Amazon.com
If your pulse flutters at the thought of castle ruins and descents into crypts by moonlight, you will savor every creepy page of Elizabeth Kostova's long but beautifully structured thriller The Historian. The story opens in Amsterdam in 1972, when a teenage girl discovers a medieval book and a cache of yellowed letters in her diplomat father's library. The pages of the book are empty except for a woodcut of a dragon. The letters are addressed to: "My dear and unfortunate successor." When the girl confronts her father, he reluctantly confesses an unsettling story: his involvement, twenty years earlier, in a search for his graduate school mentor, who disappeared from his office only moments after confiding to Paul his certainty that Dracula--Vlad the Impaler, an inventively cruel ruler of Wallachia in the mid-15th century--was still alive. The story turns out to concern our narrator directly because Paul's collaborator in the search was a fellow student named Helen Rossi (the unacknowledged daughter of his mentor) and our narrator's long-dead mother, about whom she knows almost nothing. And then her father, leaving just a note, disappears also.
As well as numerous settings, both in and out of the East Bloc, Kostova has three basic story lines to keep straight--one from 1930, when Professor Bartolomew Rossi begins his dangerous research into Dracula, one from 1950, when Professor Rossi's student Paul takes up the scent, and the main narrative from 1972. The criss-crossing story lines mirror the political advances, retreats, triumphs, and losses that shaped Dracula's beleaguered homeland--sometimes with the Byzantines on top, sometimes the Ottomans, sometimes the rag-tag local tribes, or the Orthodox church, and sometimes a fresh conqueror like the Soviet Union.
Although the book is appropriately suspenseful and a delight to read--even the minor characters are distinctive and vividly seen--its most powerful moments are those that describe real horrors. Our narrator recalls that after reading descriptions of Vlad burning young boys or impaling "a large family," she tried to forget the words: "For all his attention to my historical education, my father had neglected to tell me this: history's terrible moments were real. I understand now, decades later, that he could never have told me. Only history itself can convince you of such a truth." The reader, although given a satisfying ending, gets a strong enough dose of European history to temper the usual comforts of the closing words. --Regina Marler
Book Description
If your pulse flutters at the thought of castle ruins and descents into crypts by moonlight, you will savor every creepy page of Elizabeth Kostova's long but beautifully structured thriller The Historian.The story opens in Amsterdam in 1972, when a teenage girl discovers a medieval book and a cache of yellowed letters in her diplomat father's library. The pages of the book are empty except for a woodcut of a dragon. The letters are addressed to: "My dear and unfortunate successor." When the girl confronts her father, he reluctantly confesses an unsettling story: his involvement, twenty years earlier, in a search for his graduate school mentor, who disappeared from his office only moments after confiding to Paul his certainty that Dracula--Vlad the Impaler, an inventively cruel ruler of Wallachia in the mid-15th century--was still alive. The story turns out to concern our narrator directly because Paul's collaborator in the search was a fellow student named Helen Rossi (the unacknowledged daughter of his mentor) and our narrator's long-dead mother, about whom she knows almost nothing. And then her father, leaving just a note, disappears also.As well as numerous settings, both in and out of the East Bloc, Kostova has three basic story lines to keep straight--one from 1930, when Professor Bartolomew Rossi begins his dangerous research into Dracula, one from 1950, when Professor Rossi's student Paul takes up the scent, and the main narrative from 1972. The criss-crossing story lines mirror the political advances, retreats, triumphs, and losses that shaped Dracula's beleaguered homeland--sometimes with the Byzantines on top, sometimes the Ottomans, sometimes the rag-tag local tribes, or the Orthodox church, and sometimes a fresh conqueror like the Soviet Union.Although the book is appropriately suspenseful and a delight to read--even the minor characters are distinctive and vividly seen--its most powerful moments are those that describe real horrors. Our narrator recalls that after reading descriptions of Vlad burning young boys or impaling "a large family," she tried to forget the words: "For all his attention to my historical education, my father had neglected to tell me this: history's terrible moments were real. I understand now, decades later, that he could never have told me. Only history itself can convince you of such a truth." The reader, although given a satisfying ending, gets a strong enough dose of European history to temper the usual comforts of the closing words. --Regina Marler
Customer Reviews:
Fresh Take on an Old Legend.......2007-10-10
I have to come out and honestly say how much I enjoyed this novel. Which is not to say I consider it flawless, but that doesn't mean it wasn't worth reading. Seems to have engendered some pretty polarized views, from what I read of the many, many reviews, some of which left me wondering if there is a portion of the reading public that reads as a subliminal means of getting really p.o.'d! But actually, I should be very grateful that literature and reading still evoke strong emotions,otherwise it would not be art worth having.
Personally, as someone who is better read than travelled, I very much enjoyed the "travelogue" part of the novel, especially since it dealt with a part of Europe I am little versed in. I thought all that was quite seamlessly woven into the larger tale. Also thought the use of the letter form (a dying art in itself!) served well to take a certain perspective, at once distant and intimate, to convey the pathos and heart of the story. Now then, yes, the multiple perspectives and the long reach of the details to be kept track of should surely have been edited some. The excellent novel _Mortal Love_ by Elizabeth Hand does a much better job of this.
I didn't chafe against the pace of this novel either, I approached it like a long train ride I could muse through, not bored a bit, but maybe this type of book just doesn't jive with the 21st century jeezles we all live with! Certainly felt the Dracula character to have been the most interesting I have ever encountered, because he felt so medieval, and so eastern European, not the suave and sinister Count we find in Stoker, but very a much a creature of his own time. Yes, I would've loved more insight into his motivations, his plans for his future, and how that may involve the rest of the unwitting world. Certainly by the end, there is a very unsettling sense that someone is not through plaguing the third generation of people to have suffered great loss from the machinations of this deadly Impaler Prince.
