Memorials Books

This book is a very personal biography of Henry David Thoreau, written by one of his closest friends. Although the book contains many biographical details of Thoreau, it is more a eulogy than a biography. It begins with a chapter on Thoreau's early life, but after this chapter, Channing's commentary is collated more by topic than by chronological order. These topics include: manners, reading, nature, literary themes, philosophy, writings, field sports, characters, and moral. Following the main text are a selection of memorial verses written by Channing.

Channing, author, intimate friend and frequent walking companion of Thoreau, first drafted this work in 1863, shortly after Thoreau's passing. Because he and Thoreau had been friends from young adulthood, Channing was able to provide many anecdotes and details of Thoreau's life. As a result, all subsequent biographers have relied on Channing's text as a source of firsthand information. Channing was also the first person other than Thoreau himself to delve into Thoreau's massive Journal, and he draws heavily on Thoreau's Journal in this volume. When the draft of this biography was sent to a publisher, however, the publisher declared it too short. Channing's response was to insert several chapters of an unpublished work from the 1850s, in which Channing had arranged journal entries from himself, Emerson, and Thoreau into a group of pseudo-conversations. These insertions, while somewhat interesting, reduce the cohesion of the overall text of the volume even more. Nevertheless, the book is quite interesting for the intimate perspective Channing was able to provide of Thoreau, and for the journal entries that he selected to demonstrate Thoreau's characteristic themes.

The author is careful to include a brief history of the war monument, he has also done his homeword and places obvious emphasis on monuments of WWI. All in all, I strongly recomend this book to anyone ineterested in Canadian memorials. On a more critical eye, the author does not state the problems that arose in provinces that were felt to be less nationalist (i.e.: Quebec City), another problem is his passing interest to the war experience as women saw it, and the Myth of the War Experience. Complementary reading will remedy this.

I bought this book to learn more about the Andean textiles I began collecting while working in Peru and Bolivia. The photos are beautiful and the info is pretty good-good for a beginner but probably not as helpful for a collector with more expertise. There are not many books on this subject and I'm interested to know if anyone has found a better one.

Vincent Starrett is remembered primarily for his contributions to Sherlockiana, but he was also an accomplished writer of detective stories for newspapers and the pulps, many of them featuring Chicago sleuth Jimmie Lavender. Pop-culture expert Peter Ruber has gathered together many forgotten stories from yellowing pages, and produced a vooume which captures the 1920's and 1930's. Well-worth the time of anyone who enjoys the leisurely unfolding of clues.

There's been a period of rabid anti-judgment, of the assertion that any esthetic judgment is just a matter of culturally defined opinion, and that no work of art is inherently "better" than any other. Fortunately, that thought itself is just an opinion, and one with remarkably little historical justification.

Sir Clark uses this booklet to try to define the indefinable something in works called masterpieces. I don't think Clark succeeds completely, but he doe seem to capture parts of it. Technical mastery is a requisite, but certainly not enough. An important subject helps, the kind that compels a human response from the viewer, whether or not the viewer knows the people and events depicted. Masterpieces may use the visual vocabulary of their times, or define a new idiom. Clark used Montegna's Dead Christ to demonstrate the former, and Picasso's Woman with a Guitar for the latter. Clark also seems to say that no one period can define a masterpiece - it must stand the test of centuries, holding its importance while times and fashions change around it. Most of all, a masterpiece is a product of the master, not just of the master's skill but of the personality, empathy, experience, and revelation.

Frankly, I find the book too short to address the topic properly. Though interesting, parts of Clark's definition can never be put into practice. The master's subjugation to subject is an inner experience, something that can not be shared or even detected by another person. I can't define a masterpiece either, but I can't accept a definition that relies on the artist's frame of mind.

Still, the book is brief, readable, and thought-provoking. It reproduces some of the works described, but only in black and white, printed indifferently. The pictures seem intended only as memory-joggers, to help the viewer recall better renderings seen elsewhere. This is an approachable work by an acknowledged master in his own right, but just left me hoping for more.

