On Great Literature (Featuring T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets)

Posted on October 7, 2020 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Four Quartets
Author: T. S. Eliot
Publisher: Mariner Books
Date: March 20, 1968
ISBN: 978-0156332255

When you go to pick up a book to read, what normally comes to mind is, “Where’s a good story I can sink my teeth into?” or “Where can I find some good romance and action?” These are fine reasons and reading is a great occupation regardless of what or why. But once in a while another motive ought to come up: “Where can I find a taste of the best writing, where the writer approaches the work as an artist?” Such a motive is bound to open up all kinds of new discoveries and interests in one’s reading habits.

Some of the most mouthwatering stories and intense drama occur in the realm of “great literature.” And there is nothing necessarily highbrow in the term “literature”—such literary artists as Swift, Poe, Dylan Thomas, and Capote have seen to that. You won’t find a more suspenseful romance than Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.

And you won’t find more intrigue and action than in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. What these writers do-that the so called “trash writers” don’t do is sweat and bleed over the placement of every word, agonize over the location of every paragraph.

Of course they also begin with a genius for writing, but disciplining that talent makes creating a work of art possible. This makes it literary art. But it doesn’t make it highbrow, it just makes it deeper or more interesting reading.

There’s a big difference between a good writer and a great writer. But the greatest difference applies to that distinction between a great writer and an artist. Posterity alone judges which writers endure as literary artists. The ingredients that make writing an art remain vague. They may be recognized by a consensus of those most involved in literary art, but such ingredients will never be quite explainable.

The closest one may come to an explanation is a poetic description appearing in T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets:

“ … where every word is at home,
Taking its place to support the others,
The word neither diffident nor ostentatious,
An easy commerce of the old and new,
The common word exact without vulgarity,
The formal word precise but not pedantic,
The complete consort dancing together …”

Poets are types of literary artists who don’t have the luxury of using a good story to support the form. They are one of the most overlooked groups of writers by modern readers. And no one sweats and bleeds over every word more than the poet. You may not find a juicy or compelling story, but you may find juicy and compelling thoughts; at the very least, thought provoking ways of looking at things. Every frame of mind and frame of reference can be explored in poetry. No other mode of expression is quite as capable of such blends of moods, from sensual to intellectual, violent to sublime, in such concentrated forms.

What follows is a passage of poetry which shifts from an intellectual expression to subtle sensual allusions:

“What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end,
which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened Into the rose-garden.
My words echo
Thus, in your mind.
But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves
I do not know.’’

It’s from T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. T.S. Eliot is one of those literary artists who has been looked kindly upon by posterity. (We are posterity for him.) He will most likely endure as the greatest poet of the 20th century. So if you do look for different kinds of reading once in a while, T.S. Eliot’s work is one good possibility. Whether it’s T.S. Eliot, Jane Austen, or Truman Capote, try some literature and see what happens.

Related Quote:

Reading Good Books Enhances and Lengthens Life

Great works of fiction are those with a more layered, complex investigation into the human condition, written in an artistic language resulting from painstaking development, so that it appears effortless.

Reading is a demanding process that yields deeper pleasure and more meaningful experience than movies and video. Every good book we read creates more depth in our thinking.

We also gain a deeper understanding of other people: “an influential study published in Science found that reading literary fiction (rather than popular fiction) improved participants’ results on tests that measured social perception and empathy, which are crucial to ‘theory of mind’: the ability to guess with accuracy what another human being might be thinking or feeling.”

It turns out we can enjoy our books longer as well, because reading them makes us live longer, according to another study: “Overall, the researchers calculated that book reading was associated with an extra 23 months of survival. … Reading magazines or newspapers didn’t have the same effect … it’s the deep engagement required by the narrative and characters of fiction, and the length of both fiction and nonfiction books, that increases cognitive skills and therefore extends lives.” Reading lengthens life (and improves the quality of it); watching TV shortens life (and destroys the quality of life). What a choice.

— Screenformation 2.0 (p. 86).

Happy Reading.

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Plato’s Phaedo and Its Theory of Forms: Conversations and Language Games

Posted on September 5, 2020 by rose-coutre

Title: Plato’s Phaedo
Author: Plato, Translated by Hugh Tredennick
Publisher: London: Penguin Books; First Edition
Date: January 1, 1954
ASIN : B0017DM39A

My first question upon reading Plato’s Phaedo was, “How and why did Plato invent the Theory of Forms?”

The “How” part of the question leads to a linguistic process (from the perception and naming of an object to the “perception” and naming of a Form) by which Plato commits a fallacy that leads to his Theory of Forms. For purposes of expedience, a single attribute (beauty) is used for this brief analysis. Plato commits an inductive fallacy regarding the existence of the Form for that attribute (the Form of the Beautiful). The same analysis could be applied to all attributes and objects to which Plato ascribes a Form.

The “Why” question leads to a brief psychological inquiry, treating the Theory of Forms as myth, similar in structure to Greek Mythology. The two have a similar psychological derivation which comes to light in an analysis of Plato’s invention of and experience with the Forms. First, the linguistic analysis will answer “how,” then a brief psychological analysis will provide an explanation “why.”

Socrates sees a flower. He considers its beauty, and how it is heightened by the beauty of the early morning, and the dew on the petals. He considers the beauty of the chance of circumstances that made him happen upon this flower on such a beautiful morning. The beauty of the morning diversifies in the cool morning breeze.

Later in the day Socrates converses with Plato. Socrates points out the beauty he finds in conversation. He says conversation is even more beautiful than his morning’s experience, and proceeds to give Plato an account of that experience so that Plato will understand what he is saying. This leads Plato to inquire,

“If we had been in conversation this morning, on that same path, would all of the beauty you beheld have been redoubled by the inclusion of our conversation, or would all of that beauty you just described to me have been made paltry and ugly by comparison with the beauty of our conversation?”

Socrates responds,

“Your theory from relativity should not be invoked here. We are talking about different kinds of beauty, and therefore they cannot be compared. One beauty would not make the lesser beauty ugly. The pleasure of experiencing different kinds of beauty at once would have increased the level of experience.”

Plato pursues this train of thought,

“It seems then that combining all these different kinds of beauty in an experience stimulates one to reflect upon beauty itself, a predicate that evokes reflection on the higher, more general Form. That is, the accumulation of the many manifestations of beauty, objects participating with beauty in different ways, begins to approximate something ultimate, the Ideal Form of the Beautiful. In fact, it is The Beautiful we unknowingly refer to when we talk about each manifestation of beauty in our experience.”

Socrates left Plato in this reverie.

