"Well, it's bad for them to stay up late. There's nothing like early bed as a habit."

"Yes, I suppose so," said the Doctor. "But myself, I don't like getting into habits, you know."

"Well, I do," said Dab-Dab--"when they're good ones. I like regular people."

"Do you, Dab-Dab? That's why you're such an excellent housekeeper. There are two kinds of people: those who like habits and those who don't. They both have their good qualities."

"You know, Doctor," Gub-Gub put in, "me--I always divide people into the pickle-eaters and the plain feeders--those who like chutneys and sauces on their food and those who like everything plain."

"It's the same idea, Gub-Gub," the Doctor laughed. "Those that like change in their lives and those that like sameness. Your chutney-eaters are the change-lovers and your plain-fooders are the er--housekeepers. Myself, I hope to grow more adaptable as I grow older."

"What's adaptable, Doctor?" asked Gub-Gub.
"It would take too long to explain now. Go to bed."

I decided that Gub-Gub must have appealed (and still appeals) to me because of all the characters in the book, I'm probably the most like him. Certainly, his sense of adventure matches mine:

"When the Dolittle household awoke next morning they found that the wagon was moving. This was nothing new for them. It only meant that the circus had got under way very early while they were still asleep--as it often did in moving from town to town. It was a part of the life, this, that Gub-Gub greatly enjoyed--waking in the morning and looking out of the window to see what kind of new scene lay around their moving home.

"It was a part of the life Gub-Gub greatly enjoyed"

Gub-Gub used to boast that this showed he was a born traveler, that he loved change, like the Doctor. As a matter of fact, he was really by nature much more like Dab-Dab; for no one loved regular habits, especially regular meals, more than he. It was just that the gipsy life provided a continuous and safe sort of adventure for him. He liked excitement, but comfortable excitement, without hardship or danger."

The Dervish House by Ian McDonald (2010)

2011-09-09T23:12:00.001-07:00

I tried, I really tried... but I am just too tired to continue. I need some sort of common thread, someone to start turning the lights on, something, anything. After 198 pages, nothing connected these characters and their stories together except I think - I'm not even sure - that they all live in the same house. The ONLY reason I picked this up was because it was a Hugo nominated book. Bah. I won't make that mistake again. Clearly someone likes this book. That someone ain't me.

Gerald R. Ford by Douglas Brinkley (2007)

2011-09-09T14:10:00.000-07:00

These short sketches -- the essence of a president - are really quite good; first Theodore Roosevelt (written so well by Louis Auchincloss), and then Richard Nixon, and now Gerald R. Ford. I was four years old when Ford became president. What strikes me is how little then politics were a part of our lives; I remember next to nothing about President Ford. Everything I know and see in my head comes from knowledge gleaned much later. As I've mentioned before, my earliest political memory is John Chancellor talking about Watergate on NBC news, and thinking that "Watergate" referred to the watery greenish blue background behind the newscaster. I vaguely remember that Ford and Bob Dole announced their 1976 candiday in Russell, Kansas (a couple of towns over from my hometown of Wilson). I don't remember anything about Carter being elected. I do remember Carter running again against Ronald Reagan and John Anderson; by that time I was in fourth grade and memories start to gel a little bit more (even so, that's pretty thinned memories after 32 years).

After reading about Richard Nixon and now Ford, there certainly was this theme that the nation was about to come crashing down. It didn't feel like that when I was five or six, but I suppose things must have been pretty scary. I remember being terrified about "hippies" who I associated (in my six year old head) with motorcycle gangs; by the mid-70s the peace movement had turned ugly, with Weathermen and Charles Manson and Hells Angels, and that conservative backlash against the summer of 1968 must have still been filtering through down to the first graders. I never think about it this way, but I've lived through four wars - Vietnam was still going on when I was a child (it always seems like a 60s thing to me), two Iraq's plus an Afghanistan (and numberous other engagements, including most recently Libya).

If the essence of Elizabeth Drew's Richard Nixon was evil, evil and more evil, the essence of Douglas Brinkley's Gerald Ford was the consummate politician who at heart is a really good guy. It seems like Gerald Ford never really did a bad thing. He might have willfully ignored some bad things or pretended they didn't exist, but he certainly never did anything illegal. I'm not even sure he ever did anything unethical, pretty difficult for any politician to accomplish. If Teddy Roosevelt led the liberals out of the Republic Party in 1912, Gerald Ford made them all into a solid voting bloc in the 1960s; they've voted as a bloc ever since (with exceptions, of course).

If history were a chess game, and pieces could be interchanged, I wonder if Gerald Ford would survive today? He's many gestures of conciliation and middle of the road moderation would probably get him canned. It's definitely a different world politically.

Ronald Reagan is always portrayed as the patron saint of the Republican Party, but it was definitely Gerald Ford who brought them back from the Nixonian depths, and it was Ronald Reagan who turned against him.

Nixon is always, always the ghost that haunts the Ford White House, everything Ford did or said was always going to have Nixon in the corner rattling chains.

In the three presidential sketches (four if you count the Wilson sketch from Penguin) - two are in the early part of the 20th century, and two are in the latter part. What's really the most different is the press. The press played little or no role in the stories of Roosevelt and Wilson; the press was like another branch of government in the Nixon and Ford administrations.

Richard M. Nixon by Elizabeth Drew (2007)

2011-09-05T17:03:00.001-07:00

Richard M. Nixon by Elizabeth Drew

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Someone below/before reviewed this as "capturing the essence" of Richard Nixon, and I think that's a great description of this book. How do you write a short biographical sketch of Richard Nixon without dipping a toe into left wing hatchet jobbery - or right wing hagiography? I'm not sure Elizabeth Drew succeeds in keeping her hatchet sheathed, but then I'm not sure it's possible to write about Richard Nixon and not make him sound like at least a little bit of a snake in the grass (apologies to the serpent family). Maybe the "real Richard Nixon" will always allude us, a historical mystery like the Princes in the Tower.

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Vita: A Biography of Vita Sackwille-West by Victoria Glendenning (1983)

2011-09-05T16:36:00.000-07:00

I'm positive the life of Vita Sackville-West is interesting. This biography, however, made it seem boring.

Richard M. Nixon by Elizabeth Drew (2007)

2011-09-03T11:14:00.000-07:00

I like the idea that The American Presidents series captures the "essence" of each president written by a distinguished author or historian; my second in the series (Woodrow Wilson was a Penguin Life), Richard Nixon by Elizabeth Drew may capture Nixon's essence, but I think more likely it captures his stench. I wasn't sure if this was a hatchet job or not. Was Nixon the power- hungry, suspicious, foul-mouthed, utterly Machiavellian, completely without morals or values, opportunistic, almost junta instigator that Drew makes him out to be? I think it must be difficult to judge the presidency of a living (or in Nixon's case, relatively recently deceased) president without any degree of impartiality; afterall, Elizabeth Drew vividly lived through Watergate and the Nixon regime, and while I think I trust her historical judgement, Richard Nixon is still after all these years a polarizing political figure. What Drew certainly does is separate the Wizard of PR that Nixon became from his real impact on domestic and foreign agendas of the late 60s/early 70s, which she called at one point "pragmatic." Perhaps NIxon was the first modern president, constantly worried about poll numbers, willing to modify and change in order to keep those numbers high. Things are still the same; I recently saw Barack Obama referred to as a "pragmatic" politician as well. Maybe that's not such a bad thing - but what exactly do they stand for?

I was surprised to discover players from the 21st century making their first appearances during this time period, including Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, both who return to haunt us 30 years later. Fred Thompson, erstwhile presidential candidate, also made an appearance. I'm sure everyone who lived during Watergate knew this; but Watergate happened when I was just a baby; I thought "Watergate" was the green background behind John Chancellor on NBC Nightly News. We certainly never studied Watergate in high school, and this was almost my first exposure to it (I've been to the Nixon Library, pre-National Archives, and I don't remember much about Watergate from there, but do remember Nixon's child hood house and the pie cooler).

Bob Dole commented about Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and Nixon all in the same room -- "See no evil, hear no evil, evil" which is one of the best snarks I've ever heard. Those Kansans and their near drag queen humor.

The Edwardians by Vita Sackville-West (1930)

2011-08-31T12:48:00.001-07:00

The Edwardians by Vita Sackville-West

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Edwardians live next door to Downtown Abbey and Upstairs, Downstairs. Vita Sackville-West grew up during the time period she both lovingly details and skewers in The Edwardians, and after a sort of slow start, the book comes alive because of her inside knowledge. She occasionally drop names (King Edward, Mrs. Langtry), and admits that "No character in this book is wholly fictitious." I suppose if you were reading this in 1930, when King George was still alive (his coronation ends the book), then you were probably madly trying to figure out who was who (all without the trusty help of the internet!). I'm sure the book is full of themes, some of which were perfectly obvious (the passing of the torch from generation to generation, the need for women of high society to look and feel young, the messiness of affairs of the heart) and some which I probably missed in my haste to the finish the book (the more I like a book, the faster I read, and the more I miss). I have several favorite scenes. The women at the coronation fixing their hair after putting on their coronets and the harumphing of the women about how in King Edward's day things wouldn't have been as vulgar (the reader knows full well that King Edward's day was equally "vulgar" if not more so, leading one to question the evolving nature of vulgarity and manners). Teresa (who surprisingly became my favorite character) throwing a grand speech in Sebastian's face on Christmas Eve (you go girl! Love rules all). The entire book was a pleasure though (except for the awful end). I was sorry to turn the last page, always a good sign!

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The Edwardians by Vita Sackville-West (1930)

2011-08-31T12:04:00.000-07:00

Coming down from a Downton Abbey high, this made the landing much gentler and easy. Chevron (the estate in The Edwardians) might as well be next door to the denizens of Downtown Abbey. Although Downtown Abbey is definitely more Upstairs Downstairs than The Edwardians, all three share much in common; certain scenes in The Edwardians are from the servants' point of view; the clothes and dinner parties are lush; the adultery is hidden but rampant. The Edwardians was a slow start - I wasn't sure I liked any of the characters very much (I'm still not totally sure) but once Lady Sylvia started her affair with Sebastian, WHAM BAM - off it went. I particularly liked Teresa Spedding, the doctor's wife, and the scene where Sebastian makes a pass at her and she's throws a speech in his face, that was awesome. Good for her - she became much more likable.

I'm sure the book is full of themes I missed - the better the story, the faster I read, and the more I miss. There is certainly a theme about generations - that's pretty blatant. Lucy, Sebastian's awful mother, belongs to the King Edward generation; Sebastian (sitting in for Vita Sackville-West, I think), represents that World War I Lost Generation directly afterwards; Teresa and Phil also represent facets of the Lost Generation as well. The line at the end, in which the dowagers hurumph about the new generation and how things wouldn't have been like that in good old King Edward's time - the reader knows that the dowagers were saying that King Edward was a rake and a cad and things wouldn't have been like that in Queen Victoria's time - the passing of the torch is never easily done.

I dog eared some pages for later thought. The first, on page 90, was a reference to the kitchen people (as opposed to the other servants) as the "Bandar-log," which is straight out of The Jungle Book. From what little I've gleaned about the running of great houses in the Victorian and Edwardian periods, that's a pretty good metaphor and great and cool use of allusion.