//wiredweird

Once upon a time, as Richard Reeves fondly remembers, a reporter's ethical duty was to get a story, be fair and report it. The public trusted reporters, just as it trusted presidents and auto company executives and priests and all sorts of authority figures.

Doubts began to arise in the 1960's, with a variety of revelations. Hugh Hefner said "sex is fun" and people discovered he was right. Various president's ordered hundreds of thousands of Americans to risk their lives in Vietnam, but didn't offer a similar national commitment. Auto executives churned out cars that exploded in rear-end collisions, refusing to spend a couple of dollars per car to correct the problem. After a president resigned -- not before -- Barry Goldwater called him "the most dishonest man I ever met."

Reeves seems surprised that such questioning includes the news media. His book is a wonderful collection of the doubts afflicting the media, and the very valid reasons for such distrust. Any reporter with a couple of years experience can recount horror stories of unethical editors and publishers who believe and act as if they are the most powerful people in the community. Remember the old adage, "If you talk to God, you're praying; if God talks to you, you're nuts." Some editors believe, "If you endorse our editorials, you're a good citizen; if you question our wisdom, you're nuts."

Think of Reeves as the `Martin Luther' of journalism; his book tacks his theses to the door of today's most arrogant institution. In response, the "Reformation" is here -- it's called the Internet.

Fifty years ago, in the "golden age" of journalism, some people bought a newspaper for a single reason -- for sports, stock tables, weather, comics, advice columns, crossword puzzles or other single purposes. The rest was thrown away. Now, the Internet provides such information directly and with less hassle. Newspapers will never recapture such shallow readers.

Only the media analyzes itself in full public view. The Catholic Church doesn't publicize the sexual liaisons of priests with young boys -- and, in some cases, young women. Critics of priestly failings are all noise and hate with no insight, wisdom or mercy; despite that, no priest would dare issue a book admitting, "We've got problems, and here's a solution." But, the news media is its own toughest critic -- as Reeves shows. The Janet Cooks and Duke Tullys are national embarrassments featured by the media to deter others from making similar mistakes.

Reeves criticizes the media with insight, mercy and rational analysis; he avoids egregious examples and partisan twaddle. Read the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times every day for a few weeks, and you'll understand how "truth" is so variable. Both offer vigorous, intelligent and often opposite editorial opinions by highly intelligent writers; it's what happens in a free society. Only tyrannies celebrate consensus, conformity and conservatism. The fault is not with opinions, it is with mealy-mouth publishers who think circulation depends on being so bland that the paper is "everyone's friend."

The grimmest fault of the media is the oldest story in the world, "No guts, no glory." When you have gutless publishers, reporters become equally gutless -- and the public deserts to "bold new media" such as the Internet. Sadly, Reeves failed to suggest a solution. Quite simply, take a theme from his favorite movie, The Front Page (1931 version), and get editors back to the three-martini breakfast and a gin bottle in the bottom desk drawer -- you can buy courage by the quart, if that's what it takes to give them guts.

Respect isn't earned by licking every boot in the community, it comes from a basic principle of old fashioned journalism, "Comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable." Sure, it takes guts. Maybe it's why Reeves, brilliant at outlining problems, fails to offer solutions. After all, someone may challenge him with a better idea. Remember, he's one of the professors who train modern journalists.

That is his only weakness. His book is a wonderful analysis of problems facing conscientious journalists, probably the best in the recent spate of criticism. First, read it; then, disagree with my analysis. See? You're already on the road to a solution.

What a tremendous deal. Essentially everything Robert G. Ingersoll ever wrote at less than the cost of a volume....and you can do word searches. While some of what Ingersoll had to say is dated, most is as true today as it was in the 1880's and 90's. A very refreshing 'non church' view of Christianity.

I think this book was very entertaining and thought provoking. It's a good book-club book!

I read this book years ago and just re-read it now. I found it as wonderful the second time as the first. As an adopted child, the underlying "who is family" question throughout the book really hit home and was handled beautifully. I think it would be an excellent book for anyone in a book club - definitely a book great for discussion.

This is the best book I have read for a while. So many are carbon copies of others with just different characters. This was a story with real people and a real premise. I enjoyed it from the first page through the end and highly recommend it.