Plato, deep in thought, did not notice that a very young man had been passing by, and had stopped to listen in on the conversation. The man wore a long black coat and rubbed his chin in a troubled manner. Wittgenstein approached Plato and introduced himself, and made the following comments.

“I couldn’t help overhearing your conversation. Now how can we refer to that which we do not really know? I mean, if I refer to beauty in a flower, I think I really mean the beauty only as it appears to me in my perception of that flower at that time. Yet you seem to say that unknowingly I refer to a Form, the Beautiful, from which this flower gets its beauty. But I know nothing of this Form, and yet somehow I refer to it. Perhaps if I can delineate the steps between your perception of an object and your supposition of the Theory of Forms, and what those steps entail, I will be able to point out where you have made a mistake. I believe we will find an inductive fallacy.”

The steps may be seen as forming a circle, beginning at the top of the circle with the hypothesized “object in itself” and ending with the “Form in itself,” superseding the original “object in itself” back at the top of the circle.

“Firstly, we never perceive the ‘object in itself.’ At most, we hypothesize the ‘real’ flower from our perception of qualities that we associate with flowers. These qualities are only those accessible to our senses. Part of our shared game in language is referred to as ‘naming.’ When many people point to the same object and say the word ‘flower,’ they share a language game for flowers. When many people point to the same object and say it is beautiful, they share a language game for beauty.

“The object in itself is remote from us, so we begin with our object-perception. We take a kind of attribute that in some way strikes us as attractive, or appeals to our senses in a certain way, and we name that attribute ‘beauty.’ After a series of object-perceptions, and attendant sensations of beauty (like those in Socrates’ morning experience), we build a variety, or ‘repertoire,’ of diverse characteristics of beauty. We now have double groupings of language games working together: e.g., ‘flower’ hooks into the flower-like object-perception; ‘beautiful’ hooks into an attribute that appeals to our senses in a certain way and is part-and-parcel of the flower-perception. I will call this an attribute-perception. Many people may share the new compound language game ‘beautiful flower.’

“Naming the ‘beautiful flower’ is like asserting a proposition as follows: ‘the object-perception I call flower and the attribute-perception I call beautiful occur in the world, and further, in the thing I’m pointing to.’ Thus, naming the ‘beautiful flower’ involves applying a (compound) language game which entails the above (complex) proposition. The language game is true if the name hooks into the real world (the described state of affairs corresponds to the state of affairs in the world). In other words, the language game is true if the proposition it entails is true. So, after experiences with many object-perceptions with attendant attribute-perceptions (‘beautiful’), we accumulate the above-mentioned repertoire of manifestations of beauty. We accumulate this repertoire from a series of true complex propositions, or a series of compound language games where we apply the name of the attribute ‘beautiful’ to a variety of object-perceptions. As a result, Socrates accumulated those non-comparable manifestations of beauty this morning. Each one involved a new language game and became part of his repertoire of ‘beautiful.’

“What I mean by each one involves a new language game is as follows: the things beautiful are beautiful in this way and in that way, each attribute-perception ‘beautiful’ being different, for which each language game hooks into the world in a different way (beautiful glimmer from the dew, beautiful color, beautiful shape, and so on). Each experience of a new manifestation of beauty develops a new language game and contributes to Socrates’ repertoire of ‘true meanings’ of beauty (remembering the above-stated conditions of ‘true’).

“Now that the repertoire of language games is built, one may be far from any flowers and utter the compound name ‘beautiful flower’. The utterance of the name in the absence of the object/attribute-perception referred to, conjures up an object of reflection or mental image of what the name refers to (the referent). To review, perception first triggers development of a language game in the naming process, and, in turn, later uttering the name triggers the language game which evokes the mental image of the thing named.

“This latter process, this utterance/language game/mental image process, occurs countless times every day. Also, in the case of Socrates reflecting on the varied manifestations of beauty of his morning’s experience, each mental image will carry ‘true meaning.’ The pattern, by countless repetition, becomes entrenched in the mind, almost an automatic assumption, that these mental images of things beautiful carry ‘true meaning,’ because they are evoked by names that trigger language games that are true (which hook into the world of object- and attribute-perceptions). Through this chain, each mental image is a true picture of a part of the world. Through the ongoing repetition of occurrences of this chain, a pattern is established that mental images are generally true, over and over again. From this pattern, induction leads us to believe that our mental images will always be true, just as induction leads us to believe that the sun will rise tomorrow morning, is true.

“Now, Plato, you have your repertoire of ‘beauty’ language games just as Socrates has his. The amalgam of ‘beauty’ language games taken together in contemplation causes a sort of set intersection. You extract and keep only the one general element they all have in common—’appealing to the senses in a certain way’—you project the element, create an abstraction, and name it ‘The Beautiful.’ By definition now, ‘The Beautiful’ can never not appeal to the senses in that certain way. Now you are working with an abstract amalgam in your mind of all things beautiful. So instead of starting with the object/attribute-perception in the world, you now start with your amalgamated mental image (your created abstraction). Now you are not naming anything in the real world (e.g., beautiful flower), instead, you are naming something entirely in your mind (i.e., beauty). But you treat it as you would treat an object/attribute-perception from the world. You name it (‘The Beautiful’) and develop a language game which triggers a mental image. Now when you utter ‘The Beautiful,’ the language game triggers a mental image of an amalgamated abstraction. You trigger a language game that hooks back into only your created abstraction in your mind, not in the world. It does not hook into any object/attribute-perception in the real world. But by induction you subconsciously take for granted that the language game will act the same for your created abstraction, that it will always be true.

Because the language game functions in a familiar way, you assume it is a true language game. You assume the compound name (Form of the Beautiful) represents a true complex proposition (an object ‘Form’ exists and furthermore, that object possesses ultimate Beauty which is beyond the beauty that any single object in the world can possibly possess). You have named ‘The Beautiful,’ so by induction you think your mental image must refer to something that must exist.

“The former language game (qua object/attribute-perception) hooks into the world—the latter language game (qua created abstraction) does not: it does not, because you claim the status of objectified reality for your Realm of Forms, not merely a reality of mind or conceptualization. The latter language game, false though it is, may be a powerful language game because it represents the link between, and the rarefied characteristic of, all the ‘beauty’ language games in your repertoire. It is the essential something that appeals to our senses in a certain way (by definition making it ultimately appealing), waiting for an object-perception to participate in it and take on the participatory form of attribute-perception.

You have not only a mental image, but a powerful mental image, and by induction as stated above, you conclude that this mental image (the Beautiful) is true, by which you conclude that ‘the Beautiful’ is true. This might be called the Platonic Inductive Fallacy of the Theory of Forms.

