5 comments about Royal Russia: The Private Albums of the Russian Imperial Family.

1. Hmmmm, I was decidedly disappointed in this book. Many of the pictures contained within were very poor quality and there were some blatant mistakes in identification of the family members. A good many of the photographs are not new to the collector of Romanov books. I would not recommend this book if one is expecting to see anything new. I dont think Mr. Blair Lovell would have been pleased!



2. Brief Summary:

   In the year 1881 church bells rung from the towers Alexander II is dead. His eldest son Nicholas was crowned czar of imperial Russia. With his wife Alexandra from England. Granddaughter of Queen Victoria. Their first child was born in 1895.Her name was The Grand Duchess Olga Romanov. She was the czars heir. Then in 1897 their second child was born. Her name was Tatiana Romanov. Then in 1899 Marie was born. Then in1901 Anastasia was born. Followed by their final child the new heir Alexei in 1904. Then problems came to Russia there were riots in Russia. The people started to hate the czar and czarina. People were starving in the streets. And Nicholas didn't know anything about it. Alexei was diagnosed with Hemophilia that meant if he bleeds he could bleed himself to death. The Russian Revolution started and the people hated the czar. They imprisoned him and his family. To a small village in Siberia. Then they transported them to a village near Moscow. Where one morning a soldier came to there room and told them to get dressed and get downstairs. The family was told to wait in the basement. A firing squad opened the door and started to fire on the family. The bullets cut their bodies down. There were screaming and lots of smoke. Not one Romanov lived that morning. They say that Anastasia escaped and lived. But that is another mystery.

   Critical Thinking:

   In the book Royal Russia the Romanov family had many fears. They were imprisoned to Siberia and they went from extremely rich to poor. The girls were the most scared because they did not know what was going on or what was going to happen to them. When they were shot in the basement they probably had a clue what was going on. When they were shot they were terrified on what happened to there family.

   Bottom Line:

   Good book to read and also has some good pictures to look at that best describes the Romanov family as they were not how they were preseved to be.




3. In "Royal Russia", Lovell draws the reader into the amazing world of the last Imperial Family with their wonderful photographs. The photographs are excellent, however there are some misidentifictations of the Grand Duchesses. Nonetheless, the book is great.



4. i love to read anything i can find on the russian royal family,great book.great service,thanks.



5. If a reader of this book is already familiar with the images of the OTMA, and Maria in particular, then the mistaken identifications will not be a problem. There are many photographs that are not in many Romanov photocollections, and the information contained in the text seems spot on. However, I would not recommend this for anyone who does not have a familiarity with the Romanov family already.

No comments about DANGEROUS FRONTIERS: Campaigning in Somaliland and Oman.

5 comments about Evita: An Intimate Portrait of Eva Peron.

1. "Evita: An Intimate Portrait of Eva Peron," edited by Tomas de Elia and Juan Pablo Quieroz, brings together a wealth of black-and-white photographs of Eva Peron, the legendary first lady of Argentina. The editors note in their preface that with the 1955 overthrow of Eva's husband, President Juan Peron, much visual material related to this controversial woman was destroyed. Thus, this book has significant historical and sociological value.

   We see the full span of the woman's extraordinary life: Eva as a child, aspiring actress, wife, and triumphant first lady. There are "glamour shot" portraits, candid photos, magazine covers, stills from film productions, and more. We see Eva and her husband, as well as her interaction with adoring crowds.

   Eva is a consistently fascinating subject: whether fiery, starry-eyed, thoughtful, amused, determined, or serene, you can see why she continues to captivate so many imaginations.

   The text portions of the book are very positive towards Eva. If you have been intrigued by the Broadway musical and motion picture about her life, or by other media about her, I definitely recommend this book.




2. EVITA: AN INTIMATE PORTRAIT OF EVA PERON is the best photographic record available of Eva Peron, First Lady of Argentina from 1946 to 1952. ("Evita," meaning "Little Eva," was her nickname.)

   Evita lived in a time before television was widely used, and since she was a politician she did not have many spreads in glossy magazines (once she became First Lady, her "cheesecake" portraits - taken while she was an actress - were supressed). Therefore, most of her pictures were used in newspapers, giving them a grainy feel. Often, the quality of pictures you find of Evita seem to be much poorer quality than what you would expect from something taken merely 50 years ago. EVITA: AN INTIMATE PORTRAIT OF EVA PERON is an exception, perhaps the best exception I have ever found. Most of these pictures are clear and crisp, though they are all black-and-white.