Viola, telling Margaret Roehampton about the society in which they live:

"Very well, if you want the truth, then here it is. The society you live in is composed of people who are both dissolute and prudent. They want to have their fun, and they want to keep their position. They glitter on the surface, but underneath the surface they are stupid -- too stupid to recognize their own motives. They know only a limited number of things about themselves: that they need plenty of money, and that they must be seen in the right places, associated with the right people. In spite of their efforts to turn themselves into painted images, they remain human somewhere, and must indulge in love-affairs, which sometimes are artificial, and sometimes inconveniently real..."

Sounds a lot like high school, or the glitzy world of hip-hop, or Paris /Perez Hilton Land... After a century, some things are still exactly the same. The houses and clothes and cars might be different, but the motivations remain the same - and the A-list is still remarkably stupid.

A bit about the end - the awful end. I'm not sure how I wanted it to end, but certainly not like that. It's almost like Sackville-West wasn't sure how she wanted it to end, so she just dropped Sebastian off a cliff (not literally). There is certainly a bit of deus ex machina at play. Although I love, love, love the surprise! about Anquetil (who is simply a plot device) marrying Viola. (Teresa and Phil, both could have been plot devices as well, but come across as much more real and not cardboard, particularly Teresa; Anquetil felt like a cardboard cutout at the beginning and end).

Why Not Say What Happened by Ivana Lowell (2010)

2011-08-26T10:29:00.000-07:00

I don't like gushy, self reflective, stream of consciousness memoirs. They are usually among my least favorite kinds of books - I think I liked textbooks better than memoirs. First person celebrity memoirs are the worst. I personally don't care about a celebrity's internal struggles with addiction or the sexual abuse they suffered as a child. You what I want from a celebrity steam of consciousness first person memoir? Gossip about other celebrities. The secrets of hollywood or broadway or royalty or government. I tend to avoid these kinds of memoirs like the plague.

I wish I remember why I put Ivana Lowell's Why Not Say What Happened on my list of books to read. I think maybe it was after reading that latest Mitford memoir by the Duchess of Devonshire, and this came up as a similar read. It's not a similar read. It was BETTER. I have now stress the "usually" part of my least favorite books. Because Ivana Lowell's memoir was everything I hate about this genre - except it was really good.

I think that's partly because she named names and didn't pull any punches (her being chased around a desk in a Weinstein's office comes instantly to mind). That made it a bit exhilarating. It felt fresh and fun. It was painfully sad - abuse, addiction, pain, sadness. But there was a bit tongue in cheek about the whole thing, the purposeful juxtaposition of wealth and privilege and parties with the Queen Mother and the Academy Awards with the hideous craziness and crazy hideousity of Ivana Lowell's life. She didn't take herself all that seriously.

Some reviews on Goodreads were particularly annoying about how this was another "poor little rich girl" story. First of all, why finish it then? Second, "poor little rich girl" stories are a genre in of themselves. There is a clearly a market and interest for them.

The Queen Mother's nickname among her uppercrust aristo cronies was "Cake." Who knew?

The Little Ships: The Heroic Rescue at Dunkirk in World War II by Louise Borden; illustrated by Michael Foreman (1997)

2011-08-25T12:23:00.000-07:00

This is my second Louise Borden book in a row, both stories from World War II, this one about "the heroic rescue from Dunkirk." I like Borden's prose style - choppy and poetic at the same time; she always writes poetry. Her point of view - from a fisherman's daughter who (with her father's permission) dressed as a boy to accompany him on the journey to France. There are stories throughout history of girls dressing as boys to go to war (both fiction and nonfiction), and this makes a nice addition. Foreman's illustrations are good - I think it's hard to capture the true power of the sea, but he has a true mixture of what the day must have been like - beautiful, chaotic, terrible. The illustration of the troop ship heading to safety in England, with thousands of faces of soldiers lining the decks, passing the little yachts on their way to France and danger, was a particularly memorable illustration. I think the story of Dunkirk is a really interesting one - full of incredible bravery and terrible sadness. Although the heroism and courage of Dunkirk makes it seem like a victory, it's actually a terrible and terrifying defeat - the threat of Germany now looms over a weakened and scared England, and at this point it's all touch and go. But from this defeat certainly comes some great stories and moving speeches, Winston Churchill's "We shall go on to the end..." most stirring of all.

Bunny Days by Tao Nyeu (2010)

2011-08-24T19:44:00.000-07:00

Cute, almost but not quite precious, more than a bit surreal. I wish I knew more about how to describe art and illustration in a meaningful way. The pictures seem flat to me; they are all silk screen, which think is an arduous and time consuming process; knowing this fact makes me now think each illustration looks like really cute t-shirt. I loved the monochromatic color scheme; each story is in a different palette. I think Bear is gay - but I also think Frog and Toad are more than Friends too. My favorite scene is when the bunnies get sucked up into the vacuum cleaner - their coughing expressions are funny and really well illustrated.

The Journey That Saved Curious George: the True Wartime Escape of Margret and H.A. Rey by Louise Borden; illustrated by Allan Drummond (2005)

2011-08-23T17:37:00.000-07:00

Curious George turns 70 years old this fall, so I decided to have a birthday party here at the library and tell the story of Curious George's amazing escape from the Nazis - actually the authors escape from Paris with the manuscript on their back. It's an exciting little tale, and I think it will make a cool storytime subject; I'm going to combine it with other stories about World War II and of course the very first Curious George story.

Woodrow Wilson by Louis Auchincloss (2000)

2011-08-20T16:53:00.000-07:00

My second presidential sketch (and third sketch overall) by Louis Auchincloss. This one part of the Penguin Lives series. Not quite as good as Theodore Roosevelt but still quite good. This morning I went directly from reading Tom and Lorenzo's Project Runway blog to Woodrow Wilson and momentarily confused the style of the two - I thought to myself that this was almost (but not quite) "Blogging Woodrow Wilson" except refined and not so raw.

Woodrow Wilson always comes across as such a douche. Very rigid and old time Presbyterian. Except for when it comes to the ladies (except he's a very old school gentleman women have their place sort of guy, which still makes him douchey).

If Louis Auchincloss does nothing else, he makes you think about then and now in very interesting, thoughtful ways. For example, he writes that when Wilson went to Paris and the peace conference, he brought with a messiah complex that made it hard for him to compromise. Auchincloss calls this Wilson's "worst political fault." "His faith that he had, more than other leaders, a sense of the will of the common people, and that he was divinely ordained to carry it out... he never learned that the only leader who can take political advantage of the momentary enthusiasm of the common man is a dictator who can us its force to blast his way to power; a democrat must abide by the decision of those whom the common man has elected to represent him." Auchincloss uses the impeachment of President Clinton as an example of how a popular president still must live under the thumb of the common man's elected representatives. Our current president has tasted much of that same medicine as well. It will be interesting a century from now to see the Penguin Lives version of President Barack Obama.

Those turns of thoughtful and thought provoking phrases makes reading Louis Auchincloss such a pleasure. Here's another, this one about the concept of self determination. "It might be noted here that the principle of self determination is as difficult to apply in our day as it was in Wilson's Will it stop short of splitting our planet into an impossible small number of small, bickering nations? It may be well to remember of our two most revered presidents that Washington fought a war to affirm the doctrine, and Lincoln one to deny it."

It's obvious from the last chapters that the story Auchincloss really wants to tell is the League of Nations battle royale between Henry Cabot Lodge and Woodrow Wilson. There is high drama and catty bitchiness involved in this fight, which may have been based on Wilson's hasty remarriage after the death of his wife, which Lodge found intolerable and gauche. Kelly Green's hilariously short review on Goodreads "Henry Cabot Lodge was such a hater" says quite a bit about the book itself. I didn't take that away from the book though. Henry Cabot Lodge was makes a good ice blooded villain and foil for the goodness of Wilson, but Wilson himself is also inflexible, holier than thou, and really unable to compromise or find common ground.

Colonel Robert Ingersoll Speech

2011-08-16T12:55:00.001-07:00

I read an excerpt of this speech in Sarah Vowell's Assassination Vacation, she included it as a prime example of "waving the bloody shirt" during the time period in which Garfield was elected. I included the entire speech because part of it are so wonderfully scathing. My initial thoughts on reading the excerpt - and now the whole speech - is that Fox News was around even then.

Indianapolis Speech (1876)

Robert Green Ingersoll

Delivered to the Veteran Soldiers of the Rebellion.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, FELLOW CITIZENS AND CITIZEN SOLDIERS: -- I am opposed to the Democratic party, and I will tell you why. Every State that seceded from the United States was a Democratic State. Every ordinance of secession that was drawn was drawn by a Democrat. Every man that endeavored to tear the old flag from the heaven that it enriches was a Democrat. Every man that tried to destroy this nation was a Democrat. Every enemy this great republic has had for twenty years has been a Democrat. Every man that shot Union soldiers was a Democrat. Every man that denied to the Union prisoners even the worm-eaten crust of famine, and when some poor, emaciated Union patriot, driven to insanity by famine, saw in an insane dream the face of his mother, and she beckoned him and he followed, hoping to press her lips once again against his fevered face, and when he stepped one step beyond the dead line the wretch that put the bullet through his loving throbbing heart was and is a Democrat.

Every man that loved slavery better than liberty was a Democrat. The man that assassinated Abraham Lincoln was a Democrat. Every man that sympathized with the assassin -- every man glad that the noblest President ever elected was assassinated, was a Democrat. Every man that wanted the privilege of whipping another man to make him work for him for nothing and pay him with lashes on his naked back, was a Democrat. Every man that raised bloodhounds to pursue human beings was a Democrat. Every man that clutched from shrieking, shuddering, crouching mothers, babes from their breasts, and sold them into slavery, was a Democrat. Every man that impaired the credit of the United States, every man that swore we would never pay the bonds, every man that swore we would never redeem the greenbacks, every malinger of his country's credit, every calumniator of his country's honor, was a Democrat. Every man that resisted the draft, every man that hid in the bushes and shot at Union men simply because they were endeavoring to enforce the laws of their country, was a Democrat. Every man that wept over the corpse of slavery was a Democrat. Every man that cursed Abraham Lincoln because he issued the Proclamation of Emancipation -- the grandest paper since the Declaration of Independence -- every one of them was a Democrat. Every man that denounced the soldiers that bared their breasts to the storms of shot and shell for the honor of America and for the sacred rights of man, was a Democrat. Every man that wanted an uprising in the North, that wanted to release the rebel prisoners that they might burn down the homes of Union soldiers above the heads of their wives and children, while the brave husbands, the heroic fathers, were front in the front fighting for the honor of the old flag, every one of them was a Democrat. I am not yet through yet. Every man that believed this glorious nation of ours is a confederacy, every man that believed the old banner carried by our fathers over the fields of the Revolution; the old flag carried by our fathers over the fields of 1812; the glorious old banner carried by our brothers over the plains of Mexico; the sacred banner carried by our brothers over the cruel fields of the South, simply stood for a contract, simply stood for an agreement, was a Democrat. Every man who believed that any State could go out of the Union at its pleasure, every man that believed the grand fabric of the American Government could be made to crumble instantly into dust at the touch of treason, was a Democrat. Every man that helped to burn orphan asylums in New York, was a Democrat; every man that tried to fire the city of New York, although he knew that thousands would perish, and knew that the great serpent of flame leaping from buildings would clutch children from their mothers' arms -- every wretch that did it was a Democrat. Recollect it! Every man that tried to spread smallpox and yellow fever in the North, as the instrumentalities of civilized war, was a Democrat. Soldiers, every scar you have on your heroic bodies was given you be a Democrat. Every scar, every arm that is lacking, every limb that is gone, is a souvenir of a Democrat. I want you to recollect it. Every man that was the enemy of human liberty in this country was a Democrat. Every man that wanted the fruit of all the heroism of all the ages to turn to ashes upon the lips -- every one was a Democrat.