Thus you conclude that your mental image’s name ‘the Beautiful’ must entail a true language game, which we have seen is not the case. The language game fails because one can’t find an object/attribute-perception in the world that the name ‘the Beautiful’ hooks into. One only finds perceptions of particular combinations of types of beauty. That the language game fails, shows that ‘the Beautiful’ does not represent what is the case in the objective, real world.

“Of course, the Beautiful must reside somewhere, epistemologically speaking, or we couldn’t utter the name, for we can only name that which we can experience in some manner. The Beautiful is pure concept. It is a small step from the subjective concept of the Form to an inductive conclusion of an objective Form of the Beautiful. From there, because we do not see The Beautiful in the real world of our normal acquaintance, it is another small step to positing a ‘realm’ that accommodates the objective, rarefied Forms. Such a realm would accommodate not just the Beautiful, but all significant object- and attribute-perceptions. I believe you have posited such a realm, and call it, ‘The Realm of Forms.’ Because this Realm is rarefied, unchanging, and pure, you ascribe higher value to it. Finding the Unchanging, or the Unchangeable, has long been an intellectual and emotional holy grail. Investing a superior objective reality into a Realm of Forms seems to be the necessary outcome of the one inductive leap to the objective existence of the Form of the Beautiful. You have a ‘more real’ place with ‘more real’ things which affords the luxury (albeit an illusion) of ‘more real’ language games. The language game for The Beautiful hooks into a ‘more real’ world, which we can’t see. So you might say that the language game is somehow ‘more true,’ so true we cannot even experience it, because the place hooked into is too refined for our paltry senses. Unfortunately these hooks must remain your hypothesis, hooking only in your mind.

Nevertheless, this is a powerful illusion indeed. The theory is constructed, the Theory of Forms is in place, and exists in a place. A question remains: Why did the fantastical, myth-like nature of the final product not alert you to the problems in your reasoning immediately?”

By this time a crowd had gathered around the two men. A man by the name of Carl Jung stepped forward from the crowd in response to Wittgenstein’s last question. The ensuing conversation began with Mr. Jung.

“It may be that there is something more powerful yet at work behind the Theory of Forms. Deep in the unconscious, our myth-generating Archetypes contain information not available to conscious or rational thought. Primordial images were passed to us from primitive man, who lived in a preconscious state. These are myth-forming structural elements. The psyche wields such power that primordial images become reality, equal to or greater than the material world. They demand expression with metaphors borrowed from the material world. It might be said that myths are not invented, but experienced. They are thrust upon the conscious mind when the psyche reveals bits and pieces of an Archetype through metaphors provided by the conscious mind. The Realm of the Forms might have emerged from archetypal origins in Plato’s personal unconscious in much the same way that Greek Mythology emerged from Archetypes in the collective unconscious of Greek society. Ancient Greek culture is a setting amenable to the emergence of a Realm of Forms, an abstracted version of Mount Olympus. The mythical structure is similar as can be seen in the myth-structure of perfected beings/attributes: beauty perfected in Aphrodite is not far from the abstracted version in the Form of at least one type of Beautiful. Greek Mythology seems a likely influence in the structure of and experience with the Theory of Forms (‘experience’ as natural revelation from the Archetypal structure in Plato’s personal unconscious).

“Now consider the language game for the Beautiful—it hooks into a reality at least as substantial as the material world. Does this not make it ‘true’ given your conditions?

Wittgenstein was again rubbing his chin as he responded,

“No. The world to which language games must correspond is the world of object/attribute-perceptions. You may have hit upon a ‘substantial reality.’ Your ‘substantial reality’ is hypothetical and subjective in a way that the world of object/attribute-perceptions is not. A language game cannot be considered true when it hooks into a reality that is only psychological and therefore not directly demonstrable. But even if it could be considered so, the reality you suggest is not the reality Plato claims for his Realm of Forms. Plato asserts an objective realm outside of and independent of yours and my psyches.

“Your primordial reality is as insubstantial as Plato’s Realm of Forms in the following manner: We never see, hear, or know of an object-in-itself; only object/attribute-perceptions. Similarly, the primordial reality, as well as the Realm of Forms, relies on inference from metaphors presented in the world of object-perceptions. Yours is a speculation of what lies behind the perception, a thing-in-itself. We cannot get beyond the world of object-perception, because by definition what is beyond it is what we cannot perceive. In such areas we can only speculate.

If language games hook into nothing (the result of talking about that which we cannot perceive), then we are talking nonsense. We talk about that which can have no objective meaning in our language. In this sense, the Theory of Forms and the Realm of the Forms have no coherence. That is, their names hook into only images, images that have no corresponding direct referent. Meaning was ascribed to them as a result of the Platonic Inductive Fallacy of the Theory of Forms.

Wittgenstein turned again to Plato,

“Mr. Jung’s comments helped clarify the totality of your predicament. As long as you claim an objectified status for the Realm of the Forms, you carry the mental image of the Form of the Beautiful unavoidably into your Inductive Fallacy. Now, if you say that your Theory of Forms is true, and that it is true that a Form may be an abstract amalgam of your ‘beauty’ language game repertoire compiled by your psyche, generated by your primordial imagination, existing only in your mind, then I concede that your Theory of Forms is true. However, I have not heard you say that. Therefore, as shown by your Inductive Fallacy, and because of the failure of your language game for the Beautiful, the Theory of Forms must be false.”

Plato seemed a little troubled. But he looked upon a nearby rose and smiled, “Nevertheless, the flower has beauty.”

Works Consulted

Jung, Carl G. “The Psychology of the Child Archetype.” In Essays on a Science of Mythology, pp. 70—100. Translated by R.F.C. Hull. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1973.

Plato. “Phaedo.” Translated by Hugh Tredennick. “Republic.” Translated by Paul Shorey. In Collected Dialogues, pp. 40—98, 75—844. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig. Notebooks 1914—1916. Translated by G.E.M. Anscombe, Edited by G.H. von Wright and G.E.M. Anscombe. New York: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1961.

My Related Book Reviews:

Hintikkas’ Investigation of Wittgenstein

Kant and Critique: New Essays in Honor of W.H. Werkmeister

Georg Henrik von Wright on Wittgenstein

Wolfram Eilenberger’s Time of the Magicians

My philosophy book:

Abstract Objects, Ideal Forms, and Works of Art: An Epistemic and Aesthetic Analysis

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P. V. LeForge’s Principle of Interchange

Posted on August 22, 2020 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Principle of Interchange and Other Stories
Author: P. V. LeForge
Publisher: Paperback Rack Books
Date: April 1, 1990
ISBN: 978-0962487804

A collection of sixteen stories, Principle of Interchange holds its share of surprises, mostly pleasant surprises. The subject matter varies widely: from an impoverished girl in Bombay who becomes a prophetic hero, to a downtrodden writer in Alaska who mainly corresponds with comic book publishers, to a troubled married couple in rural China where the woman’s mother-in-law keeps trying to kill her. Some stories are third-person, some first-person. The point of view works well in each case, and the imaginative plots provide compelling reading experiences.

