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What I Read in August 30 Years Ago (1982)

1735. Founding the American Colonies 1583-1660, by John E. Pomfret with Floyd M. Shumway (read 1 Aug 1982) This is a volume in the New American Nation series. It is well-written and of considerable interest, and I know more than ever about things like that now. Only recently have I become aware that Plymouth and Massachusetts were two separate colonies, and only now have I realized that Connecticut and New Haven were also separate colonies. As this book so well says: "...what now seems to have been inevitable was once not only unforeseen but actually unforeseeable. Many of the Englishmen who planned the colonization of America were intelligent, energetic, and persistent, yet even the most perceptive of them could not anticipate either the hardships or the opportunities that awaited the early pioneers. In particular, they could not predict the way in which environment would subtly but surely alter the institutions that the colonists brought with them and would even transform the colonists themselves." ( )

1736. Lizzie Borden: A Case Book of Family and Crime in the 1890's, edited by Joyce G. Williams - J. Eric Smithburn - M. Jeanne Peterson (read 2 Aug 1982) This is an odd book, consisting mostly of newspaper stories on the case, Lizzie's testimony at the inquest, and the judge's charge to the jury. The charge was very helpful to the defense, and the jury took only one vote and came back in an hour with a verdict of not guilty. I could not but conclude Lizzie must have done it: but she was a cool cookie, and I have trouble seeing what became of the blood. Someone had to have helped Lizzie--Bridget? Lizzie was an unlikable person, though her father was too. A weird insight into a weird house. This book is a kind of non-book, but Lizzie Borden's is one of my favorite crimes. I really enjoyed this book. ( )

1737. Why We Were in Vietnam, by Norman Podhoretz (read 5 Aug 1982)
Somewhat to my surprise I read this based on a recommendation by a conservative columnist. Podhoretz concludes we were in Vietnam for idealistic reasons, though it was imprudent to attempt what we did. I sturdily supported our Vietnam policy until 1968, when I became more dovish--but my heart was never really in my dovishness, though despising Nixon as I did I could be easy about opposing things he did. But this book is so rightist that it turned me off some, too. But the book is a good antidote to the liberal line on Vietnam. ( )

1738. White House Years, by Henry Kissinger (read 29 Aug 1982) (National Book Award history prize for 1980) This 1476-page book covers the period from 1968 to 1973, which is the period that Kissinger served as Nixon's special advisor on foreign policy. I found myself agreeing with a lot of what Henry had to say: which I suppose simply shows I did not know or have forgotten a lot of things I should have known during those years. I found myself reverting to my old view on Vietnam--the view I had before 1968, when I supported the war. I should next read Kissinger's Years of Upheaval, but 3000 pages of Henry is a little much, so I may put that off for awhile. But this has been a very worthwhile book. ( )

Schmerguls wrote: I should next read Kissinger's Years of Upheaval, but 3000 pages of Henry is a little much, so I may put that off for awhile. But this has been a very worthwhile book."

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Did you read the Years of Upheaval ? I see it's 3 books.
Years of upheaval
White house years
Years of renewal.

I got about halfway through White House Years and intended to get back to it, but never did. It was interesting for what it was, but I did get to the point where I just didn't feel like I wanted to know so many details. Maybe I'd feel differently today, 30 years later. But, I have too many other things which have priority for me today.

Alias Reader wrote: "Schmerguls wrote: I should next read Kissinger's Years of Upheaval, but 3000 pages of Henry is a little much, so I may put that off for awhile. But this has been a very worthwhile book."

I did read Years of Upheaval a little later, and said of it:

