Product Description

Just as Ireland has produced many brilliant writers in the past century, so these writers have produced a new Ireland. In a book unprecedented in its scope and approach, Declan Kiberd offers a vivid account of the personalities and texts, English and Irish alike, that reinvented the country after centuries of colonialism. The result is a major literary history of modern Ireland, combining detailed and daring interpretations of literary masterpieces with assessments of the wider role of language, sport, clothing, politics, and philosophy in the Irish revival.

In dazzling comparisons with the experience of other postcolonial peoples, the author makes many overdue connections. Rejecting the notion that artists such as Wilde, Shaw, Yeats, Joyce, and Beckett became modern to the extent that they made themselves "European," he contends that the Irish experience was a dramatic instance of experimental modernity and shows how the country's artists blazed a trail that led directly to the magic realism of a García Márquez or a Rushdie. Along the way, he reveals the vital importance of Protestant values and the immense contributions of women to the enterprise. Kiberd's analysis of the culture is interwoven with sketches of the political background, bringing the course of modern Irish literature into sharp relief against a tragic history of conflict, stagnation, and change.

Inventing Ireland restores to the Irish past a sense of openness that it once had and that has since been obscured by narrow-gauge nationalists and their polemical revisionist critics. In closing, Kiberd outlines an agenda for Irish Studies in the next century and detects the signs of a second renaissance in the work of a new generation of authors and playwrights, from Brian Friel to the younger Dublin writers.

Customer Reviews (3)

Inventing Ireland
This book is essential to my dissertation topic and was suggested by my director. It provides specific as well as general information about major Irish writers of the 19th century. The first half of the book is very readable -- even entertaining -- the second half, not so much. Any student of Yeats, Wilde, or Synge should probably own a copy.

Don't miss it!
Declan Kiberd's is one of the few historioes of contemporary Irish literature which manages to do justice to the literature in Irish language, too. It is also a fascinating view on the development of the modern Irishnationalism and ideology. It is also brilliantly written. I have found it atreasure trove, also because it offers valuable analogies for a student ofmy own country's history. I sincerely hope you buy it, and read it, andre-read it. It is worth ten times what you pay for it.

A lively and thought-provoking read!
This book offered me a lot on first reading, and even more upon re-reading. I'm sure I'll be going back again, as his ideas about not only Anglo-Irish literature, but the uses of history in constructing a presentidentity for Ireland really impressed me a great deal.

My absolutefavorite quote of 1998 appears on p. 293 "...History thereby becomes aform of science fiction: in order to get a fair hearing in a conservativesociety, the exponents of revolution had to present their intentions underthe guise of a return to the idealized past..." If you're as confusedas this Irish American was about how to make sense of the disparate Irishhistories - you need this book! ... Read more

Product Description
Taking a critical perspective on the economics and politics of "presenting" the news, this topical supplement argues that the media systematically distorts news coverage. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

Reporting on the Media
This 1986 book examines the corporate media in the US from a viewpoint based on class or ownership of the media. Don't be put off by the biased title. "A Word to the Reader" explains what he is going to study and what he will uncover. Others have done this years earlier. The best audience for this book are those who are considering a career in journalism. It warns about the politics of journalism. The rise of television and its advertisers saw the end of mass magazines like the 'Saturday Evening Post' and 'LIFE'. Local newspapers were bought up by big corporate chains and are now suffering financially. The Internet and cellular phones have an effect if only as a consumer of personal time.

Parenti has an outlook that is based on rhetoric. He says "capitalism's purpose is not to create jobs" (p.1), then capitalism "is to make a profit off other people's labor" (p.2). This seems to be a contradiction. Chapter 1 discusses why the owners of the media control it for their own purposes. Yet they must appear to be "liberal" so people will buy their publications and they can sell advertising. There is no mention of the monthly magazines and their function in selling advertising (misleading their subscribers?). No mention of the relative wealth of the people who buy products. The current recession has put a strain on publications during the last few years. The original purpose of newspapers was advertising, to bring buyers to sellers. Adding news was a feature to sell more newspapers. Radio and then TV were followed by fewer newspapers. There were fewer small businesses to advertise in local newspapers as well.

TV has "inadequate and superficial coverage" (p.54) because "that's the way it is". Its purpose is to hook viewers for the nightly shows. Many people just scan headlines in their newspapers. TV can devote many hours and days if needed (11/22/63, 9/11/01, Watergate hearings, etc.). TV is for entertainment. Newspapers (and some magazines) are for news; it's the bandwidth. Parenti rightfully tells about the 'NY Times' censorship (p.37). I think they have a long tradition of that, like other "first rate" newspapers. So what? The only danger is an uncritical belief in any newspaper or book (such as this one). This book will test your beliefs and assumptions.

Starting with Chapter 4 the book becomes more informative and educational in its coverage of historical events. Chapter 8 points out the deception of Reagan's "arms reduction" program! Chapter 9 tells about various hoaxes in the corporate media. Were you fooled by any of them? Chapter 10 tells how countries are oppressed and exploited (p.173). Chapter 11 tells about the distortions and omissions in the media coverage of impoverished lands (p.187). There is powerful censorship in the US press (p.188). One example is Turkey (p.191). Another was Nicaragua (p.193). Chapter 12 has other examples of misrepresentation (p.217). Parenti discusses the manipulation of the news (pp.219-220). Ever notice that, or the tone of voices? Chapter 13 explains how censorship works (p.231). What was censored on the bottom of page 233?

The Blackshoepirate
Michael Parenti does what so many of the popular liberal writers can not seem to do. He speaks directly to the common man. His prose and cadance are in tune with the way an average Joe like me thinks and uses the english language. In regards to this book, he has brought to life the reasons why a person from the blue collar ranks should begin to look again at the crap spewing out of the TV set. It is one thing to hear that Faux News is biased but another to read, in detail, how the entire mainestram media including the entertaining aspect is skewed towards the interest of the corporate conglomerates and not the interest of an average auto mechanic like myself.
This was the second 4th of Mr. Paranti's works that I read. By now I have read them all. I encourage you all to do the same.

must read
This another excellent book by Parenti.Parenti writes clearly, and concisely on this important matter of the media.He demonstrates through many studies the ways in which the media are manipluated to serve corporate interests and keep the public in the dark.I also highly recommend Democracy for the Few.

The nature of propaganda
Parenti is an angry guy.Convinced that the American mass media is deliberately misleading the public in order to futher corporate and political interests, he has offered forth this treatise as a warning.

Some of Parenti's criticisms are valid, and much of the distortion he perceives is real, but we have to ask ourselves, how many times have we heard this before?I first encountered Parenti in college.His books were being "taught" in some of the mass communications courses.He is unapologetic in his Marxist sympathies, and seems to think that the press can, and should, exist as an instrument of a socialist state.That it is the duty of the media to inform the public.

Save for NPR and public television, the corporations which control American mass media have only one allegiance, and that is to the share holders.Market forces dictate how the press responds to world events.If people want conservative commentary like "The O'Reilly Factor", they will vote with their dollars.Likewise, if they want to read Parenti, they know where to find him.The idea that the press should be "objective" is naive.

Ultimately, Parenti's book degenerates into Chomsky-like conspiracy-theory hysterics.Fortunately for the public, his brand of Marxism is quickly becoming yesterday's news.And like Chomsky, Parenti finds it easier to write these unscholarly rants than to produce soemthing of substance.But the audience gets smaller everyday.

Not the left that the country needs
I believe that the country needs a principled, decent left viewpoint which is accesible to most Americans. Parenti, however, is not this left commentator, and this book is evidence of how out of touch he is.

Parenti is no better than the conservatives who lionize Ronald Reagan and make apologies for anything that any Republican does. He uses all of the same tricks of far right but in service of the far left. And by far left, I mean the communist, paranoid, conspiracy-theory left.

Parenti, to put it bluntly, is an apologist for communism. If you read Parenti, you will be forced to believe that communist nations such as the old USSR were really workers' paradises and utopias of enlightened policy and good governance. He is happy to point out the excesses of right wing creeps such as Pinocchet and various US-supported dictators in Africa, but he refuses to see any flaws in such genocidal communist monsters as Stalin or Pol Pot. He glosses over the awful repression that these creeps foisted upon Jews, dissenters, intellectuals, the clergy, etc.

If we want to get beyond the tired left-right divide, we need writers who are willing to take on the icons of both the left and right and give credit to policies which work, regardless of the ideological source of those ideas. Parenti's most recent work, "To Kill a Nation", praises Milosevic!

No one who is not already a communist will be swayed by his arguments. ... Read more

Product Description
Duesberg argues that HIV is merely a harmless passenger virus that does not cause AIDS. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (102)

Ignoring the data, and the truth
When Duesberg first began to talk about AIDS he was correct in saying that Koch's postulates had not been fulfilled. Some 20 years later both Koch's postulates and Bradford Hill's criteria for causation have been fulfilled, meaning it has been proven that HIV causes AIDS, according to established medical principles.

What's astonishing about Duesberg is that he continues to pretend that this data, and data from hundreds of related articles, simply does not exist. That's what we see in his talks and his writing: if you just ignore the published research, and selectively focus on the smaller, unresolved details,you can convince any gullible or predisposed person that established fact is false.

Outstanding book. Highly readable and genuinely convincing.
My only complaint is that an updated edition is needed, as this version was published in 1996. Yet much about HIV/AIDS remains the same: the risk groups, the number of Americans with HIV, the continuing lack of a vaccine, the expanding "latency period", the expanding list of AIDS-defining diseases, the conditional diagnosis, the different AIDS of Africa, etc.

The initial section on the history of misdiagnosed diseases going back to the acceptance of the germ theory through scurvy, beriberi, pellagra, and Legionnaire's Disease is essential background reading.

Amazing information
I'd heard of the battle of the gay community and AIDS researchers with Mr Duesberg and wanted more facts. I'm delighted that his information is finally written down; clearly and thoughtfully and more importantly to my non-scientific brain, accessibly. Since the author has gained nothing but making a target of himself, and the researchers refusing to acknowledge any of his information stand to lose $$billions in grant and research money, to say nothing of the drug companies and the $$billions in drug sales, I have to admit that I am have been willing to 'hear' his information. And after the AIDS conglomerates have quashed his attempts to respond to the Harvard paper accusing the author of genocide (really, he 'caused' the death of 300,000 plus Africans, in a country whose population DOUBLED during the same time he is accused of these deaths? Not rational, Harvard, not rational at all) I am doubly delighted to find this book. I would hope, several centuries ago, I would have been willing to look at Galileo's findings in as willing a mood. Meanwhile, regardless of your stance or interest, the book was interesting, and can make for spirited conversations around the table/water cooler/bar of your choice. It certainly has for me.
And what if he is correct and the research is wrong? Those folks who refuse to listen to his information may be committing even larger wrongs and more deaths in the name of their own pride. And I regret that, for my friends, for myself, and for our communal humanity.