The most important quality to me is how well written a book is. This volume is very well written from beginning to end. There are subtle changes of style supporting the substance of the stories, and this is done very effectively. LeForge clearly takes his craft seriously, because the sentences are æsthetically pleasing and seem effortless (which takes enormous effort).

To me, the most excellent stories were “Bowl of Sunshine,” “Abe Mott,” “Railroad Days,” “In Canton,” and “Vandals.” That is not to speak less of the others—the front-to-back experience was a true literary pleasure, and a lot of fun to read. On a personal note, I enjoyed the references to places in Tallahassee, Florida in “Railroad Days” as I had lived in that city several decades ago.

Don’t let the flowery book cover mislead you, the writing is strong, disciplined, well crafted, smooth, and clean. It is not flowery. I happily recommend this book to anyone who likes to read.

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Bennett Cerf’s At Random

Posted on August 2, 2020 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: At Random
Author: Bennett Cerf
Publisher: Random House
Date: March 5, 2002 (origin. 1977)
ISBN: 978-0375759765

Bennett Cerf founded Random House in 1927. It was privately held until going public in 1959. Over the next couple of years Random House acquired Alfred A. Knopf and Pantheon Books, then Ballantine Books in 1973.

Over the years Random House published (and Cerf was acquainted with) many of the time’s literary stars. He worked with William Faulkner, Eugene O’Neill, Gertrude Stein, André Malraux, Sinclair Lewis, James Joyce, George Bernard Shaw, Dr. Seuss (Theodor Seuss Geisel), US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), and many others.

Cerf was also friends from a young age with others who started other publishing houses. For example, two of his friends in college include Richard Simon and Max Schuster, who later formed the publishing house Simon and Schuster. His close friend Harold Ross founded the New Yorker magazine. Ross introduced Cerf to Ginger Rogers’ cousin Phyllis Fraser, who Cerf soon married. Bennett and Phyllis were married in New York City Hall, officiated by Mayor La Guardia (after whom the airport is named). Cerf later became a good friend of Alfred A. Knopf and other publishers, all of whom were concentrated in New York City and saw each other regularly.

Cerf himself wrote many best-sellers, wrote popular columns, had radio shows and appeared as a regular on the TV show What’s My Line for about ten years. He had an eventful life, right at home in the stratosphere of the literary world, the NYC hub of publishing greats.

Cerf died in 1971. He had written this book, but had not published it yet. It was published posthumously in 1977. The book is well written, as expected, given Cerf’s writing talent, and also given that the best editors in the world worked on it.

This book serves as both autobiography of Cerf and history of Random House and of twentieth-century publishing in general. The storyline merges the histories of Cerf and Random House seamlessly with many delightful encounters and personal experiences. There were endless memorable episodes throughout Cerf’s exciting life at the center of New York City’s brightest lights. From the giants of publishing to the wackiest oddball authors, Cerf was at home among them all, and shares it with us. Anyone interested in twentieth-century history, biography, book publishing as it used to be, or just a compelling story with an amazing cast of characters, this book is for you.

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Myrtle Scharrer Betz’s Yesteryear I Lived in Paradise

Posted on July 26, 2020 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Yesteryear I Lived in Paradise: The Story of Caladesi Island
Author: Myrtle Scharrer Betz
Publisher: University of Tampa Press
Date: October 1, 2007
ISBN: 978-1597320337

Myrtle Scharrer Betz wrote Yesteryear in 1981. She describes her father’s life (Henry Scharrer) from April 1883, age 23, when he arrived in America (from Switzerland) to December 23, 1934 when he died. The story ends there. The only mention of Henry’s prior life in Switzerland was that he had spent three years serving in the Swiss Army as a sharpshooter.

The book is also autobiographical from the time Myrtle herself arrived on the scene (bn. February 22, 1895). Henry Scharrer married Kate McNally April 14, 1894. Kate died in April 1902 when Myrtle was only 7. So there isn’t much information about Mrs. Kate Scharrer.

The focus is on Henry’s homestead on Hog Island or “Scharrer’s Island” (later Caladesi Island) near Clearwater, Florida, where Henry obtained 156 acres in 1892. But the book starts earlier with a fascinating saga of Henry spending five years exploring the West, still the “American Wild West” of the 1880s and 90s. Henry traveled by stagecoach and train, working many types of jobs such as farming at harvest time, ranching roundups, and all-around “hiredman” jobs as he traveled. He described his adventures in letters to his family in Switzerland, and those letters were reprinted as a feature in the local Swiss newspaper.

Henry traveled from Wisconsin to North Dakota. He eventually bought a horse (named “Pet”), traveled on to Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, and on to San Francisco. There are many memorable encounters and episodes along the way. From California, he sold his horse, took a train back East to New Orleans, and from there a ship to Tampa, Florida. In Tampa, he worked construction, building the Tampa Bay Hotel (owned by Railroad Magnate Henry Plant), which later became Tampa University.

In Tampa, Henry bought a 30-foot boat. It was now 1892, he finished his last day on the construction job, and sailed for the islands. Due to rough weather he ran aground in a small cove. The marker said “Hog Island.” Here he remained for the next forty-two years.

As Myrtle is a growing child, she becomes more prominent in her own story, the narrative aptly shifts from third-person (referring to “Henry”) to first-person (referring to “my father”), for the remainder of the book. The shift effectively brings the reader into a more personal feeling about the story, as though Myrtle were in the room talking to us.

People from across the sound in Dunedin and Clearwater referred to Hog Island as Scharrer Island. Henry built a strong home that weathered a hurricane’s direct hit and many tropical storms. He raised hogs, caught a wide variety of seafood, and grew a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. In addition to feeding his family, he was very successful selling the “money crops” on the mainland.

Henry’s hospitality became famous in the area. For the next forty years, anyone docking there was sure to be greeted with a hearty meal, coffee, and conversation. Myrtle shares many episodes of visitors, how much she and her father enjoyed entertaining guests, showing them around the island, making new friends over the years. They had some famous visitors, such as WWI flying ace Eddie Rickenbacker, and poet Carl Sandburg.

Myrtle became expert at boating as well. In rough waters, she rowed her skiff alone across the sound to and from school every day, after getting up at 3 a.m. and finishing several hours of chores. She was never late to school, and missed only two days.