1782 Years of Upheaval, by Henry Kissinger (read 31 May 1983) This is the author's account of 1973 and 1974 up to the time of Nixon's resignation. It is like his White House Years (read 29 Aug 1982) and I found it compelling. He tells of his visit to Hanoi, his China trips, the frustration of working with European allies, especially France, and the Middle East--all the shuttle diplomacy, which one must feel Henry did well. He insists we did not cause the fall of Allende in Chile. He tells of becoming Secretary of State in September 1973, his trips to Russia, and the extreme excitement of October 1973, when the Arab-Israeli war occurred. The chapter (XI) on "The Middle East War" I thought ranking in high drama--somehow that never came through to me as I lived the month. (Those months were dominated by Watergate for many, including me.) The Egyptian negotiations, and the even more exhausting negotiations over the Golan heights, are all told of in turgid but enlightening prose. I cannot deny the 1255 pages at times seemed unending, but am glad I persevered. It was a well worthwhile book, and I believer Kissinger did valuable work. The book also covers the oil embargo, and gives perspective to the energy crisis--"Never before in history has a group of relatively weak nations been able to impose with so little protest such a dramatic change in the way of life of the overwhelming majority of the rest of mankind." ( )

Thanks for the follow-up Schmerguls.

Since you are interested the Nixon era, you might be interested in a book I have on my TBR stack. I haven't read it yet, but read good reviews of it.

Nixonland: America's Second Civil War and the Divisive Legacy of Richard Nixon 1965-1972~~Rick Perlstein

Told with urgency and sharp political insight, "Nixonland" recaptures America's turbulent 1960s and early 1970s and reveals how Richard Nixon rose from the political grave to seize and hold the presidency.

Perlstein's epic account begins in the blood and fire of the 1965 Watts riots, nine months after Lyndon Johnson's historic landslide victory over Barry Goldwater appeared to herald a permanent liberal consensus in the United States. Yet the next year, scores of liberals were tossed out of Congress, America was more divided than ever, and a disgraced politician was on his way to a shocking comeback: Richard Nixon.

Between 1965 and 1972, America experienced no less than a second civil war. Out of its ashes, the political world we know now was born. It was the era not only of Nixon, Johnson, Spiro Agnew, Hubert H. Humphrey, George McGovern, Richard J. Daley, and George Wallace but Abbie Hoffman, Ronald Reagan, Angela Davis, Ted Kennedy, Charles Manson, John Lindsay, and Jane Fonda. There are tantalizing glimpses of Jimmy Carter, George H. W. Bush, Jesse Jackson, John Kerry, and even of two ambitious young men named Karl Rove and William Clinton -- and a not so ambitious young man named George W. Bush.

Cataclysms tell the story of "Nixonland" Angry blacks burning down their neighborhoods in cities across the land as white suburbanites defend home and hearth with shotgunsThe student insurgency over the Vietnam War, the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and the riots at the 1968 Democratic National ConventionThe fissuring of the Democratic Party into warring factions manipulated by the "dirty tricks" of Nixon and his Committee to Re-Elect the PresidentRichard Nixon pledging a new dawn of national unity, governing more divisively than any president before him, then directing a criminal conspiracy, the Watergate cover-up, from the Oval Office

Then, in November 1972, Nixon, harvesting the bitterness and resentment born of America's turmoil, was reelected in a landslide even bigger than Johnson's 1964 victory, not only setting the stage for his dramatic 1974 resignation but defining the terms of the ideological divide that characterizes America today.

Filled with prodigious research and driven by a powerful narrative, Rick Perlstein's magisterial account of how America divided confirms his place as one of our country's most celebrated historians.

Hardcover, 881 pages
Published May 13th 2008 by Scribner

Thank you, Alias. I have read the book and my comment thereon was as follows:


This is a fascinating and utterly absorbing book, which made me relive those tumultuous years when Nixon was a prominent feature of the political landscape. The author shows how his self-centered manias caused the deep divisions among the American people to be heightened. So much that was so familiar to me while I lived through those times seemed utterly new--somehow I did not realize, any more, how the 1960's and 1970's were. Maybe it was because I was younger and I could tolerate some of the things which went on and now seem so bizarre as to be almost intolerable. Any student of those times will be caught up by this vivid account. ( )

Thank you, Schmerguls, for sharing your review of Nixonland. I own the book and look forward to reading it.

