Memorials Books

Scary but realistic story but not for me. I'd rather escape if I'm going to read fiction. However if you like hard hitting, current event based action and intelligence genre novels, you will love this.

This may be my favorite Rapp novel. I like the threads and how they weave together. I read this one the quickest of all Flynn's books, so that is a very strong endorsement.

Another great segment in the Vince Flynn series. Well worth the time to read.

This is my first Flynn book and I'm hooked. Couldn't put down this book from page one. Rapp is my kind of take-charge guy. What a hero! Too bad we don't have more CIA guys like him. Mitch doesn't put up with political garbage. He knows how to take care of the enemy and has the stomach for it in order to save the lives of Americans. If you like spy fiction, but this is better, you will love this book and author. I'm not going to tell you what happens for it will spoil it for you. But if you like action and "get the bad guy" you will love this book.

This book was memorable to me for how well the author, Vince Flynn, described a military attack on a terrorist camp. Also it was memorable for how well Flynn described how a terrorist cell could plan and carry out a nuclear attack on the United States.

The author uses Mitch Rapp, CIA operative, to carry us chapter by chapter through what I can only describe as one of the best suspense thrillers that I have ever read, or seen on TV or in the movies. I was sweating during the attack on the terrorist's camp and up to the last chapter I was on the edge of my seat.

This story is of our war against terrorism that we are waging today and after you read it, I believe you will had made a decision on how it should be fought. The author has a talent for painting images in my mind and writing short chapters to blend one event smoothly into the next.

Excellent is the only word that comes to mind to describe Vince Flynn's ability to tell a story like this of government with all it's complex agencies and levels of bureaucracies in a way that makes the people within seem real and creates a suspense thriller with events that really hit home and is so memorable.

After reading this I'm sure that you will feel as I do that we can only hope that there are real Mitch Rapps out there.

Beneath a Marble Sky is a beautifully written, even if it is fanciful, history of the building of the Taj Mahal. the prose is so poetic that you feel it. Loved the book!

Other reviewers have outlined the plot in detail, so I won't cover it further in my review. Suffice to say it places a story of love and family feuds against the backdrop of the building of the Taj Mahal by Shah Jehan. What a fantastic opportunity to cast light on the era of the Moguls and the amazing power they wielded, not to mention the amazing possibilities provided by the landscape, colour and sheer diversity of India itself.

Sadly, however, for me this book fails to deliver on a number of levels. The history element is merely a sideline and India itself becomes a backdrop, instead of a driving force of the book. Additionally the protagonists are all stereotypically good or bad, coming over almost as comic-book characters, and I totally agree with other reviewers who felt the character development was one-dimensional. I also felt that, since we know for sure that the two principals end up together from the first chapter, the love story fell a little flat.

However, in my humble opinion, one of the book's greatest flaws was the attempt to tell the story through Princess Jahanara's voice. It requires great sensitivity and depth to tell a story in the first person voice, even when the author is of the same gender. However, for a man to attempt to portray the feelings and words of a woman was never going to be really successful.

Overall, however, it's not a bad book, just disappointing if you're expecting a lush epic of the Moguls as I was. I give it two and a half stars for trying.

I have long dreamed of seeing the Taj Mahal for myself. This story brought the monument and life in those times to life. Beneath a Marble Sky is a wonderfully crafted novel. John Shors bring the characters to life with such depth and realism. I felt their joy, their pain, their love and their grief as if it were my own. Now more than ever I long to see this for myself. A must read written by a truly talented author.

Linda C. Wright
Author, One Clown Short
One Clown Short

A rather disappointing love story, more about violence and war than a true love story. I had hoped to learn more about the building of this beautiful building, but got war and family feud. A love story written by a man...give me more love, not war. Had wanted to recommend this book for my book club selection, but lost interest in the story itself, and will not recommend it.

I can't say I've ever been interested in the Taj Mahal or anything related to it but this book was so smoothly and superbly told that it captured me right from the beginning. I was enthralled through the entire book and had a hard time putting it down. Books rarely ever really make me cry or laugh and this one did both repeatedly. I want there to be more from this author - I don't care the subject... if he wrote a book about lint, I'd read it because this one was just fantastic.

While this is a great piece if you want to step inside a virtue theorist's mind, as an actual philosophical text it is rather poor.
While it is obviously religiously biased, it is Lewis' own circular paradoxes that lead to a flawed system of logic that can not support itself.

I was struck with amazement as I read this most beneficial and interesting book! There are so many books to choose from these days for inquiry or answers to the brokenness in our modern day populace, but this one proved to be top-notch in this writer's opinion. The writer's skill conveys keen insights into the mind to understand mankind's condition, including interpersonal relationships from the intellect. Dead hypothesis that would try to excoriate the common sense displayed here in this wonderful little treatise would no doubt fall by the wayside. Can we see the signs of the times from the author's wisdom? Where is the world headed anyway? Read this little book for some answers. I've got a much better perspective on life now due to the dulcet manner of the author; the way he draws on the treasures intrinsic in all of us to begin with. Doubtless you will not find anything insipid within the two covers. A very powerful book indeed! Lewis displays a virtuoso's flair for observing absolutes unequivocally. I will keep one of the copies of two I purchased for my book shelf and the other one for a gift. The Den of IniquityC.S. Lewis: The Signature Classics Audio Collection: The Problem of Pain, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, Mere Christianity

This is a marvelous book for showing the rank and file American college freshman just how he or she may have been unwittingly propagandized in the lower grades. The reigning studenty "philosophy" these days is indistinguishable from classical sophistry's arguments that "everything is relative" and -since everyone has a right to his opinion - that all opinions are necessarily of equal value. I suspect this "philosophy" began its march toward triumph in the first grade when a color blind student, Johnny, misidentified a color, the other students, being naturally cruel, laughed, and the "caring" teacher correctly instructed them not to, but for a cockeyed reason, that "Johnny has a right to his opinion!"

Taking off from such a spot, sophistic relativism invariably before long comes to be embraced by the young with complete uncritical dogmatism, the opposite idea that some judgments are more apposite than others being wholly ignored by "caring" teachers, if not dismissed as patently invidious "judgmentalism." Like Socrates before him, C.S. Lewis here does battle with such lapses in critical thinking, assuming, as did his Greek predecessor, the objective existence of the Good, the True, and the Beautiful, and offering instances of the recurrent Natural Law drawn from many cultures. Defending the position that values are indeed objective, Lewis aims is to call much needed attention to this bracing alternative to the regnant view that all values are necessarily subjective, and therefore, in fact, trivial. Through his usual combination of shrewd wit, clear thinking and epigrammatic style, Lewis succeeds admirably.