Convoluted and wrong
Duesberg uses psuedo-science to "prove" his wildly wrong information.I've seen many of my friends with HIV go from near death to good health due to HIV meds, while I've seen AIDS denialists like Christine Maggiore die.Don't buy the Duesberg myth, and don't buy this book.

The Denialism IS the Conspiracy
It is shocking...and shameful....that over a decade after this book came out, and after the wealth of information gathered about HIV since then, some humans can still possibly think that:

A) HIV isn't real

or

B) HIV doesn't lead to full-blown AIDS

or

C) AIDS isn't real

But, even before we had a decade of deeper understanding (leading to significantly more effective antiretroviral treatments), this book was deeply, decidedly refuted by the vast majority of the people fighting on the front lines to educate and help people against a REAL, causal, viral killer.

The best refutation from "back then" can be seen here:

http://www.aidstruth.org/inventing.php

That was written in 1996.

I am dismayed....heartbroken....that here, 12 years later, people still log in to Amazon and give this tragically errant relic five stars, and glowing reviews.I suppose that people who WANT to believe in a conspiracy will simply believe it, and no amount of current, global, overwhelming scientific consensus can breach such an impenetrable ideological conviction.

For anyone reading this review who is NOT a zealot, and is NOT conspiracy-biased, I encourage you to read EVERYTHING YOU CAN, including Duesberg.Know the full history.Understand the controversies, real and imagined.Learn about all the present and past actors including some of the more prominent dissidents who died from AIDS in the midst of denying that they had it.

And most importantly, keep up with the field.Virology...like all of life science...is moving very fast now.As regards good science, concurrent, independent, global peer review is the lifeblood of healthy discussion here.Colorful contrarianism lives and breathes only when validated by redundant, independent, repeatable corroboration on a world scale.Without that, it eventually, rightfully dies, at least in the realm of practical scientific endeavor.

Think, read, and stay sane. ... Read more

Product Description

Offering a penetrating history of the formation of modern Iraq, Dodge uncovers numerous troubling parallels between the policies of a declining British empire and those of the current American government, which together form a timely and trenchant cautionary tale.

Customer Reviews (9)

Parallels Between 1920 and 2003??
Toby Dodge, a British political scientist who has studied Iraq extensively, has produced this book in order to educate others about one role that an occupying power has taken, 1920's Iraq via London, or 2003 Iraq via Washington.

In 1920, The British officials in charge f Iraq imported many British ideas on Iraq.For example, the was a colonialist disregard for urban iraqis opposed to urban dwellers.This had larDodge Review


Toby Dodge, a British political scientist who has studied Iraq extensively, has produced this book in order to educate others about one role that an occupying power has taken 1920 Iraq via London, or 2003 Iraq via Washington.

In 1920, The British officials in charge f Iraq imported many British ideas on Iraq.For example, the was, a colonialist disregard for urban Iraqis opposed to urban dwellers.This had largely to due to political feelings in Europe at that time.However, additionally, Iraq became a more difficult issue for the UK because of domestic issues.These issues includes, political, mainly economic, and other issues.But in both instances domestic politics played a part in the ultimate rule.
gely to due to political feelings in Europe at that time.However, additionally, Iraq became a mere difficult issue for the UK because of domestic issues.These issues includes, political, mainly economic, and other issues.But in both instances domestic politics played a part in the ultimate rule.

Proof that history repeats itself
This book is a must read for all. The book speaks volumes about a whole lot. This book proves the old saying history repeats itself. I know nowadays history isn't popular. That subject has been pushed aside for other things. This book shows the danger in that idea. We need to know history so as to hopefully understand the present and avoid disasters.

The book gives a short history of the British occupation of Iraq in the 20s. As you read that story you have to keep telling yourself this book isn't about the current US occupation. The book shows through the British experience how history repeats itself. To bad no one in the White House read this book. You will see that the issues and problems the British experienced are the exact same problems the U.S. has been experiencing over the past 5 years in Iraq.

Much of Iraq today is shaped by the British experience. To understand Iraq one has to understand the British experience. Their actions helped shape events today.This book also offers a good deep explanation of Iraq. It shows how their national bonds are very weak. You see how certain things like the transportation and tribal structure affects things.

Everyone will see something in this book. Most of all you will see in very clear terms how history does repeat itself.

Blind Invention
It is difficult to understand how anyone can really understand the enigmas and contradictions of 21st Century Iraq with out understanding its 20th Century origins. This remarkable book, successfully for the most part, attempts to provide that understanding.

The Turkish Ottoman Empire essentially imploded at the end of WWI. For strategic reasons the UK was particularly interested in retaining control the former Ottoman provinces of Mesopotamia (most of modern Iraq). This aim was complicated by the heady if unrealistic idealism of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson that greatly influenced the way the world was ordered after the "war to end all wars."Rather than simply establishing a colonial government over Mesopotamia, the UK was given a League of Nations `mandate' to exercise what is now called `nation building' and create a viable, democratic, and above all, a stable state called Iraq in place ofthe Ottoman province of Mesopotamia.

This the UK was perfectly willing to do as long it could also ensure that its influence would predominate in the new state. The principal British architects for the new state of Iraq were soldiers and administrators under the India Office or the Colonial Office. Their efforts were hampered by serious misunderstandings of Iraqi society that caused them to divide Iraq between what they believed were a `natural', rural tribal society and a more sophisticated, but corrupt urban population. This misunderstanding caused UK officials to attempt to resurrect a tribal structure that was an anachronism by the end of the 19th Century. Tribal ties were far less important than those of landowner, clan, and village. In the end the UK execution of the mandate produced a dubiously stable monarchy that was not necessarily sympathetic to British interests. In spite what generally were good intentions, the UK only partially succeeded in carrying out its Iraqi mandate. This was do to two reasons: scarcity of funds to maintain the size of garrison to really exert UK control over Iraq in its formative period; and the failure of the UK to really understand the nature of the Iraqi people or the very real nationalism that had been awakened in them after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. This book to its credit manages to treat both the British and Iraqis with fairness and appears to have accurately captured the complexities of nation building.

Inventing Iraq
Many would be quick to lament the fact that no one from the Bush administration read Toby Dodge's book Inventing Iraq.While it is abundantly clear that many mistakes have been made, Dodge himself states on page 158 that "for U.S. forces currently involved in attempting to reform Iraq's political structures, the libaries are full of books that provide no guidance.This is an important point because it underscores the fact that the situation facing the U.S. today is markedly different than one facing the British.Iraq was just coming into existance as a political entity and there was no sense of a collective "Iraqi" identity or nationalism when the British were involved.Also, Iraq's political development from 1932 onward would alter the society in many important ways.

You might be able to accuse Dodge of writing a book that told his readers more about his own beliefs than Iraq's early development because of his timing.This book was published in 2003 (right around the time of the U.S. invasion), and it has many noticeable comparisons between the British and American experiences.For example, he notes that the British thought they would receive a warm welcome by Iraqis just in the same way that the "flowers and candy" lines were tossed around by the Bush administration.These types of examples don't fill the book, but there are enough of them to make Dodge appear as if he's making a statement about the 2003 war.

Rather than going into an unorganized account of the British mandate period, Dodge offers an array of chapters that focus on particular details such as land reform, and the rural/urban divide.This type of organization will be a source of frustration for some because by focusing on these types of details, Dodge sometimes loses track of the bigger picture.This type of criticism has some validity, but the overall result is a revealing look at the Mandate period.

If Dodge is to be faulted for anything in Inventing Iraq, it would have to be his lack of a discussion of domestic British politics.He doesn't completely ignore this area, but no discussion of what's currently happening in Iraq would be complete without also discussing how events were being shaped in Washington.Dodge goes to great lengths to discuss what he calls "Oriental Despotism" in attempting to explain British actions and motives, but this is ultimately not as effective as analysis of domestic British pressures.

These minor problems notwithstanding, Inventing Iraq is a concise and well-written book that has a lot to offer to anyone interested in modern Iraq's origins.At 171 pages, it's a quick read and while prior research on Iraq certainly helps with this book, it's not a requirement.If one were to make a top ten list of Iraq history/politics books, Inventing Iraq should certainly be on it.

Inventing Iraq: The Failure Of Nation Building And A History Denied
great background history to today's strategic events in Middle East ... Read more

Product Description
In a single short book as elegant as it is wise, Ian Buruma makes sense of the most fateful span of Japan’s history, the period that saw as dramatic a transformation as any country has ever known. In the course of little more than a hundred years from the day Commodore Matthew Perry arrived in his black ships, this insular, preindustrial realm mutated into an expansive military dictatorship that essentially supplanted the British, French, Dutch, and American empires in Asia before plunging to utter ruin, eventually emerging under American tutelage as a pseudo-Western-style democracy and economic dynamo.

What explains the seismic changes that thrust this small island nation so violently onto the world stage? In part, Ian Buruma argues, the story is one of a newly united nation that felt it must play catch-up to the established Western powers, just as Germany and Italy did, a process that involved, in addition to outward colonial expansion, internal cultural consolidation and the manufacturing of a shared heritage. But Japan has always been both particularly open to the importation of good ideas and particularly prickly about keeping their influence quarantined, a bipolar disorder that would have dramatic consequences and that continues to this day. If one book is to be read in order to understand why the Japanese seem so impossibly strange to many Americans, Inventing Japan is surely it.


From the Hardcover edition. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (19)

If you want to understand where contemporary Japan came from
This is a brilliant book. I've been involved in Japan for close to 20 years and lived most of the 1990s in Tokyo. This book spanning from the late-Edo period to 1964 truly helped me to better understand the country and put the contemporary politics and culture into a perspective. Buruma shows a continuum of interrelated things that explains why and how Japan is what it is today. This critical and innovative book is a veritable tour de force.

A good read, but hardly unbiased
I agree whole-heartedly with Hitoshi's previous comments.

While Baruma's book was a very interesting introduction it suffers from the monolithic painting of the Japanese nation and people that mark many deficient history lessons.The standards that Baruma appears to demand of the Japanese (but seemingly would not apply to Western powers) seem heavily skewed and the almost childish writing at some points give the appearance of a shallow reading of Japanese history and the powers that moulded it.

It is a shame, but I couldn't help but feel I was getting a distorted picture of Japan as I read.If you wish to believe Japanese success is the result of a backwards nation emulating Western ideals and that there is little inate in Japan that has led to its success, you will find this agreeable.But if the Japanese you know do not conform to the stereotype of war-denying reactionaries you may find the content a little hard to consume.Still worthy of a couple of stars but read this book with a critical eye to what Baruma's own views are.

Japan-philes, academics focussing on Japan and ex-pats over time seem to go one of three ways - a continued positive attitude and love of the country, a healthy indifference, or an eventual sense of tiredness and feeling of Japanese inferiority.Baruma appears to have become the later.

If it is worth considering, a number of our Japan historians I spoke to about the book were very critical of its lack of academic depth and generalised views.