I have another book you may want to put on your reading list, Schmerguls. I'm currently reading it and enjoying it a great deal. I think it is a book you would enjoy. It's the bestselling book,

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President~~Candice Millard

Here is my take on the book you recommend (I gave it five stars):

I found this excellently-researched account of the assassination of President Garfiled great reading all the way through. He was shot July 2, 1881, and did not die till Sept 19, 1881, and what he had to undergo at the hands of the doctors who"attended" him is hard to believe. It has been said that not till 1912 were the chances that the ministrations of a doctor more likely to help the patient than to harm him and reading what Garfield's doctors did to him one can readily believe that. For example, it is stated that some doctors preferred to rely on their own methods of treatment, such as applying a hot poultice of cow manure to an open wound. For eight days Garfield was fed only rectally, with warmed milk, egg yoke, and opium. If Garfield had not been so strong and healthy he would never have been able to live as long as he did, given what the doctors were doing to him. This book is very well researched and cannot help but hold a reader interested in medicine, insanity, and politics enthralled, as it did me. ( )

Well, it seems I can't find a book to recommend that you haven't read. However, the ones I did mention you loved. So at least I am on the right track. :)

What I Read in September 2012

4953. The Rise of American Democracy Jefferson to Lincoln, by Sean Wilentz (read 7 Sep 2012) (Bancroft Prize in 2006) This massive volume (796 pages of text, 156 pages of notes, 94 pages of index) was published in 2005 and won a Bancroft Prize in 2006--it is the 35th Bancroft winner I've read. It is basically a political history of the U.S. from 1800 to 1861, proceeding in good chronological order and telling of the advance of democratic ideas during that time. It does an exemplary job of telling of each presidential election and of the political events in each administration, showing how democratic ideas became more acceptable. Slavery was a major obstacle to the advance of democratic concepts, and the book ends with the firing on Fort Sumter. It is hard to see how the story could be told more carefully or more completely--in fact, confessedly, the detailed discussions of events seemed at times excessive. But one feels that what was going on politically in those years has seldom been better told. It is an excellent study, brimming with really excellent research. I'm glad I read it.

4954. A Short History of Nineteenth-Century England, by John W. Derry (read 9 Sep 2012) This was published in 1963. I found it an exceptionally good exposition of English history during the years from 1793 to 1868--years filled with interesting events. The war with revolutionary France and Napoleon, and with the U.S., Peterloo, Catholic Emancipation, the Reform Bill of 1832, Chartism, Peel, Palmerston, and the Reform Bill of 1868 are all discussed ably and succinctly. The author tends to be pretty conservative and some things I did not agree with, but all the things are discussed with a sure touch and I found the book an excellent refresher of the so interesting things that occurred in those exciting times.

4955. Atlantic Fury, by Hammond Innes (read 12 Sep 2012) I read the author's The Wreck of the Mary Deere on 31 May 1998 and liked it so much that on 12 Jan 2010 I read his North Star, which I liked less. Atlantic Fury is a 1962 book and is mainly concerned with a fictional island, Laerg, in the Outer Hebrides. Laerg is very similar to an actual island there, St Kilda, which was inhabited till 1930, when the people living there asked to be evacuated. The story is told by Donald Ross, whose grandfather was the only resident to vote against leaving the island in 1930 and died in 1936 but told Donald and his brother Iain much about the island. There is a military facility which is to evacuated but the fearsome weather poses great problems. Iain Ross has assumed the name of Braddock. a guy who died when Iain was being transported to Britain as a prisoner. Much of the book details the fierce storms causing huge problems in the evacuation of the island. There is a carefully plotted story, which becomes more exciting in the latter part of the book. The earlier part of the book had so much technical weather talk that I did not appreciate but the book becomes pretty gripping as Donald makes his way alone to Laerg. where his brother is. And I liked the ending, which allowed one to hope his brother did not commit suicide. A very good book which would have been better for me if I had read the excellent Wikipedia article on St Kilda before I read the book.