   One thing this collection of pictures reveals is that Evita truly was not what would be considered a conventionally beautiful woman. She was certainly beautiful in her publicity photos and propaganda portraits (some of which are reproduced here). But in a day-to-day setting - such as the enclosed pictures that depict her having lunch, leaning against her dresser, yelling at a policeman for obstructing a youth's access to her - she was a somewhat awkward, even at times homely, woman. But she was a master of image. As Nicholas Fraser and Marysa Navarro point out in EVITA: THE REAL LIFE OF EVA PERON, she had an astonishing instinct, almost a sixth sense, for knowing how image affected people. This talent of hers is demonstrated when one constrasts the behind-the-scenes pictures of her as an awkward woman, with those gorgeous photos of Peronist propaganda. She wasn't a conventionally beautiful woman, but she knew how to make it seem as though she were.

   The portions of EVITA: AN INTIMATE PORTRAIT OF EVA PERON that I found most interesting, and most haunting, were of Eva as a young girl in her hometown of Junin, and the pictures taken of her shortly before her death. There is one particularly chilling scene of Evita, reduced to a mere 77 pounds by the cancer that had invaded her body, standing on the balcony of the government house to greet the tens of thousands gathered below. She spoke, yelled, actually, about taking justice into her own hands, warning her political enemies of the day that she would "go forth with the poor of the country and leave no brick standing that is not standing for Peron!" The rise from poverty, the contrasts, the extremes ... it's all palpable in these pictures.

   This woman was a genius.




3. Before Princess Diana, before Jackie O, even before Princess Grace, Eva "Evita" Peron made a name for herself in the international spotlight as a symbol of elegance, ambition and power. Although not always favourable to her character, the world press was intrigued by her obvious glamour. While the Peronist Argentine media labelled her with saintly nicknames such as "The Lady of Hope" and "Mother of the Poor", international correspondents used terms that were less meaningful and more shallow. She became known as "The Dashing Blonde" in the US while the french press labelled her as "La Belle Blonde D'Argentina".
   
   Argentina's first cover girl- Eva Peron's lovely face has graced more magazine covers around the globe than any other female Latin American political leader in history. She's also the only Latin American First Lady to have had the honour of gracing the coveted cover of TIME magazine- in June of 1947 and with her husband in 1951. This may not seem like a big deal NOW but at the time, it was a honour indeed and it should be noted that throughout the 30's & 40's not many woman made the cover of TIME magazine. In 1947 for instance, only a handful of women (6 - according to a source) made the cover that year - If I'm not mistaken Eva Peron was the third. Flipping through the thick pages of this book, it's not hard to see why so many were fascinated by this striking but controversial woman who wore expensive clothes, decorated herself with diamonds and wrapped her femininity in elaborate fur coats. But solely praising her for her looks is missing the point since it was her larger than life persona, her numerous works with Argentina's poor and her meteoric rise from obscurity to power that has kept her name and legacy alive.
   
   This visually informative book is one of the BEST books there is on Maria Eva Duarte de Peron. It offer's an in-depth look into her life using high quality glossy prints. Many of the images presented inside the book are striking photographs of Eva's handsome face with her golden blonde hair and it's metallic sheen either swept up into elaborate coils & curls or pulled back into it's trademark chignon or (in a couple of images) let loose to cascade over her shoulders. Her intoxicating beauty is evident and is the main showcase here but while most of these pictures show her at her most beautiful, others show us her lamentable decline as well. The once delectable body and face gave way to an extremely thin and frail woman with sad eyes and colourless skin. Her swift rise and rapid descent are all displayed infront of our curious eyes. For those of you who love Evita, it will definately arouse some type of emotion seeing her during her final struggles. For those of you who despise her, it might give you a sense of relief that this powerful & vulgar woman was finally silenced in death.
   