This book is a series of three talks where Lewis illustrates the breakdown of education , from a system which embraces natural law, truth, and virtue, to one which embraces much of nothing and feeds back nothing. It is perhaps a bit dated now as teaching methods have moved on (though not necessarily in positive directions), but yet it still has much to say as we contemplate the inadequacy of our present systems and what we need to reclaim to restore them.

In this brief book, C.S. Lewis discusses the failing of relativism and affirms the existence of objective moral values. This system of objective values, which Lewis calls the Tao, must be granted if there are to be any values whatsoever. In a long appendix at the end of the book, Lewis shows that all (or almost all) cultures, both past and present, have affirmed some basic moral principles that are part of the Tao. Against the relativist claim that all socieities have their own moral codes, Lewis demonstrates that all humans are guided by an underlying system of objective values which they may or may not recognize.

In the third and final chapter, Lewis foresees a day when men have complete control over the destinies of the next generation. Should men achieve an take advantage of such power, it would not mean that man had finally dominated nature. Rather, it would mean the abolition of man. Unguided by the Tao, man's decisions about what future generations should be like would by guided only by natural impulses. Thus, by destroying the Tao and attempting to dominate nature, man can only succeed in destroying himself.

Like always, Lewis writes with great clarity and intelligence. "The Abolition of Man" is an enjoyable read and certainly worth checking out.

I am doing a little research on this book for a school project. I have never heard of this book, or the author until this project. I think that Hart had a very interesting life. Even though bland and unfortunate, still interesting. It is a lot different than what a lot of kids today expirience. A lot of us, including me, take advantage of an education. Back in the day, education wasn't something that was handed to everyone. Because of that, most kids would look forward to school and do their very best while attending. Nowadays, school is a requirement and is enforced by the law. A lot has changed since her days. I think that this is a good book for children to read, as well as adults, so that by doing so, you may start to view life in a different perspective. I think that book is sad, but also makes you smile when you see how a simple story can change someone's life dramatically. Than again, times have changed and we have free access to books, radio, interent, TV, and movies. Yes, there are still some poorer families, but we have libraries that offer all of these things for free. It seems like this book would have a change of heart in alot of people, slightly or dramatically, it would have an effect either way.

IN Elva Trevino Hart's Barefoot Heat A young female migrant worker spends her summers on the side of a field watching the rest of her family hoe vegtables

First, I must say that this book is one of the most touching stories I have ever read because I can relate to so much of it. Secondly, there are so many coincidents in this book. For one, I was born in Pearsall, Texas, and now live in Washington, DC, and my mother, who is Mexican-American and about the same age as the author, was also a migrant worker who would travel with her parents and siblings to other states to pick vegetables. Made me wonder if my mom and Elva ever crossed paths. However, unlike Elva, neither my mom or her siblings were fortunate enough to finish high school,let alone attend college. Growing up, my mom would tell me stories about her childhood and the hardships she had to endure working in the fields alongside her family. My mother told me how she and her siblings always started school around October because that's usually when the harvests were over. She remembers being very ashamed that each year she was always behind in school and no matter how hard she tried she could never manage to catch up. Back then in south Texas, a good public education was hard to come by, especially if you were a female and a minority from a poor family. In her naivete, my mother saw marriage as the only way out of a life full of hardship and humiliation. At the age of 16 she married my father and eventually had 5 children. My mother's stories and my own memory of my parents struggling to make ends meet are what kept me pushing through college and grad school. Although I have no kids of my own, if I did, I would also regale them with my mother's migrant stories in hopes that it would make them appreciate all the advantages and opportunities available to them now. Too many Latino kids nowadays take education for granted and fail to put forth the effort needed to succeed academically. They spend too much time thinking about frivolous things like cars; fashion; dating; and the latest pop singers. Maybe if they all read this book, our Latino kids would appreciate the struggles their parents and grandparents went through and would get off their butts and do their homework. I did and it has paid off.

I'm glad I had the opportunity to read this insightful and well-written book. My job brings me in frequent contact with migrant families (mostly from Mexico), and the book helped to make me more aware of some of the issues facing these families.

Elva Trevino Hart has managed an impressive feat with this book. She recounts the depravations of her childhood without making you pity her. She also recounts the small joys she had growing up without giving the impression that these somehow made up for her poverty.
It is rare to read a memoir where the author seems like such a real person. Hart's description of her family and history manages to be simultaneously matter-of-fact and deeply personal and emotional. While a northern gringo like me will probably never be able to relate to the experience of a Mexican immigrant family, this book greatly increased my understanding of Mexican-American culture and experience.

This biography is the kind that I like. It's about an intermediate figure and uses that individual's life to frame up the times (ref: my review of Paul Preston's Franco biography).

Taubman does an excellent job of research and a good job at having a view about Krushchev's character and motives. However, the book is just not executed that well. The early years are presented fairly slowly and don't seem as tightly focused given that Taubman does have a thesis about Krushchev the man. This may just be that there are gaps in what he could learn about earlier years. The second half when Krushchev is in charge picks up a great deal. Some of this is just that the stakes are higher plus he has better sources since there are/were people alive to interview. However, even here there is some sloppiness in presentation.

The book is an excellent confirmation that much of what occurs in history is because of the idiosyncracies of individuals. Anyone who has worked in a large corporation would be familiar with unusual decision-making processes based on the personalities of people. That reality is presented clearly here even including how Eisenhower and Kennedy are presented in their dealings with Krushchev. On the one hand, it's almost amazing that war was avoided, But on the other hand, all of these individuals understood the amount of death that would have occurred and worked hard to avoid it. It speaks well that all understood that losing face was just fine compared to killing millions of people. However, it is repeatedly presented that Krushchev was certain that nuclear weapons could not and would not be used so the irony is that it made it easier to threaten with resulting in the view that he was kind of a mad man. It's similar to two bullies ready to fight as long as someone is restraining both of them. The good news is that Krushchev was not fundamentally evil like a Hitler who probably would have used the weapons.