A Starting Point
This introduction to modern Japanese history -- from Com. Perry's 1853 naval mission to the 1964 Olympics -- is perfectly fine as just that, an introduction for those who have neither the time nor inclination to read an in-depth 500-800 page work. Of course, as is to be expected from such a gloss, the author skims lightly across major topics, and without the context of further reading or background knowledge, it's difficult for the average reader to know what to make of Buruma's interpretations, emphases, and omissions.

Certainly the span of time is well chosen, although as the book is clear to point out, the arrival of Perry's "black ships" to force Japan to trade with the U.S. was hardly the first significant contact with the West. For quite some time, Japan had contacts with the Netherlands, and a segment of Japanese intelligentsia pursued "Dutch learning." Still, it's a good starting point, as the American arrival heralded the end of the feudal era and the start of the Meiji Restoration. Aside from little snippets here and there (a section on 1920s Japan made me curious to read more about the era), much of the early part of the book revolves around Japan's military muscle-flexing.

The 1904-05 Russo-Japanese War, which Buruma describes as a brutal dress rehearsal for World War I, starts the century off on an ominous note, as the Japanese taste of victory against a European power sparks delusions of grandeur. These delusions mount as the century moves forward, taking the form of expeditions into Manchuria and China (Rape of Nanking anyone?), and finally the attack on Pearl Harbor. Japanese militarism is portrayed as an outgrowth of a strange blend of overconfidence, inferiority complex, and sentiments of racial and national superiority. Such sweeping generalization of national character are bound to raise some readers' hackles, but to Buruma's credit, he doesn't dance around them.

Less familiar than Japan's military adventurism is the overview of the U.S. occupation and influence in the postwar years, and the crafting of a new constitution by low-level American bureaucrats. Another relatively less well-known area Burma sketches is the postwar Japanese domestic scene. This comes across as a relatively cozy balance of power between politicians and bureaucrats, with plenty of corruption to go around. One comes out of it with the dispiriting sense that Japan's democracy is a rather hollow one, mired in entrenched interests and overly dependent on the U.S. The narrative ends with the staging of the 1964 Olympics, an event that marks Japan's complete reassimiliation into the world community.

Ultimately, this appears to be a reasonable overview, perhaps best suited as one of several texts in an undergraduate course on Japanese history. Without some other guidance or supplementary reading, it's simply too full of interpretation to take at face value. Fortunately, Buruma does provide an excellent bibliography for those interested in further reading.

A quick read and summary, but ultimately confusing
A short book can be a great introduction to a topic, or provide a quick overview to something that you do not care to delve further in.Or, it can leave out so much context and nuance, that it is simply confusing.I am a history buff, but not a Japan expert attracted by the topic and timeframe of this book.And I cannot say I did not learn anything or that the book was dry and uninteresting.But it was breathtakingly quick...seeming to jump through the decades, introducing and then throwing away topics and characters and leaving one with far more questions than answers.I cannot comment on the biases others have noted, because I do not have enough knowledge to judge, but there was a certain "flip-ness" to the writing that was irritating, and the overall structure and pace was so flawed I cannot recommend this book regardless of its accuracy or insight.

50% five + 50%zero stars =2.5 stars.
This is the only book, I have read about the history of Japan so far. If the analysis can be validated to be true, it is a fascinating brief history of Japan that teaches the fundamentals. However, if it is a biased fantasy then it is very offending to Japanese culture. I have a tendency to believe that most of it is biased. It describes the Japanese people as easily manipulated crowd that can take a person to be their God after an overnight decision by the power elite. It gives a sense that Japanese people in any part of their history were imitating, adopting cultures of others. Reader is pushed to believe that if Japanese culture is left unchecked it has a huge potential to do harm.

I also feel hard to believe that while the elite bureaucrats are imitating the western style of life, the public, especially working class, would swallow such behavior like candy as described in the book.

It is a brief book that is very coherent in its analysis. However, it feels such an analysis may be very biased and not reflecting the truth. ... Read more

Product Description
Neither Christopher Columbus nor his contemporaries thought the earth was flat. Yet this curious illusion persists today, firmly established with the help of the media, textbooks, teachers--even noted historians. Inventing the Flat Earth is Russell's attempt to set the record straight. He begins with a discussion of geographical knowledge in the Middle Ages, examining what Columbus and his contemporaries actually did believe, and then moves to a look at how the error was first propagated in the 1820s and 1830s and then "snowballed" to outrageous proportions by the late 19th century. But perhaps the most intriguing focus of the book is the reason why we allow this error to persist. Do we prefer to languish in a comfortable and familiar error rather than exert the effort necessary to discover the truth? This uncomfortable question is engagingly answered. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (13)

Useful but sometimes repetitive
This is a handy book to have around if you want to correct modern "flat-earthers" who deny, not the evidence of science, but the evidence of history showing proving that a spherical earth was not a complete unknown in the Middle Ages. It's a quick read, too. Some people might find the large number of obscure names daunting, but I encourage anyone not to be discouraged if they sometimes feel lost. The thread is easy enough to pick up again.

The most significant flaw, I think, is the repetitiveness--ironic in such a short book. Someone deeply interested in the things Russell is talking about will not have a problem. Others might want to cry out: "enough already! I get the point!" Some things needed to be expanded; others, trimmed.

Despite these failings, Russell has written a much-needed book, and I can't recommend anything better on the subject. I know it seems like I'm damning with faint praise, but really, it's a good book, and when it first came out it was groundbreaking.

I do want to take the time to reply to another reviewer. Frank Tipler wrote that "there were a few rather serious factual errors in the book. For example, on page 13, Russell writes "The astronomers reviving Proltemy's cosmology in the fifteenth century created a more complex system of spheres modified by smaller spheres called epicycles and deferents. " Actually, as some of Russell's own references (e.g. his reference 69, Thomas Kuhn's The Copernican Revolution) would have informed him, the epicycles and deferents were part of Prolemy's own system; they were not added by the 15th century astronomers. Further, epicycles and deferents were CIRCLES, not spheres."

These comments are based on a couple of misunderstandings. First, Russell does not mean that the fifteenth-century astronomers (I suspect he has in mind Peurbach and Regiomontanus) complicated Ptolemy by adding epicycles and deferents; rather, he means that by reviving Ptolemy, who used epicycles and deferents, they complicated the earlier, simplified view of the cosmos based on true concentric spheres. (For what it's worth, Russell has left out a lot of detail here, like the simplified version of Ptolemy learned from Arabic textbooks and taught in some 13th and 14th century universities--but that's another issue, and not terribly relevant to what Russell's trying to accomplish.)

Second, epicycles and deferents definitely WERE spheres according to quite a few major astronomers, including Ptolemy himself, who described orbs based on those circles in the Planetary Hypotheses. In the fifteenth century Peurbach wrote a popular astronomy book explaining Ptolemaic astronomy in terms of sets of orbs. His work was based, ultimately, on a similar textbook by Ibn al-Haytham (known to the Latins as Alhazen). The idea was actually not that uncommon in the time Russell is trying to describe.

earth shaking
a whole new world view in a book, that this myth of science which i myself learned as a child has been so uncommented on is disturbing. a bit dry and short.

Fine Book, but with a few errors
Russell convincingly argues almost all of the leading Christian intellectuals have believed the Earth to be a sphere.However, I cannot give the book five stars because there were a few rather serious factual errors in the book. For example, on page 13, Russell writes "The astronomers reviving Proltemy's cosmology in the fifteenth century created a more complex system of spheres modified by smaller spheres called epicycles and deferents. "Actually, as some of Russell's own references (e.g. his reference 69, Thomas Kuhn's The Copernican Revolution) would have informed him, the epicycles and deferents were part of Prolemy's own system; they were not added by the 15th century astronomers.Further, epicycles and deferents were CIRCLES, not spheres.A more serious error is on page 21: "But unlike some modern Christians, few of them [the Church Fathers, St. Augustine being singled out in the preceding sentence but one] took the Bible as a guide to scientific truth."St. Augustine certainity took the Bible as a guide to scientific truth.As an example, see Russell's own reference 62, "City of God, Book 16 Chapter 9.St. Augustine says that there cannot be people living on the other side of the Earth (the Antipodes), on the grounds that the Bible says all humans are descended from a single male-female pair (Adam and Eve) and no human could possibly have travelled from where Adam and Eve originated to the Antipodes.(on page 20 Russell himself summarizes this part of St. Augustine's argument.)But the question of whether all humans have a monogenetic or a polygenetic origin is surely a scientific question.Finally, I take strong issue with Russell's claim that "... historians and philosphers [have undercut] the reductionist assumption that science [is] the only way to truth ...(p. 74)" They have done no such thing.Science IS the only way to truth.Recent historians and philosophers indeed THINK they have undercut reductionism, but a study of their arguments show only that they have failed to understand the actual relationship between classical and modern physics.

In spite of these errors, I would still recommend reading Russell's book.Until reading it myself, I had mistakenly thought that St. Augustine was a Flat Earther.Upon going to the passage in City of God cited above in this review, I realized that I had misinterpreted this passage in St. Augustine, who in fact was neutral on the question of sphericality.Thank you, Professor Russell, for correcting MY error.

Great book - even OT bible quotes say "globe" or "circle" to describe earth
I can only imagine staring up at the sky and watching the moon seeing it's shape obviously round and globular, now believing the earth wasn't flat would not be a hard sell.

Bottom line- not everybody thought the earth was flat. Funny though, even today's top scientists and weathermen still insist that the sun rises and sets.

Isaiah 40:22

A good introduction to the history of geography
Russel has written an excellent introduction to the history of the perception of the sphericity of earth. As most historians of medieval thought already know and agree upon, the view of the sphericity of earth was more or less common knowledge among the learned people of the middle ages (and for the reviewer who points to the Hereford mappae mundi as "proof" of otherwise, he can't have read Russels book very thoroughly - the Hereford map, a wonderful work of art, is a classical T-O mappae mundi, a map meant for religious use, not navigation. The stupidity of such statements would be similar to believe that the Rand McNally 2005 US Road Atlas shows that modern americans believe that there are no other continents because it doesn't show them in this, also very flat, map).

Some aspects of the book are lacking, though. Russel goes so much into the minority beliefs of Cosmas and Lactantius that these two atypical writers occupy more space in his book than the vast majority of medieval and ancient writers who took the sphericity of the earth for granted from their observations and corpus of learning. Also, he doesn't really discuss why modern people (post-1900) haven't revised the popular view - his hypothesis that the progressivist worldview that predominates today makes people WANT to believe medieval academics to be stupid because it fits the idea of constant development is probably valid, but he does not show this sufficiently.

On the other hand, his bibliography and source listings are excellent, and are the main reasons I had for buying his book.