Lastly, I am beginning to feel some books and authors suffer from the publishing hype they receive, and are billed to the public as something they are not. I am glad I read the book after all that died down and I could just experience it for what I thought it was.
Why the hype?.......2007-10-10
This was an ambitious book that seemed at first to justify the breathless reviews. A third of the way through, I realized that it would a chore to finish. And it was. It devolved into another drawn out vampire story with all the improbable history and invevitable final show-down. I was looking for another book equal to the one I'd recently finished -- "The Shadow of the Wind." This wasn't it.
endless description, little to no plot.......2007-10-05
I borrowed this book, and I'm glad for that. Had I bought it I would have been quite upset. Essentially I had to put it down as its dragging inability to keep a plot going amidst the flowery descriptions of ruins and quaint European towns beat any ability to keep the story going into the ground. Once you think the story picks itself up, it's immediately lost again in the narrator's flighty attempt to recall back story, which itself gets lost among letters and other third party recounting that, naturally, gets pushed further and further off in favor of physical description. I couldn't make it to the halfway point in this book for that reason alone. If one is looking for a romantic travelogue, this just might be your book. If it's plot and storytelling you're looking for go elsewhere.
Skillful Riff on Dracula Legend.......2007-09-29
Elizabeth Kostova's "The Historian" is long and discursive, but it's never dull. It's a sprawling, old-fashioned, epistolary novel told in the first person by several different narrators (maybe it's the last Victorian novel we'll ever see). It's a serious novel about the two Draculas--the historical figure and the fictional one--ostensibly compiled by an unnamed female narrator. The author cleverly weaves the historical passages within the more adventuresome parts, and both fascinate. The narrator, now in her mid-50s, is writing in the near future (about 24 seconds from now) about events that took place at three points in the last century--1930, 1954, and 1974. The narrators, in addition to herself, are her father, her father's dissertation adviser, and her mother. This puts the horror at some distance--the creeptastic parts seem to be taking place behind a gauzy scrim.
The author's premise is that the historical Dracula (actually, as the author tells us, the name is the Romanian for Son of the Dragon, or Devil) never died. Worse, he's growing stronger over time. The legend is based on the historical exploits of Vlad Tepes (the Impaler), a late-15th-century prince who ruled with extreme cruelty over the (present-day) Romanian province of Wallachia, which is located just south of Transylvania. His favorite method of execution was to impale his enemies--many of whom were Ottoman Turks who had conquered Constantinople in the middle of the century.
The events are set in motion when Professor Rossi, the narrator's father's dissertation adviser, discovers a bound volume that's empty except for the woodcut of a dragon in the center (several more of them will turn up). And, during the course of the tale, which turns into a hunt to find Dracula's burial place so he can be finished off with the traditional anti-vampire methods, the various characters (and there are many) spend time in Turkey, cold-war Hungary and Romania, and France. Ms. Kostova is brilliant at her descriptions of places (maybe you'll want to visit them after you read the book). And she's good at invoking the horror, too. When the undead Dracula finally turns up (at the book's nasty, brutish, and short conclusion), he's a more than serviceable villain, as well as an intellectual, given by Ms. Kostova the traditional Devil's best lines.
And he only says "good evening" once.
Great vampire story.......2007-09-28
Not as much about vampires as it is about the search for one, but it's great.
Average customer rating:
- Wondering why you were born? Look no further.
- Other Books
- Accessible and clear
- One of the best storytellers of our time!
- Intellectual stuff
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The Power of Myth
Joseph Campbell , and
Bill Moyers
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The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Mythos Books)
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Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth
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Myths to Live By
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ASIN: 0385418868
Release Date: 1991-06-01 |
Amazon.com
Among his many gifts, Joseph Campbell's most impressive was the unique ability to take a contemporary situation, such as the murder and funeral of President John F. Kennedy, and help us understand its impact in the context of ancient mythology. Herein lies the power of The Power of Myth, showing how humans are apt to create and live out the themes of mythology. Based on a six-part PBS television series hosted by Bill Moyers, this classic is especially compelling because of its engaging question-and-answer format, creating an easy, conversational approach to complicated and esoteric topics. For example, when discussing the mythology of heroes, Campbell and Moyers smoothly segue from the Sumerian sky goddess Inanna to Star Wars' mercenary-turned-hero, Han Solo. Most impressive is Campbell's encyclopedic knowledge of myths, demonstrated in his ability to recall the details and archetypes of almost any story, from any point and history, and translate it into a lesson for spiritual living in the here and now. --Gail Hudson
Book Description
Finally available in a popularly priced, non-illustrated, smaller-format edition, which is ideal for the college market and general reader alike, this extraordinary best-seller is a brilliant evocation of the noted scholar's teachings on mythology.
Customer Reviews:
Wondering why you were born? Look no further........2007-09-21
5.5 stars
The Power Of Myth pretty much explains why we are here, and what we can do about it.
I can't think of any single book that showed me as much about myself, my mind, and how I fit into the grand dance of history as Powers Of Myth. It takes the great Bill Moyers interviews and lays them out in a beautifully logical fashion.
There is more deep thought and simple logic about the world's religions and myths here than in any other book I have found; Campbell's favorite theme, that all religions come from the same sources and have the same message, is clearly explained. More importantly, the wonderfully wise author takes that information and shows us how to use it to make our lives richer and more meaningful. What a glorious man, and what a glorious book. It's not only a fine introduction to Joseph's extraordinary work, it's a fitting summation, and a tribute to how much one man can learn and share and grow in a lifetime.
Makes a perfect gift for anyone at any age who likes to think.
My highest recommendation.