   Stikingly original and visually rousing, this book is highly recommended to anyone who is interested in learning more about the life and times of this remarkable but controversial figure (altough the book itself maybe a little TOO expensive for the casual curiosity seeker, in that case I recommend buying a good used copy). It's also one of the rare PRO EVITA books (in English) that offers such clear, good quality photos of the subject. It offers a brief intro and briography but the main attraction are the photographs. You will see Eva's life from the earliest childhood photos to the last Cancer Stricken photos. Her incredible matamorphesis, her incredible acheivements and her awesome gowns and jewels are all displayed within the pages of this interesting book. My only problem with it though is that despite the amazing amount of photographs, I was still left unsatisfied. The reason being is that there are HUNDREDS and HUNDREDS of beautiful photo's from Eva's artistic career but the ones they chose to display are the ones we have already seen. The same goes with the photo's taken of her in Europe and of her candid moments. The book claims that many of the photographs have never been seen before but that is true only of her childhood photos, all of the other ones have been published before in several magazines and books. That said, it's still THE BEST photographic Book ever released in North America. The only other ones that come close are ALL visciously one-sided ANTI PERONIST accounts- Lloyd Weber's and Tim Rice's EVITA: THE LEGEND OF EVA PERON & W.A Harbinson's awful EVITA: A LEGEND FOR THE SEVENTIES- the latter remains the WORST biography ever written on the subject and was re-released as EVITA SAINT OR SINNER in 1996 however only the original 70's version contains an amazing collection of photos which is the only reason it's recomended.
   
   And for closing, I am quoting my Chilean Aunts mother (who lived in Argentina during the first Peronist Period): "I saw her from the distance and to this day I have never seen a woman more beautiful. She was and is a Goddess. Everything about her was larger than life. She looked my way and her dark eyes pierced my soul. I will never forget her look."
   
   This book offers a glimpse of the awesome power this remarkable woman had in life and still holds 50 years after her tragic demise.



4. As a photographic biography of an individual who died about a decade before bographies were featured on mass television, this book is magnificent. The Argentinian publishers painstakingly compiled nearly 200 pages of many elusive photos of this controversial Argentinian icon - all in black and white, and of surprisingly impeccable quality. One of the auhtors is an academic who provides much of the narrative, and fills an important gap in the literature on Eva Peron. Their treatment shows a clear sympathetic bias which should be recognized by any unwitting reader who may be unaware of the deeply split views of Eva Peron which still previal in Argentina and of the political movement that she and her husband created.

   You may, like myself, have enjoyed the brilliant Lloyd and Weber musical about Evita's musical life one or more times. If so, you will find these photos will provide some complementary historical insight to the dramatic performance and parallels the performance - although they two are unrealted, as far as I know. Like the musical, this book captures photos from Eva's childhood in a remote provincial pueblo in the pampas through her meteoric rise to stardom in Buenos Aires and ultimately to Argentina's First Lady. Perhaps most remarkable are the photos of her final months where, despite her cancer-ridden state and growing frailty, she continues public appearances and political campaigns.

   If you are interested in this book, I would recommend you avoid the expense of a new copy by looking for one of the many high-quality second-hand copies available. I found my copy by accident ...for [money amount]!




5. This is a fabulous book which follows the life of Eva Peron through photographs. Francisco M. Rocha tells his account of Eva's life in about seven pages, so there is not a lot of reading to be done. Instead you get hundreds of beautiful pictures ... if a picture is worth a thousand words, this book speaks volumes. There are lots of never before seen photo's from Eva's early life, many studio portraits from her acting days, as well as one of the few surviving official portraits of the Perons. To me the most touching photos are those from the days following her death. It was a fitting tribute to Evita, the thousands of Argentines standing in line for hours and sometimes days just to catch one last glimpse of her beautiful face. As well as the millions of flowers filling the streets of Buenos Aires. You can almost feel the grief that filled the air through those tragic days.
   

   There are also many photos of Eva's decline ... that proud, elegant creature shrunken down to a fragile waif and of her triumphant tour through Europe. The Peron's lavish life-stlye is also on display here ... the legendary Dior gowns, the millions of dollars worth of jewelry and the palatial Presidential Palace (destroyed in the revoltion of 1955) where Evita kept a storeroom for clothing, food and also offered as a shelter to the homeless.
   