The characters in this book were well developed- but there were so MANY of them!

I wanted to make a Family Tree just to keep them all straight!

If you've never tried listening to Aduio Books, you should give them a try- they're WONDERFUL entertainment while doing housework, traveling, gardening, and you don't have to turn on the light when you want to "read" at night!

I was really looking forward to reading this because a friend highly recommended it. I'm pretty open minded (especially after having read "Running with Scissors") so I'm surprised it didn't enjoy it.

The characters were well developed but the writing was hard to follow. Hence, I too, caught myself re-reading portions to clear up the confusion. A lot of tangents...kind of like conversations with girlfriends over a few glasses of wine.

Being from Madison, it's always nice to read references to places you know but even that didn't excite me that much. I wonder if I had been involved in an adoption issue that I might not have found this a better book? Hmmmm.

The best part was the last chapter and Keefer's voice of a child having gone through a tough life experience. A good reminder of how resillient children really are.

I will try another couple of Mitchard's books to see if this was indeed an "editor" related issue.

An important work. It really takes a fascinating, unique perspective on history and provides a provocative view on the true nature of many people's fascination with the Holocaust.

I approached this book w reasonably high expectations.

i thank tim cole for the effort and i got some value out of this book

But I found the book to be weakly argued and inconsistent.

I felt a bit ripped off by the title, the book jacket and the back blurb by michael lerner, whom i respect.

the book was really about the evolving ways that israel and the US (and to a lesser extent europe) interpret the holocaust through the decades, as driven by their own new national needs and circumstances.

so -- we are not mostly talking in this book so much about 'sale' and exploitation (as implied by the title and book jacket description, which focuses highly on $$$) of the holocaust...

...but rather about evolving interpretations as 'recallers' change their perspectives as new societal needs arise -- and they change their interpretive thrusts of the holocaust to meet changing contemporary needs

thus, for me, the title didnt match the book.

i was especially frustrated by the author's repeated expressed longing for holocaust museums to focus more heavily on the magnitude and terribleness unfathomability of the killing - and the massive despair grimness and unknowabiliity of the act -- and not just to look for 'redemptive' or 'heroic' twists on the event. he is unhappy that museum builders focus too heavily on the holocaust's 'redemptive' value, and ok, he makes that point well enough

and then he talks about he and his wife visiting a holocaust museum and coming away disappointed because there was not enough 'horror.'

but then when horror IS displayed in a museum, he seems critical and dismissive, and seems to ridicule it. it is odd how his seeming desires seem unfulfillable. after reading this book, while seeking to keep an open mind, i can't imagine a holocaust museum that would ever satisfy tim cole.

cole also harps annoyingly on a single sentence at yad vashem (his 'although-also' sentence/cite) and repeats it about ten times afterwards. he builds way too much out of this single sentence, even understanding the single sentence is meant to be emblematic of an attitude. but he endows it with too much meaning -- and that sentence just cant keep sustaining the weight of his thesis again and again and again. seems like a weak and imbalanced argument from an academic.

the lerner blurb is a big sore point. it says the book points to the need to take action to prevent another holocaust (he cites the pressing need to "transform the conditions that make equally horrible suffering a likely recurrence."). but to my great chagrin, nowhere at all in the book does cole spend any time offering this kind of advice. or i missed it but i dont think i did. very disappointing. i felt misled by the lerner quote and misled by the jacket blurb. the lerner quote does not gibe w the book content, and i am sadly left to ask whether lerner had actually read the book first (i deeply hope so)

the thrust of the book's content is worthwhile: that history can often be bent to the evolving needs of succeeding generations. fair enough, and a good point for us all to remember. this precise same point is directly discussed, for example, in 'these honored dead,' tom desjardin's take on the manipulation of gettysburg history.

but i assert that that isnt really a book about 'selling' history. it is more substantially about 'reinterpreting' history.

so i was disappointed, annoyed and frustrated by the book. it had some good content and some eye-opening analysis, and from time to time, he makes his point fairly well.

but its title and marketing message were a tease that didnt accurately reflect its content.

the book is called 'the selling of...' yet the content spends little time focused on the 'selling.'

i hope i am wrong, but i felt maybe a publisher told tim cole that he better give it this particular title so more people like me would read it and more people would buy it.