Other Books.......2007-09-03
A more popular look at myths and mythology, using this format to relate Campbell's studies and other works to mythological type influences that we see today, even in major media and popular culture or entertainment situations.
When Campbell points it out, you sometimes realise what you are subconsciously missing.
Accessible and clear.......2007-08-06
This is the audio to a PBS special from the 80's. It's done in a conversation between Bill Moyers and Joseph Campbell. For some people this may feel like there is no structure and that it meaanders through the topic. But, for me it felt more like I was sitting in a living room as they talked to each other.
I've talked to people with lots of knowledge on this topic and they've said that Campbell is sort of the popular science or myth-light version of this topic. It was just the right amount of depth for me and interesting how he personalized myth for people in modern day.
One of the best storytellers of our time!.......2007-07-28
This was required reading for a graduate course in the Humanities. This is a great book written by a very engaging storyteller. Joseph Campbell describes the monomyth in his book The Hero With a Thousand Faces as embodying all the necessary elements of the hero's journey in the many myths in human history. Campbell discovered through extensive research that humankind shares a universal monomyth in its various religions and legends especially pertaining to the creation of the world and humankind. Campbell borrowed the term monomyth from James Joyce's book Finnegan's Wake. Campbell's intuitive insight in human myth proves that for thousands of years these myths display a certain standard structure, which he summarizes beautifully in his book.
A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a
region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there
encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back
from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons
on his fellow man (Campbell 30).
There are at least four major stages that a monomyth has however, in his book, Campbell goes on to describe seventeen stages that some monomyth's posses. The four stages making up the cycle of a monomyth are "passage: separation-initiation-return:" In the passage stage the hero is summoned to journey or embark on an adventure by some kind of event that takes place or from a message, he receives. The hero may embark on this passage willingly or reluctantly. During the separation stage, the hero meets with a mentor or wise man who gives the hero either an amulet or some words of wisdom to be of help to the hero on the adventure. It is during this stage that the hero will go through his first transformation, also known as "crossing the first threshold," as he crosses over to another world or dimension leaving behind the old world. In the initiation stage, the hero goes through several trials or tests. The hero often receives help in these ordeals along the way by allies or from a supernatural force. As the hero completes these ordeals successfully, he proves himself more worthy to continue the adventure. Most importantly, during this stage the hero must pass through a major ordeal that will expand his consciousness, and thereby change his character forever. Often, this ordeal entails the death of an ally or enemy. Once the hero successful accomplishes his ordeal he is rewarded with a gift, it could be intrinsic like the "holy grail, or it can be new found knowledge to better the world with. The last stage the hero travels is that of the return whence he came. Often the hero will undergo further trials on his return before he is permitted to cross the threshold back to the world he left. During his return journey, the hero will use his newfound wisdom or gift to make a safe return home. Once home the gift is used to cure some ill in the hero's home or to impart new wisdom to his neighbors.
Campbell points to the significance of the monomyth in the fact that it describes the cycle that Moses, Jesus, and Buddha had gone through according to their religious adherents. This is not to mention the hundreds of other monomyths told throughout human history. The monomyth proves that humankind shares a common creation DNA in a sense. The monomyth is the perfect vehicle for one to study the Humanities by.
Recommended reading for anyone interested in history, psychology, philosophy.
Intellectual stuff.......2007-06-27
I have tremendous admiration for the author Joseph Campbell and also for Bill Moyers, who did the interview. Both are tremendously intelligent, well-read and capable of verbalizing opinions and explanations in a very concise way. One would glean more from reading this book if a bit of "reqired reading" had been done previous to the reading. Our book club found the book challenging because we lacked the necessary background. Having such background would have made the book read faster and also would have enlightened our understanding as we read. However, we were all glad we did read it.
Book Description
Alexis de Tocqueville was one of the greatest political thinkers of all time. Born a French aristocrat, he lost nearly his entire family in the Reign of Terror, and he spent most of his adult life struggling for liberty under the unsuccessful regimes of nineteenth-century France.
At age twenty-five he travelled to America and encountered democracy for the first time. This firsthand experience contributed to his incisive writing on liberty and democracy. The ancien régime launched the scholarly study of the French Revolution, and Democracy in America remains the best book ever written by a European about the United States. This is a brilliant account of his life.
Customer Reviews:
Excellent Biography; 4.5 Stars.......2007-08-09
This very enjoyable book is an excellent study of the very interesting French writer and politician Alexis de Tocqueville. Known best for his analysis of contemporary America, de Tocqueville is a notable figure in the history of political thought and a key source for the history of 19th century America. Brogan's Tocqueville is an essentially conservative figure. The descendent of relatively liberal aristocrats under the Ancien Regime, a number of whom were executed during the Terror, Tocqueville grew up in a legitimist household that detested the Bonapartist state and feared the radicalism that led to the Terror. Tocqueville, however, was too intelligent and preceptive to be a dogmatic Throne and Altar conservative. Following his famous trip to the USA in the early 1830s, he published Democracy in America, a case study in how a liberal society dedicated to political equality, property rights, and respect for law could produce lasting stability. Brogan points out well that Democracy in America, while about American democracy, was inspired by concerns about the role of democracy in France. At the same time, while Democracy affirmed a liberal vision, Brogan is careful to point out that it was a somewhat conservative version of liberalism and that Tocqueville did not really understand important aspects of American democracy. He didn't really understand the role of Congress and appears to have been completely clueless about the crucial role of the party system in providing stability.
Tocqueville's failure to understand crucial aspects of the American democratic system would prove to be hindrance in Tocqueville's political career. Brogan devotes much of the book to a thoughtful description of Tocqueville the politician. More than anything else, his political career shows his essential conservatism. At times, his fear of unrest led him to support distinctly illiberal policies. Like many of his contemporaries, Tocqueville doesn't seem to understand the changes being brought about by the industrialization of Europe and to his last days, he had a fear of urban unrest and the nascent working class.