While I really do not profess to know Russels' religious views - he might certainly be a christian apologist - this does not matter. Letting a foolish contrafactual myth stand in the face of all evidence in textbooks and the popular mind has little to do with apologism and more to do with correcting the prejudices of the modern age.

In the end, I'd like to quote a little tidbit from the Norse Middle ages Russel probably does not know of. The "King's Mirror", a secular book written for the education of younger sons of norwegian nobility of the 13th century, has the following to say on the shape of the earth:

"Take a burning candle and put it in a big room. Then suspend an apple from the roof near to the flame - so near the apple becomes hot. Then, it will almost put in shadow the one half of the room or even more. But if you hang it by the wall, it does not warm up, and the candle light the entire room, and the shadow of the apple on the wall is barely the size of the apple itself.

Now you must know from this that the earth's sphere is like a ball, and does not at all places come as close to the sun as others. Where the rounded part of it comes closer to the sun's path, it will be hottest. And in some of the lands that lie directly against its beams, one cannot live"

While this quote certainly shows that norwegian high medieval nobility had some incorrect ideas of the movement of the sun and the earth (as elsewhere, due to their lack of observational instruments), it cannot be disputed that they agreed that the world was a sphere. ... Read more

Product Description
W. W. Norton presents Inventing America, a balanced new survey of American history by four outstanding historians. The text uses the theme of innovation—the impulse in American history to "make it new"—to integrate the political, economic, social, and cultural dimensions of the American story. From the creation of a new nation and the invention of the corporation in the eighteenth century, through the vast changes wrought by early industry and the rise of cities in the nineteenth century, to the culture of jazz and the new nation-state of the twentieth century, the text draws together the many ways in which innovation—and its limits—have marked American history. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Just what I needed
Student, required this book, had the info I needed to breeze through the exams. Definitely a good buy if you need for school.

Inventing America, Second Edition, Volume 1
The book took along time to get here.The condition was not what I expected.All in all it was ok.

review inventing america book
The book was shipped promptly and received in fine condition.Would recommend this seller.
Thanks

Inventive approach
I am developing a course in the History of Technology in America for my local community college, and find this book an invaluable resource.There is a hard-back one-volume edition as well as a soft-cover two-volume edition available.The authors hail from Harvard, Yale and MIT, with backgrounds in history, politics and technology.

This is an American history with a difference.While the student and instructor will find the basic chronological outline of American history that is familiar, the development of themes here often draws in much more explicitly than the normal text the issues of technological innovation, scientific discovery, manufacturing and business development as engines for growth and progress in the course of American history.The authors state in their introduction that Americans 'have long considered this penchant for innovation a distinguishing feature of their culture and history.'

Technology in terms discussed here is hardly confined to the modern age.For example, very early in the text the authors state that the development of maize/corn 'was perhaps the most important plant-breeding achievement of all time' - the creation of a stable staple food crop that was adaptable and resilient spurred the growth of civilisation in dramatic ways. Technology includes that related to architecture (from the earliest buildings in the Native American cultures to modern skyscrapers, bridges and underground complexes), agriculture (the aforementioned maize development being but the earliest of these examples), transportation technologies (from canals to railroads to automobiles and aircraft), medical technologies (from early hygiene and vaccine developments to modern pharmaceutical and genetic innovations), information technology (telegraph and telephone to digital and internet), and much more.

History is naturally selective, and any history text is going to have to walk the fine line between being thorough in development and being comprehensive in scope.The whole work weighs in at well over 1100 pages (inclusive of index and appendices), which is a lot of material for a two-semester course that will include supplemental readings.As an overview of American history, it hits the high points well and develops many sidelines of interest.My own particular teaching responsibilities for this will be to students who are primarily interested in technical education - this method of developing American history has more appeal for this audience, given its more direct applicability to their courses of study.

In the two volume edition, the first volume covers the pre-Columbian scene in the Americas through to the era of Reconstruction following the Civil War; the second volume goes through the presidency of the current George W. Bush, and includes issues of 9-11 and the issues of ongoing wars against terrorists. There are CD-ROM supplements that come with the books, which include many helpful elements for the students, as well as some multi-media offerings.These are keyed to chapters in the text.

The text is written in an interesting and informative manner, with appropriate use of humour and wit as situations permit.For example, from the text on the exhibition in London's Crystal Palace in 1851, the authors write:

'Among the winners was the New York firm of Day and Newell, manufacturers of locks.In one of the more flamboyant competitions, an employee of Day and Newell successfully picked the locks of several well-known English lock makers, while an English locksmith failed to pick Day and Newell's locks.The American won a cash prize for his efforts, while the Bank of England, whose vault he opened, subsequently placed an order with Day and Newell for a new set of locks.'

The text is supplemented by a very generous sampling of graphics, pictures, woodcuts, maps, charts and other colourful elements.Every page has some element of colour and something to make it visually interesting apart from the text.

This is a wonderful book for undergraduate courses in American history as well as for general readers who want to refresh their knowledge of American history.

American History with a Technology focus
Inventing America is exactly as expected.It expands coverage of the impact of technology in a general American history textbook.We are treated to as many as three pages of technology summaries in some cases.The treatment of manufacturing technology and transportation is especially well done.

How did a collection of primitive, largely agricultural British colonies acquire technical skills for the machine age?We learn that in an effort to simplify battlefield requirements for parts and ammunition, the government caused gun manufacturers to adopt similar designs.These efforts were led by Springfield Armory and Harpers Ferry Armory and eventually resulted in interchangeable parts.The US Military Academy at West Point founded in 1802, began engineering training under Superintendent Sylvanus Thayer's tenure in 1817;Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, founded in 1824, was "the only serious rival" until after the Civil War.Army Engineers on loan to numerous private companies surveyed many of the railroad routes.We get an overview of the manufacture of steam engines for steamboats in Newark, NJ and Philadelphia, and a survey treatment of the Lowell, MA textile complex.In agricultural technology, the usual John Deere and McCormick Reaper stories are expanded to include the story of hog butchering in Cincinnati, a forerunner of the modern assembly line.The development of the steam powered rotary press in 1835, made possible high speed printing which gave us daily newspapers, dime novels, and widespread distribution of political tracts.

Numerous areas can be named where additional technology coverage would be of interest.Public health is a particularly interesting area because life expectancy in the US nearly doubled in the last century.The text gives us the usual coverage of smallpox and yellow fever, but there is little mention of Asian cholera, which caused numerous, frightening epidemics in the 19th Century.Similarly, the fact that more soldiers died of disease than wounds in the Civil War gets only brief mention.The development of public sewer systems and water supplies is noted briefly, but no mention is made of the technology impact of developing pump technology.There is no mention of firefighting technology.These technologies made urbanization possible.Without them, life in cities was hazardous.

The development of the electric power receives some coverage.The well known AC/DC conflict between Edison and Tesla gets reduced to "...after direct current (which had a limited ability to travel distances) was replaced by alternating current..."Samuel Insull's development of electric utilities gets half a paragraph.There is no mention of the Niagra Falls hydro power project.Ball Corporation's leadership in the use of electric motors as power sources in manufacturing is described.

Coal, steel, and railroads are usually considered necessary elements of the Industrial Revolution.We learn nothing of the coal industry's history or of the manufactured gas and gas lighting industry.Coverage of sawmills, gristmills and water wheels is very good.

Each volume includes a CD of additional materials.Some are audio segments.Some are maps.This is a nice implementation of computer assistance, but not as useful as a list of internet links with additional detail might have been.As it stands, its more a demo of what might be than a true asset to the student.

Generally this is a nicely done text.The writing style is clear and direct.Illustrations and maps are appropriate and adequate.In many respects the technology approach leaves us hungering for more.No doubt page limitations in a general history textbook handcuffed the authors.About 100 more pages could have made for a more complete whole.The text provides brief suggested reading lists in each chapter, but there are no references for in-depth follow-up.References and more extensive reading lists would have been helpful.Author Pauline Maier has noted the technology helps make history interesting to some who otherwise find it boring.This will likely be the text of choice at engineering schools.Most readers will find this a useful new perspective on American History. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A City's and a Newspaper's Histories Intertwined
This is a superb history of the Los Angeles Times newspaper and relates how its history affected, and vice versa, its city of publication.This book will fascinate historians and journalists.

The Los Angeles Times began as a one cent, four page paper in 1881.

Colonel Harrison Gary Otis, in 1882, who had worked previously with the Louisville Journal, began leading the Times.He had taken a stand against slavery on a pro-states' rights newspaper, the Journal.Otis then served in the Civil War and was a Lt. Colonel at war's end.Otis helped W.W. Hollister start a weekly newspaper in Santa Barbara, the Santa Barbara Weekly Press.Otis wrote editorials against Southern Pacific Railroad's attempt to seek a favorable economic climate from government.The long arm influence of the Southern Pacific Railroad led to Otis leaving the Santa Barbara newspaper.Otis took a job in Alaska while his wife Eliza directed newspaper operations.

Otis took a job as Editor of the Times and purchased a 15% interest.Meanwhile, the city subsidized rail in Los Angeles and its population began growing.

Harry Chandler moved to Los Angeles from New Hampshire for the clean air to help with his lung ailment.He began working in the Times circulation department in 19885.Within a year, he was leading the department.Circulation work began at 4 am.

Otis left the Times to serve in the Spanish American War.He then became a Brigadier General in fighting in the Philippines. He then returned to apply military style management in leading the Times.

The Times management found the efforts of Collis Huntington, Southern Pacific's President, to gain solo rights to harbor business.The ant-Southern Pacific forces convinced the Federal government to construct a deep river free harbor in San Pedro.

The Chamber of Commerce and the Times successfully fought to take water rights from ranches in Owens Valley and direct water to Los Angeles.Mayor Fred Eaton had the city purchase the Los Angeles Water Company.William Mulholland led the company in buying water rights under others; properties with no public notice.The Times kept silent as this happened.Otis and Chandler were silent financial partners in the operations.City voters approved building a $23 million aqueduct that was completed in 1913.A dam holding a year's supply of water was created due to fears of an earthquake disrupting the water flow.A dam, which Mulholland had earlier declares as safe, burst in 1928 which killed over 450 and destroyed 12,240 houses and 7,900 acres of agricultural land.

The Times kept collective bargaining out of labor force even while other papers across the nation unionized.A bomb exploded in the Times building in 1910, killing 21. The International Association of Bridge and Structural Iron Workers was blamed for the bombing and two of members were charged.

Job Harrimanm running for Mayor on the Socialist ticket, was one of the defense attorneys.Harriman attacked the Times' anti-union policies.Defense attorney Clarence Darrow and journalist Lincoln Steffens helped negotiate a compromise where defendant Jim McNamara, who admitted to placing the dynamite, would plead guilty and escape the death penalty while his brother, John McNamara, would have charges dropped that he planned and funded the bombing. The District Attorney declined the deal.Jim was given a life sentence and James 15 years.The guilty pleas hurt Harriman politically and he was defeated in his race for Mayor.