   Evita's life was distinctly cut up into sections, her poor childhood, her acting days, the glorious days as First lady, and her death. The are all documented her beautifully in the lavish photos and detailed captions.
   

   Eva Peron is perhaps one of history's greatest mysteries. Many have called her a whore and a thief. Still there are countless others who attest to her sainthood. The truth is no one really knows what Evita was hiding behind those piercing eyes and no one ever will. What we do know is that in her short life, she accomplished amazing feats. For a poor illegitimate girl from the pampas to reinvent herself as an actress is extraordinary. For an actress no one took seriously to become the First Lady of Argentina and to win over the hearts of millions really is mind blowing. Evita was only 33 years old when she died, who knows what else she could have accomplished?

3 comments about Salisbury: Victorian Titan (Phoenix Press).

1. This is not just a book of immense intrinsic value. It's a book of real historical importance as one of two biographies of Salisbury published recently which entirely reassess his standing as one of the leading English statemen of the latter part of the nineteenth century, ranking alongside Gladstone and Disraeli.

   It seems incredible in view of the plethora of studies on Gladstone and Disraeli that it's been half a century since any historian has made a full-scale re-evaluation of the life of Robert Cecil, third Marquess of Salisbury, three-times Prime Minister and architect of Queen Victoria's glittering Empire.

   And yet he was a man arguably of greater intellect than either of these two other late Victorian "giants". Disraeli wrote rather affected, stylized novels; Gladstone turned out unreadable religious tracts. Salisbury, on the other hand, produced stimulating and pithy articles in the Saturday and Quarterly Reviews and delivered parliamentary speeches at least as memorable as those of the other two statesmen.

   But few historians have really come to grips with Salisbury in recent times. One had to look into Barbara Tuchman's epic "The Proud Tower" to find a chapter that did justice to the colorful, quirky patrician figure who performed sometimes dangerous chemical experiments in his spare time, was one of the first to introduce electricity into his home, rode around on an enormous tricycle and who was always ready to chat to strangers, even lunatics.

   Perhaps historians have been too ready to downgrade Salisbury's standing because of his inherent conservatism in the domestic field, his endeavors to preserve the status quo. And as to his being a main architect of Empire, this all-too-readily clashes with the modern, probably justified aversion to that theme.

   This book was commissioned by the present Marquess of Salisbury. It says a lot about the open-mindedness of the Cecil family that historian Andrew Roberts was given the task. Anyone who has read his wonderfully debunking "Eminent Churchillians" knows Roberts as an historian of the utmost integrity, incapable of pulling punches. And he pulls none in his biography of Salisbury, whom he paints on a broad canvass, "warts and all". But Roberts's admiration and affection for his subject is never in doubt. The result is a big book about a very big statesman by a young, big, historian.




2. Victoria and Salibury; two true Titans who, the former, giving her name to the century, and the latter, who helped create the formidable empire which was both reviled and regaled. This book is in the great tradition of "Life and Times" biographies. Mr. Roberts is to be commended for the scope and structure of slowly but with anticipation revealing the aspects of a fascinating man. The chapters on the Boer War and the Realpolitik diplomacy of the African continent are just two elements that should be read for years to come. From a shy and bookish child to the political standard bearer of the Tory Party, this book shows a man with conviction, often callous to some but with foresight which comes through in the epigrammatical style of Salisbury's prose. Thank You Andrew Roberts for your wonderful book.



3. Andrew Roberts has produced a superbly written and wonderfully exciting biography of Lord Salisbury, three times Queen Victoria's Prime Minister. In his fifty-year career, Salisbury won over Disraeli, destroyed Lord Randolph Churchill, charmed Queen Victoria, wrecked Gladstone's hopes for Irish Home Rule, and saw off Bismarck. The book is based on Salisbury's archive at Hatfield House, and on the papers of more than 140 of his contemporaries.

   Roberts records Salisbury's many contradictions. He supported "the right of a minority of Americans to secede from a Union, but not a majority of Irishmen." He opposed socialism as mere confiscation, but upheld the actions of his ancestor, the First Earl, who had confiscated much of Ulster's land between 1607 and 1609, then selling it to City and Scottish businessmen.