But, this leads to the most interesting question about Krushchev. Taubman clearly speaks to the contradiction of Krushchev participating in Stalin's purges but then subsequently denouncing these crimes. While not overtly stating it, Taubman presents Krushchev as a true believer in communism who is willing to kill to achieve it for the "greater good." I think the book should have more clearly discussed the probability that Krushchev also accepted that killing was necessary for his own personal power. And, if so, could everything have not just been the pursuit of personal advancement/power with communism as a convenient support for that? Did any of these communist leaders (Lenin, Stalin, Mao) actually believe what they were saying? Taubman does not address this.

The other gap I think the book has is that it doesn't really speak much about Brezhnev. Given that Brezhnev maintains power till death, was there a contrast in his approach that would have shed light on Krushchev. My guess is that there probably is and I think it also might have helped answer the question of whether Krushchev ever believed in communism or was just out for himself.

As it is, it is easy to say that Krushchev was not evil in the way that Stalin was. Once he was in charge, it became possible to be retired from the government rather than always branded a traitor and executed. Even to the point, that Krushchev could be forced to retire.

So, this is a worthy read but expect to work a bit to get through it.

It's about time we had a decent biography of Nikita Khruschev.

Khruschev is a more important historical figure than seems generally appreciated today. He was something of a refreshing presence on the dreary world scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s. I remember his American tour, and you couldn't help but find a kind of pleasant and infectious quality in some of his observations and activities. I believe he sincerely wanted to slow or halt the Cold War the same way he diminished the horrors of Stalinism, an historic achievement.

Taubman doesn't capture the more idealistic sense of Khruschev, which I believe was genuine, because I was a young man through his time and took an interest in events.

Taubman's Khruschev is a bright (Khruschev had considerable analytical ability and a remarkable memory) peasant risen to the top, an extremely crude man, always regretful about his lack of formal education, who never ceases to behave as something of a Father Karamazov. I have no doubt there is truth here, but it provides an incomplete picture.

Was Khruschev any cruder than what we now know of the private life of John Kennedy, who had prostitutes swimming in the White House pool while Jackie was away, or of the public Lyndon Johnson, who used to conduct interviews and bark orders while relieving himself? I ask this because Taubman repeats the word crude or offers anecdotes about crude behavior many, many times.

Even as a young man I thought many of Khruschev's crudities were not so great as they were treated by America's press. The banging of his shoe at the U.N. is a favorite example. Crude? Yes. But significant beyond style? I think not much.

I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone interested in biography, the period, world affairs, or Soviet history, but I do have reservations about it, and it should be read with some caution.

Taubman weaves into the text too great a sense of the correctness of America's position and policies of the time, giving a sense of Khruschev largely representing an irritating and sometimes dangerous opponent to them. America often behaved in provocative and dangerous ways through the Cold War. Taubman mentions some matters, as Eisenhower's saying that if the Soviets over-flew the United States the way the United States regularly invaded Soviet airspace there would be war, but the week-to-week reality of this is not stressed enough here to appreciate the intensity of the Soviet point of view. There were many such matters, including American submarines actually colliding with Soviet boats.

Taubman gives a lot of attention to Khruschev's well-known habit of rattling his rockets in speeches, but we are not given enough background for why he might do this. The Pentagon actually had plans in the mid-1950s for an atomic pre-emptive attack on the Soviets. Generals like Curtis LeMay, the man who bombed Japan to the point of gratuitous horror, openly advocated nuclear hostilities. And, of course, America had used the atomic bomb, twice.

Taubman's treatment of matters like the Cuban Missile Crisis suffers from this. The U.S. had a huge, generously-finaced terrorist operation going against Cuba at the time, including along more than one track, and that is an important part of the background that Taubman treats with what I believe is neglect. Taubman's words on the ghastly Bay of Pigs does reveal hints of American jingo attitudes. They are not offered loudly, but they are there, and I think they should not be if we want to understand what motivated Khruschev.

One of the great missing chapters in the book is any detail around the Kennedy assassination. The assassination is there but not treated adequately. It was, after all, an epic event which had great consequences on both the Soviets and America. Of course, to treat the assassination adequately involves going into issues that remain murky and controversial.

Despite my reservations, the book is an interesting and worthwhile read, however, I certainly do not agree with the New York Times review which said "Succeeds in every sense...unlikely to be surpassed any time soon...."

In the last 60's, Krushchev wrote "Khrushchev Remembers", a self-serving memoir. It was interesting to read depsite its heavy slant, but the book didn't provide the reader with a sense of the man, and it was clearly censored by Soviet authorities. William Taubman has written a fine biography that gives us a clear and astonishing picture of Krushchev along with a snapshot of the Stalin-era purges and a superb picture of the Cold War. He uses interviews with Krushchev's former associates and with his son Sergei to great effect. He also uses archives that became available only after the Soviet Union fell apart. As a result of his research and clear writing, we feel like we know the man who darn near blew us all up during the Cuban missle crisis. (Or at least that was the feeling I had in 1962, watching in a college dorm as it all unfolded on TV.)

It's scary to see Krushchev as Taubman displays him. We knew he was a boor when he took off his shoe and pounded his desk at the UN in 1960, but it was fascinating to read about his highly charged, highly politicized encounters with Soviet artists and writers in the early 60s. Taubman shows us the man's temperament, which makes one wonder at how the Cold War failed to cause a nuclear war. It also makes one marvel at the distortion in national policies that come about when one person has such enormous power and is so undisciplined.

Although the character flaws Taubman illuminates are serious and frightening in retrospect, Taubman also shows how important Krushchev was in ending the Stalinist era. In 1953, a politician in the USSR who fell from power would have been shot; in 1964 Krushchev was simply booted out, given a pension and made to shut up.

It's hard to imagine anyone having better access to Khrushchev's contemporaries, and Taubman puts an astonishing story together for us in a beautuifully understated way.

First off, I read the British printing not the U.S. - but I assume it's the same text.

The entire book left me feeling like I was not getting much. It's an immense book and the writing is tight so it is covering a lot of ground.

But... I kept finding myself asking, what was going on here. Why did this event happen. Why did Khrushchev do this and not do that.

The most egregious example is when he was removed from power - there is nothing about how it happened. The book jumps from he is absolute ruler to two days after he has lost all power. Who did it? How did they pull it off? What did Khrushchev do if anything to try and retain his power? You won't find out here.

And then there is the central question that makes Khrushchev such a fascinating person - how did he survive under Stalin, helping in many of the purges, yet when he took over, virtually eliminate state sanctioned murder. On this subject the book talks a little, but so very little.

The banal and boring parts of his life are here. The interesting parts are not.