I am a Republican. I will tell you why: This is the only free Government in the world. The Republican party made it so. The Republican party took the chains from four millions of people. The Republican party, with the wand of progress, touched the auction- block and it became a school house, The Republican party put down the Rebellion, saved the nation, kept the old banner afloat in the air, and declared that slavery of every kind should be extirpated from the face of this continent. What more? I am a Republican because it is the only free party that ever existed. It is a party that has a platform as broad as humanity, a platform as broad as the human race, a party that says you shall have all the fruit of the labor of your hands, a party that says you may think for yourself, a party that says, no chains for the hands, no fetters for the soul.

I am a Republican because the Republican party says this country is a Nation, and not a confederacy. I am here in Indiana to speak, and I have as good a right to speak here as though I had been born on this stand -- not because the State flag of Indiana waves over me -- I would not know it if I should see it. You have the same right to speak in Illinois, not because the State flag of Illinois waves over you, but because that banner, rendered sacred by the blood od all heroes, waves over me. I am in favor of this being a Nation. Think of a man gratifying his entire ambition in the State of Rhode Island. We want this to be a Nation, and you cannot have a great, grand, splendid people without a great, grand, splendid country. The great plains the sublime mountains, the great rushing, roaring rivers, shores lashed by two oceans, and the grand anthem of Niagara, mingle and enter, into the character of every American citizen, and make him or tend to make him a great and grand character. I am for the Republican party because it says the Government has as much right, as much power, to protect its citizens at home as abroad. The Republican party does not say that you have to go away from home to get the protection of the Government. The Democratic party says the Government cannot march its troops into the South to protect the rights of the citizens. It is a lie. The Government claims the right, and it is conceded that the Government has the right, to go to your house, while you are sitting by your fireside with your wife and children about you and the old lady knitting, and the cat playing with the yarn, and everybody happy and serene -- the Government claims the right to go to your fireside and take you by force and put you into the army; take you down to the valley of the shadow of hell, by the ruddy, roaring guns, and make you fight for your flag. Now, that being so, when the war is over and your country is victorious, and you go back to your home, and a lot of Democrats want to trample upon your rights, I want to know if the Government that took you from your fireside and made you fight for it, I want to know if it is not bound to fight for you. The flag that will not protect its protectors is a dirty rag that contaminates the air in which it waves. The government that will not defend its defenders is a disgrace to the nations of the world. I am a Republican because the Republican party says, "We will protect the rights of American citizens at home, and if necessary we will march an army into any State to protect the rights of the humblest American citizen in that State." I am a Republican because that party allows me to be free -- allows me to do my own thinking in my own way. I am a Republican because it is a party grand enough and splendid enough and sublime enough to invite every human being in favor of liberty and progress to fight shoulder to shoulder for the advancement of mankind. It invites the Methodist, it invites the Catholic, it invites the Presbyterian and every kind of sectarian; it invites the Freethinker; it invites the infidel, provided he is in favor of giving to every other human being every chance and every right that he claims for himself. I am a Republican, I tell you. There is room in the Republican air for every wing; there is room on the Republican sea for every sail. Republicanism says to every man: "Let your soul be like an eagle; fly out in the great dome of thought, and question the stars for yourself." But the Democratic party says; "Be blind owls, sit on the dry limb of a dead tree, and hoot only when that party says hoot."

In the Republican party there are no followers. We are all leaders. There is not a party chain. There is not a party lash. Any man that does not love this country, any man that does not love liberty, any man that is not in favor of human progress, that is not in favor of giving to others all he claims for himself; we do not ask him to vote the Republican ticket. You can vote it if you please, and if there is any Democrat within hearing who expects to die before another election, we are willing that he should vote one Republican ticket, simply as a consolation upon his death-bed. What more? I am a Republican because that party believes in free labor. It believes that free labor will give us wealth. It believes in free thought, because it believes that free thought will give us truth. You do not know what a grand party you belong to. I never want any holier or grander title of nobility than that I belong to the Republican party, and have fought for the liberty of man. The Republican party, I say, believes in free labor. The Republican party also believes in slavery. What kind of slavery? In enslaving the forces of nature.

We believe that free labor, that free thought, have enslaved the forces of nature, and made them work for man. We make the old attraction of gravitation work for us; we make the lightning do our errands we make steam hammer and fashion what we need. The forces of nature are the slaves of the Republican party. They have no backs to be whipped, they have no hearts to be torn -- no hearts to be broken; they cannot be separated from their wives; they cannot be dragged from the bosoms husbands; they work night and day and never tire. You cannot whip them, you cannot starve them, and a Democrat even can be trusted with one of them. I tell you I am a Republican. I believe, as I told you, that free labor will give us these slaves. Free labor will produce all these things, and everything you have to-day has been produced by free labor, nothing by slave labor.

Slavery never invented but one machine, and that was a threshing machine in the shape of a whip. Free labor has invented all the machines. We want to come down to the philosophy of things. things. The problem of free labor, when a man works for the wife he loves, when he works for the little children he adores -- the problem is to do the most work in the shortest space of time. The problem of slavery is to do the least work in the longest space of time. That is the difference. Free labor, love, affection -- they have invented everything of use in this world. I am a Republican.

I tell you, my friends, this world is getting better every day, and the Democratic party is getting smaller every day. See the advancement we have made in a few years, see what we have done. We have covered this nation with wealth, with glory and with liberty. This is the first free Government in the world. The Republican party is the first party that was not founded on some compromise with the devil. It is the first party of pure, square, honest principle; the first one. And we have the first free country that ever existed.

And right here I want to thank every soldier that fought to make it free, every one living and dead. I thank you again in and again. You made the first free Government in the world, and we must not forget the dead heroes. If they were here they would vote the Republican ticket, every one of them. I tell you we must not forget them.

NOTE: (The following part of this speech was to become known as "A Vision of War" and became the most famous of all written Memorials to the Civil War.)

The past rises before me like a dream. Again we are in the great struggle for national life. We hear the sounds of preparation -- the music of boisterous drums -- the silver voices of heroic bugles. We see thousands of assemblages, and hear the appeals of orators. We see the pale cheek, of women and the flushed faces of men; and in those assemblages we see all the dead whose dust we have covered with flowers. We lose sight of them no more. We are with them when they enlist in the great army of freedom. We see them part with those they love. Some are walking for the last time in quiet, woody places, with the maidens they adore. We hear the whisperings and the sweet vows of eternal love as they lingeringly part forever. Others are bending over cradles, kissing babes that are asleep. Some are receiving the blessings of old men. Some are parting with mothers who hold them and press them to their hearts again and again, and say nothing. Kisses and tears, tears and kisses -- divine mingling of agony and love! And some are talking with wives, and endeavoring with brave words, spoken in the old tones, to drive from their hearts the awful fear. We see them part. We see the wife standing in the door with the babe in her arms -- standing in the sunlight sobbing. At the turn of the road a hand waves -- she answers by holding high in her loving arms the child. He is gone, and forever.

We see them all as they march proudly away under the flaunting flags, keeping time to the grand, wild music of war -- marching down the streets of the great cities -- through the towns and across the prairies -- down to the fields of glory, to do and to die for the eternal right.

We go with them, one and all. We are by their side on all the gory fields -- in all the hospitals of pain -- on all the weary marches. We stand guard with them in the wild storm and under the quiet stars. We are with them in ravines running with blood -- in the furrows of old fields. We are with them between contending hosts, unable to move, wild with thirst, the life ebbing slowly away among the withered leaves. We see them pierced by balls and torn with shells. in the trenches, by forts, and in the whirlwind of the where men become iron with nerves of steel.

We are with them in the prisons of hatred and famine; but human speech can never tell what they endured.

We are at home when the news comes that they are dead. We see the maiden in the shadow of her first sorrow. We see the silvered head of the old man bowed with the last grief.

The past rises before us, and we see four millions of human beings governed by the lash -- we see them bound hand and foot -- we hear the strokes of cruel whips -- we see the hounds tracking women through tangled swamps. We see babes sold from the breasts of mothers. Cruelty unspeakable! Out-rage infinite!

Four million bodies in chains -- four million souls in fetters. All the sacred relations of wife, mother, father and child trampled beneath the brutal feet of might. And all this was done under our own beautiful banner of the free.

The past rises before us. We hear the roar and shriek of the bursting shell. The broken fetters fall. These heroes died. We look. Instead of slaves we see men and women and children. The wand of progress touches the auction-block, the slave-pen, the whipping- post, an we see homes and firesides and schoolhouses and books, and where all was want and crime and cruelty and fear, we see the faces of the free.

These heroes are dead. They died for liberty -- they died for us. They are at rest. They sleep in the land they made free, under the flag they rendered stainless, under the solemn pines, the sad hemlocks, the tearful willows, and the embracing vines. They sleep beneath the shadows of the clouds, careless alike of sunshine or of storm, each in the windowless Palace of Rest. Earth may run red with other wars -- they are at peace. In the midst of battle, in the roar of conflict, they found the serenity of death. I have one sentiment for soldiers living and dead: cheers for the living; tears for the dead.

NOTE: (end of 'A Vision of War.')

Now, my friends, I have given you a few reasons why I am a Republican. I have given you a few reasons why I am not a Democrat. Let me say another thing. The Democratic party opposed every forward movement of the army of the Republic, every one. Do not be fooled. Imagine the meanest resolution that you can think of -- that is the resolution the Democratic party passed. Imagine the meanest thing you can think of -- that is what they did; and I want you to recollect that the Democratic party did these devilish things when the fate of this nation was trembling in the balance of war. I want you to recollect another thing; when they tell you about hard times, that the Democratic party made the hard times; that every dollar we owe to-day was made by the Southern and Northern Democracy.

When we commenced to put down the Rebellion we had to borrow money, and the Democratic party went into the markets of the world and impaired the credit of the United States. They slandered, they lied, they maligned the credit of the United States, and to such an extent did they do this, that at one time during the war paper was only worth about thirty-four cents on the dollar. Gold went up to $2.90. What did that mean? It meant that greenbacks were worth thirty-four cents on the dollar. What became of the other sixty-six cents? They were laid out of the greenback, they were slandered out of the greenback, they were maligned out of the greenback, they were calumniated out of the greenback, by the Democratic party of the North. Two-thirds of the debt, two-thirds of the burden now upon the shoulders of American industry, were placed there by the slanders of the Democratic party of the North, and the other third by the Democratic party of the South. And when you pay your taxes keep an account and charge two-thirds to the Northern Democracy and one-third to the Southern Democracy, and whenever you have to earn the money to pay the taxes, when you have to blister your hands to earn that money, pull off the blisters, and under each one, as the foundation, you will find a Democratic lie.