Brogan shows very well that his last great work, the very interesting Ancien Regime and the French Revolution, should be interpreted in good measure as a critique of the Second Empire. Tocqueville's contemporary preoccupations clearly influenced the themes of his last major work.
Tocqueville is often compared with Montesquieu and this is quite apt. Its clear from Brogan's account that Tocqueville's version of liberalism and democracy was one in the tradition of classical 18th century republicanism. He would definitely have preferred a society with democratic elements but also with institutions that allowed a powerful voice for a principled elite. This vision, shared by people like John Adams and even James Madison in his early constitutional proposals, essentially evaporated in the early years of the American democracy. Tocqueville was pursuing something that had really become anachronistic in his own time.
Brogan writes affectionately but objectively about Tocqueville. This book is written very well with a nice combination of the primary narrative and enough background information to be informative but not over power the narrative.
de Tocqueville from A to Z.......2007-05-31
He seems the unlikeliest person to write an incisive study of American democracy: a rather spoiled son of a French aristocrat of the ancien regime, and one who suffered from a sense of futility in his own life. But the amazing truth is the Alexis de Tocqueville was exactly the best qualified man to do exactly that. Scholarly, intelligent, a precise writer, de Tocqueville was the one to write an immortal study of American life that would become in time a classic. Best of all, he wrote his work not in his study, but after an intense journey through America itself in the early 1830s.
Hugh Brogan's biography is an excellent study of this young author, and probably the very best modern biography. He uses de Tocquevilles' letters and other contemporary writings to illuminate the life and thought of the young aristocrat. And aristocrat he was, his father having stoutly stood by the French crown through its many vicissitudes (and nearly executed by the Jacobins for this). Young Alexis himself clung to the aristocracy until the turbulent days of the July Monarchy, when the Bourbons were unseated by the Orleanists. After this, the young writer lost much of his loyalty to the crown.
Brogan's book is well written, and covers the political scene in France during de Tocqueville's time quite thoroughly. It is simply a book not to be missed about the world of this very talented young man, who proved to be so influential in studies about America and democracy in general.
A Complete Understanding of Tocqueville.......2007-04-11
I have been using Tocqueville's teachings in my college classes for years. However, it has been difficult to piece together exactly how his thought process came together. Brogan has brought this process together so beautifully in this book. Thank you.
The roots of American history.......2007-04-10
Hugh Brogan brings to light on of the most careful and subtle minds ever to ponder the origin and meanings of democracy in American history, the fall of the Ancien Regime, and the the basis for much of what passes for modern political thought.
One of my favorite all-time biographies!!.......2007-03-31
Every line is almost poetic in this beautifully written biography of de Tocqueville. Gorgeous imagery and flowing language--Alexis comes to life as though he lived only 10 years ago rather than many decades ago! Wonderful book!!
Book Description
Wallace Stegner's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel is a story of discovery--personal, historical, and geographical. Confined to a wheelchair, retired historian Lyman Ward sets out to write his grandparents' remarkable story, chronicling their days spent carving civilization into the surface of America's western frontier. But his research reveals even more about his own life than he's willing to admit. What emerges is an enthralling portrait of four generations in the life of an American family.
Like other great quests in literature, Lyman Ward's investigation leads him deep into the dark shadows of his own life. The result is a deeply moving novel that, through the prism of one family, illuminates the American present against the fascinating background of its past.
Customer Reviews:
Greatest Love Story of All Time.......2007-08-10
I read this book because a friend of mine (a male friend) called it "the greatest love story of all time". It's a hard book to get into, but once your past the first 50 pages it all becomes worth it. It really is a great love story, it shows you a very non Hollywood side of love, love can be very hard. I highly recommend the book to anyone in the mood to think.
Sweeping, epic, moving, everything a book should be!.......2007-08-10
I am so glad I heard about this book from a reading club list! I am very surprised that it is not better known as one of the great examples of American literature. The book, which parallels the lives of a handicapped man living in the 1970s in California and his grandmother, a true pioneer, is engrossing and gives the reader a real glimpse at life in the American West in the late 1800s.
I was truly moved by this book and it will remain one of my favorites for quite some time.
Dated but Pleasant.......2007-01-12
This book, writeen in the '70s, requires some patience. The story of the developing West, interwoven with the narrator's own story, is interesting, if not exciting.
History lesson in an interesting format.......2006-11-10
If you are from the Bay Area, you have to read this one! Not to take anything away from the Pulitzer prize winning (and deserving) story telling, but what made this book memorable to me were the references to San Francisco, San Jose, Santa Cruz peppered throughout. I felt like I was back in the days of the Gold Rush... and couldn't put the book down.
Rich prose.......2006-11-10
I'm love writers who use language to paint vivid pictures - of people, landscapes, cultures, situations - and Stegner's a master at that. Although his 'word pictures' are secondary to the main stories - of two marriages dissolving under stress - the settings and the ways the characters interact with them are what make this book shine. This one's a classic, and should be on the required reading list of college freshman English classes.
Average customer rating:
- I tried but I couldnt read it
- Provocative
- Arrogant and Boring
- A British epic
- For People Who Love Literature
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Possession: A Romance
A.S. Byatt
Manufacturer: Random House
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Possession
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Beloved
ASIN: 0679735909
Release Date: 1991-10-01 |
Amazon.com
"Literary critics make natural detectives," says Maud Bailey, heroine of a mystery where the clues lurk in university libraries, old letters, and dusty journals. Together with Roland Michell, a fellow academic and accidental sleuth, Maud discovers a love affair between the two Victorian writers the pair has dedicated their lives to studying: Randolph Ash, a literary great long assumed to be a devoted and faithful husband, and Christabel La Motte, a lesser-known "fairy poetess" and chaste spinster. At first, Roland and Maud's discovery threatens only to alter the direction of their research, but as they unearth the truth about the long-forgotten romance, their involvement becomes increasingly urgent and personal. Desperately concealing their purpose from competing researchers, they embark on a journey that pulls each of them from solitude and loneliness, challenges the most basic assumptions they hold about themselves, and uncovers their unique entitlement to the secret of Ash and La Motte's passion.