My mom -- white bread, Communist-fearing, life-long Democrat -- has always had a soft spot for Nikita Khruschev. "I just don't think he was that bad. He couldn't have been that bad if he cried after President Kennedy died." This book vindicates my mom. He really *did* cry after Kennedy died -- although it's not clear how much that was due to grief and how much that was due to the realization he'd have to work with a US president with some actual political experience and ties in LBJ. (No word on how my mom knew about the crying thing....KGB files have now been closed).

But even if Nikita Sergeyevitch, right hand man to Stalin, participant(however distasteful) in the Ukraine purges, cold war bully to Kennedy's (and to some degree Eisenhower's) naivete, and shoe banger extraordinaire wasn't Mr. Sentimentality, this book divulges a lot about him we can be grateful for. And in looking at the darker side of this major player of the 20th century, Taubman excels at helping us understand him from all angles: his son Sergei, Khruschev's own papers, the historical record here and in Russia, and indeed the correspondence between Khruschev and Kennedy, which began during the Cuban Missile Crisis and did not end until the fall of 1963 (both undoubtedly expected it to continue).

The last is indeed the most poignant, perhaps just for the American reader, perhaps for all of us, since it does signify the attempts of two great but flawed leaders to struggle with the immense burden on their shoulders and try to come to some kind of understanding for the sake of their nations. In doing so, they seem just about to build a friendship.

I found the book a bit too long, and would like the prose to have gone at a more clipping pace. Better editing may have helped. But I will read it again someday and I'm glad to have it on my shelf. I don't see how it could become outdated or lose its importance.

I have noted in a review of Death of A Salesman that Arthur Miller had a good ear for the foibles and traumas besetting the ordinary people of the old middle class, here upper middle class, put up against the wall in a world that was dramatically changing after World War II. The difference between success and failure is sometimes very close. As we know Willie Loman did not make it. In the final analysis Joe Keller the `hero' of this play does not make it either.

Here Miller gets to take a peek at the strivings, legal and illegal, of a small time capitalist, Keller, who in the afterglow of success via lucrative government war contracts is confronted with exposure and ruin. That his factory's `shoddy' work may have contributed to own his son's death in war and that a co-conspirator in his governmental dealings, his partner, is slated to be the fall guy only add to the moral tension of the drama. Is this Arthur Miller's best drama? No, Death of a Salesman is the one that will stand throughout the ages. Nonetheless this is a thought provoking look at a modern moral dilemma concerning personal responsibility in a maddeningly impersonal world and deserves a read.

Betrayal and denial run rampant through Arthur Miller's play, All My Sons. This play brings to light the effects of war profiteering on those who participated in it, as well as those who benefited from it. Miller's first successful play, All My Sons is a precursor to his most famous work, Death of a Salesman, both of which deal heavily with the relationship between father and son. The play is in three acts, the first of which serves as an introduction to the Keller family and their neighbors. As the play progresses, the action heats up and the consequences of the characters' actions are revealed.

World War II has been over for a few years and the Keller family is still adjusting back into their normal lives. The family consists of Joe and Kate Keller and their son, Chris. Larry, the other son, was reported missing 3 years earlier, but Kate refuses to believe that her precious son is dead. Larry's fiancée, Ann, is staying with the Keller's because Chris hopes to marry her.

The trouble really begins when Ann's brother, George Deever, comes to take Ann away and prevent her from marrying Chris. Although George and Ann grew up with the Kellers, George harbors deep resentment towards Joe Keller. During the war, Joe's manufacturing plant made alot money by selling airplane parts to the Army. One day, Steve Deever, George's father, made a batch of defective parts. The parts were sent out anyways and both Steve and Joe were sent to jail, but Joe was not convicted and went home free. George believes that Joe was the one who told Steve to ship the defective parts. Whose fault is it that twenty one pilots died because of the parts and what does it have to do with Larry Keller?

This play reveals the seedy events that occur during wartime and the never ending pursuit of the American Dream. Sixty years after it was written, All My Sons remains relevant today in both its themes and entertainment value.

A challenging aspect within great literature plays is to find out why the title was named so, whether the title is hidden metaphorically or literally. The title for Miller's first successful play, and not as well-knows as Death of a Salesman, derives from a line "they were all my sons", when the main character, Joe Keller, refers to the twenty-one P40 pilots killed because his company knowingly shipped out cracked cylinder heads.

Although sent to prison for 14 months, he was exonerated, because he shifted the blame to his worker, Herb Deever, who still sits in prison.

The emotional drama is lengthy and considered in the book series Best American Plays from 1945-1951 edited by John Gassner. The themes run gamut from family, employment, greed, betrayal, denial, lies, anguish and most of all, responsibility. The plot evolves, a twist here, and a turn there! Pain, sorrow and confusion permeate the mood. And like Miller's plays, there are lengthy emotional monologues.

Set in the back yard of a home in an American town, it takes place in one long night and it opens as family keeps remarking on the tree planted for their 27 year-old son Larry, missing-in-action for 2 years, and some presume him dead. The broken tree keeps popping up throughout conversations as it is symbolic of the demise of the family.

The night the tree breaks, the chain of action begins. Larry's girlfriend Anne is expected to come back to town, but now, she is about to marry Chris Keller, the other brother. The tension & conflict arises because, once childhood neighbors to the Kellers, Anne and her brother, George, now an attorney, are the children of the man, Herb Deever, the one who was forced to take the blame for the death of twenty-one pilots.

Like most plays, they are always better than the movie versions, (if any). If you see an exact play performed, then it is worth it. ......But the books are always better....MzRizz

I recommend two excellent Miller plays:
A View from the Bridge (Penguin Plays):
The Price (Penguin Plays)

The story line of this family tragedy centres on an entrepreneur's/ manager's bad decision under heavy pressure: deliver a faulty product even when you know it can cause serious problems to the customer? Try to hide the product flaws? Or risk the ruin of the enterprise? And once started on the wrong trajectory, do you accept accountability or do you put the blame on a weaker link in the chain?
This basic dilemma is known to everybody from politics to business life.
Miller wrote this play after WW2, and his example of the problem are faulty cylinder heads delivered to the airforce under time pressure.
The man who did it compounded his crime by dodging truth and letting another man go to jail.
The families of both men are heavily interrelated and as it turns out, the damage is unreparable. Not just to the crashed pilots, but also to sons and daughters.
Reading the play now gives me a feeling of meeting a stereotype, but then, was the theme really as well explored at the time as it seems now? Quite possibly Miller was a pioneer in it, I don't know. I give only 4 stars because the play is a bit over-didactic.
I have not researched this, but I seem to remember that Miller got some flack from the McCarthy-committee for this play. Must have looked awfully un-American apparently, to explore questions of accountability. Certainly not a tradition in presidential circles.
P.S. I read an old interview with Miller where he says that he got 'invited' to the committee only because the guys were hoping for a photo shooting with Marilyn.