   He wrote eloquently against intervention in other countries' domestic affairs. "The Assemblies that meet at Westminster have no jurisdiction over the affairs of other nations. Neither they nor the Executive, except in plain defiance of international law, can interfere with the brigandage of Italy, or the persecutions in Spain, or the teachings of the schools in Schleswig-Holstein. What is said in either House about them is simply impertinence ... It is not a dignified position for a Great Power to occupy, to be pointed out as the busybody of Christendom." And, "there is no practice which the experience of nations more uniformly condemns, and none which governments more consistently pursue."

   Indeed, his Governments annually waged colonial wars in Asia and Africa, adding 2.5 million square miles and 44 million people to the Empire. His war against the Boers was particularly shameful: he claimed that Britain had sovereignty over the Transvaal, although the British Government had ceded this in the 1884 Pretoria Convention. (Roberts grants that Salisbury was `on exceedingly tricky ground legally'.) As Salisbury admitted, "If our ancestors had cared for the rights of other peoples, the British Empire would never have been made."

3 comments about The White House Physician: A History from Washington to George W. Bush.

1. This is a well crafted, researched and comprehensive treatise, yet it is an entertaining and fluid "read". I did not expect that the topic could be presented in such an interesting and entertaining manner. The book succeeded in educating me not only in the specifics of the various actors, but in the evolution of the roles and responsibilities of the President's physicians. I had assumed that the provision of medical care to the President had been static over the decades; it was fascinating to learn just how much and how recently it has changed. This book not only deals with presidential physicians, the evolution of presidential medical care (including political overlap), but also provides fascinating insights into presidential history.



2. 
   
   Ludwig Deppisch is a medical doctor who has an interest in medical history, and out of that interest he has given us a book that sets out the fascinating story of the doctors who, from the time of the founding of the republic up through the modern era, have served as physicians to the Presidents. This story is doubly fascinating because it not only traces the historical progress of medicine through time but it also reveals how medical practices, sometimes in conjunction with political subterfuge, can impact the presidency itself.
   
   The first part of the book, which covers the practices of the best doctors of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries - the doctors who treated Presidents - exposes the shortcomings of the medical profession in those years, even as medicine itself was becoming more professional. Thomas Jefferson wrote about his friend doctor Benjamin Rush, a greatly influential figure, that the doctor had "done much harm" with the practice of bleeding patients to treat illness. Indeed, calling on the aid of a doctor did not guarantee a cure; just the opposite could be the case. President James Garfield, who lived in a somewhat more advanced medical period, when shot by an assassin had his wound examined by doctors with hands so dirty that, according to the author, the doctors themselves likely caused his fatal infection. Still, a physically tough old President like Andrew Jackson could have a bullet removed from a dueling wound years after the duel and emerge much improved from the surgery.
   
   But it is as the story moves toward the twentieth century, while medical knowledge seems to be progressing, that we see another compelling issue begin to emerge, and that is how political and medical subterfuge can be employed to deceive the citizenry about what is going on in the health of a President. Grover Cleveland had a secret operation, for example, on board a private yacht, to remove a cancerous growth in his mouth. In the event the operation was a success and the public never became aware of what had taken place. Woodrow Wilson, however, had a stroke of such massive proportions that he probably should have left office but he did not. His physician was complicit in keeping Wilson isolated and the public misinformed about his true condition. FDR's health was so badly failing at the end of his third term that he should never have run for a fourth. But we were in the midst of war. His actual medical state was concealed and the reelected President died a short time into his last term. President Eisenhower had a series of serious medical problems which were interpreted to the public through rose tinted glasses. Never the less, Ike was popular, he completed two terms, and what Americans were told about the President's health likely gave them the reassurance most of them were looking for. Finally, it should be noted that JFK deliberately misrepresented his awful health facts to the American people throughout his political career with the audacity of Harry Houdini making an impossible escape. We might admire the audacity, but was it the right thing to do?
   
   The author also raises some related and interesting issues about using psychiatry as a tool both for evaluating the mental fitness of a President and as a mode of treatment. Hindsight suggests it might have been useful to know more about the mental health and psychological makeup of Richard Nixon before he was elected. But would it have been possible, we wonder, to get an objective and non political pre-election evaluation of Nixon's personality? By the same token, Senator Thomas Eagleton was forced off the Democratic ticket as a Vice Presidential candidate in 1972 when it was revealed he had been treated for serious depression. Was this action appropriate? And how would the American people react if they learned that a President was undergoing current psychiatric treatment? These are worthwhile questions to ponder.
   