The time span covers interesting changes in technology as well. Myrtle’s first phonograph played cylinders, and later disc-shaped vinyl records. Water transportation was with Sailboats at first, then later changed to motorboats. Similarly on the mainland, horse-and-buggies changed to automobiles.

The latter pages recount her marriage to Herman Betz. Off and on they lived on the island with Henry or just across the sound in Dunedin. Henry and Herman became fishing partners and as the family grew (Herman and Myrtle had a daughter), they continued the island lifestyle.

Two of Myrtle’s granddaughters wrote very nice forwards to this edition. The book includes maps and a lot of black-and-white photographs of the island and the people. The book is a fascinating, personal story that is extremely well written and enjoyable to read. It’s a slice of history and a culture long gone.

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Daniel Defoe’s The Storm

Posted on February 15, 2020 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: The Storm
Author: Daniel Defoe
Publisher: Penguin Classics; New Ed edition
Date: May 31, 2005 (First published 1704)
ISBN: 978-0141439921

The Storm is centered on a hurricane that hit England, including London, on November 26–27, 1703. The strongest winds were approximately eighty mph sustained between 1:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m., and covered an area 300 miles wide. Defoe experienced the storm first-hand, and tells his account of the impact and the damage that he witnessed that morning. Defoe also published ads inviting residents across England to write-in their accounts, and that those accounts would be compiled in a book so that the storm would be remembered for posterity. Defoe mixed fact and fiction in his later writings, and may have done so to some extent in The Storm. As 19th-century critic William Minto notes, “it is possible that the letters are genuine, and that he compiled other details from published accounts.” (Daniel Defoe, Chapter III, by William Minto).

The letters from the public show great variety in the details of individual experiences with the storm. There were many tragic and sad deaths, and many miraculous escapes from death. The stories have a common theme of the severity of the storm. Many homes were demolished, roof tiles and other objects becoming deadly projectiles flying through towns. The strongest winds sweeping through at 1:00 a.m., most people had been in bed and so caught off guard (there were no weather forecasts to speak of in 1703). Defoe speaks of noticing the barometer being so low, he was sure one of the children had been playing with it, as it could not possibly go that low on its own. Many other households likely had the same experience. Even if they interpreted the barometric pressure accurately, there was little they could do in response that evening.

Defoe’s writing style is clear and very engaging in this book, though his writing is less than half of The Storm. Most of it comprises the write-in letters from the public in answer to Defoe’s invitation. The letters bring a local flavor that complements Defoe’s own account, and makes the reader feel closer to the experience on the ground.

The Penguin edition comes with an excellent introduction by Richard Hamblyn. It establishes the context of the times, and Defoe in relation to his audience and the establishment. For example, Defoe had spent time in prison recently for published attacks on high-level officials in Queen Anne’s government. He was released about a week before the storm hit (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Defoe#Pamphleteering_and_prison). Defoe was already a well-known “pundit” as we might call him today; before he had published any of his famous novels (The Storm was his first book).

The Penguin edition also includes a very helpful chronology and maps to give more context. The book represents a compelling slice of history, which sheds light on the culture of its time and place. I recommend The Storm to anyone interested in British history, world history, literature, or simply a good book to read.

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Bennett Cerf’s Great German Short Novels and Stories

Posted on December 26, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Great German Short Novels and Stories
Editor: Bennett A. Cerf
Publisher: Modern Library
Date: 1933
ASIN: B000BTPSYS

This collection of German short novels and stories includes works by Thomas Mann (Death in Venice), Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (The Sorrows of Werther), Johann Von Schiller (The Sport of Destiny), Heinrich Heine (Gods in Exile), The Brothers Grimm (Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella), Ernst Hoffmann (The History of Krakatuk), Hermann Sudermann (The New Year’s Eve Confession), Arthur Schnitzler (The Fate of the Baron), Gerhart Hauptmann (Flagman Thiel), Jacob Wassermann (Lukardis), among others.

These novels and stories represent a wide variety of types, genres, times, and styles. Reading one after another created a feeling of a great journey over many time periods and across many regions of Germany. As editor Bennett Cerf says in the Introduction, “…the reader who goes through this collection from beginning to end will be able to form an impression of the whole of German literature that is comprehensive and sound” (vii).

From the Sturm und Drang sentimentality of Goethe’s Werther, to the moral tales of Schiller’s Destiny and Hauptmann’s Flagman, to the folklore of Hoffmann’s Krakatuk, the vibrant literary translations were very refreshing and made the book hard to put down. One need not be a special fan of German literature per se. The book is simply a wonderful experience of a lot of great stories.

There is something for most any taste in literature. My advice for starters would be the short, lively pieces with nice twists at the end, such as Schnitzler’s Fate of the Baron and Sudermann’s New Year’s Eve Confession. For a deeper experience in a more literary vein, Mann’s Death in Venice is the best choice.

The beauty of this series is that the hard part has been done for us. Readers don’t have to hunt for representative German authors and their works. The book gives us a readymade set of the best examples gathered into a convenient collection. Generally, of course, that is the very purpose of the Modern Library series and the objective of its editors such as Bennett Cerf. Cerf does a great job of accomplishing that objective in this German collection.

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John Sitter’s Literary Loneliness

Posted on November 8, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Literary Loneliness in Mid-Eighteenth-Century England
Author: John Sitter
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Date: 1982
ISBN: 978-0801414992

For a critical study of a literary period, this book is a gem for readers who love history, literary insights, and good writing. This book is a well written investigation into a very small period of time—a very lonely little period of time—largely uncommented by scholars—lost in the background of two “more important” periods: after the “Age of Pope and Swift” and into the “Age of Johnson” (9). These are the years roughly between 1740 and 1760 in England.

Sitter starts with the philosopher David Hume and theological essayist William Law, and ends with novelists Henry Fielding and Samuel Richardson. In-between, we meet poets from Thomas Gray to William Collins, William Shenstone to James Thomson, who mark the transition from Augustan to Romantic influences. In this period there is a lot of death in poetry, and as Sitter phrases it, a flight from history. It represents a movement towards rural innocence, nature and passion, and away from the corruption of ambition, wit and public history: poetry over politics.

Sitter performs fascinating analyses of his diverse cast of characters showing their singular uniqueness. Along the way, he highlights each one’s loneliness of style in various ways. “…these images of seclusion are also metaphors for the solitary poetic imagination itself” (102). There is a lot of solitude, time to think deeply and carefully about life, and then in quiet solitude, write it all down for others to read, so readers may contemplate further in their own solitude. These are the Pleasures of the Imagination indeed, as Mark Akenside’s poem suggests, as we each experience Heaven’s Eternal Destiny for ourselves (160).