Winner of the 1990 Booker Prize--the U.K.'s highest literary award--Possession is a gripping and compulsively readable novel. A.S. Byatt exquisitely renders a setting rich in detail and texture. Her lush imagery weaves together the dual worlds that appear throughout the novel--the worlds of the mind and the senses, of male and female, of darkness and light, of truth and imagination--into an enchanted and unforgettable tale of love and intrigue. --Lisa Whipple
Book Description
An exhilarating novel of wit and romance, an intellectual mystery, and a triumphant love story. This tale of a pair of young scholars researching the lives of two Victorian poets became a huge bookseller favorite, and then on to national bestellerdom.
Customer Reviews:
I tried but I couldnt read it.......2007-08-27
I really tried. I came here to Amazon to see if I was the only one who struggled with this book. I wasn't. The effort finally became too much and I am giving up after reading about a third of this book. Life is too short
Provocative.......2007-08-11
I found the weaving together of different styles in this book delightful and utterly satisfying. I'm the sort of person who often has two or three books going, who needs a regular poetry fix, who reads literary criticism with the proverbial grain of salt. If you take "LITERATURE" super-seriously, you probably won't like the book, because, well, you'll get made fun of. But if you are willing to enter a story with childlike belief and follow the author down unexpected side roads, if you enjoy observing a person's creative work for what it reveals about their character, well, this book supplies all of that. The fact that it has provoked such passionately opposite reviews is, to me, simply an indication that it has substance.
Arrogant and Boring.......2007-06-22
I've read a few short stories by Ms. Byatt and found them all to be intriguing, thus, I had high hopes that this book would be interesting and unique - an intelligent, romantic novel perhaps. I was wrong, so wrong. The first third of the book moved quite slowly. The reader gets introduced to two literary scholars one (a man) who studies a famous male Victorian poet and the other (a woman) who studies a famous female Victorian poet. I didn't like either scholar. The central one-third of the book is dedicated to 'uncovering' lost love letters that the poets wrote to each other. The letters are boring, the poetry is bad, the thoughts about religious agnosticism are anachronistic. Now, two-thirds of the way through the book, I have decided that I don't like the Victorian poets either and couldn't care less if they loved each other or committed mass murder. The last third of the book brings the reader back to the present with our literary scholars dealing with academic politics, a budding romance and growing academic reputations based on finding the lost letters of the Victorian poets.
I didn't like the book because there was no humor or humility in any of the characters. The atmosphere of the book was very chilly. No one is ever warm or comfortable or happy. I hated this book. I would have been better off reading a sappy romance with stilted writing.
A British epic.......2007-06-12
This is British literature at its height. A love story within a love story, Possession takes the reader through the characters' intimate obsessions with themselves, each other, and their work. And like most British novels, much of the action of this book takes place within rather than externally. What makes Possession a "Classic" (as the Booker Prize attests to) is the way the author blends the voices of the main characters through direct narrative, diaries, epic poems, and various other writings woven throughout the book. The mixture of letters between characters, love poems spanning centuries, journal entries, travel logs, and mythical allusions on which the story is built is more impressive here than in any other work I've read. For the literary minded, this book stands out among others.
For People Who Love Literature.......2007-01-06
This is one of the best books I have read. It combines poetry, romance, and a detective story--what more could you ask for? While the subject is academic, the prose is lively and engaging and you can't wait to see what will happen next. It's like a literary "Da Vinci Code" without the continuous cheesy escapes. If you are looking for a "romance novel," then this isn't for you. If you seek a thought-provoking work that will move you, then pick this up.
Book Description
It can take hours to research family history and it is easy to become inundated with stuff - paper records, recordings, photographs, notes, artifacts, and more information than one would imagine could ever exist. The usefulness of the collection is in the organization - using computers, archival boxes, files, and forms to help you put your hands on what you need when you need it. Also included, in this book, are instructions on the best ways to store and preserve one-of-a-kind family relics.
Fifth in the National Genealogical Society's Guide series,
The Organized Family Historian will follow the same user-friendly format that makes the other books helpful at any level of genealogical experience. The NGS offers readers 100 years of research and experience.
Customer Reviews:
"Read, Do, Remember".......2007-05-13
When it comes to family research I cannot stress enough the need for it. Our generation is on the verge of losing our heritage and not passing it on to our children and grandchildren. Who we are is a direct result of who our parents, grandparents and great-grandparents were. It takes so little time to write down names and birth dates. Trust me- it doesn't matter what your life was like growing up if you can't put it to paper and share it with someone you love. Even the bad things that may have happened don't change names and dates. Let your kids know where their grandparents came from. Let them know when their great-grandparents came to this country and WHY. Our ancestors left everything and started all over in a strange, new world. They did it for us. Don't ever forget and don't ever stop sharing. Use the tools in this book and put your information down and keep it for future generations. Utilize the knowledge of the genealogists that put this wonderful book together to help you achieve your goals. Catalog your treasures - even if they're not worth two cents. Money isn't everything - but the memories are.