One McNamara attorney, Joseph Scott, was also on the Board of Education.The Times wrote viciously about Scott until he left the School Board in 1915.He then used all the newspaper attacks to successfully sue the Times for $47,659.71, an award that was upheld by the state Supreme Court.

The Times supported the successful passage of the Criminal Syndicalism Act of 1919, which created a new felony crime of belonging to an organization that supported violence against industry or for political change.The Police Department created a Red Squad that disrupted union meetings and strikes.Upton Sinclair, a writer, was arrested for reading the Bill of Rights.

Kyle Palmer of the Times became a leading political editorialist.He always supported Republicans and opposed unions.

Harry Chandler died in 1944.Norman Chandler, Harry's son and General Otis's grandson, took over managing the Times.He sold stock to raise funds and abandoned its policy of only supporting Republicans, although it kept a conservative editorial tilt.In 1941, the Times had the third highest circulation in Los Angeles.Norman Chandler also started the Mirror newspaper as a publication with greater appeal to middle class readers.

The Times supported imprisoning Japanese residents during World War II, declaring they were agents of Japan.The Times also sided with police and military personnel who did not intervene when 5,000 other military personnel and civilians attacked Mexican Americans wearing zoot suits.

The Times opposed a public housing plan by Mayor Fletcher Brown.In the final three weeks of the next Mayor's race, the Times wrote 219 column inches about Brown and 1,010 column inches on his opponent, Norris Paulson.Paulson won.The land Brown wanted for public housing was then used to build Dodger Stadium.

Norman Chandler supported Robert Taft for President in 1952 until he saw Taft yelling at a photojournalist.This upset Chandler who switched to supporting Eisenhower.

The Times was very supportive of Richard Nixon.Chandler allowed a Political Editor for the Mirror work for Nixon in 1952, 1954, 1956, and 1960.

Otis Chandler became Times Publisher in 1960.He abandoned the conservative political leanings and attracted talented journalists and allowed them more freedom on what they wrote.Times writers provided more coveregae of different sides of labor - management disputes.

Tom Johnson became the Times Publisher in 1980 as Otis Chandler became Editor in Chief of Times Mirror, the paper's company. In 1986, conservative Board members, including cousines of Otis, forced Otis Chandler out of his job.In 1989, the Board ousted Editorial Page Editor Anthony Day for being too moderate and fired Tom Johnson.The paper became editorially conservative.

Comprehensive and Captivating History of Los Angeles
Former Los Angeles Times columnist and City Editor, Bill Boyarsky, has authored a comprehensive and captivating history of the Chandler Family, founders of the L.A. Times.With many rare and beautiful pictures of old Los Angeles, this book describes the behind the scenes drama that went into the formation of one of America's greatest newspapers. Boyarsky goes into well-researched detail of how the Chandler Family was instrumental in helping create the great city that Los Angeles became.

The story behind the Chandler Family and the Los Angeles Times is a compelling read, even for those not from the region. At a time in which we are witnessing the decline and possible death of many newspapers - this book is an essential piece of history! I found the writing and photographs even more interesting than the Inventing L.A. PBS documentary. ... Read more

Product Description
When fourteen-year-old Elliot Sutton arrives at HolminsterHigh, he’s determined not to stand out. He simply can’t let himself become a target again—not like he was at his last school. This time, he’s a new Elliot. Tough. Impenetrable. But then he meets the Guardians, a group of upperclassmen that secretly rule Holminster with a quiet and anonymous terror. Obsessed with George Orwell’s book 1984, they desire power for the sake of power—and they always get what they want. Now, they want Elliot. Not to terrorize . . . but to join them. Can Elliot face his new future, or will he become his own worst nightmare?Amazon.com Review
In this stunning first novel, Graham Gardner pays homage to Robert Cormier’s great The Chocolate War with a story about a boy trying to survive in a school run by a vicious secret society. But where Jerry Renault resists the system, only to succumb to it in the end, Elliot Sutton is more eager to do its bidding, and doesn’t take action to resist until it is almost too late. At first Elliot had hoped that it would be different at Holminster High. He carries the fear always--the fear of the beatings and much worse that made his life hell at his old school. But at Holminster High, Elliot can be the kind of person who avoids trouble by fitting in. He watches himself carefully every moment and shapes himself to be noticed just enough in the right way. Ironically, his strategy backfires when the Guardians (the secret three who control and terrorize Holminster High) select him as a candidate to be trained for their group.

After school, Elliot finds a friend in outcast Ben, but both boys know they can never acknowledge each other in the halls. When Elliot falls in love with bright, outspoken Louise, he feels he must wear yet another identity for her. Elliot sinks into numb isolation behind his masks when a crucial decision pushes him to take back his self with an act that could cost him dearly. Inventing Elliot is a heartrending, engrossing novel to be pondered and discussed. (Ages 12 and older) <--Patty Campbell> ... Read more

Customer Reviews (35)

Discussion starter for bullying
I used this book as a read aloud for eighth graders and it was a good discussion starter on bullying.It might have been better for students to have their own copy because there were many flashbacks and it was hard to follow at times.

unrealistic
totallyhard to believe. i bought this book and i was surprised. it was not what i thought.
the school Elliot goes to is more of a nightmare than a real school. those wacko bullies must have brain damage. they base all their ways on a book called "1984". it is a real book. there are spies all over the high school workign for the "guardians"-who are the directors and leaders of the bullying. some think the teachers are even in on it.Elliot is bullied when he does not follow the rules. and so Elliot takes some moneya nd remakes himself to fit better. next thing ya know he is being asked to be part of the group?
dosnt make sense to me, but what ever. i think this story could only be a fantasy. if you want a book that takes place in a crazy world, here ya go-->

Parents Reject "The Chocolate War"
FYI
11/19/07 Baltimore Examiner

Harford County, MD school district parents request that "The Chocolate War" be removed from the curriculum; "Inventing Elliott" is chosen as substitute

Fast paced and compelling
A strong and powerful story of a secondary schoolboy, the victim of bullies, who after reinventing himself is befriended by the bullies in his new school and invited to be one of them. I found this book fast paced and compelling and always to the point.

Inventing Elliot
Inventing Elliot by Graham Gardner is a riveting book, although
obvious at times. Elliot Sutton is a 14 year-old boy who's family
has just moved to a new town where he starts in a new school
called Holminster High. Here he meets the Guardians, a group of
students that rule the school; Ben, an intelligent boy that isn't
excepted by other people; and Louise, a nice girl that Elliot falls
in love with. This story is told in Elliot's perspective and can go slow at times, but still keeps you wondering what will happen next.
I thought this book was an emotional book that truly shows how cruel life can be sometimes. Through most of the book, I didn't like Elliot because of some of the choices he made and the way he was always so moody. Graham Gardner has many jobs such as a writer, an academic researcher, and a musician. Inventing Elliot is his first novel and was shortlisted for the Branford Boase Award. After reading this book i feel he really understands how Elliot would feel and does a wonderful job of showing it in the book.
I would only recommend this young adult book to sixth graders
and up because it is graphic and violent. ... Read more

Product Description

INVENTING THE MIDDLE AGES

The Lives, Works, and Ideas of the Great Medievalists of the Twentieth Century

In this ground-breaking work, Norman Cantor explains how our current notion of the Middle Ages-with its vivid images of wars, tournaments, plagues, saints and kings, knights and ladies-was born in the twentieth century. The medieval world was not simply excavated through systematic research. It had to be conceptually created: It had to be invented, and this is the story of that invention.

Norman Cantor focuses on the lives and works of twenty of the great medievalists of this century, demonstrating how the events of their lives, and their spiritual and emotional outlooks, influenced their interpretations of the Middle Ages. Cantor makes their scholarship an intensely personal and passionate exercise, full of color and controversy, displaying the strong personalities and creative minds that brought new insights about the past.

A revolution in academic method, this book is a breakthrough to a new way of teaching the humanities and historiography, to be enjoyed by student and general public alike. It takes an immense body of learning and transmits it so that readers come away fully informed of the essentials of the subject, perceiving the interconnection of medieval civilization with the culture of the twentieth century and having had a good time while doing it! This is a riveting, entertaining, humorous, and learned read, compulsory for anyone concerned about the past and future of Western civilization.

Customer Reviews (18)

Interesting, Informative
This book is a study of 19th and 20th century historians of the Middle Ages and how they have created our points of view.

I really enjoyed this work, at least up to a point. Not having read all the writers Cantor examined, I can't say whether he was entirely fair to them all, but it gives the impression of fairness, and anyway I won't live long enough to read most of them. It is true that if most of what history is autobiographical projection (which is what the book is about) then the idea that most of the public has about learning is wrong. The pursuit of truth and knowledge has turned into a walk through a chamber of mirrors.We like authors who say agreeable things, things that affirm our points of view and emotional dispositions. It's more a pursuit of pleasure than of truth.I suppose one is closer to the truth as the realization grows that no one really knows much of anything.

Nevertheless, this is an interesting study and well worth reading. Cantor is an incisive critic with a rich sense of irony and a very sturdy sense about what is fair and balanced. He finds the value in writers of every political persuasion from the far left to far right. Though I think the occasional Freudian analysis in some of the biographies seems a little dated,other than that, I thought it was, as they say, richly entertaining.

Cantor's Inventions
When I received this book for Christmas, I was excited. As I read the book, my excitement palled and has become dismay. I find it, though somewhat informative--at least the names of prominent medievalists are given--generally a venomous reflection on those with whom Cantor did not agree. His ascription of venal motives to a number of historians, particularly the Annales school, is not an objective assessment of their contributions tohistoriography. Were this book billed as a personal polemic, it would be correctly labeled. One may gain some insight into the construction of Medieval history, but if one lacks any prior introduction to the subject, this is NOT the book for them

Entertaining
Sure, it's filled with gossip and provocative (and sometimes glib) generalities.That's what makes it such a pleasure to read.It's a little like getting invited to have a couple of beers with your indiscreet, cantankerous, opinionated but lovable dissertation advisor, after passing your qualifying exams.Please, kiddo, call me Norm.

There's no question Cantor goes way over the top in places, as was his wont.Probably the most notorious instance was his labeling Ernst Kantorowicz a Nazi.Since Eka was a Jew who fled Germany in 1938, this is more than a bit of a stretch. The evidence?Eka was a fan of the poet Stefan George, and we all know the George Circle "prefigured" Nazism.Also Kantorowicz wrote admiringly of Emperor Frederick II and of kingship during the Weimar Republic.Other tid-bits:his biography of Frederick appeared with a swastika on the cover and, alarmed by the threat of a communist take-over in 1918, he briefly joined the Free Corps.But it is virtually out of thin air that Cantor concludes that, save for the accident of birth, Eka would have become a Nazi.As for Percy Schramm, the other "Nazi Twin," "there is essentially no difference between him and Albert Speer."Schramm was appointed official historian of the Wehrmacht's General Staff in 1943.He had the rank of major.He was not a member of the Nazi Party.Go figure.