The late Lord Bertrand Russell once said, "Actions have consequences." Arthur Miller makes it clear: Bad actions have bad consequences in his early play, "All My Sons." Set not long after the end of World War II, the play concerns big issues: life and death, and the necessity of living a moral life. The conflict pits the idealistic son, Chris Keller against his pragmatist father, Joe Keller, owner of a manufacturing plant that shipped out defective airplane parts during the war. As a result, twenty-one pilots died when their planes crashed.

This early play foreshadows the disillusionment by the son of the father that plays so predominantly in "Death of a Salesman," the flagship of Miller's dramatic output. Miller also introduces the idealist's version of moral behavior. When younger son Chris discovers his father's flawed decision to continue production of cracked engine parts, he berates him for lacking the high caliber of character of which he thought his dad was made. His father sincerely asks Chris: "What could I do?" The key line and one which comes to fruition in "The Crucible" is "You could be better." Actions have consequences.

Yes, I am revealing a key secret in the play, but it is the consequences of this revelation that is really the clincher of Miller's powerful morality play. That I will not reveal. But lack of idealism, lack of moral turpitude show the inner essence of a person. Everyone is born with this pure core. Time and circumstances chip away, a day at a time, a person's idealism. Only the few survive. Joe Keller has revealed a seriously hacked core; Chris's is still intact. But at what price?

Two other stories deal with the consequences of idealism. Miller's The Crucible (Penguin Classics) shows John who can confess to witchcraft (although not guilty) and live, or deny his involvement, be found guilty, and die. He must sign a document; in doing so, he besmirches his name. Because of his idealism: "It is my name, I have no other," he cannot sign and thus dies. In the other story, Gone Baby Gone Casey Affleck's character believes it to be just to turn in the kidnapper and return the child to her neglectful mother and a probable miserable life, or leave the child with the kidnapper who would inevitably give the child a good home. Each decision shows the impact of idealism. Actions have consequences. Good or bad?

Chris forces his father to acknowledge his misdeed by realizing he caused the pilots' deaths. Joe says, "Yes, they were all my sons." Even this is not the end of the misdeeds. Two other secondary plots involve moral choices and evil consequences when morality is not chosen. Ann Deaver, the girl next door who was engaged to the older brother when he went to war, and now recently engaged to Chris, must live with a flawed decision she made. The other plot line goes to Ann's father and the consequences surrounding him.

"All My Sons' is a powerful play that holds up to scrutiny an American story of success at a high cost and the devastation that malignant success brings to so many others. With this play Miller established himself as a major talent and voice of conscience which would become so important in "The Crucible" and McCarthyism to come.

They only have the Gideon Bibles in the state pen
I sent this one and he likes it

This Living Bible is such a blessed book of God. It is so understandable that most grade school children would understand reading it. I am so glad that I purchased this Bible. What I like to do is first read the King James version and then read this Living Bible. You'd be amazed how it breaks words down to where it in all understandable. I give a 10 thumbs up for this Living Bible. GOD BLESS YOU ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I really enjoy reading my Living Bible. It is written in today's language. It is very easy to understand.

While I certainly wouldn't use this translation as my primary Bible, it is a nice introduction to the Bible. It is a highly readable translation, in part because it is a paraphrase, which some say makes it less reliable. I think though that it is only a problem if you are a biblical scholar. Otherwise, I don't see why this translation wouldn't work for you.

I love this translation. It is paraphrased, so being aware of that is essential. So is having the living word in your heart, that is where this translation is very sucessful.

Most folks read books like they eat donuts or fast food hamburgers: gobble, gobble, gloomph, swallow, is that all? what's next? If approached that way, Njal's Saga may well disappoint, as the Iliad and the Odyssey may well disappoint, or much of Shakespeare may well disappoint, or Moby Dick, or Canturbury Tales, the Bible, Dante, or a few more, may well disappoint. The trick with all of these is that each in its own way creates a world, and it just takes a bit of tme to do it.

Everything about Njal's Saga is alien (unless you're a viking, one supposes). The Magnusson translation is the only one I've read; it works for me. It rises to the level of great literature in its own right - and it's very readable.

And here's the magic: there comes a point when, after getting somewhat familiar with the thing with a read or two, and perhaps some time as a bedside or traveling book, it all just plain comes absolutely vividly alive! Alive in ways that no other book achieves. And it all makes sense. There are lots of reasons for this, of course - this not the place to explore them.

Would you like to be a Xth century Icelander? It's a beautiful and dangerous world of formidable men and women - but here is the door, if you care to enter.

I would recommend Njal's Saga as a primer on anarchy. Not the theoretical, Emma Goldman philosophical anarchy, but anarchy as it manifests itself "on the ground" as anthropologists like to phrase it.

Njal's Saga is a great piece of literature concerning how the early Norse settlers of Iceland, often themselves outlaws back in Norway, dealt with lawlessness. The main theme is stated by Njal himself. "With laws our nation will be built up." This sentiment is echoed by several other characters throughout the tale. Another saying, uttered by more than one person is, "The hand is soon sorry it has struck," and provides the awful counterbalance propelling the plot. For here we find a historic locale in which each man must execute justice and law for himself because medieval Iceland was a place of no central authority. Therefore, only men powerful enough themselves, or with enough powerful friends, could exact just retribution for injuries sustained by their neighbors. Men were driven by a warrior honor code that forced them to take up arms or lose face and the whole saga is full of a sense of dreadful irony of how just causes are perverted by resorting to violent solutions. This society is reminiscent of Odysseus' description of the cannibal Cyclops' society where each father is a law unto his wife and children and they meet in no just assemblies. The old Icelanders had their national assembly, the Althing, and while it could render decisions based upon law imported from Norway, it was left to the aggrieved individual to exact the sentence. Therefore, Gunnar of Hlidarende could ignore the sentence of outlawry and not leave the country and his enemies were therefore free to kill him in his home without fear of legal reprisal. Njal's Saga is an actual account of what anarchy is like in a remote society based upon powerful males trying to dominate all the land and people they could based on individual might and wit and prestige. The United States prides itself on being a nation of laws and not of men. Medieval Iceland was a settlement of contending personalities, each trying to adapt traditions from the old country to their individual benefit, with no central executive authority to carry out sentences in the name of the common good. So men pursued vengeance and blood begat blood as original justifications became obscured. In other words, traditions minus authority still equals anarchy. Read Njal's Saga and you can imagine the tragedy of being a law unto yourself.