Later in the book Sitter focuses on comparisons between Fielding and Richardson. This section is especially stimulating for novel lovers. Starting out as opposites, the two seem to meld into each other over time. The competition and contrast between them interestingly reverses in their last works, each taking the other’s style as though to acknowledge and respect the talents of their adversary, a tip of the hat to the enemy as it were—i.e., Richardson’s Charles Grandison and Fielding’s Amelia. Through the creation of thousands of pages, two brilliant novelists end with an artistic salute to each other. This is how two artists struggling in solitude for many decades finally find themselves in relation to each other.

The theme of loneliness becomes a set of bookends for the critical text, stated early in the Preface and restated later in the Conclusion. The book introduces its theme in the Preface, “…the particular consciousness mid-eighteenth-century authors had of themselves as solitary writers for solitary readers that I have tried to characterize as ‘literary loneliness’” (9). The Conclusion restates it as “…the relation of solitary writers and solitary readers to the theater of public life” (215). The book is about the shared aloneness of writer and reader; and about how a lonely mind steeped in complex literary experience stands in relation to public society. This is classic sentimentality that many avid readers cherish in the deepest throes of literary life.

Sitter’s book is a cozy little study that true literary obsessed readers could curl up with and read straight through, easily (only 225 pages). It is well suited for a rainy windy morning sitting alone near a window as the drops blow across the panes. Sitter is a concise, artistic writer, with elegant style and logical arguments. These qualities add to the enjoyment as well as the substance of the work. They make the experience of this book’s content reinforce the theme: literary loneliness, in the best possible sense.

(Note: I read this book when it was first published in 1982, and re-read it in 2019 because I had a vague memory that it had been a delightful read. I remembered correctly, and very happy that I read it again.)

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Hintikkas’ Investigating Wittgenstein

Posted on October 30, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Investigating Wittgenstein
Author: Jaakko and Merrill B. Hintikka
Publisher: Blackwell
Date: 1986
ISBN: 978-0631141792

The book Investigating Wittgenstein by Jaakko and Merrill B. Hintikka was special to me for several reasons:

  1. Jaakko Hintikka was one of the most renowned experts on Wittgenstein and in the philosophy of language in general, established early in his life
  2. Jaakko Hintikka was my major professor in the Department of Philosophy at Florida State University
  3. Merrill B. Hintikka was also a formidable philosophical mind and she was my departmental advisor in philosophy at FSU

For me the book served as a refresher course of professor Jaakko Hintikka’s courses that I enjoyed in the early-to-mid-1980s. I studied the philosophy of language in general and Wittgenstein in particular under Hintikka from 1981 through 1986 and this book was published in 1986.

I was first struck by the two facts about this book:

  1. Highly methodical critical analysis connecting Wittgenstein’s early, middle, and late periods.
  2. Method itself is deeply informed by Wittgenstein’s method of exposition

The book clearly and accurately explains Wittgenstein’s view of language as the universal medium and the ineffability of semantics. Further, it shows how this framework holds true throughout Wittgenstein’s early, middle, and late periods (contrary to some other philosophers’ mistaken opinions in the past, e.g., G. Hallett’s Companion). Those who suggest Wittgenstein changed his views of the limits of language do so from a mistaken idea that the Strictness of Rules has anything to do with it. But “Whether such semantical rules are strict or loose does not make the slightest difference.” Wittgenstein does change his views about the strictness of rules around language. But the point is, semantics are ineffable, how strict the rules are doesn’t matter.

The book shows the important difference between the ineffability of semantics vs. the ability to talk about syntax, which is where philosophical discussion becomes most productive. Wittgenstein’s philosophy of mathematics and language as calculus are also explored in depth. Just as in calculus you have to do something with the signs, in language you have to do something with the signs. Language is action. Then the authors lament, “Alas, the prevalence of pocket calculators is bound to make this point harder for future readers of Wittgenstein to appreciate.” This was in 1986. Imagine how much harder today, where almost no calculation is done “in the head” anymore! In fact, the way games used to interact with the world highlighted the meaning of Wittgenstein’s famous “language games” as well. But the analogy falls apart with video games and other screen-based games. So today the phrase “language games” probably fails to communicate the action that Wittgenstein intended.

Getting back to the review, readers who follow the “game” analogy will be happy to find that “language games” and their interrelations figure prominently throughout the book. Like any philosophy of language book, it explores how names and abstract objects interact and hook into the world (e.g., logical form such as color ascriptions).

The book is divided into short numbered sections, which are very logically ordered. The writing style is pleasing (not typical of philosophy books). The book will be boring to anyone not truly interested in the philosophy of language, but that’s to be expected. Anyone with such an interest, will find the book rewarding in its straightforward style, well-thought-out organization, well-supported and brilliantly argued points of view. The mind of Wittgenstein truly comes alive in this study.

Note: Jaakko Hintikka dedicated this book to his mentor, Georg Henrik von Wright. See my related book review: Georg Henrik von Wright on Wittgenstein

More Related Book Reviews:

Kant and Critique: New Essays in Honor of W.H. Werkmeister

Georg Henrik von Wright on Wittgenstein

Plato’s Phaedo and Its Theory of Forms: Conversations and Language Games

Wolfram Eilenberger’s Time of the Magicians

My philosophy book:

Abstract Objects, Ideal Forms, and Works of Art: An Epistemic and Aesthetic Analysis

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Oliver Bullough’s Moneyland

Posted on September 27, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Moneyland
Author: Oliver Bullough
Publisher: Profile Books
Date: May 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1781257937

For those who already know how the wealthiest among us protect their money from the IRS, from law enforcement agencies, and from the scrutiny of other governments, this book will give you an advanced degree in the subject. For those blissfully unaware of the machinations of Moneyland, the book provides a jarring re-adjustment of all of your treasured assumptions about “fair play” and how the world really works.

One of the surprising revelations in Moneyland is that the tax-avoidance manipulations and the shuffling of money to hide it from governments is almost always entirely legal. This book does not reveal how laws are broken. Instead, it reveals how laws are passed, and intentionally customized to provide rabbit holes down which to sink vast fortunes in the hundreds of $billions and even $trillions. The term “rabbit hole” is quaint, because this nether region of $trillions, which the author calls “Moneyland,” where a tiny percentage of the population does business, constitutes an economy as large as the entire global “above-ground” economy.

One of the key facts that makes Moneyland possible, is that money can flow freely across national borders, but law enforcement does not. Law enforcement stops at the border. So the FBI, for example, can do nothing about US Citizens who own dozens of shell companies in other nation states. Some of the Moneyland-friendly nation states specifically legislate to attract Moneylanders. Investigators from the US or other countries cannot gain access to any of the records of incorporation, or bank records, or records of transactions, or even who may have accounts in the Moneyland nation state. By creating corporate structures in various jurisdictions, Moneyland rises above the laws of any one jurisdiction. So the rich figuratively, sometimes literally, are global citizens, above the laws of any single country, in ways that are not possible for the rest of us. That’s how Moneyland legally protects Moneyland.

