Last Book You Read

[Groggy]

No End of a Lesson: The Story of Suez - Anthony Nutting - Nutting's insider account of the Suez Crisis of 1956, detailing his attempts to forestall the Anglo-French-Israeli conspiracy and subsequent resignation. There's plenty of axe-grinding self-justification against Eden and his ministers, but Nutting earned the right: his opposition to that absurd enterprise was an open secret at the time, not a johnny-come-lately criticism.

[Groggy]

The Road to Khartoum: A Life of General Charles Gordon - Charles Chenevix Trench - One of the more balanced biographies of Gordon. Trench spends a lot time rebutting the criticisms of Strachey and Nutting: claims of pederasty and drunkenness are convincingly debunked, and Nutting's idea that Gordon provoked his own death on a half-cocked glory hunt is shown fairly hollow. The Gordon emerging here is fairly complex: heroic, honest in his old-fashioned Christianity, a good man in some ways but an impossible egotist in others. Good show.

[Groggy]

Hancock the Superb - Crisp biography of Winfield Scott Hancock, the "Superb" Union general who distinguished himself throughout the Civil War, proved a judicious arbiter during Reconstruction and unsuccessfully ran for President in 1880. Tucker makes no bones about admiring Hancock: an inspiring military commander, duty-bound civil administrator and honorable man. He employs a clean, readable narrative, detailing Hancock's famous exploits at Gettysburg and Spotsylvania as enthusiastically as his political campaigns. An odd error here and there (how could Thomas Meagher have campaigned for Hancock when he died in 1867?), and elision of Hancock's private life, doesn't mar an enjoyable work.

[titoli]

 
A fast-reading oral autobiography of the famous composers. It tells much about a duo which for most is just a repetitive couple of names on dozens of great songs. Still that much is not enough. I would have liked more infos about how they write words and music and even more curious about their views on fellow composers and musicians. 7\10

[Groggy]

Army of Amateurs: General Benjamin F. Butler and the Army of the James, 1863-1865 - Edward G. Longacre - Excellent account of the hard-luck Union Army of the James, who formed an unwieldy fifth wheel to Grant's advance on Richmond. Longacre's account focuses more on the personalities than the battles, showing an officer corps riven with infighting, backstabbing and rampant egos. The central figure is Benjamin Butler, notorious political general, who hopes to use the Army as a springboard to political success. Longacre's account mixes trenchant analysis with wry humor, though he goes a step far in suggesting Butler was an unfairly maligned general.

The Vainglorious War - A.J. Barker - Workmanlike volume on the Crimean War. Barker's account is good as a straight military history: he provides extremely detailed tactical accounts of the war's major battles, which help elucidate what other books make unclear (especially the Alma). Otherwise, he recites familiar facts, figures and fights without particular insight or originality, giving short shrift to the political aspects while relegating Florence Nightingale to a brief side chapter. Compared to standard works like Woodham-Smith, Hibbert et al unremarkable.

[Groggy]

Churchill's Crusade: The British Invasion of Russia, 1918-1920 - Clifford Kinvig - Wordy chronicle of the Allied intervention in Russia's Civil War. As the title implies, Kinvig focuses on Britain's involvement in the conflict, particularly Winston Churchill's eagerness to embroil Britain in another major conflict so soon after World War I. Kinvig conveys the campaign's haphazard staging, logistical difficulties and imparts some new information on tactics used - notably Britain's heavy use of poison gas. Unfortunately the dry prose and cluttered narrative make it a chore to read.

The Race to Fashoda - David L. Lewis - A revisionist take on Moorehead's The White Nile, centering on the Anglo-French confrontation at Fashoda in 1898. Lewis (also a biographer of Martin Luther King and Alfred Dreyfuss) focuses heavily on African reactions to the Scramble for Africa, showing the efforts by Abyssinia, Mahdist Sudan and others to work the European rivalries to their own advantage. It's a decent read but feels superficial.

[Groggy]

Falling behind a bit...

Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan, 1839-1842 - William Dalrymple - Peerless account of the First Anglo-Afghan War, besting extant volumes by Patrick Macrory and Peter Hopkirk. Dalrymple presents fresh primary research, tapping Afghan, Indian and Russian archives to provide a more rounded portrait. Dalrymple counterpoints the Anglo-Russian "Great Game" with ongoing Afghan tribal rivalries. Ousted Shah Shujah manipulates the British into placing him on the Afghan throne, as more compliant than the cagey Dost Mohammed. Dalrymple fleshes out the familiar story of Elphinstone's disastrous occupation and retreat from Kabul with new interpretations. He argues Afghans would have accepted Shujah's rule if not for the foreign bayonets propping him up. Similarly, Afghan resentment of the British began almost immediately, due to rampant exploitation of Kabul's women. And British military and political incompetence, from virulent Russophobia to Elphinstone's bizarre passivity towards the rumblings in Kabul, registers with stark clarity. A masterpiece of narrative history.