Recollect that the Democratic party did all the things of which I have told you, when the fate of our nation was submitted to the arbitrament of the sword. Recollect that the Democratic party did these things when your brothers, your fathers, and your chivalric sons were fighting, bleeding, suffering, and dying upon the battle-fields of the South; when shot and shell were crashing through their sacred flesh. Recollect that this Democratic party was false to the Union when your husbands, your fathers, and your brothers, and your chivalric sons were lying in the hospitals of pain, dreaming broken dreams of home, and seeing fever pictures of the ones they loved; recollect that the Democratic party was false to the nation when your husbands, your fathers, and your brothers were lying alone upon the field of battle at night the life-blood slowly oozing from the mangled and pallid lips of death; recollect that the Democratic party was false to your country when your husbands, your brothers, your fathers, your sons were lying in the prison pens of the South, with no covering but the clouds, with no bed but the frozen earth, with no food except such as worms had refused to eat, and with no friends except Insanity and Death. Recollect it, and spurn that party forever.

I have sometimes wished that there were words of pure hatred out of which I might construct sentences like snakes; out of which I might construct sentences that had fanged mouths, and that had forked tongues; out of which I might construct sentences that would writhe and hiss; and then I could give my opinion of the Northern allies of the Southern rebels during the great struggle for the preservation of the country.

There are three questions now submitted to the American people. The first is, Shall the people that served this country rule it? Shall the men who saved the old flag hold it? Shall the men who saved the ship of State sail it, or shall the rebels walk her quarter-deck, give the orders and sink it? That is the question. Shall a solid South, a united South, united by assassination and murder, a South solidified by the shot-gun; shall a united South, with the aid of a divided North, shall they control this great and splendid country? We are right back where we were in 1861. This is simply a prolongation of the war. This is the war of the idea, the other was the war of the musket. The other was the war of cannon, this is the war of thought; and we have beat them in this war of thought, recollect that. The question is, Shall the men who endeavored to destroy this country rule it? Shall the men that said, This is not a Nation, have charge of the Nation?

The next question is, Shall we pay our debts? We had to borrow some money to pay for shot and shell to shoot Democrats with. We found that we could get along with a few less Democrats, but not with any less country, and so we borrowed the money, and the question now is, will we pay it? And which party is the more apt to pay it, the Republican party that made the debt -- the party that swore it was constitutional, or the party that said it was unconstitutional?

Every time a Democrat sees a greenback, it says to him, "I vanquished you." Every time a Republican sees a greenback, it says, "You and I put down the Rebellion and saved the country."

Now, my friends, you have heard a great deal about finance. Nearly everybody that talks about it gets as dry -- as dry as if they had been in the final home of the Democratic party for forty years.

I now give you my ideas about finance. In the first place the Government does not support the people, the people support the Government.

The Government is a perpetual pauper. It passes round the hat, and solicits contributions; but then you must remember that the Government has a musket behind the hat. The Government produces nothing. It does not plow the land, it does not sow corn, it does not grow trees. The Government is a perpetual consumer. We support the Government. Now, the idea that the Government can make money for you and me to live on -- why, it is the same as though my hired man should issue certificates of my indebtedness to him for me to live on.

people tell me that the Government can impress its sovereignty on a piece of paper, and that is money. Well, if it is, what's the use of wasting it making one dollar bills? It takes no more ink and no paper -- why not make one thousand dollar bills? Why not make a hundred million dollar bills I be and all be billionaires?

If the Government can make money, what on earth does it collect taxes from you and me for? Why does it not make what money it wants, take the taxes out, and give the balance to us? Mr. Greenbacker, suppose the Government issued a billion dollars to-morrow, how would you get any of it? [A voice, "Steal it."] I was not speaking to the Democrats. You would not get any of it unless you had something to exchange for it. The Government would not go around and give you your average. You have to have some corn, or wheat, or pork to give for it.

How do you get your money? By work from Where from? You have to dig it out of the ground. That is where it comes from. Men have always had a kind of hope that something could be made out of nothing. The old alchemists sought, with dim eyes for something that could change the baser metals to gold. With tottering steps, they searched for the spring of Eternal Youth. Holding in trembling hands retort and crucible, they dreamed of the Elixir of Life. The baser metals are not gold. No human ear has ever heard the silver gurgle of the spring of Immortal Youth. The wrinkles upon the brow of Age are still waiting for the Elixir of Life. Inspired by the same idea, mechanics have endeavored, by curious combinations of levers and inclined planes, of wheels and cranks and shifting weights, to produce perpetual motion; but the wheels and levers wait for force. And, in the financial world, there are thousands now trying to find some way for promises to take the place of performance; for some way to make the word dollar as good as the dollar itself; for some way to make the promise to pay a dollar take the dollar's place. This financial alchemy, this pecuniary perpetual motion, this fountain of eternal wealth, are the same old failures with new names. Something cannot be made out of nothing. Nothing is a poor capital to carry on business with, and makes a very unsatisfactory balance at your bankers.

Let me tell you another thing. The Democrats seem to think that you can fail to keep a promise so long that it is as good as though you had kept it. They say you can stamp the sovereignty of the Government upon paper.

I saw not long ago a piece of gold bearing the stamp of the Roman Empire. That Empire is dust, and over it has been thrown the mantle of oblivion, but that piece of gold is as good as though Julius Caesar were still riding at the head of the Roman Legions.

Was it his sovereignty that made it valuable? Suppose he had put it upon a piece of paper -- it would have been of no more value than a Democratic promise

. Another thing, my friends: this debt will be paid; you need not worry about that. The Democrats ought to pay it. They lost the suit, and they ought to pay the costs. But we in our patriotism are willing to pay our share.

Every man that has a bond, every man that has a greenback dollar has a mortgage upon the best continent of land on earth. Every one has a mortgage on the honor of the Republican party, and it is on record. Every spear of grass; every beard head of golden wheat that grows upon this continent is a guarantee that the debt will be paid; every field of bannered corn in the great, glorious West is a guarantee that the debt will be paid; every particle of coal laid away by that old miser the sun, millions of years ago, is a guarantee that every dollar will be paid; all the iron ore, all the gold and silver under the snow-capped Sierra Nevadas, waiting for the miners pick to give back the flash of the sun, every ounce is a guarantee that this debt will be paid; and all the cattle on the prairies, pastures and plains which adorn our broad land are guarantees that this debt will be paid; every pine standing in the somber forests of the North, waiting for the woodman's axe, is a guarantee that this debt will be paid; every locomotive with its muscles of iron and breath flame, and all the boys and girls bending over their books at school, every dimpled babe in the cradle, every honest man, every noble woman, and every man that votes the Republican ticket is a guarantee that the debt will be paid -- these, all these, each and all are guarantees that every promise of the United States will be sacredly fulfilled.

What is the next question? The next question is, will we protect the Union men in the South? I tell you the white Union men have suffered enough. It is a crime in the Southern States to be a Republican. It is a crime in every Southern State to love this country, to believe in the sacred rights of men.

The colored people have suffered enough. For than two hundred years they have suffered the fabled torments of the damned; for more than two hundred years they worked and toiled without reward, bending, in the burning sun, their bleeding backs; for more than two hundred years, babes were torn from the breasts of mothers, wives from husbands, and every human tie broken by the cruel hand of greed; for more than two hundred years pursued by hounds, beaten with clubs, burned with fire, bound with chains; two hundred years of toil, of agony, of tears; two hundred years of hope deferred; two hundred years of gloom and shadow and darkness and blackness; two hundred years of supplication, of entreaty; two hundred years of infinite outrage, without a moment of revenge.

The colored people have suffered enough. They were and are our friends. They are the friends of this country, and, cost what it may, they must be protected.

There was not during the whole Rebellion a single negro that was not our friend. We are willing to be reconciled to our Southern brethren when they will treat our friends as men. When they will be just to the friends of this country; when they are in favor of allowing every American citizen to have his rights -- then we are their friends. We are willing to trust them with the Nation when they are the friends of the Nation. We are willing to trust them with liberty when they believe in liberty. We are willing to trust them with the black man when they cease riding in the darkness of night (those masked wretches,) to the hut of the freedman, and notwithstanding the prayers and supplications of his family, shoot him down; when they cease to consider the massacre of Hamburg as a Democratic triumph, then, I say, we will be their friends, and not before.

Now, my friends, thousands of the Southern people and thousands of the Northern Democrats are afraid that the negroes are going to pass them in the race of life. And, Mr. Democrat, he will do it unless you attend to your business. The simple fact that you are white cannot save you always. You have to be industrious, honest, to cultivate a sense of justice. If you do not the colored race will pass you, as sure as you live. I am for giving every man a chance. Anybody that can pass me is welcome.

I believe, my friends, that the intellectual domain of the future, as the land used to be in the State of Illinois, is open to preemption. The fellow that gets a fact first, that is his; that gets an idea first, that is his. Every round in the ladder of fame, from the one that touches the ground to the last one that leans against the shining summit of human ambition, belongs to the foot that gets upon it first.

Mr. Democrat, (I point down because they are nearly all on the first round of the ladder) if you can not climb, stand to one side and let the deserving negro pass.

I must tell you one thing. I have told it so much, and you have all heard it fifty times, but I am going to tell it again because I like it. Suppose there was a great horse race here to-day, free to every horse in the world, and to all the mules, and all the scrubs, and all the donkeys.

At the tap of the drum they come to the line and the judges say "it is a go." Let me ask you, what does the blooded horse, rushing ahead, with nostrils distended, drinking in the breath of his won swiftness, with his mane flying like a banner of victory, with his veins standing out all over him, as if a network of life bad been cast upon him -- with his thin neck, his high withers, his tremulous flanks -- what does he care how many mules and donkeys run on that track? But the Democratic scrub with his chuckle-head and lop-ears, with his tail full of cockle-burrs, jumping high and short, and digging in the ground when he feels the breath of the coming mule on his cockle-burr tail, he is the chap that jumps the track and says, "I am down on mule equality."

I stood, a little while ago, in the city of Paris, where stood the Bastille, where now stands the Column of July, surmounted by a figure of liberty. In its right hand is a broken chain, in its left hand a banner; upon its glorious forehead the glittering and shining star of progress -- and as I looked upon it I said Such is the Republican party of my country." The other day going along the road I came to a place where the road had been changed, but the guide-board did not know it. It had stood there for twenty years pointing deliberately and solemnly in the direction of a desolate field; nobody ever went that way, but the guide-board thought the next man would. Thousands passed, but nobody heeded the hand on the guide-post, and through sunshine and storm it pointed diligently into the old field and swore to it the road went that way; and I said to myself: Such is the Democratic party of the United States."

The other day I came to a river where there had been a mill; a part of it was there still. An old sign said: "Cash for wheat." The old waterwheel was broken; it had been warped by the sun, cracked and split by many winds and storms. There had not been a grain of wheat ground there for twenty years.