But apart from these outrageous asides and a misconception that the German Empire in 1871 was half-Protestant and half-Catholic (OK, and a highly idiosyncratic definition of "German Idealism"), the chapter is an engaging account of the careers of the two scholars and a lively if very abbreviated summary of their orientations as historians.

In another chapter, Cantor writes that the two leading American medievalists of their generations, Haskins and Strayer, "were Woodrow Wilson duplicated and reincarnated."Well, OK.But this doesn't prevent him from providing an entertaining and acute reminiscence of Strayer, Cantor's dissertation advisor.(When he turned the thing in after four years, Strayer's only response was, "It's OK.I'll schedule your defense.") You can take or leave his definition of "Wilsonianism."

"A reader," who comments below, failed to read the book's subtitle: "The Lives, Works, and Ideas of the Great Medievalists of the Twentieth Century."This is not supposed to be a sophisticated work of historiography.It's a collection of anecdotes and apercus, some whifty but some right-on, along with summaries of the oeuvres and of the legacies of twenty legendary historians.Even if you're a fan of the Annales school (and by the way, there's no reason to believe Cantor's animus toward the school has anything to do with envy of the sex-lives of its stars), you'll probably enjoy this book.Unless, of course, you happen to be a medievalist.

No other historian I can think of would have the chutzpah to publish a book like this.Cantor will be missed.

Eye Opening Histoiography
Cantor ablely lays out the various schools of thought in 20th century Middle Ages Studies.This book was close to a god send for me.I've been reading almost exclusively out of the Annales school, like a blind man, having no idea that there were other areas to explore (more accurately, what those avenues might be).

Cantor uses the personalities and backgrounds of the major midievialists to explain their works.Along the way he offers excellent summations and critiques of the various works.He includes a list of 125 books that provide a "core collection" of the subject.

If there is a thesis or over riding theme in this book is that the great tragedy was the triumph of the instutition builiding Annales school at the expensive of the more talented (and English) R.W. Southern.Cantor goes so far to present Southern's refusal to create an institute in his image as an "Arthurian tragedy".

I understand what he's talking about since I've been reading on the subject for over a year and have yet to come across anything other the annales school and their decendants.Funny.

I haven't been this excited about a book in a couple years.I read it in about a day and if you have gotten to the point where you are reading this review, I HIGHLY recommend you get this immeditately.

Off the scale
Norman Cantor's Inventing the Middle Ages is arguably the best history book I have ever read - at the very least it belongs in my top ten.Of course, it isn't actually a book of history, but rather historiography.None-the-less, it is an absolute delight.Cantor takes the reader for a mesmerizing and often hilarious ride through the last 100-odd years of medieval scholarship, skewering the minor and mighty alike.Kantorowitz, Huizinga, Tolkien, the Annalists-- all fall before his sword.But there is more here than just screed - Cantor's no holds barred description of the growth and development of medieval scholarship is informed and informative.His lucid prose reflects utter familiarity with the complex literary currents of his period, a familiarity derived from a lifetime of scholarly immersion.One can't help but read this book and be spurred on to read further in medieval history.

Regarding the very negative reviews below - these baffle me.I can't figure out if the writers are humorless, lack any ironic sense at all, or simply take themselves (and the historical profession) far too seriously.But they seem to have missed entirely the underlying humor and humanity in this book. I have often found that some of the most entertaining and worthwhile books receive highly polarized reviews on Amazon, and this is a case in point.

If you have ever yearned for the non-fiction equivalent to Moo, Small World, or Lucky Jim, then Inventing the Middle Ages is for you.I've read other recent books (more like "booklets") from Cantor - In the Wake of the Plague comes to mind - and they are disappointing by contrast, quite brief and read more like collections of lectures.But don't let this or the few negative reviews dissuade you from picking up a copy of the superb Inventing the Middle Ages.I can't recommend this book highly enough. ... Read more

Product Description
Great Neck, New York, is one of America’s most fascinating suburbs. Settled by the Dutch in the 1600s, generations have been attracted to this once quiet enclave for its easy access to New York City and its tranquil setting by the Long Island Sound. This illustrious suburb has also been home to a number of film and theatrical luminaries from Groucho Marx and Oscar Hammerstein to comedian Alan King and composer Morton Gould. Famous writers who have lived there include Ring Lardner and of course, F. Scott Fitzgerald, who used Great Neck as the inspiration for his classic novel The Great Gatsby.

Although frequently recognized as the home to well-known personalities, Great Neck is also notable for the conspicuous way it transformed itself from a Gentile community, to a mixed one, and, finally, in the 1960s, to one in which Jews were the majority.In Inventing Great Neck, Judith Goldstein tells this lesser known story. The book spans four decades of rapid change, beginning with the 1920s. Throughout the early half of the century, Great Neck was a leader in the reconfiguration of the American suburb, serving as a playground of rich estates for New York’s aristocracy. Throughout the forties, it boasted one of the country’s most outstanding school systems, served as the temporary home to the United Nations, and gave significant support to the civil rights movement. During the 1950s, however, the suburb diverged from the national norm when the Gentile population began to lose its dominant position.

Inventing Great Neck is about the allure of suburbia, including the institutions that bind it together, and the social, economic, cultural, and religious tensions that may threaten its vibrancy. Anyone who has lived in a suburban town, particularly one in the greater metropolitan area, will be intrigued by this rich narrative, which illustrates not only Jewish identity in America but the struggle of the American dream itself through the heart of the twentieth century. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

The Pressures of Identity
Reading Judith Goldstein's excellent book, Inventing Great Neck, reminded me irresistibly of Philip Roth's seminal story of identity and assimilation, "Eli The Fanatic." Roth described the accommodations of Jewishness to the American way of suburbia and the various challenges to (and pains of) such accommodations. In her sweeping history of twentieth century Great Neck, Goldstein shows that the adjustments of each ethnic group are inevitably difficult and never completely secure.
Her book does more. It sketches the transformation of Great Neck from aChristian-dominated community in the twenties to a Jewish community by ca. 1960. In the process it pictures the rich and aristocratic being replaced by middle-class business- and education-minded Jews. Less tangible but equally important is the author's attention to a certain change of tone in middle-class life -- not only in Great Neck, or in suburbia, but in America as a whole.
A solid book!
Manfred Wolf

An American Original
Great Neck emerges as a personality, an American Original, in Judy Goldstein's fascinating tale of a place that might look like just another bland pocket of sprawl. But Great Neck has a rich, star-studded history set against a variegated panorama of social and ethnographic elements, from mogul to maid, from the American South to the Middle East to Eastern Europe. Who knew that behind the split-level facades, complex sagas of life on earth were taking place?It gained part of its mythology from Fitzgerald and his use of it as the locale of The Great Gatsby. Then came Eddie Cantor and Jock Whitney and the Iranian Jews.This book details these stories and others and everything else you might want to know about Great Neck in scholarly, eloquent, accessible prose. The more you read, the more you do want to know about what happened there. One of America's multi-faceted habitats, disguised as a suburb, comes to life in these pages.

A Golden Suburb
I just finished reading Inventing Great Neck, and I loved it.This was all completely new to me.I thought that Great Neck was just another suburb - I didn't realize that it had grown into a predominantly Jewish suburb.
It was fascinating reading on so many levels.

The book's magic lies in the thumbnail sketches of the people who lived in Great Neck.Eddie Cantor's was riveting, as was Louise Eldridge's, who was part of the old guard.I loved that old Russell Eldridge could turn Saddle Rock, his estate, into a village to avoid interference.Those were the days.As for Cantor, what a miracle he was.His mother died in childbirth, his father two years later, and he was raised by a sixty-two year old grandmother. The fortune he made, how proud he was of his incredible home, how SAFE he felt in the hands of Nathan S. Jonas, his friend who built a series of immigrant banks into Manufacturer's Trust, and how it all crashed with the Depression.Sic transit Gloria.

The 40's and 50's were Great Neck's glory years.Like all suburbs, Great Neck grew richer as the cities grew poorer.The American dream was in the suburbs: ownership of a single family home, a church or temple in which to worship, money to shop, men who earned enough money for their wives not to work.Women had more time on their hands and could become deeply involved in community organizations - schools, churches, temples, hospitals.It was in 1953 that North Shore Hospital was built.The creation of this hospital makes for fascinating reading.It is one of the great stories of the book.What a crew: Jock Whitney, his wife Betsey (who was a Cushing) and his sister Joan Payson, and Tex and Jinx McCrary joined forces with Jack Hausman and Willie Cohen to build one of the great hospitals.In an odd historical twist, it was Whitney's friendship with David O. Selznick and his interest in Hollywood that made Whitney one of the few WASPS that were not anti Semitic.

By the end of the 50's and the beginning of the 60's, the Jewish majority finally materialized.And the changes of the 60's infiltrated the golden suburb of Great Neck, as they did the nation: the anti war movement, the woman's movement, the influx of conservative Jews which changed the profile of religious Jews, divorce, conspicuous consumption, excessive development.

I loved the book.I am barely doing it justice.There was so much rich detail, so much thoughtful honesty in reportage, so many wonderful stories as the Jews of Great Neck realized (perhaps more than any other immigrant group) the American dream.

I am a city person with an innate prejudice against suburbia, but if there MUST be a suburb, let it be Great Neck between 1920 and 1960.

GN, I hardly knew you
Having been connected to GN directly (1933-1973) and indirectly (1973-2006) for nearly three-quarters of a century, I thought I knew pretty much all about its modern history. Wrong! Judith Goldstein has done scholarly, profound research and written a highly readable, thoroughly detailed and documented account of the growth and development of GN through its most critical 40-plus years. I literally couldn't put it down and in the reading I learned a huge amount, even about events and trends in which I actually took part. The highlight for me is the chapter on domestic servants and the fact that our family's "Ruthie" Helen Palmer is one of those featured. It was a privilege to actually witness Ms Goldstein's live-action research as she interviewed my late mother, Beti, for well over two hours - and that is obviously just a tiny fraction of what went into this work. I cannot praise this excellent book nearly enough, so I recommend that readers of this review read it themselves to appreciate the interesting, frequently glamorous history of this wonderful town.

My life
This could have been my biography.Moved to GN in 1929.Lived at 24 5th street.Later became Bond Street.Went to Kensington School and Mrs. Pingree was my 6th grade teacher(The Best).Was one of the few Jews in a very gentile neighborhood.Saw the strike at GNHS in 1939.There was one Jewish Teacher in GNHS, Mr. Milton Meyers.Everybody wanted to be in his class (History).Grew up graduated HS, Navy, College.Saw Saddle Rock, Harbor Hills and Strathmore built.Saw the problems that the gentiles had withv Jews.Was in business aftr the war in Great Neck and saw it develop. My daughter was one of the first babies born at North Shore Hospital.Beulah Brandt (1st marriage in Temple Beth-el) was my first cousin and I was there.Rabbi Rudin married my wife Muriel Spear and me.I could go on and on, however one thing the moving force behind the NS Hospital was named Danny Udell not Udall.
I retired in 2002 and moved to Virginia, however I still belong to Temple Beth El. and maintain my relationships. I loved the book and couln't put it down.It was a socialogical masterpiece. ... Read more

Product Description

Why is there such a striking difference between English spelling and English pronunciation? How did our seemingly relatively simple grammar rules develop? What are the origins of regional dialect, literary language, and everyday speech, and what do they have to do with you?