...which leads me to an unhappy conclusion:

i feel i have been a little exploited by 'the selling of...' this book to me.

Cole traces the development of popularization of the Holocaust in the US, Israel, and in other parts of the world. He uses the term "myth" not to question the fact of 5-6 million murdered Jews in any way, but to point out the gradual emergence of the Holocaust in much contemporary thinking. Cole (p. 6) quotes Yaffa Eliach on the fact that "there is no business like Shoah business."

In common with other writers (e. g., Novick, Finkelstein), Cole points out that there was little special attention paid to the WWII extermination of Jews, by either Jews or gentiles, in the first years after the war: "While the Holocaust was perpetrated in Europe during 1941-45, it was not really until the early 1960s that anything like widespread awareness of the `Holocaust' began to emerge."(p. 7). Also: "During the 1940s and 1950s, throughout Israeli society, there was an effective silence about the Holocaust."(pp. 51-52). Finally, "After 1961 the Holocaust ceased to be a taboo, and instead assumed an increasingly central--if contested--position in Israeli society and politics."(p. 63).

Cole concludes: "There is little question that in the 1970s and 1980s the `Holocaust' assumed a critical role in self-definition as Jewish." (p. 13). In fact, he also shows that the Holocaust had become a substitute for Jewish tradition, for self-identity as Jews, among many assimilated American Jews (pp. 118-119).

By the 1990's, the Holocaust had assumed nothing short of staggering dimensions on the American scene: "...in the United States there are more than one hundred Holocaust museums and research centres, suggesting that the `founding of Holocaust museums' is `a particularly American phenomenon.'"(p. 147).

Cole devotes a moderate amount of attention to the Auschwitz Carmelite convent controversy. For a long time, Christian symbols in Jewish places of death had not aroused Jewish antagonism at all (p. 103). He also points out the fact that, ironically, Auschwitz itself had assumed a prominent place in Jewish Holocaust consciousness only gradually: "From being a site of Warsaw bloc memory of fascist atrocity, `Auschwitz' became recognized not simply as a site of the mass gassing of Jews, but the site of Jewish memory of the `Holocaust'. Yet alongside this `Jewish Holocaustisation' of Auschwitz, a process of `Catholising' Auschwitz started to take place, in particular centered on the Polish-Catholic martyr Father Maximilian Kolbe."(pp. 102-103). Cole continues: "What was being contested during the controversy was less ownership and use of the physical fabric of the camp, and more ownership and use of the `brandname''Auschwitz'."(p. 105).

Cole (p. 108) then recounts Cardinal Glemp's suggested compromise solution: Oswiecim-Auschwitz, where mostly Poles died, would be central to Poles and Christians, while Brzezinka-Birkenau, where mostly Jews died, would be central to Jews. However, most Jews rejected this compromise solution on the grounds that it would impinge upon the symbolic status of Auschwitz. What is unclear in all of this is how the fact that 90% of the victims of the entire Auschwitz complex were Jews is supposed to entitle them to dictate to everyone else how and how not the site of the Auschwitz complex is to be memorialized. It is easy to see that all the talk about the Jewish victims of Auschwitz being forgotten, or about Auschwitz becoming "Christianized", are simply smokescreens. The real reason clearly is Jewish intolerance against the sufferings of non-Jews being associated, even indirectly, with the sufferings of Jews. As further proof of this, note Cole's citation of Israeli philosopher Adi Ophir on the latter's statements concerning the Holocaust becoming a religion of sorts that supplants the Ten Commandments: "...Holocaust religion offers new commandments:'Thou shalt have no other Holocaust', `Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image or likeness", Thou shalt not take the name in vain'. .."(p. 143). No wonder that there was so much Jewish opposition to the Carmelite convent at Auschwitz! Its very presence dared juxtapose the Polish Holocaust with that the Jewish Holocaust, thereby violating the first and third of these new commandments!