The door was gone, nobody had built a new dam, the mill was not worth a dam; and I said to myself: "Such, is the Democratic party."

I saw a little while ago a place on the road where there had once been an hotel. But the hotel, and barn had burned down and there was nothing standing but two desolate chimneys, up the flues of which the fires of hospitality had not roared for thirty years. The fence was gone, and the post-holes even were obliterated, but in the road there was an old sign upon which were these words: "Entertainment for man and beast." The old sign swung and creeked in the winter wind, the snow fell upon it, the sleet clung to it, and in the summer the birds sang and twittered and made love upon it. Nobody ever stopped there, but the sign swore to it, the sign certified to it! "Entertainment for man and beast," and I said to myself: "Such is the Democratic party of the United States," and I further said, "one chimney ought to be called Tilden and the other Hendricks."

Now, my friends, I want you to vote the Republican ticket. I want you to swear you will not vote for a man who opposed putting down the Rebellion. I want you to swear that you will not vote for a man opposed to the Proclamation of Emancipation. I want you to swear that you will not vote for a man opposed to the utter abolition of slavery.

I want you to swear that you will not vote for a man who called the soldiers in the field, Lincoln hirelings. I want you to swear that you will not vote for a man who denounced Lincoln as a tyrant. I want you to swear that you will not vote for any enemy of human progress. Go and talk to every Democrat that you can see; get him by the coat collar, talk to him, and hold him like Coleridge's Ancient Mariner, with your glittering eye; hold him, tell him all the mean things his party ever did; tell him kindly; tell him in a Christian spirit, as I do, but tell him. Recollect, there never was a more important election than the one you are going to hold in Indiana. I tell you we must stand by the country. It is a glorious country. It permits you and me to be free. It is the only country in the world where labor is respected. Let us support it. It is the only country in the world where the useful man is the only aristocrat. The man that works for a dollar a day, goes home at night to his little ones, takes his little boy on his knee, and he thinks that boy can achieve anything that the sons of the wealthy man can achieve. The free schools are open to him; he may be the richest, the greatest, and the grandest, and that thought sweetens every drop of sweat that rolls down the honest face of toil. Vote to save that country.

My friends, this country is getting better every day. Samuel J. Tilden says we are a nation of thieves and rascals. If that is so he ought to be the President. But I denounce him as a calumniator of my country; a malinger of this nation. It is not so. This country is covered with asylums for the aged, the helpless, the insane, the orphans and wounded soldiers. Thieves and rascals do not build such things. In the cities of the Atlantic coast this summer, they built floating hospitals, great ships, and took the little children from the sub-cellars and narrow, dirty streets of New York City, where the Democratic party is the strongest -- took these poor waifs and put them in these great hospitals out at sea, and let the breezes of ocean kiss the roses of health back to their pallid cheeks. Rascals and thieves do not so. When Chicago burn railroads were blocked with the charity of the American people. Thieves and rascals do not so.

I am a Republican. The world is getting better. Husbands are treating their wives better than they used to; wives are treating their husbands better. Children are better treated than they used to be; the old whips and clubs are out of the schools, and they are governing children by love and by sense. The world is getting better; it is getting better in Maine, in Vermont. It is getting better in every State of the North, and I tell you we are going to elect Hayes and Wheeler and the world will then be better still. I have a dream that this world is growing better and better every day and every year; that there is more charity, more justice, more love every day. I have a dream that prisons will not always curse the land; that the shadow of the gallows will not always fall upon the earth; that the withered hand of want will not always be stretched out for charity; that finally wisdom will sit in the legislatures, justice in the courts, charity will occupy all the pulpits, and that finally the world will be governed by justice and charity, and by the splendid light of liberty. That is my dream, and if it does not come true, it shall not be my fault. I am going to do my level best to give others the same chance I ask for myself. Free thought will give us truth; Free labor will give us wealth.

Actually, Robert Ingersoll was a pretty cool guy. He was one of the best orators of the 19th century, and was known as the "Great Agnostic." He was a humanist, a secularist, a friend of Walt Whitman. In all actuality, he'd probably be a Democrat today. Or more likely in the Green Party!

Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell (2005)

2011-08-16T12:05:00.000-07:00

How do you describe a Sarah Vowell book? This is my second one I've read by her - the first being Unfamiliar Fishes about Hawaii - and both of them are written in exactly the same style. Vowell takes facts - in this case about the assassinations of Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley - and spins them with her own opinions and segues into her own life and experiences. In reading some Goodreads reviews of the book, someone wrote that it's Vowell's voice that really makes her book (s) and I tend to agree. Not her actual voice - although that's amusing and interesting enough to be used in animation - but her writer's voice. What kind of "voice" does Sarah Vowell write with? Sometimes tongue in cheek, sometimes snarky, sometimes bitterly humorous (particularly when talking about the then administration of George W. Bush); sometimes she has an almost childlike sense of awe about a particularly subject or happening, almost as if whatever she's writing about is glowing in a multitude of rainbow colors - but in a totally likable way. Her voice is the line drawn between Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley - a crooked line that segues here there and everywhere but a line nonetheless.

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting (1922)

2011-08-13T10:32:00.000-07:00

I'm nearly finished with The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle, and while it's still not my favorite of the books (at least I think that now), it does have at least one beautifully memorable and quotable passage about the sea, and some interesting analogies about colonialism.

First the passage. Tommy Stubbins, Doctor Dolittle's nine (!) year old assistant, is describing the beautiful, terrible power of the sea:

Indeed the whole sky was now beginning to take on a very threatening look. The black line to the eastward grew blacker as it came nearer and nearer. A low, rumbly, whispering noise went moaning over the sea. The water which had been so blue and smiling turned to a ruffled ugly gray. And across the darkening sky, shreds of cloud swept like tattered witches flying from the storm.
I must confess I was frightened. You see I had only so far seen the sea in friendly moods: sometimes quiet and lazy; sometimes laughing, venturesome and reckless; sometimes brooding and poetic, when moonbeams turned her ripples into silver threads and dreaming snowy night-clouds piled up fairy-castles in the sky. But as yet I had not known, or even guessed at, the terrible strength of the Sea's wild anger.

Now on to colonialism. The whole war between the Indian tribes and the Peace of the Parrots got me to thinking, particularly about the Terrible Three: Doctor Dolittle (the white Englishman, European, armed with Western knowledge and technology), Long Arrow (the South American Indian, armed with traditional know-how and an understanding of the native mind) and Bumpo (the African prince, strong and brave, although not so developed as the other two, but trying via and Oxford, western education). They represent the Popsipetel tribe - weak, without knowledge or technology (they don't even have fire), easily tricked by the "smarter" Westerner and his allies (albeit tricked for the good). Invaded by the Bag-jagderags - whose sole purpose in invading is to steal the corn of the Popsipetel, because the Bag-jagderags are too lazy to grow their own. This certainly smells like a parable for children about the evils of colonialism. I wrote earlier after reading the first Dolittle book that the war between the Doctor and the African king were anti-colonial as well; Voyages seems to make that indictment, although in a much more subtle (and fun) manner. Here we have the powers of the third world, represented first (of course) by the great white doctor, coming together to stop a great power from invading for the purpose of exploiting the smaller, weaker people for material gain. This doesn't seem to include a specific anti-war sentiment - that certainly seems to come later in Lofting's works; the doctor is a peaceful man but willing to fight tooth and nail to protect the weaker Popsipetel from their aggressive neighbors. The fact that the two peoples make Dolittle their king has that Babar-esque feel; but kings have been elected before for equally odd reasons, and it certainly makes for a fun ending to the story.

After teaching the natives of Spider Monkey Island all about Western culture and technology - metal making, medicine, art and literature - the Doctor doesn't think he can leave:

"Now Doctor," said she in a soft persuasive voice as though she were talking to a wayward child, "you know this king business is not your real work in life. These natives will be able to get along without you--not so well as they do with you of course-- but they'll manage--the same as they did before you came. Nobody can say you haven't done your duty by them. It was their fault: they made you king. Why not accept the snail's offer; and just drop everything now, and go? The work you'll do, the information you'll carry home, will be of far more value than what you're doing here."
"Good friend," said the Doctor turning to her sadly, "I cannot. They would go back to their old unsanitary ways: bad water, uncooked fish, no drainage, enteric fever and the rest. . . . No. I must think of their health, their welfare. I began life as a people's doctor: I seem to have come back to it in the end. I cannot desert them. Later perhaps something will turn up. But I cannot leave them now."
"That's where you're wrong, Doctor," said she. "Now is when you should go. Nothing will 'turn up.' The longer you stay, the harder it will be to leave."
Again, that anti-colonial sentiment. It's okay to teach the third world about medicine and art and how to mine and make things - but it's not alright to stay.

******

As I read the second Dolittle book, I was also struck - and who couldn't be - by how Lofting was ahead of the curve on thoughts about animals. The tidbit about the Doctor discovering the North Pole before anyone else:

I promised to keep it a secret. And you must promise me never to tell any one. Yes, I discovered the North Pole in April, 1809. But shortly after I got there the polar bears came to me in a body and told me there was a great deal of coal there, buried beneath the snow. They knew, they said, that human beings would do anything, and go anywhere, to get coal. So would I please keep it a secret. Because once people began coming up there to start coal-mines, their beautiful white country would be spoiled—and there was nowhere else in the world cold enough for polar bears to be comfortable. So of course I had to promise them I would.

Hasn't drilling in the Alaskan wilderness been a perennial presidential debate for the last two elections? Lofting was writing this 90 years ago; I wonder if anyone else was saying this in 1922?

This very modern environmentalism appears again and again. The idea that lions and tigers should not be kept in zoos. The idea that zoos are to make animals comfortable and mimic their habitats. Later, in Doctor Dolittle's Circus, the Doctor takes it a step further and frees a sea lion -- I think the 21st century Doctor Dolittle would definitely be an environmental terrorist trying to free Willy at Seaworld.

I was also thinking about my reaction to this particular book, wondering why it was an award winner, thinking it was quite as interesting as some of the other books. I also kept thinking to myself - the cynical grown up - things like "Indians would have fire" and "There aren't really any black parrots, that's just made up" poking holes right and left (there is another part of mind saying "Shut up; it's a fantasy book, and while the rules of this world aren't absolutely perfect, they aren't that bad either).

But then a spark in my mind: I'm a nine year old boy in 1922. Maybe I have a radio, but maybe not. I'm on a farm in Kansas or Nebraska. My family has an automobile of some sort, but aside from school we really don't go into town very often. I probably don't even have electricity. My parents have 8th grade educations, or maybe they are immigrants (most likely second generation Americans). I go to school for part of the year in town, and some midwestern school marm in the big new brick school shows me this new book The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle - and my mind is opened to far away places. Indians and floating islands and shipwrecks. Tribal warfare. Whales and dolphins. A man who can talk to animals. And a nine year old boy, just like me, who gets to go on this adventure. Between milking the cows and weeding the vegetable garden and feeding the chickens and all that other back breaking farm work, I get to escape for a while.

Even a 9 year old boy in a small town in Kansas in 1979 wanted to escape for a while into that world. I hope nine year old boys still do.