Seth Lerer'sInventing English is a masterful, engaging history of the English language from the age ofBeowulf to the rap of Eminem. Many have written about the evolution of our grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary, but only Lerer situates these developments in the larger history of English, America, and literature.

Lerer begins in the seventh century with the poet Caedmon learning to sing what would become the earliest poem in English. He then looks at the medieval scribes and poets who gave shape to Middle English. He finds the traces of the Great Vowel Shift in the spelling choices of letter writers of the fifteenth century and explores the achievements of Samuel Johnson'sDictionary of 1755 andThe Oxford English Dictionary of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He describes the differences between English and American usage and, through the example of Mark Twain, the link between regional dialect and race, class, and gender. Finally, he muses on the ways in which contact with foreign languages, popular culture, advertising, the Internet, and e-mail continue to shape English for future generations.

Each concise chapter illuminates a moment of invention-a time when people discovered a new form of expression or changed the way they spoke or wrote. In conclusion, Lerer wonders whether globalization and technology have turned English into a world language and reflects on what has been preserved and what has been lost. A unique blend of historical and personal narrative,Inventing English is the surprising tale of a language that is as dynamic as the people to whom it belongs.

Customer Reviews (13)

A great overall survey of the evolution of English
I have long been looking forward to reading this book (it has been on my TBR pile for months).It finally worked its way to the top of the stack, and I am happy to say it did not disappoint.

"Inventing English" traces the evolution of English from the earliest known written document in Old English to the modern day.As the author describes it in his introduction, it is an episodic epic, with each chapter covering a specific topic.

In his book, Lerer does a good job of striking the middle ground; that is, his work is a bit more conversational than a college textbook, but it is definitely not dumbed-down.Someone like me whose degree is in something other than English or Linguistics may struggle a bit with some of the more technical terms he uses in the earlier chapters.However, if you're interested enough in the history of our language to even pick up this book in the first place, then you're probably motivated enough to stick with it, anyway.Not knowing the exact meaning of the technical terms doesn't prevent a good understanding of the gist of what the author is trying to convey.

The first half of the book is the most difficult.In discussing Old and Middle Englishes, Lerer necessarily focuses on the technical aspects of the language:the syntax, grammar, word formation, and pronunciation.This is slow reading, if you really want to absorb what he's saying, that is.However, once he moves into Modern English the reading is faster and less technical.

This book is an excellent survey for the non-Linguistics major.It covers a vast amount of territory at just the right amount of depth to give a nice, beginning overall knowledge of English.For someone who has studied Linguistics in depth, this book would definitely be too shallow.But for anyone else this is a great starting place to understand the birth and evolution of our fascinating and ever-changing language.

Reading at Ease
If reading a history of the English language seems a daunting task, do not despair.Lerer presents his concise history as a conversation with his reader and not as an encyclopedic form.Lerer's style of writing is familiar and close, like you are having light discourse with friends over a glass of wine.He writes in short, self-contained chapters, which smoothly take the reader from seventh century English to the present.It is a book that can be read in a few nights, or if one wishes, at a more leisurely pace which does not make one feel detached from the subject.During the course of this book, Lerer connects with his readers on many levels.He offers his own feelings of inadequacy about studying the language and provides his readers with a sense of immediacy about language change.Although some prior knowledge of linguistics may be helpful, Lerer's text is complete with an appendix and glossary of terms.So, while studying the English language may not seem like easy reading, be assured that Lerer's book provides readers with the experience of reading at ease.

Doesn't fascinate...
Seth Lerer missed an opportunity to invent an interesting read with his portable history of the English language. The dry manner in which Lerer writes will certainly disenchant logophiles and entertain only a small number of those of us fascinated by the richness of English. It is difficult to determine what audience Lerer had envisioned when this project was compiled- certainly too simple for true word historians and language scholars, yet too technical for the amateur linguist or wordsmith to properly enjoy. That said, the book does have a handful of interesting revelations pickled through its many sections, but this book will neither fascinate nor captivate the majority of those interested in the invention of English. Two stars, Mr. Lerer.

Why is there such a difference between English spelling and pronunciation, and how did grammar rules develop?
Why is there such a difference between English spelling and pronunciation, and how did grammar rules develop? INVENTING ENGLISH is an engaging survey considering all the oddities of English: it not only covers these oddities but places them in rare American historical perspective, adding background to a survey where others would focus on linguistics alone. High school, college and public library holdings alike will find it a lively historical survey of how people discovered and developed new forms of expression bundled into the English language we know and use today.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

review
interesting fairly easy to read I love words and word histories and wanted to add to the history after a review of the text was sent to me by my son.Not the easiest thing to read before napping.
might enjoy the lectures on the learning group or whatever that the author mentions in his preface. ... Read more

Product Description
A New York Times bestseller

One of the master stylists of American literature, Gore Vidal now provides us with his uniquely irreverent take on America’s founding fathers, bringing them to life at key moments of decision in the birthing of our nation.

“Pure Vidal. . . . Inventing a Nation is his edgy tribute to the way we were before the fall.”—Los Angeles Times Book Review

“[Vidal offers] details that enliven and . . .reflections on the past that point sharply to today.” —Richard Eder, New York Times

“An engaging [and] . . . unblinking view of our national heroes by one who cherishes them, warts and all.”—Edmund S. Morgan, New York Review of Books

“[Vidal’s] quick wit flickers over the canonical tale of our republic’s founding, turning it into a dark and deliciously nuanced comedy of men, manners, and ideas.”—Amanda Heller, Boston Sunday Globe

“This entertaining and enlightening reappraisal of the Founders is a must for buffs of American civilization and its discontents.”—Booklist

“Gore Vidal . . . still understands American history backwards and forwards as few writers ever have.”—David Kipen, National Public Radio

Gore Vidal, novelist, essayist, and playwright, is one of America’s great men of letters. Among his many books are United States: Essays 1951–1991 (winner of the National Book Award), Burr: A Novel, Lincoln, and the recent Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace.


















... Read more

Customer Reviews (50)

Vidal's invention
This work was my introduction to Vidal and, frankly, I was not impressed.While somewhat well researched, much of it is Vidal's personal opinion and sounds oddly like a more hardcore Republican Party revisionist take on the Constitution and the founding fathers than one might imagine from someone allied with the Democrats.His arrogance on the subject makes it almost laughable.Vidal's writing style is choppy and disjointed in places.The whole work is entirely unsatisfying.

Rave review for "Inventing a Nation"
"Inventing a Nation" by Gore Vidal is a concise and clear analysis of the development of the United States of America and how the decisions made in the late 18th century impact government today. Gore Vidal cuts to the chase. He destroys the myth of American Democracy by revealing the constructions of the constitution, the formation of the three branches of government, and the development of the electoral college.

At times, Vidal can be didactic and not everyone will agree with his suppositions.

I checked this book out from the library on CD, then read the library's print addition. Now I'm purchasing a copy for my mother to read and to pass on to others.

I highly recommend this book.

Here Today, Tomorrow Forgotten
I was never enthralled by this book.Not a history buff, I was not thrilled to learn of important concepts with little flippant comments to "entertain" , rather than educate with elaboration.He has some flair for the dramatic interactions (whether exaggerated or not) among characters (the three main, Hamilton, Marshall, Franklin, etc); however, they are not developed or enriched with further explanation.I, giving him two stars, grant him the benefit of the doubt that he had to "INVENT" the nation with only 177 pages, but this is far too limited.He emphasizes discord and elements of struggle for one principle and its inventor over another rather than collaboration among fellow patriots.Clearly, it is important to see the contrast of one party and patriot against the other, but it is overemphasized, or just not fully explained to give any nuance.He is strictly secular in the "invention" of the nation, which for me, limits it further.Altogether, if you've started reading it, by all means finish it.If not, skip it.I've heard his other works have more merit, however.

Misleading Title
I admit that I have not finished the book yet and I may not.I picked this up from the library expecting a book about the founding of the USA with respect to our first three presidents.While that may be in the book, the book is primarily an anti-Bush diatribe.I am not one to defend President Bush but I can not stand intellectual dishonesty.In the book, Vidal states that invading Canada in response to 9/11 made as much sense as invading Afghanistan.While the issue of invading Iraq is and continues to be a controversial one, there has been very little opposition to our invasion of Afghanistan.Our current President Obama has stated many times that our fight against terror was in Afghanistan and not Iraq.For Vidal to state that Afghanistan had as much to do with 9/11 as Canada comes across to me as intellectually dishonest.His hatred of President Bush has made the book almost completely unreadable in my opinion.

delightful and iconoclastic tour of what the founding fathers wrought
Vidal sees most contemporary politicians not as men of ideas concerned with society and ideals, but as demagogues who are conducting the family business. His legacy of historical novels is an absolute delight to those who tired of the official, self-congratulatory version of US history: with few exceptions, our top pols are portrayed as petty men of parochial concern even when endowed with political genius. I have often wondered where the line is between Vidal's own opinion and his novelistic portrayals, which are unfailingly vivid and hilariously subtle.

Though I expected a continuation of his seeming reflexive cynicism, in my reading this book is a surprising delight. In a long unevenly flowing essay, Vidal focuses on the founding fathers with a mixture of respect and denunciation, singling out Franklin, Jefferson, and Hamilton as distinctive Enlightenment geniuses, indeed as the most outstanding of these men of the 18C.

He starts with Franklin, who ominously predicted that corruption would lead to the downfall of the American Republic, a warning that was ignored until recently. Washington comes off as a great executive and uniquely brilliant politician, who shrewdly engineered an image that had great world impact and enshrined his fame for posterity. Jefferson, by far the most enigmatic character in my reading, is an idealist full of very human contradiction (an anti-artistocratic aristocrat, a slave-holding opponent of slavery) and political savvy. Hamilton comes off as the true demagogue, stopping at nothing to gain power and spawning corruption to his own ends while writing much of perhaps the greatest poli-sci classic from the Enlightenment. Adams too is a great and honest man, if wanting as a pol, and the contributions of the lesser characters (Madison, George Mason, and Marshall) are also covered.

If I read it correctly, Vidal sees the nation's founding as an extremely tenuous undertaking that could have gone many ways. He does not like the urban-industrial version with a strong central state that Hamilton essentially established, but prefers the modest version (agrarian with a minimal state and strong individual rights) that the Republican Jefferson championed. The bottom line is that the original intent conservatives are ahistorical and tendentious in their arguments to preserve the US constitution as a sacred document of perfection, with Vidal seeing it rather as a political compromise that was deeply flawed and meant to evolve, which it obviously did.