4956. War Trash, by Ha Jin (read 15 Sep 2012) (PEN/Faulkner winner for 2005) Back on Apr 16, 2010, I saw a list of "The Ten Best Books of the Decade" and this was one of them. I read the author's book Waiting on 30 Jan 2000 because it won the 1999 National Book Award for fiction and liked it so I decided to read this, which reads like a war memoir but isn't. It tells of a Chinese man who is sent to fight in Korea in 1951. He is captured and remains in POW camps till 1953. The account is full of dramatic incidents, told in the first person (Ha Jin was born in China on 21 Feb 1956 , studied in the U.S. and after the incident in 1989 in the Peking square decided not to return to China). I have read lots of POW accounts, but never one of a Chinese. The account of brutality is riveting and I suspect is based on truth. The narrator of the story wants to return to China because his mother and fiancee are there. though he never hears from them. One sympathizes with the POWs at times but also is infuriated by all the trouble they caused the Americans who ran the huge POW camps in Korea. The book tells of the capture of an American general by the POWs, and such did happen though in the book a different name is given the general. The narrator has a huge difficulty trying to decide what to do, disliking as he does the Communists but wanting to go back to his mother and fiancee. What happens is a matter of suspense all through the latter part of the novel. I found the book full of thought-provoking situations and an engrossing read.

4957. The Royal Stuart's A History of the Family That Shaped Britain, by Allan Massie (read 17 Sep 2012) This is a 2010 book by a Scottish writer which tells, in non-academic way, of the Stuarts, including the five King Jameses who were kings of Scotland , and then of Mary,Queen of Scots, her son, James I of Britain, Charles I (who had his head chopped off), Charles II, James II, and the descendants of James I. It is very easy reading (the author is primarily a novelist, but he has done some research--though not in primary sources). He takes a reasonably favorable view of Mary though clearly she made mistakes. I have read a lot more detailed stuff on the English Civil War, such as C. V. Wedgwood's three great books thereon and individual biographies of Stuart kings, but not of the Scottish kings. I found this enjoyable reading, though sad of course. The author says 90% of English people are descended from King Edward III, which seems hard to believe, and that there were over 700 people with a better claim to the English throne than Queen Victoria, looking to blood line alone.

4958. the art of racing in the rain A Novel, by Garth Stein (read 19 Sep 2012) This is a 2008 novel in which Enzo, a dog, is the perceptive narrator. His master, Denny, drives race cars and lives in Seattle and has a wife, Eve, and a daughter, Zoe. For the first part of the book I was non-enamored of the book but when the plot thickened and Denny was threatened with losing custody of his daughter to the child's rich maternal grandparents after his wife died the book became totally engrossing and absolutely heart-wrenching. I have not been so overcome by a story in a long time. I sometimes think of what rating I will give a book while I am reading. At one time I thought I'd give this book 2 and a half, then decided 4, then 4 and a half, and finally I knew I had to give it 5 (the top rating, which I don't often give). It was for me a sweepingly overpowering book. And I think to dog enthusiasts would be even more so.

4959. The War Walk A Journey Along the Western Front, by Nigel Jones (read 21 Sep 2012) This is an account of a walking tour of the Western Front published first in 1983, when the English author was 22. He tells a lot about World War I and of what he sees as he visited the sites of WW I battles. The author's father was in the War, and though the author was not born till 1961, but his father took him to France as a boy and showed him where he had served and where his father's brother was killed. The took of course reminded me of Back to the Front by Stephen O'Shea which I read 23 Feb 1998 and of that other superlative book Before Endeavours Fade, which I read May 4, 1991 This book by Jones is a very good book though if one knows a lot about WW I he tells more about the War than necessary. But his description of what he saw is consistently full of interest. Most of his visits were to fields where Britons fought though he does do an excellent chapter on his visit to Verdun. He quotes a lot from accounts of people who were in the War. This is an excellent book to recall the awful trauma which World War I was for the world.

4960. Joining the United States Navy A Handbook, by Snow Wildsmith (read 22 Sep 2012) I was in the Navy sixty years ago and I thought it might be fun to read this 2012 book designed for kids thinking of joining the Navy. The first thing that startled me was that a seaman recruit gets $1357.60 a month. I forget what I got as a seaman recruit, but I know my brother when he was drafted in 1941 got $21 a month and my pay was a lot closer to that than what a recruit gets now. I also leaned that men and women are trained together in boot camp, which surprised me. Are they in the same barracks? The book doesn't say. The book is full of good advice for anyone thinking about joining the Navy--and tells things I never gave a second thought to when some of my friends induced me to sign up in the Navy Reserve when I was in college in 1949. It was a simpler world, I guess.