The Organized Family Historian.......2007-05-12
I think this is a wonderful, helpful book for the beginning genealogist. I would have loved to have something like this when starting out. The inclusion of a CD rom with the forms makes the book worthwhile in its own. Each chapter really helps a new genealogist starting out to get organized. There are explanations of how to keep records and how to research. Anyone doing genealogy or teaching genealogy should have this on their bookshelf. The book even helps you get organized to write your family history.
The Organized Family Historian: How to File, Manage, and Protect Your Genealogical Research and Heirlooms (National Genealogical.......2007-01-17
This book is a great help in organizing the mass of data that appears when you do genealogy research. Also included is a CD with various forms for logging in those materials. Beside that, the book offers great ideas for internet use and other search help. I am a beginner and was pleased that the book offered help geared to my level as well as more advanced information. Well worth the price.
Beginner genealogists buy this book!.......2007-01-16
I wish I had purchased this book when it first came out. It would have saved me alot of time and effort. I did learn some new tricks however and find it valuable enough to keep near my desk. Well written and easy to understand.
Bits 'n Pieces are useful.......2006-04-07
I agree with Michael K Smith's in-depth review. My very short impression is: The book contains useful information, but it is short on hard advice. If you've never considered how to file information, this book would be very useful.
However, I consider myself to be very organized and logical but I keep coming across a roadblock of how to organize female ancestors. When the female is a fairly close relative, I manage to remember the maiden name and cross-reference it to the married name. But what do I do with female relatives more than two generations back? (my mental limit). I'm not great at remembering computer-generated reference numbers. (And, my computer is not always on.) I need a way to track females based on names. I did not find any helpful hints. Perhaps this is a roadblock for everyone. I can only say I was dissappointed as I believe this is a common problem. There should be a solution in a book claiming to help organize info.
I did like the section on heirlooms, although it is pretty much common sense.
Customer Reviews:
We need more like him today........2007-07-03
This book is about the author of the "Long Telegram" in his own words. He helped lay the foundation for the Cold War that was eventually successful.
For people who think Reagan won the Cold War, don't forget people like Kennan.
We need more people like him in the diplomatic corps today.
A must-read for anyone involved in foreign affairs.......2004-01-25
In a very different period of time, I have travelled to (or lived in) almost all the places described in these memoirs. Furthermore, I have confronted - a generation or so removed - many similar anecdotes, characters and bureaucratic missteps. This book has a ring of authenticity that is striking. It describes the ordinary and then shifts smoothly to the momentous. I have not found anything else quite like it. (Leigh White's 'The Long Balkan Night' has this similar feature, but it's the story of a journalist).
With all of that said, I was nonetheless struck by Kennan's essential desire to survive by avoiding any personal risk. He was a successful bureaucrat. During his life, he derived his status entirely from his position, or membership in an organization, and not from any personal endeavour.
How many today would naively do as Kennan and, during a whole career, derive status from membership? There are too many other things on offer. And the bureaucracy now is, well, too bureaucratic. Thank God.
kennan's filth.......2003-11-04
His writing lacks coherency and he seems as though he genuinely has no knowledge of the subject, a thoroughly challenging book with no discernable benefit. The conclusion is inadequate and unjust, perhaps he should learn the facts first.
Historically Significant and Equally Sensitive - Rare Combo.......2001-03-12
It is extremely rare that the memoirs of someone who played a truly significant role in his country's history are also beautifully and sensitively written. They candidly reveal the shy and introspective man who also happen to have been a critical player in the U.S. relationship with the Soviet Union from the 1940s through the 1980s (from the late 1920s thorugh the 1950s in his governmental role and as historian and critic since then). Kennan is candid, brilliant, critical, and happens to have a wonderful writing style. This is personal history at its best. If you've read this one (which won the Pulitzer Prize), be sure to read the sequel.
A Fascinating Life, a Penetrating Look.......2000-12-28
"Experience had convinced us that far more could be learned by careful, scholarly analysis of information legitimately available concerning any great nation than by the fanciest arrangements of clandestine intelligence."(p48)
"In the face of this knowledge, [of the inevitable Russion domination of Poland] I could only feel that there was something frivolous about our whole action in this Polish question. I reflected on the lightheartedness with which great powers offer advice to smaller ones in matters affecting the vital interests of the latter. I was sorry to find myself, for the moment, a part of this. And I wished that instead of mumbling words of official optimism we had had the judgment and the good taste to bow our heads in silence before the tragedy of a people who have been our allies, whom we have helped to save from our enemies, and whom we cannot save from our friends."(pp209/10)
"The strength of the Kremlin lies largely in the fact that it knows how to wait. But the strength of the Russian people lies in the fact that they know how to wait longer."(p511)
[On the German war crime trials] "I have already mentioned my aversion to our proceeding jointly with the Russians in matters of this nature. I should not like to be misunderstood on this subject. The crimes of the Nazi leaders were immeasurable. These men had placed themselves in a position where a further personal existence on this earth could have had no positive meaning for them or for anyone else. I personally considered that it would have been best if the Allied commanders had had standing instructions that if any of these men fell into the hands of Allied forces they should, once their identity had been established beyond doubt, be executed forthwith.
"But to hold these Nazi leader for public trial was another matter. This procedure could not expiate or undo the crimes they had committed. It could have been justified only as a means for conveying to the world public the repudiation, by the conscience of those peoples and governments conducting the trial, of mass crimes of every sort. To admit to such a procedure a Soviet judge as the representative of a regime which had on its conscience not only the vast cruelties of the Russian Revolution,of collectivization, and of the Russian purges of the 1930s, as well as the manifold brutalities and atrocities perpetrated against the Poles and the peoples of the Baltic countries during the wartime period, was to make a mockery of the only purpose the trials could conceivably serve, and to assume, by association, a share of the responsibility for these Stalinist crimes themselves."(pp260/1)
This is a great book. It shows the progress of a fine mind possessed of a practical scholarship and a moral voice in what were often excrutiatingly ambiguous circumstances.