The Great Mutiny: India, 1857 - Christopher Hibbert - I loved Hibbert's The Destruction of Lord Raglan, which remains my favorite book on the Crimean War. Everything else I've read of his, however, has been either naggingly superficial or inscrutably dense. The Great Mutiny falls in the latter category. Hibbert's heavy on eyewitness accounts, almost exclusively from the British point of view, which gives some immediacy to the horrible events depicted. But for a popular history, and for a writer who's done more accessible work, it's rough sledding, due to dense prose and anodyne analysis. It took me three tries over a year's time to finish it. Having finished, I'm not sure it was worth the effort.

The Long Road to Antietam: How the Civil War Became a Revolution - Richard Slotkin - Slotkin provides a good narrative account of the events surrounding the Battle of Antietam, the repulse of Robert E. Lee's first invasion of the North. Slotkin's military coverage is workmanlike; his narrative works well-enough, but doesn't provide especially keen insight to the battle or strategy surrounding it. He's much better placing the conflict in a political context. In particular, he highlights the clash between George McClellan, headstrong, ambitious but cripplingly cautious Union general and the shrewd, polite to a fault President Lincoln. Slotkin shows the battle's main importance on two fronts: one, by encouraging Lincoln to pass the Emancipation Proclamation and hence add a moral dimension to the Union war effort. Two, by dissuading McClellan that a military putsch (seriously advanced by McClellan's inner circle) wasn't on the cards, thus preserving a threat to democracy just as grave as secession. Readable, though Civil War buffs won't learn anything new.

I also took a stab at the collected correspondence of Sir Garnet Wolseley. After about 100 pages of preening, bigoted snobbishness I gave up.

[titoli]

I read a french edition, but Bazin writes so well that he loses little if anything in translation (I'm talking about the italian translations, of course). I share little of his enthusiasms for the french movies he raves about. But I don't care because he's my favourite writer of cinema possibly with Dwight MacDonald.

[drinkanddestroy]

Yogi Berra: Eternal Yankee, by Allen Barra

http://www.amazon.com/Yogi-Berra-Eternal-Allen-Barra/dp/B004JZWLVS

Great bio of the great Yankee catcher and American icon.

It's very clear that Barra is an unabashed Yogi fan, and I suppose it may occasionally get on some reader's nerves how much of a fan Barra is: Yogi can basically do no wrong in his eyes; anyone who ever doubted Yogi as a player or manager is crazy; he even has a section where he tries to explain why the Yogi-isms kinda make sense! But I laughed that stuff off, I found that kinda funny. Bottom line is that this is a terrific  book. One of my favorite subjects to read about is the Yankees' legendary dynasty from 1947-1964, when they won 15 pennants and 10 World Championships in 18 years -- and this book puts you right in the middle of it all. But more than that, it follows Yogi's entire life, from his childhood on St. Louis's "Dago Hill" to his service on Landing Craft Support Small rocket-launching boats on D-Day, to his great playing days with the Yankees, his managerial stint with the Yanks in '64, then coaching and managing with the Mets, managing the Yankees again and coaching the Astros, and his very successful career as a pitchman for various products, to exec at Yoo-Hoo, to uttering some of the most famous and endearing lines in American history.

Yogi Berra is one man that everybody loves -- even if you are a Yankee-hater -- and this book is therefore a wonderful read for everyone  

[Groggy]

Burnside - William Marvel - Sympathetic biography of the much-maligned Civil War General comes off as an egregious case of special pleading. Marvel shows convincingly that Burnside was a nice guy who was often manipulated by ambitious colleagues. His descriptions of Burnside's victories in the Outer Banks and Knoxville make good reading, even if (especially with the latter) he's inclined to overrate their importance. When it comes to Burnside's more famous blunders though he really reaches. Like any defender of incompetent generals Marvel blames everyone but his subject: meddling politicians, idiot superiors, blundering subordinates. Sure, at Fredericksburg William Franklin botched his attack on the Confederate right. But whose fault was it that Burnside threw 14 consecutive attacks against the stonewall on Marye's Heights? The whole book is like that. Marvel's contention that Burnside was a good general with bad press won't convince anyone who's read more than a few books on the Civil War.