4961. Exorcising Hitler The Occupation and Denazification of Germany, by Frederick Taylor (read 25 Sep 2012) This is a 2011 book by a British historian which tells of the occupation of Germany in 1945 and then of the trials and tribulations in the years 1945 to 1947 of the occupying powers as they struggled to run things in Germany and denazify the country. The account of the time before May 8, 1945, telling of the occupation to the country is well-told even though trodding well-known events. Then there are many chapters about the efforts of the occupying powers to get the collaborators of the Nazis out of running the country. Those chapters did not seem well-organized to me, often reciting mere anecdotal evidence and jumping around chronologically and also, sadly, showing the occupiers did not do a very good job handling the huge job they had--millions of German soldiers to be fed and processed, and trying to have the country operate while getting the Nazis out of running the country. But the final chapter, showing the course of events in Germany from 1947 on, is fun to read, as Germany became prosperous and democratic and then, in 1990, reunited. That is a heart-warming story and makes up for the rather turgid and meandering account of the first years of the occupation. The book makes me want to read a fuller account of Germany in the years since 1945.

4962. The Long Walk The True Story of a Trek to Freedom, by Slavomir Rawicz (read 27 Sep 2012) Ever since, on 26 Aug 199, I read We Die Alone, by David Howarth, I have wanted to read this book. It is by a Polish soldier who was arrested by the Russians in 1939, after the Poles were defeated by the Nazis and Russians, and sent to a labor camp in Siberia. According to this book, he and six others escaped from the labor camp and made their way to Mongolia and China, crossed the Gobi desert on foot, their only food for many days being snakes they caught, traveled through Tibet, and arrived in India. The story of this tremendous feat is hard to believe, and there is evidence that it is not true--records supposedly show the author was released by the Russians. The book was ghost-written by an Englishman and published in 1956. The edition I read was published in 2010. The author died in 2004, at age 88. It is a fantastic story and there are things about it that make it unlikely to be true. But it is an amazing account and one is very relieved that they surmounted such fierce obstacles--only four reached India, and apparently the other three have never been heard from. I am glad I finally was able to read the book, though it probably is not as good a book as We Die Alone.

Don't forget you can also post your monthly reads at:

Book Nook Cafe.

Here is a link to our "What I read in Sept 2012 thread"

http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1...

What I Read in November 2012

4973. HitlerLand American Eyewitnesses to the Nazi Rise to Power, by Andrew Nagorski (read 2 Nov 2012) This is a 2012 book which tells of Americans who were in Germany in the 1920's and 1930's and had interaction with Hitler. There were a few Americans who knew of Hitler before and at the time of the 1923 beer hall putsch, and newsmen who had Germany as their beat in the 1930's and early 1940's. Included are discussions of William Shirer and Edgar Mowrer, who were appropriately repulsed by Nazi doings. Also the American ambassadors, Frederic Sackett, William Dodd,and Hugh Wilson--none of whom were as anti-Nazi as they should have been. Also much discussed is Putzi Hanfstaengl, a Harvard graduate and admirer of Hitler from 1923 and later. The discussion of the 1920's and in 1940 and 1941 was not worth the attention given it in the book. On balance, reading this was probably not worthwhile, but to see how so many failed to see Hitler's evilness was sobering.

4974. Finn A Novel by Jon Clinch (read 4 Nov 2012) This is a 2007 novel acclaimed critically when it was published though I had no memory of it and only read it because it was mentioned in a book game I follow. It is a novel purporting to tell of the life of Huckleberry Finn's father. He is a person of unadulterated evil, who is a drunk and cruel to the black woman he lives with and with whom he fathers Huckleberry. It is quite a stunning book, though the bad things Finn does are outlandish. His father despises Finn but in the event also shows himself seriously bad. The chronology seems a bit inverted--the latter part of the book seems to precede the early part. Lots of dialog, everybody seems to talk with much understood rather than explicitly stated, but it is easy to follow.