The foundation of Moneyland’s financial industry rests with these governments whose economy depends upon the world’s wealthiest clients who want secrecy. For some nations, this is their only economy. They generate revenue from the fees they charge for setting up confidential companies and confidential transactions. They deal in citizenship and passports as commodities. For example, if you are a leader of a government, and you squirrel away $billions, you might want to make a quick exit from that country at some point. If you have a ready-made citizenship in a nation state in the Caribbean, and a passport to travel under, you are home free. By moving your $billions around various shell companies incorporated in the Caribbean, you can draw on that money anytime, anywhere, with assured confidentiality. And it’s perfectly legal. Moneyland does not check or care if the original source of the money was legal or ethical. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t. But once the money is invested in this shadow global financial industry, it is effectively “laundered,” and legally protected.

The rules of the game are very complicated. Everyone’s financial situation is different. It takes the brightest lawyers to look at an individual’s circumstances, then determine which Moneyland nations’ laws are best suited to protect the secrecy and security of the individual’s wealth, and maximize it. The precise strategies using shell companies and Caribbean accounts is unique for each individual. This is why Moneyland is such a massive invisible industry. The first requirement of the whole system is invisibility, the second requirement is ease of access to the “processed” money.

Nation states actually engage these Moneyland lawyers to help write their laws to make sure Moneylanders will do business in their country. When you see the annual “wealthiest people in the world” listed in a finance magazine, the one thing you can be sure of, is that those are NOT the wealthiest people in the world. The wealthiest are invisible, and will never be included in such a list.

If you happen to slip up, or get a bad lawyer, who leaves a loophole open where your money machinations broke a law in some country, exposing you to law enforcement, there is one other commodity you can buy for extra safety: Diplomatic Immunity. For the right price, you can be come an official designee from a willing nation state to the United Nations. Once you have a nation state’s citizenship, passport, and add “diplomat” to your credentials, you have the ultimate checkmate over the US or any other country’s legal jurisdiction.

Moneylanders are sometimes referred to as “UHNWs” or Ultra-High-Net-Worth people. In a world of 7 billion people, there are about 230,000 UHNWs. The wealth of these 230,000 people is about $27 trillion. The UHNW population is expected to grow to about 300,000 in the next couple of years, with wealth increasing to about $36 trillion.

A shell company can be owned by another shell company, and so on with no end to the layers. There are plenty of buildings in London, New York, and around the world that no one knows who owns. In one example, the US government didn’t know who owned a third of the buildings leased by its own General Services Administration (98). Apparently shell-company ownership is so routine to those “in the know,” the government doesn’t even care if it leases from anonymous companies.

Towards the end of the book, the author makes a weak (perhaps obligatory) attempt to encourage the reader that Moneyland can still be changed, even dismantled. But that attempt is so lame, it actually reinforces the permanence and unchangeability of the $trillion financial industry known as Moneyland.

In the final analysis, Moneyland is here to stay. Secrecy ensures a good portion of the wealth in Moneyland will continue to come from illegal sources (corrupt government officials, tax evaders, organized crime figures). But much comes legally, though perhaps not ethically, by way of shell companies that feed tax-free cash into the system. The book names names of some Moneylanders (from American businesses to foreign dictators to sundry international entrepreneurs), cites attempted legal cases and lawsuits, identifies the nation states most closely identified with shell companies and Moneylanders. These are not included in this book review. You’ll have to buy the book for that information.

The book tells a gripping story, a story that is rigorously factual and documented in every detail. An unexpected bonus of this book—it is beautifully written. Bullough is an excellent writer who knows how to craft a sentence as well as how to tell a story. It’s a compelling story and a pleasure to read.

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Ernst Junger’s Storm of Steel

Posted on August 7, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Storm of Steel
Author: Ernst Junger
Publisher: Penguin Classics; 1st edition
Date: May 4, 2004
ISBN: 978-0142437902

Ernst Junger’s Storm of Steel tells the story of the author’s experiences as a special forces soldier, then as an officer leading the special Shock Troops, in the German army during WWI (1914–1918). The book is famous for its detached point of view and for its extreme care with details. The narrative is first person, though the tone is often mechanical and objective. The story is free of any judgments about war, neither glorifying nor condemning it, but merely describing it.

Junger begins as a naïve young recruit both scared and excited about the prospect of fighting for his country. He decides early to keep a daily diary, which he miraculously maintained and never lost throughout the war. It was miraculous due to the many times he was shot, injured in explosions, and endured numerous other trials when the diary might easily have been lost. The diary became the raw material for the present book.

An example of a typical entry for one day:

“Standing at dawn on the fire-step opposite our dugout next to the sentry when a rifle bullet ripped through his forage cap without harming a hair of his head. At the same time, two pioneers were wounded on the wires. One had a ricochet through both legs, the other a ball through his ear.

In the morning, the sentry on our left flank was shot through both cheekbones. The blood spurted out of him in thick gouts. And, to cap it all, when Lieutenant von Ewald, visiting our sector to take pictures of sap N barely fifty yards away, turned to climb down from the outlook, a bullet shattered the back of his skull and he died ln the spot. Large fragments of skull were left littering the sentry platform. Also, a man was hit in the shoulder, but not badly.”

Thus ends one day’s entry from the trenches. There are other nerve-wracking descriptions of daring acts on the front lines. For example, often a handful of men would go on 3 a.m. excursions crawling towards the enemy trenches to get a closer look. These excursions often ended in someone getting killed (on either side or both sides), and a lot people barely surviving.

There were hundreds of days spent under heavy bombardment, when it was impossible to hear anyone’s orders, or to give any. During one manœuvre where Junger was leading fifty men towards an objective, after many waves of bombardments, Junger completed the objective with five men remaining. With so many such examples, it is a miracle the diary survived, as well as that the man survived to tell about it.

Some of the worst “nights of terror” involved the combinations of bombardments, hails of bullets flying all around his head, lost in the fog of a heavy chlorine gas attack. The gas masks allowed limited oxygen flow. In order to keep it on and survive the chlorine, he couldn’t move around much, because that would require breathing harder, more than the allotment of oxygen, and thus suffocate. Meanwhile, he and all the other men, were still expected to fight back, locate the enemy, and fire their weapons constantly.

The old saying “War is Hell” clearly applies to WWI as much or more so than any other, not just for the intensity of multiple types of deadly horrors overwhelming them simultaneously, but that it continued incessantly and relentlessly, happening to men who were held down in one place, barely budging forward or backwards, almost every day for four years.