   All of this leads us to note that there is some useful discussion in this book about the place of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment when it comes to dealing with the ramifications of any severe medical impairment of a President. And while this constitutional amendment was specifically passed to provide guidelines should a crisis occur, we have unfortunately seen, as in the shooting of President Reagan, that when a crisis does occur key officials can still be caught flatfooted in the immediate aftermath as to what to say and do. Moreover, the question of whether a President is medically fit to continue in office places the White House Physician squarely in the cross hairs of decision making. Thus, relevant officials in any new administration need to discuss and understand all of the protocols to be followed and all of the attendant constitutional and medical implications well in advance of any medical emergency. Deception of the public will probably no longer be tolerated as it has been in the past.
   
   Lastly we should note that, like a good novel, this tale contains some rich characters, strong personalities like Dr. Cary Grayson, Wilson's physician, who can color the story and influence the plot. And we see the potential for conflict when there are many doctors involved in treatment, a few of whom may have large egos. Kennedy had a wide range of treating doctors and his titular head physician, Dr. Travell, was shunted aside while the President received secret and controversial treatments from Max Jacobson, the Manhattan doctor known as "Doctor Feelgood" because of the injections he gave the rich and famous, injections that contained amphetamines and steroids.
   
   All in all, it would be fair to sum up that the author has given us a book that is not only rich in scholarship, but one that tells a tale which is fascinating on its own merits. Moreover, this is a book that is a significant resource of information for any doctors or officials who are newly being called to serve in an administration and who might have to grapple with a replay of history sometime in the future. For them it might be essential reading; for the rest of us it is just a darn good read.
   
   G. F. Shirley



3. Terrific! This is a thoroughly researched body of work. It contains great insights into the development of American medicine, and I highly recommend it to those interested in American and presidential history. Furthermore, its examination of legal, political, and moral issues make it a must-read for those in the medical profession.

3 comments about Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Volume Two.

1. General Grant wrote this book while dying of throat cancer. He had been swindled by a dishonest Wall Street Broker and his trophies and possessions were stripped from him to satisfy the demands of his debtors. Bankrupt, suffering from a terminal illness and never passing a moment without acute pain, he produced this magnificent monument to his greatness. Those who denigrate Grant as a drunkard, butcher, bumbling President need to read this book in order to correct these errant assumptions. It is impossible to read this book and not realize that Grant was an inordinately intelligent man and one hell of a writer.

   Grant's Memoirs are a deserved classic in American literature and considered the greatest military Memoirs ever penned, exceeding Caesar's Commentaries. Grant wrote as he lived: with clear, concise statements, unembellished with trivialities or frivolities. The only "criticism" the reader might have is that Grant bent over backwards not to wound the feelings of people in the book. He takes swipes at Joe Hooker and Jeff Davis, but what he left unsaid would have been far more interesting. A compelling and logical reason why Grant was so spare in his comments was because he was involved in a race with death. He didn't know how long he could live and therefore, "cut to the chase."

   Grant's assessments of Lincoln, Sherman, Sheridan and other military leaders are brilliant and engrossing. His style, like the man himself, was inimitable and couldn't be copied. In everyday life, Grant was a very funny man, who liked to listen to jokes and tell them himself. His sense of the absurd was acute. It's no accident that he loved Mark Twain and the two hitched together very well. Twain and Grant shared a similar sense of humor, and Grant's witicisms in the Memoirs are frequent, unexpected and welcome. There are portions where you will literally laugh out loud.

   Though Grant's Memoirs were written 113 years ago, they remain fresh, vibrant and an intensely good read. I have read them in! their entirity 30 times in my life and I never weary of the style and language that Grant employed. He was a military genius to be sure, but he was also a writer of supreme gifts, and these gifts shine through on every page of this testament to his greatness. All Americans should read this book and realize what we owe to Grant: he preserved the union with his decisive brilliance. In his honor, we should be eternally grateful.