4975. The Third Reich in Power 1933-1939, by Richard J. Evans (read 13 Nov 2012) When I finished reading Richard Evans' first book on the Third Reich (on 13 Oct 2009) I decided not to then read this second volume. But now I have. It is a massive volume (712 pages of text, 114 pages of notes, 74 pages of bibliography, and a 41 page index). The book carefully sets out the sad story from 1933 to Sept 3, 1939, with full exposition of the setting up of the police state, the murders of June 30, 1934, the way the Nazis took over all aspects of life in Germany and sought to convert the Germans to approve of evil, the drive to rid Germany of the weak, gypsies, and Jews, and the relentless drive to war--Rhineland, Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. It is clear Hitler wanted war even though the Germans, though brain-washed, did not. Much of the book was pretty "heavy" but the last eight or so chapters were absorbing reading, taking us back to those frenzied days in 1938 and 1939 I remember so well. I will have to read the third and final volume since it is bound to be the best reading since it tells of the end of Nazis.

4976. Do Not Ask What Good We Do Inside the U.S. House of Representatives, by Robert Draper (read 16 Nov 2012) This is a 2012 book which tells about the House of Representatives in 2011, concentrating on the tea party Republicans so intent on being sure little was done in Congress. The book spends a lot of time telling about Jeff Duncan of South Carolina, who has been dubbed the most conservative person in Congress, and about Allen West of Florida, a real nut. It was good I read this after the election, since West was defeated on Nov. 6, 2012. The book also dwelt some on John Dingell, who has been in the House 50 years--and who was at Georgetown Law when I was and who I think I sort of knew there. The book also tells about Kevin McCarthy of California (Republican Whip) and of course tells what a hard time John Boehner had trying to make the Republican freshmen act with a little sense. The book gives a good idea how hectic things were in the House in 2011 and how utterly irresponsible some of the Republican members were, and are. One only wishes the election in 2012 had defeated a few more of the obstructionists in the House. One shudders to think what would happen to the country if the tea party ran things. The book, while too lenient with the nuts it discusses, is a good picture of what things were like in 2011 in the House. One hopes things will be a little better in 2013--and is grateful the election turned out as it did.

4977. Official and Confidential The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover, by Anthony Summers (read 20 Nov 2012) This book was published in 1983 and is "investigative journalism" and so includes a lot of gossip and hearsay, but ultimately the picture of J. Edgar Hoover drawn appears persuasive. He was authoritarian and whatever would make him and the FBI look good was to be stressed. And he did a lot of wrong to people he disliked and allowed lots of evil to go unresisted. His methods gave him power over presidents and congressmen and one is appalled that they behaved in such a way as to enable him to protect himself by what he knew. This is an easy-to-read book and fast moving, though over 500 pages. Much that is set out is very disturbing if true, and one fears that too much of it is true.

4978. behind the beautiful forevers, by katherine boo (read 21 Nov 2012) (National Book Award nonfiction prize in 2012) This is the 29th National Book Award nonfiction winner I've read. It reads like a novel but appears to be a carefully researched account of people in a Mumbai, India, slum. It is not fun reading since one is so appalled at the way the people have to live. Especially galling to me was the crookedness of the police and the ready resort to beatings by police and husbands. Abdul is a teenage boy who is a hard worker gathering scrap by which he supports his father (a drunk) and mother and all his younger siblings. Only when I read the author's account of how she wrote the book did I appreciate it was really true--before that it seemed like fiction.

4979. The Juror, by George Dawes Green (read 25 Nov 2012) This is a 1995 novel and the title suggested it might be worth reading. Annie is picked as a juror for the trial of a Mafia boss and is quickly the object of an effort to get her to vote not guilty. The effort is run by a guy called The Teacher, who is an overpoweringly evil person. The book is dotted with pornographic episodes--which made one feel less kindly toward the women who participate in them. The story is fast-paced but not very credible. Yet one reads on to see what will happen. The story goes on and on after the trial, with lots of characters dying, including an alcoholic detective who I was hoping would outwit the evil doers. I cannot say the book is a good one, though it moves fast and is easy to read.

Hi, Schmerguls .

This board is not active at this time.

If you and anyone else would like to post your monthly reads at Book Nook Cafe, we would certainly enjoy reading your posts.

This is the Folder where you will find the new thread each month:
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/group_...

This is the Thread for November 2012
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1...

Hope to see you there !