Marc Ladewig
author of Odysseus: The Epic Myth of the Hero

This translation of the famous Icelandic saga was extremely readable and was helped by having geneologies in the back as well as a glossary of the main characters, listing each of the chapters in which they appeared and a one or two word summary of what they did in that chapter. Since many of the characters have the same names, that is helpful. I had another version and it was not anywhere as readable.

Njals saga is one of the great works of world literature, worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as the Iliad, King Lear, the Divine Comedy, and Don Quixote. It toughminded, witty, socially and politically astute and has the best tough guy in all literature, even beating out Achilles and Beowulf: Skarphedin Njalsson. For some inexplicable reason Penguin retired this brilliant, not to be surpassed, translation of Magnus Magnusson with a rather lame effort with nothing to recommend it. To get the real feel for this saga, read the Magnusson translation.

This is a highly readable translation (although not the only one) of a work of literature that has several familiar names. In full, it is "Brennu-Njals Saga," or "The Story of Burned Njal," but just plain "Njals-Saga" is equally correct. And, like several other sagas, it has a nickname in its native Iceland, "Njala" (like "Grettla," for "Grettir's Saga"). It is generally conceded to be the outstanding monument of a burst of literary productivity at the very edge of medieval European civilization. For those who know it, with its unforgettable portraits of men and women presented through their responses to the events that entangle them, it has a place alongside the great novels of modern Europe. It demands patience of the reader; although it starts off with a couple of resounding scandals, including a Queen-Mother's affair with a handsome Icelander, before plunging into disputes over property, and who stole the hay, and wise advice that is never followed. (There are certain resemblances to Westerns; including the problem of subsistence in an unforgiving environment, and the critical importance of a reputation.)

Magnus Magnussson and Hermann Palsson made the decision to give a plain-language version, which I think has stood up well for over forty years (first published 1960). On my first reading I found the Introduction, Genealogical Tables, Glossary of Proper Names, Note on Chronology, and maps, all very useful. It has been supplanted in the Penguin Classics list by a new translation by Robert Cook, but I hope that this older version will continue to remain available. (Penguin sometimes has two, or even three, translations of a given work in circulation.)

"Njal's Saga" is, like several others, a long account of cascading disputes between farmers, and the resulting fights and lawsuits, broken up with voyages and adventures in Viking-Age Europe. (There are a great many shorter ones on the same basic pattern, generally less complex and diverse.) "Njala" includes a famous account of the official conversion of Iceland to Christianity, and a description of the Battle of Clontarf in Ireland, just over a decade later -- both apparently drawn from pre-existing accounts, and both inserted into the sequence of events quite naturally, although possibly with some violence to chronology.

The co-translators' most dramatic departure from the Icelandic text was the decision to relegate most genealogical descriptions of characters to footnotes. Many chapters begin something like "There was a man named A who lived at B. He was the son of C, son of D, son of E, who was the first who came to B, and he was the son of F, son of G, the kinsman of ..." Those of us who persist in reading the major sagas will soon learn to decipher such passages to mean either, "A came from a famous family, and would have many allies in a dispute," or "A was a complete nobody, whose most notable ancestors were famed only for being violent and unreasonable." Until then, these paragraph-long descriptions are just a jumble of names -- there is a "Monty Python" routine based on that impression, which is very, very funny if you know the sagas; and, I am told, amusing anyway if you don't.

"Njala" has had a long series of translations from its original Old Icelandic into other languages -- there is a whole book on its "reception" into other literatures, "The Rewriting of Njals Saga: Translation, Ideology, and Icelandic Sagas," by Jon Karl Helgason. And it bulks large in Andrew Wawn's "The Vikings and the Victorians,' because it received a magnificent first translation into English, by George Webbe Dasent, "The Story of Burnt Njal, or, Life in Iceland at the End of the Tenth Century," pubished in 1861. Dasent had begun work in 1843, but the whole subject was still so unfamiliar that Dasent, probably wisely, spent a good part of the two-volume first edition just explaining medieval Iceland to his readers. This material was dumped in later, one-volume editions of Dasent's translation, including the Everyman's Library reprint of 1911, which got a new introduction and select bibliography by E.O.G. Turville-Petre in 1957. It was available in paperback in the 1970s, in competition with the Penguin Classics translation.

Dasent's "Burnt Njal" has many merits, even today. Unfortunately, between Dasent's decision to imitate the Icelandic vocabulary and sentences, and changes in English since the 1850s, many will find his prose indigestible; and the 1772 edition of the saga he was using is now *very* obsolete. For those who want a look, there is an HTML edition on-line; the translator's name is there given as DaSent. Modern readers can turn to Jesse Byock's "Viking Age Iceland" for an equivalent of Dasent's introduction and appendices, with their maps and diagrams; it is much more readable, as well as much more reliable. And I would certainly make the suggestion of Magnusson and Palsson as a better place to start with Njal and his associates.

Another alternative is the American-Scandinavian Foundation's 1955 "Njal's Saga," translated by Carl F. Bayerschmidt and Lee M. Hollander. For American readers it had the slight advantage of not being quite so British in tone as the Penguin translation (let alone the mid-Victorian Dasent!); but it seems to have been available in recent years only in a 1998 paperback from a British publisher, in the "Wordsworth Classics of World Literature" series, with a new introduction by Thorsteinn Gylfason. It too has maps, family trees, and notes.

There is a substantial critical literature on "Njal's Saga," some of it in English. Richard F. Allen's old "Fire and Iron: Critical Approaches to Njals Saga" is very literary in approach. Jesse Byock's "Feud in the Icelandic Saga," which argues that behavior in the sagas reflects real social patterns, has thirty pages on this saga (Chapter 9, "Two Sets of Feud Chains"), which I think are brilliant; but probably most helpful to those who already know the story, and can appreciate how he makes connections between scattered-looking events.