Kennan was in Moscow in 1935 when Stalin began the purges; he was in Prague in 1938 when Germany invaded the Sudetenland; he was in Berlin when Germany declared war on the U.S.; he was the chief architect of the Marshall plan. Of course, he is associated with our Cold War policy of "containment" of the Soviet Union, an association that he regrets, since very little of it reflects his thinking. The book is a fascinating look at modern power politics from a bemused, but acute, inside observer.
Book Description
Finally--the only guidebook devoted exclusively to research in America's courthouses. Full of essentials starting with preparation, interacting with the clerks, using the indexes, and what to expect to find in each courthoiuse office. But it doesn't stop there. Evaluating the records and using them to solve genealogical problems are included. For those who can't travel to the courthouse personally, use of the Internet, microfilm, and published books of abstracts are discussed.
Tips galore from an author who has researched in more than 500 courthouses.
Customer Reviews:
Re: Courthouse Research.......2007-08-13
This is a great little book. It describes and illustrates may of the records to be found at your local courthouse. I would recommend this book to anyone who is planning a research/genealogy trip to their local courthouse.
Excellent how-to source, expecially for "relative novices" (heh, heh . . .).......2007-06-08
Rose is a Fellow of the American Society of Genealogists and a well-known speaker at national conferences. She's also an admitted courthouse junky. There are some 3,140 courthouses in the United States and she's poked around in more than 500 of them -- and she would be the first to tell you that every one is different, even in neighboring counties formed at the same time. (I've spent considerable time rummaging in courthouses myself, though not as many as Christine. . . .) Which county office has custody of which types of records varies from state to state, as do the names of the departments themselves. Big city courthouses are very different from small rural ones. Courthouses in poorer areas of a state do things differently, by necessity, than courthouses in comparatively wealthy counties. And that's not to mention the wide variation in personalities among county clerks and their minions, not only from place to place but even from year to year. (Every experienced researcher has run across courthouse workers who have no tolerance whatever for genealogists.) Rose approaches her topic methodically, from figuring out which county ought to have the records you're seeking (counties often have parents and offspring, too) and where to start when you arrive (with the indexes, the use of which may sometimes be arcane), to dealing with all sorts of records: Deeds, vital records, estates, civil and criminal court books, and all the rest. She goes on to discuss what's available on microfilm when your travel budget is tight, and the "strategies for success" that have worked for her. Courthouse research is a very difficult subject to generalize about, but this volume does an excellent job.
Guide to Genealogical Treasures.......2007-05-13
"Courthouse Research for Family Historians" is an easy book to use. One that is not filled with facts and figures but still remains a product to help find thos elusive relatives. It is filled with suggestions that I (a fairly novice researcher) find very useful. It covers everything courthouses might be able to offer the researcher. It is fun to read. I definitely recommend it.
Courthouse Records.......2006-07-04
This book gives a lot of great information and tips for research at court houses. It is up to date and thorough, and a great help to researchers.
Not Bad......... But NOt Great.......2006-04-07
This would make a nice gift. However, most of this information ..... if not all of it can be found on the internet.
Book Description
Wait Till Next Yearis the story of a young girl growing up in the suburbs of New York in the 1950s, when owning a single-family home on a tree-lined street meant the realization of dreams, when everyone knew everyone else on the block, and the children gathered in the streets to play from sunup to sundown. The neighborhood was equally divided among Dodger, Giant, and Yankee fans, and the corner stores were the scenes of fierce and affectionate rivalries.
We meet the people who influenced Goodwin's early life: her father, who emerged from a traumatic childhood without a trace of self-pity or rancor and who taught his daughter early on that she should say whatever she thought and should bring her voice into any conversation at any time; her mother, whose heart problems left her with the arteries of a seventy-year-old when she was only in her thirties and whose love of books allowed her to break the boundaries of the narrow world to which she was confined by her chronic illness; her two older sisters; her friends on the block; the local storekeepers; her school friends and teachers.
This is also the story of a girlhood in which the great religious festivals of the Catholic church and the seasonal imperatives of baseball combined to produce a passionate love of history, ceremony, and ritual. It is the story of growing up in what seemed on the surface a more innocent era until one recalls the terror of polio, the paranoia of McCarthyism reflected even in the children's games, the obsession with A-bomb drills in school, and the ugly face of racial prejudice. It was a time whose relative tranquillity contained the seeds of the turbulent decade of the sixties.
Customer Reviews:
Wait till Next Year.......2007-07-13
Most interesting for me since I am a "wait till next year" Red Sox fan. She's an excellent writer and commentator and this lives up to her standard.
Really Good Read!.......2007-06-27
Ms. Goodwin knows how to tell a good story. In addition to telling us about her childhood in a New York City suburb in the 1950s, she also talks about the changes America was going through in this time period: economic development and the impact on the family, the beginnings of the civil rights movement, the "end" of baseball as the American pasttime. The book is well-written and very enjoyable.
A great book on taking your daughter to the game!.......2007-04-27
Great book. It inspires me to take my two little girls to games. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
A Fan's Notes.......2007-04-10
Goodwin grew up in New York in the 40's, and this memoir tracks her Brooklyn Dodgers through their World Series win in 1956.
Something to Touch the Heart.......2007-03-27
So many people recommended Doris Kearns Goodwin's charming memoir, "Wait Till Next Year," that I couldn't wait to get my hands on it.
Experiencing her youth in the forties and fifties as I and many of my reading friends did, Goodwin struck chords that reverberated movingly with us. Though the story takes place in Rockville Centre, New York, a suburb just a train ride away from Brooklyn, her pictures of herself and her friends in front yards and back yards, her schools and churches, drug store and neighborhood could have been taken in any American suburb of those distant days.