Junger records many life-and-death encounters, analyzing himself as well as noting the behaviors of those around him. He makes observations about men’s character, such as “…brave puny men are always to be preferred to strong cowards, as was shown over and over….” He often notes minute facts about people, mannerisms and personality traits, and impressions of everyone around him.

Junger notes the camaraderie in many different ways and occasions. For example, “This same man, with whom I shared pieces of metal from the same bullet, came to visit me after the war; he worked in a cigarette factory, and, ever since his wound, had been sickly and a little eccentric.” He relates several anecdotes about tender moments amid the daily fury and firestorms.

The stark descriptions persisting with such consistent detached objectivity every day for four years reflect the remarkable strength of character of the author. The book, however, is much more than diary entries. In addition to being a rare record of WWI life, the author has created a literary masterpiece. Junger proved to be a true literary artist as he spent many years after the war transforming his diary into a compelling, novelesque epic story. Regarded as a major literary figure, and having written about forty books after the present work, Storm of Steel remains the one he is most famous for.

Junger lived to age 102. He won dozens of awards and honors, from the Iron Cross in 1916 to the Prix mondial Cino Del Duca French literary award in 1981 to an honorary doctorate from Complutense University of Madrid in 1995.

While recording events with cold detachment, amid the daily fighting across trenches, he emerges as a passionate student of life, psychology, behavior, and philosophy. He proves to be a compassionate admirer of the men on both sides of the fighting, and a peacemaker who spent his life healing wounds, and being welcomed and embraced by his erstwhile enemies throughout his life after the war.

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R. Bruce Bickley’s Joel Chandler Harris: A Biography and Critical Study

Posted on July 12, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Joel Chandler Harris
Author: R. Bruce Bickley, Jr.
Publisher: Brown Thrasher Books, The University of Georgia Press
Year Published: 1978
ISBN: 978-0820331850

Professor Bickley does a magnificent job bringing out the heart and soul of his subject, Joel Chandler Harris. Few could be said to have more heart and soul than Harris, which Bickley shows us with astute critical analyses of the works, as well as insights into the man’s character. The book shows how Harris’ journalistic and literary works helped heal a nation during some of its most difficult times. Harris was a poor orphan deeply immersed in African American culture before, during, and after the Civil War. He used all of his energy and intelligence to push the envelope of equality and integrity of all people. By being very much ahead of his time, Harris shocked some people. For the most part, however, he was appreciated and lauded for his attacks on social injustice, and his compassionate feeling for people struggling in the aftermath of the war.

Bickley highlights both the shining character and the artistic talent of Harris. Good people make good examples that make more good people. Bickley contributes to that healthy circulation in our society today, by showing us this example from the nineteenth century. Bickley also provides enlightening critical commentary on the works of Harris. From the folk tales to the artistic fiction to the nonfiction writings and journalism, all of Harris’ oeuvre is put under a microscope with wonderful effect. Whether the work is comic, tragic, serious, or angry, Harris’ heart shows through. His personality brings a coherent light that brings harmony to his many varied modes of communication.

Another part of the enjoyment of this book lies in the history it covers. Anyone interested in history will travel through major events and meet major figures of the latter nineteenth century. It provides a stimulating journey through that period.

The writing of the book itself is another pleasant surprise. Most people expect a dry text, anything but a page-turner, when they pick up a scholarly work. But this is an exception. Bickley himself is a very good writer, and it shows in every paragraph. Bickley provides us with an æsthetically pleasing, well-written study of a fascinating personality. Bickley’s writing is concise, colorful, and lively, always inviting the reader to turn the next page. You will be glad you accepted the invitation.

Harris produced amazing works that changed and encouraged multiple generations of hearts and minds. Professor Bickley gives us another look, and another chance to appreciate a true and artistic force from the past.

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Walter Cronkite’s A Reporter’s Life

Posted on April 8, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: A Reporter’s Life
Author: Walter Cronkite
Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf>
Date: December 16, 1996
ISBN: 0-394-57879-1

Walter Cronkite’s autobiography fascinates on at least two levels: 1. the storied life of a well-traveled and internationally acclaimed television journalist; 2. the prominent figures that played a part in his life due to his position and popularity.

One anecdote involves the discovery of shady dealings. He worked for a newspaper and made the mistake of changing something on a page he didn’t usually work on. The firestorm that followed shocked him, until he learned that the numbers on the page were communicating the winning numbers in the Mafia’s Numbers Racket.

Cronkite was a radio announcer and was famous for being able to fill in details when the communications went down during a football game. He could make up plays and then smoothly dovetail his made up events with the actual progress when the communications came back online.

One of Cronkite’s first brushes with celebrity was the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. Due to the limitations of technology at the time, some of the interesting anecdotes involve the ways they had to improvise to get film from the live event to the studio in time to show footage during the evening broadcast. This was especially challenging getting footage from England to New York on the same day.

TV made Cronkite the famous figure that he became. So it is with some irony that he marks the end of democracy with the beginning of TV. Politicians and political conventions suddenly became sanitized and dishonest when cameras were trained on them. The exposure of the democratic process could appear ugly to the untrained eye. It’s like some dishes, they are excellent, but it’s not a good idea to watch the chef create it.

By sanitizing the process itself, the end product became sanitized. The end product is the political reality today. The goal was to look polished for the camera, not to honestly work the process to the best possible outcome. “The conventions were reduced to marketing tools. From that day forward, the image on the tube has been the most important aspect of a political campaign, and politics and television have gone skipping hand in hand down this primrose path” (182–183).

Despite the demise of democracy, Cronkite remained an optimistic personality and a revered leader, or at least an accurate reflection, of mainstream American public values. His many decades of journalistic writing gave him a way with words that shows in the present autobiography. It’s an exciting travelogue through the figures and events of the twentieth century, which he covered so well for the CBS Evening News.

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Oleg Kalugin’s Autobiography Spymaster

Posted on February 11, 2019 by rose-coutre

Book Review
Title: Spymaster
Author: Oleg Kalugin
Publisher: Basic Books, Perseus Books Group
Date: 2009
ISBN: 978-0465014453

Spymaster is an espionage thriller. It is also a true story—it is the autobiography of Oleg Danilovich Kalugin, Soviet General and head of foreign counterintelligence, First Chief Directorate of the KGB. The storyline focuses on Kalugin’s professional activities and timeline, which gives it the narrative coherence of a nonfiction novel (a genre more or less invented by Truman Capote with In Cold Blood). The literary quality is superb, which reinforces the nonfiction-novel feel of the book. Continue reading →

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