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting (1922)

2011-08-12T15:44:00.000-07:00

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle won the Newbery Award in 1923. But I have to say, my memory of it was that it was one of my least favorite of all the Doctor Dolittle books. And I think that's probably still true. Although by this second book the Doctor has developed into "himself," I still think it's not a very interesting story (at least not yet). I miss Gub-Gub, Too-Too, Dab-Dad, the white mouse, etc. who don't really play any sort of role in the book -- only Dab-Dab is mentioned by name.

I wonder what it was about the book that helped it win the Newbery that year? Interestingly, that was only the second year of the Newbery Awards, so perhaps they were still getting their footing. There aren't any recorded honor books to compare it to that year either.... TIME PASSING... GOOGLING IN A FRUSTRATED MANNER... BROW FURROWED...

It's difficult to find a list of books for children published in 1922. (the Caldecott Awards were started in 1938!)... Maybe children just read and re-read the same books over and over again... Doctor Dolittle, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Andrew Lang...

These were in the Most Popular Books Published in 1922 at Goodreads:

The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
Blacky the Crow by Thornton Burgess
Whitefoot the Woodmouse by Thornton Burgess
The Bobbsey Twins and the County Fair Mystery by Laura Lee Hope
Some other series crap I'd never even heard of.

NOTHING ELSE! No wonder The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle won the Newbery Medal and there weren't any honors - except for some series (and those early old lady librarians hated series, although HOW Doctor Dolittle isn't a series is beyond me) - there wasn't anything else published except for The Velveteen Rabbit. Both Voyages and Rabbit are still in print, which to my mind makes them beloved classics. I'm not sure one is any better than the other; perhaps Velveteen wasn't even offered up.

The plot thickens! The early Newbery Awards were a popularity contest - popular vote among librarians! Still, not a lot to choose from that year though.

The Shadow Pavilion by Liz Williams (2009)

2011-08-09T20:46:00.000-07:00

Liz Williams keeps on amazing me. Each time I pick up one of her books, I read about three chapters and I think "Ho hum, do I really want to finish this?" But that nagging little voice reminds me, oh so rightfully "Keep on going, it's always worth it..." And boy, it sure always is worth it. It's like a long, slow drum roll that starts out softly but just keeps getting louder and louder and until BOOM and then it fades delightfully away.

Everything in the world of Detective Inspector Chen is dark, an oily sheen on a dirty harbor reflecting red neon lights and the full moon. The world Williams has created is both old and modern, where ancient stories and folktales run smack into raw, new stories. It's always night in Singapore Three, and my recent experience at a LA Noir panel discussion (and a new awareness of noir in general) made me wonder if the Detective Inspector Chen novels were indeed some sort of fantasy noir. So I looked up some characteristics of noir to check.

There is definitely a new sub genre called "fantasy noir" out there - I just checked - described as "magical cities in decay." That's a good label for Singapore Three. That good old school marm Miz Wikipedia provides some additional information to compare, from the article on film noir. "Convoluted storylines." Liz Williams plots are pretty fragmented and tend to snake around one another until you come to the end. "Crime, usually murder, is an element in all noirs" usually based on greed or jealousy. Since these are nominally books about a detective inspector, that seems to be an obvious that some sort of crime is going to take center stage - although, interestingly, geopolitical circumstances often play a role as well (or in this case, politics involving any number of Hells and Heavens), making some of the books a cross between fantasy noir and a fantasy political thriller. "Flawed heroes... morally questionable" A demon from hell seems ultimately flawed and certainly morally questionable (he just cheated on his fiance with an erotic deva, and I don' t think he has any intention of telling her). Chen, on the other hand, considers himself flawed - or at least his former patroness Kwan Yin seems to think so -- but I'm not always so sure (I've got a huge crush on Chen; so far he can do no wrong in my eyes, although Zhu Irzh is far more sexy, at least for a giant insect). "Urban setting." Already covered that. "The city as a labyrinth or maze." Singapore Three goes on and on, twists and turns both physically and plot wise. "Essentially pessimistic;" perhaps this where the noir ends and the fantasy begins, because the books might be dark, but they have pretty upbeat endings. "Trapped in unwanted situations (which, in general, they did not cause but are responsible for exacerbating), striving against random, uncaring fate, and frequently doomed." This definitely describes everyone who Detective Inspector Chen meets, from his demonic partner to his wife (even her badger), and certainly the characters they interact with in each book. "A world that is inherently corrupt." Singapore Three seems to be filled with corruption. Hell, of course, is corruption in itself. But even Heaven is corrupt! "Film noir is often said to be defined by moral ambiguity, yet the Production Code obliged almost all classic noirs to see that steadfast virtue was ultimately rewarded and vice, in the absence of shame and redemption, severely punished (however dramatically incredible the final rendering of mandatory justice might be)." Let's see -- the Empress of Heaven was confined to eternal solitary confinement for plotting against her son and trying to have him killed. That seems pretty severe. But the assassin her/himself (s/he is both sexes) is saved at the end (I won't give away that plot point, just in case someone is reading this). Morally and sexually ambiguous.

I think I'd call this fantasy noir. Or some sort of noir. If the characteristics were the ingredients of a recipe, then Liz Williams has prepared several incredibly fun to read noir cakes.

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting (1922)

2011-08-09T14:13:00.000-07:00

Tommy Stubbins comes to the doctor's home for the second time, the next morning after they had met. After a short conversation with Polynesia the parrot, he goes inside. "When I opened the door, I could smell bacon frying, so I made my way to the kitchen. There I discovered a large kettle boiling away over the fire and some bacon and eggs in a dish upon the hearth."

Egad? Has the doctor slaughtered Gub-gub the pig? Shouldn't Doctor Dolittle be a vegetarian? For some reason, this never bothered me as a kid. In fact, all of those hearty English meals were kind of comforting.

Theodore Roosevelt by Louis Auchincloss (2001)

2011-08-08T12:12:00.000-07:00

A nonfiction book in which the reader learns absolutely nothing new is a mediocre at best and boring at worse. Sometimes a book's writing style can save it from the abyss of abysmal, but most of the time when I run across these types of book, I consign them to the dust heap.

Theodore Roosevelt by Louis Auchincloss is not one of those books.

I consider myself something of a Theodore Roosevelt aficionado. I remember in a long ago American history class, TR was the president I chose to write about. I remember getting the paper back with red marks written something to the effect that I had dwelt too much on his early life, marriage, and family and not enough on his presidency. That's because I'm usually more interested in those things when reading or researching people. I've read many TR biographies over the years. I know about his childhood asthma - which may or may not have been psychosomatic. I know about his lovely but dim first wife, Alice Lee. I know his mother was a Rebel and that his first wife and mother died on the same day. I know about the Badlands, about Edith Carow waiting for him like Penelope back at home (sans suitors, I imagine), and about how she ruled the roost. I know about his big, funny brood of children - Princess Alice and her blue, Ted and his macaw, plain Ethel, the younger mischievous boys. I know about his relationship to FDR and ER, and William Howard Taft I know he invented the phrase "threw my hat into the ring." And that he was a bull moose. I'm not a TR scholar by any way shape or form. But I consider him one of our strongest presidents - he really made the modern presidency what it is today, and Congress has been spending the whole of the 20th century trying to regain the power that TR took from them. With varied amounts of success.

So I approached this slight volume in the American Presidents series (published by Henry Holt, edited by Arthur Schlessinger, who knows his stuff) with some trepidation. What could I possibly learn about TR that I didn't already know? It's that second part - the writing style - that really brought me to this book. I've discovered Louis Auchincloss - blue blood writer from New York - and kind of fallen in love with his whispering in your ear style of history. And afterall, who better to write about a blue blood New Yorker from an old family than another blue blood New Yorker from an old family? Happily, I was proven right. Theodore Roosevelt is a magnificent little book. Auchincloss, as usual, doesn't just let the facts stand for themselves - he tells the story of TR, but in a crisp, interesting way. He covers his early life, is relationships, his friendships, his presidency, his Bull Moose years, and his war against Wilson over World War I. The book literally took me all of two days to read - I could have probably read it in one or two sittings over the course of one day, if I had made the time for it - but packed a mighty wallop. Why can't all books be as good as this?

So the writing style was magnificent (as usual) - but you may ask "Did you learn anything new?" Amazingly, I did. The last few chapters were packed full of new new ideas and concepts about TR -- and the Republican Party as a whole - that had never occurred to me until Auchincloss pointed them out.

For example, after Roosevelt and Taft lost to Wilson - Auchincloss muses on page 122: "What he (TR) may have done to his party may still affect it to this day. Has the Republican Party ever really recovered the liberal wing which abandoned it to follow TR in 1912?"

Auchincloss has a superb few pages in Chapter 16 in which he compares the government philosophies of TR and Woodrow Wilson, laid out in a clear cut way that made complete and or sense to me. TR, Auchincloss said, was at heart still for big business and corporations, regardless of his progressive label. He "admired their force and orderly organization; he saw them as essential to the growth of a great industrial nation, as vital components of the new century of material progress. And as a devoted advocate of military preparedness, he must have also foreseen them as the indispensable producers of warships and armaments. " What TR didn't like was what Auchincloss - I think most likely quoting the morally high horsed TR himself - was their "wickedness. That had to be policed by a national government stronger than the corporations themselves." The first part alone would make him a pure Wall Street Republican -- it's that last (brave) stance that sets him apart from the Republicans of his day and ours. Wilson, on the other hand, "saw the business picture through a different lens. To him, the mammoth size of the trusts was an evil in itself, a factor that stifled competition and shut the small guy out of the market. He wanted every man, so to speak, to have his chance; he wanted to open the business arena to new enterprises that might initially lack the capital held by the established ones." Roosevelt, says Auchincloss, was a believer in laissez-faire, tempered by government regulation of antisocial behavior (exploitation of labor and unfair business practices; he hated caveat emptor and thought it ungentlemanly and without honor). Wilson "believed in protecting the individual from being shut out of business by corporate monopoly. For, unlike his predecessor in office, he insisted that size did lead to monopoly and that monopoly did stifle competition." I don't think the Republican Party today has changed all that much from the Republican Party of 1912; I still think they are mostly in the pockets of big corporations, and deregulation is their revenge against the Roosevelts (the first and second). But I'm not sure the Democrats today are Wilsonian either. I think a good chunk of them, including our current president, might talk a lot about the little guy, but I have a feeling they are more Teddy Rooseveltian than Wilsonian in their business outlook.

These two - warrior Roosevelt and professor Wilson - make great rivals as reading. Auchincloss points out that something changed in TR after he left the presidency. He becomes more intense, more outspoken, more radical - what I call "boiled down" When you boil down something, it becomes more of what it was - sweeter or darker or thicker -- and that's what happened to Roosevelt. The TR of the 19th century was all gung-ho and bully, and while he said some pretty outrageous (but often true) things, I don't think he was quite as outrageous - and almost demogographic - as what he says about Wilson in the passage below. Wilson, who lived in a borrowed manse during the summer called "Shadow Lawn", refused to go war, even with American casualties. Mr. War Himself vehemently disagreed: "There should be shadows now at Shadow Lawn," he said in 1916, the shadows of the men, women and children who have risen from the ooze of the ocean bottom and from graves in foreign lands: the shadows of the helpless whom Mr. Wilson did not dare protect lest he should have to face danger, the shadows of babies gasping pitifully as they sank under the waves, the shadows of women outraged and slain by bandits." YERGH. That's some tough stuff - House of Representatives rhetoric; certainly our current ex-presidents tread more carefully in their speeches.