This is wonderfully written and often funny, but not easy to read. It is best if you know the history of the period and the bios of the major players: that way, it is a brilliant essay with satyrical cameos and bold interpretations that reorder the readers' perceptions and gets them to question their assumptions. I loved every page of it.

Warmly recommended. ... Read more

Product Description
This book considers the Vietnam war in light of U.S. foreign policy in Vietnam, concluding that the war was a direct result of failed state-building efforts.This U.S. nation building project began in the mid-1950s with the ambitious goal of creating a new independent, democratic, modern state below the 17th parallel.No one involved imagined this effort would lead to a major and devastating war in less than a decade. Carter analyzes how the United States ended up fighting a large-scale war that wrecked the countryside, generated a flood of refugees, and brought about catastrophic economic distortions, results which actually further undermined the larger U.S. goal of building a viable state.Carter argues that, well before the Tet Offensive shocked the viewing public in late January, 1968, the campaign in southern Vietnam had completely failed and furthermore, the program contained the seeds of its own failure from the outset. ... Read more

Product Description
Over the past two decades, North Americans have become increasingly interested in understanding and reclaiming the rites that mark significant life passages. In the absence of meaningful rites of passage, we speed through the dangerous intersections of life and often come to regret missing an opportunity to contemplate a child's birth, mark the arrival of maturity, or meditate on the loss of a loved one. Providing a highly personal, thoroughly informed, and cross-cultural perspective on rites of passage for general readers, this book illustrates the power of rites to help us navigate life's troublesome transitions.
The work of a major scholar who has spent years writing and teaching about ritual, Deeply into the Bone instigates a conversation in which readers can fruitfully reflect on their own experiences of passage. Covering the significant life events of birth, initiation, marriage, and death, chapters include first-person stories told by individuals who have undergone rites of passage, accounts of practices from around the world, brief histories of selected ritual traditions, and critical reflections probing popular assumptions about ritual. The book also explores innovative rites for other important events such as beginning school, same-sex commitment ceremonies, abortion, serious illness, divorce, and retirement.
Taking us confidently into the abyss separating the spiritual from the social scientific, the personal from the scholarly, and the narrative from the analytical, Grimes synthesizes an impressive amount of information to help us find more insightful ways of comprehending life's great transitions. As we face our increasingly complex society, Deeply into the Bone will help us reclaim the power of rites and understand their effect on our lives. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Many strengths, one yawning weakness
There are many good things to be said for _Deeply Into the Bone._ As an overview of the rich possibilities that ritual presents for solidifying both abstract meaning and concrete community in our lives, it is excellent. In particular, the specific descriptions of rituals from many cultures illustrate the immense variety that ritual practice takes worldwide. The first-person accounts of ritual experiences, from birth to marriage to more problematic life passages such as abortion and divorce, are extremely well-chosen; I found several of them so affecting that I was moved to tears.

Grimes's book, however, falls short of the promise of its subtitle, "Re-inventing Rites of Passage." The author attacks those who exploit other cultures by borrowing their rituals out of context, but also points out that ritual experimentation can lead to rites that ring emotionally false or seem awkward to the participants. Grimes presents this conundrum without offering any clear advice on how to negotiate it. While he gives a number of examples of innovative rituals that he sees as effective, he fails to explain why these rites are effective while others fall flat; his commentary each time is specific to the ritual described, rarely stepping back to give a larger perspective. Additionally, he muddies the issue by praising ritual groups that seem to violate his rules about taking other cultures' rituals out of context, as when he spends several admiring pages on Paul Hill, the founder of the National Rites of Passage Institute, while never addressing the fact that Hill has evidently conflated the diverse initiation rites of several African cultures into one unified "African-centered" rite.

As an aspiring creator of rituals, I am thankful for the rich context that Grimes provides the question of how Westerners might re-invent ritual. Ultimately, however, the book fails to speak to the question itself. At the end of the book, rather than feeling inspired, I was left frozen between the desire not to take others' rituals out of context and the fear of failing to create effective ritual. Though Grimes ostensibly wrote this book in order to help others imagine their own rituals, his harsh criticisms of the sincere mistakes that seekers make tend to discourage rather than encourage innovation. ... Read more

Product Description
Between 1890 and 1920 over one-third of the peasants of Mount Lebanon left their villages and traveled to the Americas. This book traces the journeys of these villagers from the ranks of the peasantry into a middle class of their own making.

Inventing Home delves into the stories of these travels, shedding much needed light on the impact of emigration and immigration in the development of modernity. It focuses on a critical period in the social history of Lebanon--the "long peace" between the uprising of 1860 and the beginning of the French mandate in 1920. The book explores in depth the phenomena of return emigration, the questioning and changing of gender roles, and the rise of the middle class. Exploring new areas in the history of Lebanon, Inventing Home asks how new notions of gender, family, and class were articulated and how a local "modernity" was invented in the process.

Akram Khater maps the jagged and uncertain paths that the fellahin from Mount Lebanon carved through time and space in their attempt to control their future and their destinies. His study offers a significant contribution to the literature on the Middle East, as well as a new perspective on women and on gender issues in the context of developing modernity in the region. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Groundbreaking study in Migration and gender!
This text is truly working from the ground up.Despite its being one of the world's largest diasporas, the case of the lebanese "in the world" is one that has yet to be sufficiently explored.Khater's text attempts two things: to piece the history of the Lebanese migration, and to analyze how migration "works" theoretically.In all of this, Khater even ties together a compelling narrative on gender in the Lebanese migration network.The result is an ambitious book that is a great starting point in understanding Lebanese history, and its connections to all of the world.My hope is that Khater will continue to pursue the Lebanese migrants, and write a second volume. ... Read more

Product Description
From Edison to the iPod, from the Warner Brothers to George Lucas, the story of how the movies became America's favorite form of escapist entertainment - and retained their hold on our imaginations for more than a century - is a story of innovators prevailing again and again over skeptics who prefer to preserve the status quo. Inventing the Movies unspools the never-before-told story of the innovators who shaped Hollywood: how a chance meeting at the Saratoga Race Track led to the end of black-and-white movies ... how Bing Crosby brought you the VCR ... how Walt Disney tamed television ... how a shotgun blast signaled the end of hand-made models and the beginning of digital special effects ... and how even the almighty Morgan Freeman had trouble persuading theater-owners that the Internet wasn't their mortal enemy. Inventing the Movies is an important read not just for fans of Hollywood's history, but for innovators trying to make change happen in any industry. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (15)

Comments from a Hollywood Director and Entrepreneur
I am a long-time member of the Director's Guild of America and working in Hollywood. I am also an entrepreneur holding an issued U.S. Patent (6,792,411) for a new method of financing movies and the Chairman/Founder of [...]. To me, this book is the definitive work on not only every invention to effect the movie business from Thomas Edison to Steve Jobs, but even more importantly, it shows how the "preservationists" fought the "innovators" tooth and nail to keep them from changing the movie business' status quo.

But this book actually offers much more, as it chronicles the resistance that an entrepreneur faces when trying to implement new ideas in a major industry run by old-boy networks and major corporations (movie studios). The book greatly encouraged me by showing that ANY new and innovative idea is often met with extreme resistance.

As a lover of movies and the movie business, I would wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone, as it is the definitive work on motion picture history, the changes that took place in the movie business, and the people and inventions that caused those changes.

Gene Massey, Hollywood

inventing the 3D movies
Enjoyed this book until the small section about the 1950's 3D movies, where Mr. Kirsner proliferates the mistaken notion that those movies were shown anaglyphically (with red/blue glasses). Almost without exception 3D movies of the time were shown with polarized glasses. He also included misinformation about the NaturalVision camera system and even how anaglyph film is projected. I'm sure these errors will be corrected in the revised edition, in which case I can give a higher rating!

A good read and thought-provoking
I wasn't sure what to make of this book when I picked it up, but it exceeded my expectations.It's a very thoughtful look into innovation and blows away many myths.For example, many think innovation is about an-idea-in-the-shower that catches fire quickly; instead, Mr. Kirsner shows that the road to innovation *implemented* is fraught with opponents, tensions, politics, and fear.Innovation usually involves a gradual "chipping away" campaign.By looking at one industry over a long period of time and analyzing its multiple cycles of innovation, the author provides a very thoughtful perspective as to why entrepreneurship is hard.A must-read for entrepreneurs, I think.And, a fun read, too--I too would love to be invited to George Lucas' house for thought-provoking conversation.

Reviewing Inventing the Movies
As one who considers himself a dedicated moviephile, I found Inventing the Movies to be both illuminating and entertaining. The wealth of information it offers in barely more than 200 pages is astounding and the manner in which technical detail is interwoven with personal stories keeps one's attention throughout. I would heartily recommend this book to anyone with even a passing interest in the motion picture industry.

Inventing the Movies
Inventing the Movies is really well written, describing with great clarity the history of innovation in the entertainment industry. Kirsner shows the century-long efforts of Hollywood pacesetters to innovate while others preferred to maintain the status quo. The author's extensive use of sources and recognizable theme makes his book compelling for both industry aficionado and the layman alike.

See the blog posting here: http://www.newsoftwarepathways.com/blog/?p=25 ... Read more

Product Description
Ages 9 to 12 years. An invention of dramatic impact, the automobile led to the creation of new industries, changed the way roads and cities were built, and required a system of laws to protect drivers and pedestrians. This colourful book describes the eventful history of the automobile and the inventors who helped develop it. Readers will learn about: the basic parts of a car; how the engine works; how the industry grew rapidly through mass production; threats to the environment; possible fuel alternatives such as biodiesel and ethanol. ... Read more

Product Description
Students invent toys, games, and solutions to everyday problems.An ideal resource for science fairs or invention contests. Grades 5-10 ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Great for kids and adults
I have used this book in my college courses with great success. But my 10 year old loves it as well. Creativity and invention are stripped of its academic jargon and presented as a road to discovery. Learning by doing and the books activities inspire one to view all "stuff" in the worldas potential tools for inventing. ... Read more

Product Description
In a turbulent business environment, leaders must begin to think more broadly about what a corporation is and how it can create a richer future. With the globalisation of the world's economies, the intensification of competition, and quantum leaps in technological development, the insular and static strategic thinking of many global corporations has become inadequate for understanding the business environment and determining strategic direction. This 2006 book provides comprehensive and practical analysis of what sustainable business development (SBD) is and how companies can use it to make a significant difference. Case studies of companies in the US, Europe, the Pacific Rim and South America demonstrate that achieving innovation and integration depends on a comprehensive understanding of all of the forces which drive change and responding to them with fresh ways of strategic thinking. It is compulsory reading for MBA students and executives as well as professional readers. ... Read more