2. General Grant wrote this book while dying of throat cancer. He had been swindled by a dishonest Wall Street Broker and his trophies and possessions were stripped from him to satisfy the demands of his debtors. Bankrupt, suffering from a terminal illness and never passing a moment without acute pain, he produced this magnificent monument to his greatness. Those who denigrate Grant as a drunkard, butcher or bumbling President need to read this book in order to correct these errant assumptions. It is impossible to read this book and not realize that Grant was an inordinately intelligent man and one hell of a writer.

   Grant's Memoirs are a deserved classic in American literature and considered the greatest military Memoirs ever penned, exceeding Caesar's Commentaries. Grant wrote as he lived: with clear, concise statements, unembellished with trivialities or frivolities. The only "criticism" the reader might have is that Grant bent over backwards not to wound the feelings of people in the book. He takes swipes at Joe Hooker and Jeff Davis, but what he left unsaid would have been far more interesting. A compelling and logical reason why Grant was so spare in his comments was because he was involved in a race with death. He didn't know how long he could live and therefore, "cut to the chase."

   Grant's assessments of Lincoln, Sherman, Sheridan and other military leaders are brilliant and engrossing. His style, like the man himself, was inimitable and couldn't be copied. In everyday life, Grant was a very funny man, who liked to listen to jokes and tell them himself. His sense of the absurd was acute. It's no accident that he loved Mark Twain and the two hitched together very well. Twain and Grant shared a similar sense of humor, and Grant's witicisms in the Memoirs are frequent, unexpected and welcome. There are portions where you will literally laugh out loud.

   Though Grant's Memoirs were written 119 years ago, they remain fresh, vibrant and an intensely good read. I have read them many times in my life and I never weary of the style and language that Grant employed. He was a military genius to be sure, but he was also a writer of supreme gifts, and these gifts shine through on every page of this testament to his greatness. All Americans should read this book and realize what we owe to Grant: he preserved the union with his decisive brilliance. In his honor, we should be eternally grateful.




3. This book is a good subject for the Civil War buff that delves into the personal accounts of a general from birth to retirement. This a must companion for "Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant, Volume One."

No comments about Nasser: Hero of the Arab Nation (Makers of the Muslim World).

5 comments about Nader: Crusader, Spoiler, Icon.

1. I gotta say, who knew this guy was this cool? I kind of thought Ralph Nader had a story behind him. And here I find it in full living color. Martin, who wrote the fab Greenspan book from the high falutin era, now takes on an "icon" whom no one really knows...which is the point. Since Nader's plan was to stay silent and mysterious so it is wild to see Martin foil it in such an artist, comprehensive and above all, surprisingly fun manner. (Nader with his clothes off, so to speak...) I'm sure no one expected to see 'fun' and 'Nader' in the same sentence and in this book you finally get to see what all the fuss was about. I'd stood at a brick bookstore perusing a copy of Nader's quasi-autobio and thought "What is this?" Was all jargonish propoganda. This book is terrific and fascinating cause Martin goes for the jugular in a style that is refreshing - and yet not muckraking in the least. I say this bio is a new form of art: taking the wraps off someone no one knew or even thought of as more than a figurehead, and showing what that person has really done - and the consequences too. Oh and the cool part - that he's more than a political geek, that's for dessert.



2. I'm admittedly biased towards Ralph Nader, having volunteered and voted for him during the 1996 and 2000 presidential elections. That being said, I found this book to be remarkably balanced. It's neither a hagiography nor a hatchet job, but rather gives equal weight to Nader's achievements and shortcomings.

   Martin writes extremely well, with a brisk pace: by page 30 Nader has finished law school, and by page 45 he's written "Unsafe at Any Speed" and is ready to take on GM! Despite the quick pacing, Martin doesn't gloss over Nader's early years: he presents the reader with all the necessary information on Nader's upbringing and influences, relying on well-chosen anecdotes rather than tedious genealogies.

   The section on Nader's crusade against GM practically reads like a spy thriller. Fans of Nader will thrill during his "peak period" of 1969-1976, when it seemed he could do no wrong. But those same fans will scratch their head later on, when Nader inexplicably sabotages some of his own initiatives through a refusal to compromise with Congress.