Wilson wanted to keep out of the war, TR wanted us in - but I can see where Wilson was coming from in trying to stay out. I'm not sure what the vested interest in our entering the war was, and on the side we entered (propaganda and a shared language and history insured we took the British side, I'm sure). (I'm not exactly sure why we are in Iraq either). There wasn't a precedent for meddling in European affairs - in fact, there had been a century of staying out of European affairs, and keeping Europe out of the Western Hemisphere. I was trying to think what the first truly international war we entered into with somewhat entangling alliances (not technically, I think) - and that was probably the War of 1812. And as James Loewen points out in Lies My History Teacher Told Me, that war was mostly against the Native Americans and less against the British (really, let's be honest, not even the British - we were at war with Canada). Our other international wars up to that point - Mexico and Spain - weren't really about coming in on the side of anyone but ourselves. So Wilson was shooting blind here - without any (or very, very little) history or past presidential behavior to guide him. It's pretty easy for TR to sit on the sidelines (albeit forced to sit there by circumstances) and goad Wilson, calling him a coward, and blaming him for the deaths of women and children in gruesomely purple oration. But I think Wilson was right in taking a "wait and see" attitude. He needed to get his ducks in a row first before sending the Yanks "over there."

Once the war began, and TR wanted to serve - admirable but delusional - Wilson most definitely did not want him go "over there." I love a bit of sarcasm, dry wit, turns of phrase, or good quips. Here's one from Colonel House, Wilson's right-hand man. TR, "voicing his discouragement" about not being allowed to form a new Rough Rider regiment, said: "After all, I'm only asking to be allowed to die." To which House replied: "Oh? Did you make that quite clear to the President?" The Center Square couldn't have quipped better.

(I also love the J.P. Morgan quip; Morgan, hater of TR for his trustbusting, upon hearing that TR was going to hunt lions in Africa, proposed a toast: "American expects that every lion will do his duty.").

Finally, Auchincloss doesn't excuse any supposed or real bigotry on Roosevelt's part, and he doesn't explain it away. But he does put Roosevelt's actions and words in context. Roosevelt was an old fashioned, extremely moralist man, for whom the world was black and white, good and evil, dark and light. Women had a place in society. Discrimination against blacks (in the south) and Asians (in the West) was unfortunately, but the bully pulpit could only go so far. Homosexuality was still the love that dare not mention its name, and Alice Roosevelt, quoting George V's comments about the gays: "I thought men like that shot themselves," commented "My father was a bit like that." (even though his "influential military aide" Archie Butt was the boyfriend of painter Frances Davis Millet; the two went down together on Titanic and have a memorial devoted to the both of them in Washington DC!). But as Auchincloss points out, Roosevelt was a man of his time, hampered by laws or sectionalism or ignorance.

It's been a long, long time since I've read (and blogged so extensively) about such a good book. I'm definitely going to look up the others in the series now!

Founding Gardeners: The Revolutionary Generation, Nature and the Shaping of the American Nation by Andrea Wulf (2011)

2011-08-07T09:36:00.001-07:00

I was really disappointed - I wanted to like Founding Gardeners as well as I liked Brother Gardeners, but I just could not get into it. The books share a similar problem - the narrative thread isn't very clear and feels unnatural. However, what didn't matter in Brother Gardeners (for whatever reason - subject matter? writing style?) bogged down Founding Gardeners. I wasn't sure exactly what the book was about, and I didn't really care that much to keep going to find out. I gave it a good old college try (three chapters!), but in the end, I'm sending this back to the library shelves.

Elizabeth's Women: Friends, Rivals, and Foes Who Shaped the Virgin Queen by Tracy Borman (2009)

2011-08-02T18:09:00.001-07:00

This wasn't exactly a disappointment - it was actually a pretty good book - but the subtitle indicated that the book would be about the women who surrounded Elizabeth, when big chunks of it were primarily about Elizabeth herself. Still, there was enough about the women - and some new stuff I'd never read before -- plus really good writing (if a bit chronologically screwy) to make me finish the book. Anything with Bess of Hardwick as a supporting or leading character is good in my mind - she's a really fascinating woman. Those Elizabethans were self centered to the core too, conniving and stabbing each other in the back all the time, Elizabeth herself at the head. Those absolute monarchs - or nearly absolute - must have been absolutely terrifying! I guess because people really believed in God's punishing powers, and that Elizabeth was anointed by God - that put the fear in them (although clearly not everyone). Like when Bess of Hardwick turned her own granddaughter in for scheming against the queen. Very Soviet Russia. Even Elizabeth, as interesting as she is to read about, was a tyrant at heart. But in those days, I guess you had to be - if you weren't, then you stood a really good chance of losing everything, including your life.

Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting (1920)

2011-07-26T13:16:00.000-07:00

Something put me in the mood to re-read some of my oldest best of favorites from childhood, the Doctor Dolittle series by Hugh Lofting. The Story of Doctor Dolittle is the first in the series. I read the expunged version, without the racially insensitive bits - although that was the version I read as a child, and I don't remember it making me racism - although if I were an African American child reading the book, I wouldn't have felt so good about myself. It's interesting, because later on in the series, I remember Bumpo being a well rounded character, and not particularly stereotypical (I might be wrong though; we'll see). I even have it in the back of my head that he went to Oxford, but I again, we'll see. Lofting's portrayal of the Africans might have been insensitive, but the reason Doctor Dolittle and company are chased and captured by the African king is pretty anti-colonial - white men make mischief and cause problems, so they aren't welcome in my kingdom. Unlike something like Babar, in which everything in the Elephant kingdom is made whole by the French.

I think that in the first half or so of The Story of Doctor Dolittle, Lofting is still getting his footing, and he's not quite sure where he wants his world to go. His story is sound, but his characters aren't full developed into what they eventually would become. Only Polynesia the Parrot is completely developed from the beginning. But once the ship leaves Africa, suddenly everyone starts to have the familiar personality - Dab-Dab the Duck worries like a housekeeper and occasionally snaps, Gub-Gub says inappropriate things at inappropriate times and thinks about food, Jip is heroic and brave with jokes.

It's been many years since I've read the series, and I think it will hold up to adult scrutiny.

As a sidenote, I didin't realize that The Age of Innocence and The Story of Doctor Dolittle were both written in the same year. And have absolutely nothing in common other than that.

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (1920)

2011-07-23T11:44:00.000-07:00

I finished The Age of Innocence a few days ago, but it's really stuck with me. The sign of a really good book, I guess.

Why can't Newland go up to Ellen even after all these years? Is the memory of the past better than what the future holds? Is the fantasy better than the reality? Is he so ashamed, so scared, still mired in the past? Was he aghast that everyone has known about this all along, but no one ever talked to him about it? What a pitiful and pitiable scene.

Why can't Edith Wharton ever write something with a happy ending? Or maybe she has, and I just haven't read it. Or maybe she doesn't believe in happy endings. Or romantic endings.

May Welland Archer is scary.

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (1920)

2011-07-22T10:25:00.001-07:00

Heartbreaking, absolutely heartbreaking. I hate Newland Archer, and I feel so sorry for him. "You never did ask each other anything, did you? And you never told each other anything. You just sat and watched each other, and guessed at what was going on underneath. A deaf-and-dumb asylum, in fact!" That line was like a poison dart, so right, and so sad, and so still true about so many people. The clothing have changed, the mores have changed, art and society have changed, and certainly the divorce laws have changed, but the story still rings true. People still fall in love with someone they can’t be with (for whatever reason) and pine and pine, and often stay with someone for reasons other than love. People still get married and stay married for reasons that have nothing to do with romance and love. Even in this day and age.

Wharton describes what a hell Newland and Ellen's life would be if they started their affair: "A lie by day, a lie by night, a lie in every touch and every look; a lie in every caress and every quarrel; a lie in every word and in every silence." It’s a great line, and iIt's old time country music.

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (1920)

2011-07-21T18:19:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure how I graduated from college with a degree in English. I distinctly remember writing a paper for some class (who knows which) that compared Edith Wharton's The Age of Innocence to some other work of fiction - I think it was Daisy Miller by Henry James. Let's see... that was probably twenty years ago. I thought I was re-reading The Age of Innocence, but I barely remember anything about it. It's like I'm reading it for the first time, and knowing the kind of lazy student I was, I probably AM reading for the first first time! (I know I saw the movie though).

I'm enjoying it though, as much pain and heartache as the book is slathered with. Let's be honest too - it's a very soapy book. It's filled with gossipy type questions. Do you think Ellen slept with Beaufort? I don't think so; I think Newland thinks that, and I think Ellen is a minx and wants him to think that. She plays with men like a cat plays with mice - she's an expert. Do you think Newland is a laughable pussy and completely dominated by the women (and gay men like Sillerton Jackson) in his life? Yes - he is basically the pawn on a gigantic chessboard played by his female relations. He's very romantic, and I guess in Edith Wharton's eyes romantic meant femanized; but all the men in The Age of Innocence seem very female and catlike -- almost but not quite gay. Except maybe Beaufort, and he's always described as an "other." Is May Welland the biggest bitch of them all? Newland might think he' s knight with Ellen as his queen, but in May Welland's hands they are all pawns. Wide-eyed, butter won't melt in her mouth, blink blink blink innocence. I think she might be my favorite character in the end - she's made of steel.

Edith Wharton: A Woman in Her Time by Louis Auchincloss (1971)

2011-07-17T11:46:00.000-07:00

I was flipping through channels a few days ago, and watched a bit of a documentary on TCM about Natalie Wood, narrated by Robert Redford. It wasn't a biography - it was more like reminiscences from Redford about his relationship with Natalie Wood and what she meant to him. Edith Wharton: A Woman in Her Time reminded me of that. Although Louis Auchincloss is from a generation or so later than Edith Wharton, this book still felt like his memories of Wharton and her world. A lot of narrative, a little bit biography, a bit of literary criticism - this could have been the words behind a PBS doc on Wharton's life. I like Auchincloss's style of writing - it feels like you're in his class to talking with him over coffee or martinis.

She-Wolves: The Women Who Ruled England Before Elizabeth by Helen Castor (2011)

2011-07-14T21:19:00.000-07:00

What a pleasant surprise - I wasn't expecting much out of this book, and it was fantastic! Really well written, and interesting. Helen Castor did an excellent job drawing a line from Matilda to Elizabeth, comparing and contrasting, but also giving a gradual progression from women wanting to rule to women actually ruling - Jane Grey seemingly some kind of throwback that showed that women rulers on their own like Mary and Elizabeth were going to be taken seriously unlike Jane Grey, who was under the thumb of her father-in-law.

The book was full of thought provoking passages of interest and new ideas:

Jane Grey, Mary and Elizabeth all came to power because Henry VII and Henry VIII systematically killed off almost every conceivably possible male heir.