For those who find "Njala" a bit too long to start with, there are variety of other sagas in excellent translations -- and also some not-so-good translations. Going strictly by the sagas themselves, other good places to start would be "Laxdaela Saga," which shares some important characters, scenes and events with "Njala," "Grettir's Saga," the story of a famous outlaw, with some wonderful accounts of battles with supernatural as well as human enemies; and "Egil's Saga" (Egils Saga Skallagrimssonar; "Egla" for short), which is closer to the popular idea of an Icelandic saga. The hero is a warrior-poet, brilliant, bad-tempered, and remarkably ugly; he takes after his grandfather, who was nicknamed "Evening-Wolf," and suspected of being a shape-shifter, and Egil spends much of his time on Viking adventures abroad, instead of tending the flocks ... .

Incidentally, "Njala," "Laxdaela," and "Egla" all contribute, along with the master-narrative of Snorri Sturluson's "Heimskringla" (a long saga-history of the Kings of Norway) to the late Poul Anderson's fine historical novel, "Mother of Kings," which is another approach to the world of the sagas.

I have enjoyed Ehrlich's writing style, very poetic descriptions about the ice and the people. She switches back and forth between her own experiences and historical expeditions, and the contrasts are interesting.

This amazing book opened my eyes to the Inuit culture and homeland in a most unexpected way. I really bought it hoping to learn something about Inuit kayak hunters, but that aspect of Inuit hunting life is not heavily covered in the book. Instead, the author takes us on many wonderful journeys by dogsled and gives the reader a most fascinating viewpoint - right behind the dogs. We experience the hard but thrilling life of the skilled Arctic hunter as described by an articulate passenger in the sled, and in that way we come to know the people of the north country in a most sympathetic way.

I recommend this book to anyone who loves beautifully written adventures. They are here.

Not being a fan of travel books, my comments may be biased. Years ago when I wandered the globe, my desire was to live as a part of the places in which I found myself. I made a terrible tourist. I mostly wanted to go where I could speak the language of the natives and getting a letter home took weeks. The world isn't like that any more, nor maybe has it so been for a while for tourists and travel writers. The four books by Gretel Ehrlich I have read run the gauntlet. "This Cold Heaven", tells of her visits to Greenland between 1995 and 2001. It best conveys a feel of what life is like for, maybe the last generation of, Inuit hunters who use dogsleds. And out on the sled is where Ms Ehrlich most wants to be. It is a beautiful book interspersed with Rasmussen's, diaries and descriptions of his life in the north. The reader gets a sense of how the Inuit world is put together, its roots, some differences between various groups and the challenges it faces, at the edge of the internet age. The greatest changes, to a relatively remote First Nation in Canada I am familiar with, were brought about by television. A kind of passivity set in: no more making music and living by one's body became less central. When dogsled, hunting Greenlanders tell Ehrlich that they just want to give their children the experience of the hunt and that the children will decide in their turn whether they will live that way, I sense she is documenting the last of the dogsled hunts. In my First Nation, the elder who last used dogs is now too old, so four wheelers and snow mobiles are a way of life.

What I lose patience with in Ehrlich's writing is most manifest in her book, "Questions of Heaven." She goes to China in search of Buddhism during the early stages of "getting rich is good." I don't quite understand her purpose except relating the difficulties of travel, telling anecdotes about some Chinese and their experiences from "let a thousand flowers bloom" to the cultural revolution, and her frustrated search. She goes to decayed monasteries which are just beginning to be opened to tourists. She is overwhelmed by the density, filth, poverty, pollution, etc. of China. Had she done some homework, all this wouldn't be such a revelation. In the Tibetan areas, she mentions the existence of Tibetan speaking westerners but does not explore who they are and why they are there even though she says she practices Tibetan Buddhism. The most interesting part of the book are her descriptions of the old man who was tortured during the cultural revolution and survived to resurrect traditional forms of music with a rag tag bunch of people from his valley. She doesn't explain why where he lives is more prosperous and happy than other places she visits.

What I find difficult in many nature/travel writers she pours on in this book. Flowery language describing clouds, hills and landscape doesn't do much for me. I have spent much time out of doors. I could wax poetic about the blood red bark of an old manzanita in contrast to the peeling orange brown of a madrone, or the stages of a slime mold or a clown nudibranch grazing urchins. The silence of the redwoods, desiccated by summer dryness just before the coming rains, filled my yesterday's walk. No signs of animal life but a few dragonflies and a fleeting flock of bushtits. A few days earlier I had used "dead" to describe it to a walking companion, and she was a bit offended. A precontact California Indian would have known what I meant. Ehrlich evens makes mention of it during her recovery in California related in book four. But it takes more than poetic adjectives to convey a scene in nature. Reading lengthy passages of romantic descriptions of nature becomes tedious. I want to know why Ehrlich travels and writes, how the places she goes are assembled, the role landscape plays, their history, their challenges, the differences among their inhabitants, etc. If her book is the journey of an American Buddhist, there is very little critical relating to Buddhism except that either nobody she meets practices meditation, even chanting, or she doesn't inquire about it.

The other two books, "Solace of Open Space," and "A Match to the Heart," fall somewhere in between. The former is good in the beginning, particularly in the descriptions of sheep herding, but becomes spotty after her marriage and life ranching. Ehrlich has really lived in Wyoming. She earned her spurs. But it would be great to know more about the strong, silent herders and ranchers: who are they; what is their inner landscape like; what are the tensions and rewards of working as they do? How does machinery effect their lives? During my brief stint as a cowboy, besides pushing cows between gigantic pastures, and sorting out the non-pregnant ones, I spent days building fences and hours in a four wheel drive pickup bouncing off-road. The chapters on the rodeo and Sun Dance give us far too little information on what these institutions are really like and what makes them tick. Ehrlich is also a tease when it comes to her personal life. We learn of the tragic death of her boyfriend which leads to her to stay in Wyoming, but the stuff of her one affair and her marriage are only hinted at. She is a beautiful woman in cowboy country. There has got to be more to it.