Cole describes Holocaust education in contemporary Israel as follows: "Not only do they have `Holocaust' lessons at school--where `since the early 1980s, questions on the Holocaust have accounted for 20 per cent of the overall score in the high school diploma examination in history'--but as mentioned earlier they all visit Yad Vashem, and an increasing number visit the death camps in Europe."(p. 141). In view of this intense education, the ignorance of Israeli students who visit Poland is unbelievable (unless, of course, it is intentional). Cole does not mention the fact that visiting Israeli students hold to grotesque Polonophobic errors, even to the point of believing that Poles killed more Jews than the Germans, and asking, in all seriousness, about the size of pensions "those Polish guards at Auschwitz" are receiving. What kind of education are these young Israelis truly getting?

I appreciated Cole's ability to trace the evolution of Holocaust representation over the years and his comparison of how different cultures portray it. I also agree that the media generally fails to convey the desperation and hopelessness inherent in The Holocaust. The Holocaust should not be remembered only as an inspiring story of courage and survival- we must remember the terror, despair, hopelessness, and depravity.

Maybe the public consumers are not interested or prepared for the graphic details or a protagonist whose death seems as meaningless as it is vicious. Perhaps the public consumers are not ready for a Nazi protagonist who has more in common with the reader/viewer than his victim. If Holocaust literature and media are not able to break this barrior, the meaning of this tragedy will indeed be lost.

However, I am disappointed in Cole's criticism of U.S., Israeli, and European efforts to make meaning of The Holocaust. Is it surprising, or even wrong, that an Israeli museum/memorial would emphasize Jewish resistance and heroism during The Holocaust? Is it surprising that the U.S. museum would focus on Jews as victims and American soldiers as liberators?

While everyone must be careful in how they portray and memorialize The Holocaust, the search for meaning must be a part of such an endeavor. One must explore why the Nazis acted as they did. One must consider why many Jews did not resist and some even betrayed those who did. One must acknowledge the courage of Jews who resisted and Allied soldiers who liberated the camps.

I encourage anyone who reads this book to also read Viktor Frankl's MAN'S SEARCH FOR MEANING.

Having read and seen more than my fair share of Holocaust-related books and films, I was hoping for some provocative, or at least thought-provoking, analysis here. Instead, I was treated to a superficial and incomplete overview. From start to finish, Cole's contention is that in literary and cinematographic works the Holocaust has been packaged to supply consumers with a "happy ending", and that in endeavours such as museums the full horror is deliberately (although the reader is left in some doubt as to how consciously) blanked out or softened.

In fact, many survivors have pointed out that the full horror can never be known, as even their own experience could only be partial. Another fact is that all the first-hand accounts, however gruesome, have been given by survivors, which does tend to leave an impression of the Holocaust as something which could be (and in fact was) survived, if only by a minority. It is a pity that Cole did not take a closer look at the abundant literature describing the damage wreaked on survivors and their families, for instance Art Spiegelman's depiction of his parents, Lily Brett's of her mother, or Charlotte Delbo's wrenching account of the individual lives of her fellow deportees before, during and after their imprisonment in Auschwitz.

There are also occurrences of sloppy thinking. For instance, Cole has accomplished the tour de force of simultaneously criticising the early presentation of Anne Frank for "stripping her of her sexuality" and drawing a veil over her appalling death. Actually, that early presentation was almost exclusively based on the first published version of the Diary, which made no secret of Anne's romance with Peter (sexual enough to cause her parents serious concern), and surely it is not common for diarists to record their own demise, least of all in a death camp?

Finally, there are a number of careless errors not acceptable in a scholarly work. The recurrent misspelling of "Birkeneau" is especially irritating in view of Cole's credentials, "the girl in the red coat" of "Schindler's List", whom Cole dismisses as a "myth" incorporated by Spielberg into his film, does in fact appear in Keneally's book under the name "Red Genia", and the Jews in the "Train of Life" do not escape to freedom - the last scene shows the narrator in prisoner's garb, possibly German, possibly Soviet, behind barbed wire, leaving it unclear whether the train story was a fantasy or whether the Gulag ultimately caught up with the escaped Jews.

In a word, disappointing.