"Three Londoners who had been overheard to say that the king was dying had their ears cut off in punishment." When I read this passage, I immediately thought of why we have free speech laws. We have plenty of people who say things, either in jest or in vitriol, about our elected officials. But imagine if when Sarah Palin spouts off about Barack Obama or Jon Stewart says Marcus Bachmann is a gay, and they get their ears cut off as punishment! What a completely different world this was, and how far we've come.

In a scene straight out of a movie, Matilda and a group of male supporters made their way seven miles to safety through the frozen, snowy landscape. "Wrapped in white cloaks as camouflage against the snowy landscape, Matilda and knights walked silently across the river, its treacherous current now muffled under a lay of ice thick enough to bear their weight with ease. No one saw them pass; and no one challenged them as they trudged seven miles through the cold and dark, feet numb and freezing in the drifting snow." Nonfiction does many things for me - fills me with awe or wonder, causes Eureka moments during which I might shout out with glee, instructs and educates. But it's not often that I get such a clear, visual image from a book of nonfiction - that's a sign of sharp, good writing. It's such a great story too, an illustration of Matilda's bravery, and the devotion of knights to her cause. One other note about this story - she was 40 years old when this was going on! Hurray for fortysomethings - we rock!

I knew only a little about Matilda and her battle with King Stephen for control of England (I never realized, for example, that Stephen was king because he was annointed). The little I knew came from Brother Cadfael - and that wasn't much.

Isabella I knew a bit more about - many gay men know at least something about gay King Edward II. What I didn't realize in full was that the uprising against the King was not especially because he was gay - Castor points out that King William Rufus was probably gay as well, but supported -- but because Edward played favorites, and his favorites either were greedily selfish or brutally selfish.

It's when Castor writes about Margaret of Anjou that really changed my thinking. My knowledge, and more importantly opinions, of Margaret came from Sharon Kay Penman's Sunne in Splendor and other books about the Wars of the Roses. Specifically in Penman, Margaret and her son the prince are definitely meant to be antagonists painted in the broadest of stripes, a wicked, haughty, malignant - sort of a Sleeping Beauty Maleficent character. Castor's Margaret though is definitely a more heroic character. Her is this wife and mother, whose husband is mentally ill, in a brutal land where several men stronger than she want to essentially take over the kingdom - and one does. So she's ruthless - what lioness isn't ruthless when protecting her cubs? The saddest, saddest scene in the book, after he husband and son are killed, something out of ancient Rome: "When the victorious (King Edward IV) made his triumphant entry into London, with trumpets sounding and his loyal lords about him, there was a chariot at the back of the procession in which the queen sat, straight-backed and blank-faced, staring at nothing." She who had been in the front, now at the back, and eventually reduced to poverty and forgotten by all. "Her life was over." I have a brand new appreciation for Margaret of Anjou, and all of these women (including Mary Tudor, who stiff necked and unbending as she was, started out as a badass). Thank you Helen Castor.

More of the Littles

2011-07-10T18:51:00.000-07:00

I read The Littles Take a Trip (1968) and The Littles to the Rescue (1968). Somewhere in my attic is a box of books from childhood and among them is The Littles to the Rescue, a book which I remembered with nostalgic fondness - lthough I had forgotten much of the plot. I don't remember owning any more of the Littles books, and to be honest, I'm not sure I read any more of them! My only exposure as a youth to the Littles was this single book - and the Saturday morning cartoon of the same name.

Like the first in the series, The Littles Take a Trip is short on character development but action packed. All three end abruptly - suddenly, they are just over, like that. There's no meditation or evaluation of the preceding events by the character or the author (and to be honest, very little by me). I will say that of the three, The Littles to the Rescue is the best of the lot; and I'm not saying this because it was one of my old favorites (at least I don't think that is what is swaying me). Rescue is really exciting, and the characters are starting to be a more developed and less flat (except the parents). I'm still not exactly sure where they get their clothes and shoes. That never occurred to me as a kid. The illustrations are still excellent, but I noticed now that all the tiny teenagers have beetles haircuts and where bell bottoms and turtleneck sweaters, which is a hoot. And they Little kids are rebellious - just like contemporary kids in the sixties.

Still, as books go, these are kind of bland. Again, if you are a second or third grader and this is some of your first chapter books, the Littles probably make for interesting and exciting reading. But they aren't going to change anyone's lives.

The Littles by John Peterson (1967)

2011-07-06T22:31:00.000-07:00

Someone donated two boxes full of dusty children's paperbacks to the library, and while sorting through them I found about six books in the Littles series by John Peterson. The Littles were some of my favorite books growing up. I had this old, old book called The Adventures of a Brownie by Dinah Maria Mulock (Mrs. Craik) - that's how her name is on the cover and the title page, I just pulled it off my shelf of old books, about a little fairy who lives in a house and tricks or treats the inhabitants depending on what they fed him, or his moods. I also remember reading The Borrowers by Mary Norton, at least a couple in the series, and Mistress Masham's Repose (sp?) by T.H. White, both again about little people who live hidden among us. I always liked The Littles the best, maybe because they seemed the most likable to me. The Brownie was kind of a bitch (plus the pages were smelly and old) although I liked him second best; the Borrowers dressed and talked funny, had strange names, and the mother was mean. Everyone in T.H. White's book was unlikable; I can still see the illustration of the girl's face in the book, all scrunched up and mean looking. (As a child, I still read and re-read all of these books multiple times, so usually starved was I for reading material). The Littles, on the other hand, had adventures that were exciting and made sense (or at least that's how I remember them - re-reading them might change my mind). They had normal names -- Tom, Lucy, Uncle Pete. They dressed and looked like normal people (except for the tails and size of course).

The Littles, which I assume is the first book in the series, wasn't one I remember reading as a kid (I read from the school library, the small public library, and my own very small personal library; I owned only one Littles book myself, which I dimly recall being about Mrs. Little having a baby and being kidnapped by someone). The plot is pretty thin, but it's written for children, and specifically for children who are just starting to read chapter books. It certainly ends rather abruptly. But in 80 pages - most of which had a picture - we learn that Tom Little is pretty brave, Lucy Little is even braver, that small wall people (I don't think they ever get a species name) and mice are deadly enemies, and that cats were thought to be deadly enemies as well (we find out that isn't necessarily true!). The Biggs - they own the house - we really never get to meet; they are away on vacation and have let their house to city folk. An artist and a writer -- a lady writer at that! (who still has to cook). The Newcombs -- get it, "new comers" -- are terrible housekeepers (that's what brings in the mice).

Maybe one thing that's appeal about books like the Littles (and the Borrowers too) is that it's sometimes a peephole into what our lives are like.

This isn't a profound or life changing book, but not every book has to be. Some books are just simple, little adventures, with great pictures. And there ain't nothin' wrong with that.

The FItzosbornes in Exile by Michelle Cooper (2010)

2011-07-06T22:25:00.001-07:00

I was under impressed with the first book in this series, and I should have just left it at that. I should like these books - royalty, 1930s - but I just can't get past some points about the books. Why is it a journal? It doesn't read like a journal at all - why can't it just be in first person? Why does it have to be a journal? That bugged me. And the characters, other than the three siblings, are all shits. Are they supposed to be likable? Or hateful? Certainly Princess Whatever (I've already forgotten her name), the one who wrote the journal, is likable - but far too glib for my taste. I've read the other reviews, and discussed this with a colleague, and it's clear I'm in the minority on these books. But in the minority I will plant myself and stay - I've given it the old college try, and I'm on to another book.

Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente (2011)

2011-07-05T13:56:00.000-07:00

I can't even begin to do this book justice. I like dabbling in reviews, writing down my personal feels, what I think, what I liked or didn't like... but Deathless feels beyond my powers of description. It was is so good! What I didn't like about it was that I felt too dense for most of the book; my head, thick as a plank, and only bits of the beauty of this book could seep in, but those bits were magical. Other people's reviews describe what I felt. On the cover: "Romantic and blood-streaked, and infused with magic so real you can feel it on your fingertips," writes Cory Doctorow, and I nod madly "yes, yes, so yes!" I picked up Andrew Laing's Red Fairy Book because it has a re-telling of Koschei the Deathless, and after reading it, I understood a bit more about what probably was Valente's starting point - why was he chained up in her basement?

"You can taste the summer in this mixture," Marya says of a jar of brined pickles. "Summer boiled down and soaked in brine. Because that is life... jars on a shelf, bright colors under glass, saved up against winter, against starving."

"After love, no one is what they were before." So true.

I can't recommend this book enough right now. It has a clever conceit and is so lyrical and beautiful.

Fraud by David Rakoff (2001)

2011-07-02T15:59:00.000-07:00

A time machine trip, jump in and fly back to a simpler time, when soap operas were still on television, when Steven Seagal was a celebrity - that's what Fraud felt like. Snarky and urban hipster (from before urban hipsters actually existed as such) and tres New York - but also occasionally funny and good. The above mentioned Steven Seagal article, although definitely a slice of time, was still readable -- remove Steven Seagal, replace with Suzanne Sommers or some other minor celebrity with a faddish religion or movement to sell, spiced with new age idiots and frenzied fans, and the article could take place at any time or place; Rakoff's sometimes bitchy sometimes dead on running commentary is delightful. That was the highlight of the book for me; most of the other essays were good, but not David Sedaris brilliant.

Alice Behind Wonderland by Simon Winchester (2011)

2011-07-02T15:44:00.000-07:00

Disappointing and misleading. From the title, one might think that the book is going to be the story of Alice Liddell, her relationship to Charles Dodgson, Lewis Carroll, and the famous books, and then what happened afterwards. Anyway, that's what I wanted the book to be. Instead, this is a very simple look at Charles Dodgson and his relationship with the beginning of photography and photography as a Victorian science and art. Interesting, but not exactly what I wanted to read about. "The photography behind Alice" might have been a better title.

In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson (2011)

2011-06-27T17:34:00.000-07:00

A lovely but haunting, horrific passage: "the reprisal killings for which the Nazis became infamous, where on some sunny afternoon in a village in France a dozen men and women would be whisked from their homes and shops, stood before a wall, and shot. No preamble, no good-byes; just birdsong and blood."

Larson writes like a television show - much build up, lots of cliffhangers. I wish the Nazis had been more evil - they were almost portrayed as kind of menacing yet blowharding - perhaps that's what they felt like in the early 30s. Kind of a threat, but also kind of full of hot air. The subtitle: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin. The love part, yes (that Martha Dodd was a minx); the American Family part, yes. The terror party - I don't know. I know it was terrifying and scary and horrifying, but I just didn't feel like Larsen did a very good job of portraying that. Maybe that's a longer book than he wanted to write. It seems to have got great reviews, and I certainly enjoyed it - I kept on reading right to the very end, and was never bored. But I think I wanted a bit more terror and drama. (the night of the long knives was pretty dramatic though).

A Voice from Old New York by Louis Auchincloss (2010)

2011-06-27T17:02:00.001-07:00

I'm not sure what you would call this book - a memoir? It's not really an autobiography. Perhaps "reflections" is a better term.

He was an interesting guy. He really did straddle several generations of New York - he caugh the very tail end of the glittery world of the Vanderbilts and Astors of the late 19th century on up through the vulgar riche of the 80s and 90s.

I know that by the time I finished, I definitely wanted more!