In the last of the foursome, "A Match to the Heart," she is truck by lightening and relates her torturous recovery. It is a touching book. I have a lot of empathy with her struggle. Her descriptions of the deep humanity of her cardiologist are beautiful. But the book also leaves me a bit unsatisfied. The husband who doesn't seem to care, her trip to London, which seemed so inappropriate given her physical condition, the people with whom she connects but also seems distant from---I want to know more about her inner processes, her meditation practice. "A Match to the Heart" has aspects of a travel book, a chapter about being on a boat in the Alaska Panhandle without any sense of why she is there: a paying tourist; a guest of scientists or friends? When Ehrlich is on the way to recovery she lays out a map of the world pondering where next. It is hard to fathom, that she runs off from her Wyoming ranch to far distant travels and undertakes similar jaunts during her absences from Greenland. When she casually mentions these, the style of life implicit in so bouncing around the world seems inconsistent with the sense of place she is trying to convey. I am deeply attracted to what she has to say when she really inhabits the places in which she spends, as they say, quality time. I guess I want more of that from her.
Charlie Fisher author of Dismantling Discontent: Buddha's Way Through Darwin's World

I really enjoyed this book, Gretel takes you with her in her travels and experiences to one of the most starkley beautiful places in the world.
great book to read in the heat of summer.
wonderful tales, wonderful author.
I could feel the ice, well reading this book.

great insightful book.....
one you will want to have on your shelves for ever.

In "This Cold Heaven", Gretel Ehrlich extolls the life of the subsistence hunters of Greenland. Her writing is really very nice and brought this remote place to life for me. Jared Diamond's "Collapse" gave us the picture of the european Greenlanders and now Ehrlich gives us the picture from the 'other side of the hill.'

The beauty of the environment and the struggle for sanity in the long dark made very interesting reading, having spent 20 winters in Minnesota where it is dark a mere 16 hours a day.

I'm not sure she takes her observations to their logical conclusion, however. The life she admires is that of the subsistence hunter. What makes it admirable for her is the totality of it, the self-sufficiency, the purity. But that life evolved out of necessity, which has been overtaken by modern life. Most Greenlanders live off the supply ships; only a handful hunt for a living. These few are restrictive in their practices, using rifles but eschewing outboard motors and snow mobiles, for example.

In other words they are playing an elaborate game of 'survival.' They could make it easier for themselves but they don't because it makes it more of a challenge. The fact is, there is no obvious reason for people to go around in dogsleds hunting walrus. They could be educating themselves for the future instead of clinging to an outmoded past.

I think she understands this. I say that because of the incident of the polar bear, where she urged that it not be killed. She accompanied the hunters by dogsled to polar bear country for the specific purpose of getting a bear. Then when it came time to pull the trigger she wanted the men to let it go.

In that moment she understood that synthetics are just as good as bear skin for keeping warm. Food can be gotten from the shelves thanks to the supply ships. Transportation to any place in the world is available. There is no longer any need to shoot polar bears in order to survive, and she knew it.

There is honor and purity in modernity, too. We meet Fred, who has been forecasting the weather at Thule for 27 years. I'm a forecaster, too. I can relate to Fred, and I understand why he has stayed there all this time. While his duties benefit the well-being of everyone on that base, he has undertaken a wider quest, that of comprehending nature and humanity in his specific setting. It is similar to that of the hunter, in that it is also an internal quest which reveals oneself.

Only Fred really knows why is there. Only Jens and Mikele really know why they go out on the ice to hunt. Fred could retire to Punta Gorda. Jens could go to Copenhagen and relax. Gretel slides past this whole matter. But then, her eyes were bothering her.

I am only part way through the first volume, but it is far enough into the works to gather an understanding of the maginitude of Swami Vivekananda's understanding and straight forward elucidation of Vedanta. His writings are intellectual in nature with a strong undercurrent of spiritual truth. He has the ability to stir within the mind something unspeakable through his words. This is a testament to his depth and understanding. So far, in this first volume, there is an ongoing feeling of freedom from creed and blind belief, and a very structured, scientific approach to living through Yoga. This will certainly appeal to those who are disheartened by orthodox faith, but still are religious minded and are a seeking for greater truth. Excellent!

In the moments of desperate help, this book has thought me how to hold my self together. It has made me a better person overall. I recommended this book to all of my friends and teachers. It is by far one of the most AMAZING book I have ever seen.

its irritating, but i need to regularly re-write my posts as experience dictates. the main idea behind Vedanta writing would seem to be 'realisation' (mukti or moksha). one becomes one with God. this is perhaps the big hindu thing, but it is also found in many mystical paths.
Vivekananda does not seem though to write too much about realisation of the ultimate ie becoming one with God, at least this (the impersonalist path) is not mentioned to the exlusion of the personalist paths in hinduism. the personalists believe in loving the object (God) whereas the impersonalists believe in becoming the object. i must say that i respect him for this. he is very flexible/free minded and must be called pretty open, in regards to things Hindu. he however is not so open to the truths found in other mystical paths such as the Christian, Moslem or Buddist paths and seems in my opinion to misunderstand them quite badly at times.

a serious error, though minute in regards to the main idea and experience of hinduism (if its taken to be union with God) is that one does not judge between good and evil (non-judgement). i have argued before that one understand evil (3), then good (2) in order to finally arrive at true good (1). it is too simplistic to say that good is evil and evil good... if one argues this then one is not aware of true goodness as a possibility, nor of the possibility that good be good as well as, or evil. sadly this illogic can lead to a form of indifference or a-morality, which in short... achieves nothing, only confusion and disharmony.

the big question... what is theosis, moksha/mukti... is this possible?. i guess that i just dont know, possibly, will just have to wait and see. but... if this is possible, its implications are miraculous and MOST important. however, i urge myself not to worry too much about self development and more on acceptance and love for others. this search for ones inner self, or union with god could be egotistical and self centred... ikku, the zen master said "the most important koan of all is, you." does not the True God look on others just as he looks on himself... with love and admiration. there is of course room for personal development but ultimately this development must take the focus away from oneself onto others... a dying to ones own needs in order to support and help others. this must be the ultimate expression of God/love. "To love and not to be loved" St Francis of Assisi.

i must say that i am very grateful to the publishers of this compendium of Vivekanandas work for providing it at such a bargain price. i would say however that the blessing, or injunction or whatever it was on the first book in the series was unhelpful. i would suggest that any hindu could benefit from reading these books, but keep an open mind.

with love from snow-flake. xxx

(many questions and answers unknown, and much uncertainty remains, but does one have to know?!).

This is an excellent work of Swami. I cannot express it in my words how great the work is. I think, everyone in the world must own a copy of this book.

Vivekananda was one of Ramakrishna's students. These books mostly depict the Swami's trips in behalf of Vedanta, in America and other countries. He writes beautifully and has simple, clear exposition. He does briefly describe the various types of Yoga. I did not find the books highly inspiring, and certainly not at the spiritual level of Autobiography of a Yogi.