I love this book, and understand why few (if any) used copies are available now that it has gone out of print: people want to hang on to their copy. It speaks to a great mystery, and Ross Hamilton seems to take care to preserve that sense of what is unanswerable and unfathomable for the reader, allowing one to make-up one's own mind while shedding some light.
These reviews weren't intended to be message boards or a venue for debate, but I noticed that one reviewer submitted two pieces which reduced the star average so much as to make the book appear mediocre and unworthy of acquiring. This kind of leverage goes against the written guidelines of this forum, and so I shall add a five star rating in the hope of countering that fellow's illegitimate actions. Because I have my own copy, I see that he did not bother to actually read the book as the author has requested, apparently selectively isolating various parts in what appears an effort to raise his own reputation.
We here in the Ohio Valley treaure our Great Serpent, and the advent of Hamilton's book has made the earthwork's reputation for a mystery study entirely legitimate and quite welcome by both Native Americans and their white brothers and sisters. I have been to Serpent Mound on more than one occasion, and you can bank on it being truly a magnificant piece of architecture, however damaged it has become with time. I do not believe that it is in anyone's better interests to further damage this earthwork's study; and I apologize for breaking the rules myself in order to get at the heart of this matter.

Leslie LaBoda

Methinks Mark Newbrook doth protest too much. This is brilliant stuff.
Yes, it's a tough read for those readers not from a scientific background, but nothing worthwhile comes easy. The author hits the nail on the head. There are deep deep truths in this monument, as there are at Stonehenge, Angkor Watt and the Pyramids. Ross Hamilton has made a great discovery and deserves our admiration and respect.

Mark Newbrook's adamant rant about the irrationality of the author's theory spurred me to buy the book. When I run across someone vehemently denying any other possibility due to staunch dogmatic platitudes revolving around "rational thinking" that automatically tells me there is possibly something more lurking here. I say this only because people who cling to any "belief" regardless of origin often will reduced to uivvering mess if/when their belief is proven otherwise. In this case, Newbrook's belief will probably stick until our culture advances enough to build time-travel and then go back to observe the origins of the Serpent Mound.

Overall the book author's "belief" about the effigy seemed quite New Age to me as a scientist. But unlike Mr. Newbrook, I do not lash out with Occam's Razor at every belief that crosses me. For instance, we know the biblical Genesis account of creation is but a myth or story because we know the dinosaur era lasted millions of years preceding man. The proof is the bones left behind. For those who believe in Genesis, then I classify that as a useful lie until the believer tries to force me to believe in it too.

The author offers several useful lies that may or may not provide you with answers. Much like Erik Von Daniken did with his Chariots of the Gods series it is fun to speculate and enjoy but it has no proof it actually happened the way he states it. Much the same with this book.

I give it four of five stars and recommend it to you for an entertaining theory.

This book opens your mind. Unless you've got the lock of rationality and science chained around it.

Many people like the "DR." who reviewed this book will not get it. It is outside the tiny box they have squeezed their minds into.

For a well researched and thoughtful look at some of human history, without the fear of grasping at the circa 1950 type of rationality, buy this book.

'A reader from Great NorthWest' claims that Hamilton's book 'opens your mind unless you've got the lock of rationality and science chained around it'. The reference is apparently to my own earlier review. But rationality (including science) is exactly how we evaluate competing theories about the world. It is NOT out of date ('1950') and it is NOT the same thing as closed-mindedness or thinking inside a 'tiny box' (that does occur but is very rare in serious scholarship). If Hamilton wants us to accept a radically novel & in many ways implausible account of the matters discussed, he must produce better evidence and argumentation than he does in his book. After all, if he is right, large parts of existing theories and ideas which are themselves very well supported must somehow be wrong. Perhaps 'reader from Great NorthWest', or some other admirer of Hamilton, can marshall evidence & argumentation and rebut my criticisms (which could be expanded to considerably greater length & detail). If so, I will cheerfully accept and promote Hamilton's views. If not, I stand by my criticisms; and on current evidence I am confident that other scholars would endorse them. (No one can say I ignored the book because of the views it expresses. Some scholars would think it unworthy of comment, but I am an active skeptic and thus take a different view.)