These memories make up a different kind of "fan's notes," as she tracks the ups and downs and near misses of her beloved Brooklyn Dodgers, the team she followed faithfully as a six-year-old in 1949, until "dem bums" finally delivered a World Series championship in 1956. Her team, with Gil Hodges and Roy Campanella, and even their radio announcer, Vin Scully, moved to Los Angeles in 1958 and became my wife's favorite team. My "Whiz Kids," the Philadelphia Phillies of the fifties, with Robin Roberts and Ritchie Ashburn and Eddie Waitkus received mention and reminded my wife and me of the days when you could count on the same players returning loyally to play year after year for the same team.
In addition to the thread of baseball running through the book, Goodwin touches on national events that characterized the times for anyone who lived through them: the death of FDR, the Korean War, the Rosenberg spy case, McCarthyism, and forced school integration in Little Rock. She remembers Elvis and James Dean and covers faithfully the rituals of growing up in the Catholic Church. There is something here to touch the heart of anyone who grew up in those naive times of the 1940s and 1950s.
Average customer rating:
- Good Background Information
- A Christian history teacher's review
- Surprisingly historical
- A Must read.
- Interesting, non-biased work by a scholar of ancient history
|
In the Fullness of Time: A Historian Looks at Christmas, Easter, and the Early Church
Paul L. Maier
Manufacturer: Kregel Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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Pontius Pilate: A Novel
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ASIN: 0825433290 |
Book Description
This engaging and beautifully written narrative sheds a brilliant new light on the life of Jesus and the courageous men and women who carried His message throughout a hostile empire. Full-color photos and illustrations.
Customer Reviews:
Good Background Information.......2007-10-01
Maier does a good job putting Christmas and Easter into their appropriate historical contexts. Lots of good information that helps to place both into perspective.
The third part of the book, on the early church, is not as well done. There is less historical and archaelogical information brought into play. It was still pretty good, just not as good as the first two sections.
Still, I would recommend this book as one to help build a foundation.
A Christian history teacher's review.......2007-05-14
Paul Maier is a truly gifted lecturer. I've had the pleasure of watching two of his videos and if I lived anywhere near Western Michigan University, I'd sneak into the back of his classroom (he is a member of the history faculty there) on a regular basis - he has a gift for making the First Century A.D. accessible.
"In the Fullness of Time" continues this tradition. Maier has basically consolidated 3 other books into one larger volume (with a few changes) and he discusses the first Christmas, the first Easter and the ministries of the early Apostles, especially Paul and Peter.
Maier does a great job of bringing actual documentation that supports the stories of Christmas, Easter and the Book of Acts. He includes the works of Roman and Jewish historians, explains Roman and Jewish religious and political practices and deals with alternate theories that have been proposed. While this could be dry reading, Maier makes it lively and this volume reads more like a novel than a textbook.
So, who is this book for? If you are a well-read Christian who has looked into many of the facts that back the New Testament as it is written on your own, you won't find much new ground covered in this book. The internet has lots of this information scattered about. However, you are unlikely to find sources as concise and as well-written as this one. Plus, if you are interested in further research, it is well-documented with tons of footnotes.
If you are a new Christian or are newly interested in the history behind Christianity, this is a powerful introduction.
I give this one a grade of "A"
Surprisingly historical .......2006-07-30
Maybe it's because I enjoy reading historical literature... or maybe I am facinated by the notion the Gospel accounts are historical in nature. Paul Maier has done a wonderful job combining backround historical context, archeological artifacts, and a clear logical approach into a credible and refreshing look at what is was like to: experience the first Christmas, the first Easter, and what it was like for the early Christians after the resurrection. This is surprisingly enjoyable read.
A Must read........2005-05-20
Pail Maier, a expert in ancient history, has written a great book. from my understanding is that, this book was three different books now put into one. If you are a new Christian, you need this book. If you read this book as a new believer, you will have a better grasp of the background of the NT in reading this book, than going to a expositional preaching church for two years. It will lay a great foundation for your walk with the living Christ. If you a long time believer, and have not read this book, you should, for it will open your eyes, to the NT. Dr. Maier goes into the Christmas story, Easter Sunday and the early church. Great book.
Interesting, non-biased work by a scholar of ancient history.......2002-03-14
When I saw Paul Maier interviewed in a documentary on the life of Jesus, I searched for titles by this author, and when this book was listed, I immediately ordered it. I wasn't dissappointed.
Maier is a professor of ancient history at Western Michigan, and brings credibility and scholarship to a subject that is frequently approached with bias, often from polar perspectives. Professor Maier is one of the leading scholars on the writings of first century Jewish historian Josephus, and this book includes appropriate and informative references to this ancient source. As a student of history and an attorney, I found the book stimulating and thought provoking. However, the book most certainly does not read like a history text, and is interesting to both the historian and the person simply looking for some information on the historical context of the birth of Christ, his crucification and the biblical account of his resurrection. The book also examines the early church and the spread of Christianity. Anyone with an interest in these topics should read this work.
I very much recommend this book, and look forward to reading other works by Paul Maier.
Books:
- The History of Love: A Novel
- The Hunt Club
- The Jungle is Neutral: A Soldier's Two-Year Escape from the Japanese Army
- The Known World
- The Last Templar
- The Map of Innovation: Creating Something Out of Nothing
- The March: A Novel
- The Old Man And The Sea
- The Parkinson's Disease Treatment Book: Partnering with Your Doctor to Get the Most from Your Medications
- The Peebles Principles: Tales and Tactics from an Entrepreneur's Life of Winning Deals, Succeeding in Business, and Creating a Fortune from Scratch
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Suite Francaise