   Martin quickens the pace of the book yet again when detailing Nader's quixotic presidential runs. He describes the alienation Nader felt after being rebuffed by the Clinton/Gore administration - a feeling than no doubt sparked his candidacy and defused any feelings of remorse at possibly costing Gore the 2000 election. The irony of Nader's career is that he achieved the most when Republicans were in power, because he expected little of their administrations and focused on galvanizing grassroots efforts to achieve reform.

   This is an excellent biography, a revealing portrait of a man who has devoted his life to consumer advocacy and making America a safer place to live.




3. The intelligent, take no prisoners, crusader of consumer rights is featured in Justin Martin's new book, Nader, Crusader, Icon Spoiler. Overall, the book, 281 pages, reads well and is organized, but suffers from what appears to be some author-induced opinions which detract from the book's authenticity. Still, the book is an interesting story about a guy who never gave up, made life a little safer on the highways, but doesn't know how to stop when he's ahead. This, leading to the title of this review, in a quote by Teddy Roosevelt listed in the Nader biography by Martin to describe Nader.

   Martin brings us through Nader's early life in Conneticut, his college and law school days at Princeton and Harvard and then his life stuggle against for profit corporations. Ultimately the theme of Nader's life, as described by Martin, is essentially a life long vendetta against the corporation. In the early days of Nader's career, as told by Martin, Nader had the issues behind him. Auto safety, for instance, was an important issue which Nader championed with much success. In the later years, however, Nader picked fight after fight, including a fight with President Jimmy Carter, according to Martin. This fight just seemed so unnecessary, according to Martin.

   The political quotes choosen by Martin in the Nader biography are fun to read, but some of Martin's choosen quotes to describe a point he wants to make seem unnecessarily targeted to the potential reader audience which, in my opinion, takes away from the biography.

   For instance, Martin seems to take some unnecessary pot shots at Donald Rumsfeld and George Bush. Martin, in describing how Nader despised the typical Ivy Leaguer, chooses this quote by Nader:
   "At Princeton, the athlete was king... Donald Rumsfeld was on the wrestling team and he would swagger around campus."

   Another unnecessary quote was when Martin is describing how hard working the Nader workers were; Martin chooses to insert a quote by one of Nader's guys from Yale who attended at the same time as our current President, "When I [referring to the Nader worker] was studying..., Bush was getting drunk at the frat house across the street." These quotes appear to add little more than some cheap pot shot humor that should not be used in a serious biography.




4. The intelligent, take no prisoners, crusader of consumer rights is featured in Justin Martin's new book, Nader: Crusader, Icon Spoiler. Martin is also the author of Greenspan: the Man Behind the Money. Overall, Nader: Crusader, Icon Spoiler, 288 pages, reads well and is organized, but suffers from what appears to be some author-induced opinions that detract from the book's authenticity.

   Still, the book is an interesting story about a guy who never gives up, made life a little safer on the highways, but doesn't know how to stop when he's ahead. As Martin points out by quoting Teddy Roosevelt, muckrakers are an important part of society, but must know when to stop raking the muck. Nader, according to Martin and other accounts, just doesn't know when to stop stirring up the muck.

   Martin brings us through Nader's early life in Connecticut, his college and law school days at Princeton and Harvard and then his life struggle against for profit corporations. Ultimately the theme of Nader's life, as described by Martin, is essentially a life long vendetta against the corporation. In the early days of Nader's career, as told by Martin, Nader had the issues behind him. Auto safety, for instance, was an important issue which Nader championed with much success. In the later years, however, Nader picked fight after fight, including a fight with President Jimmy Carter, according to Martin. This fight just seemed so unnecessary, according to Martin. This experience highlighted by Martin brings out the defensive, never satisfied, approach Nader always gives to his project. Nader is more worried about looking like a compromiser than in getting a good result, according to Martin and this comes out in this episode.

   The political quotes that Martin chooses in the Nader biography are fun to read, but some of Martin's chosen quotes to describe a point he wants to make seem unnecessarily targeted to the more liberal audience likely to read this book and, in my view, take away from the author's credibility.

   For instance, Martin seems to take some unnecessary pot shots at Donald Rumsfeld and George Bush. Martin, in describing how Nader disliked the typical Ivy Leaguer, chooses this quote by Nader: "At Princeton, the athlete was king... Donald Rumsfeld was on the wrestling team and he would swagger around campus." Another unnecessary quote was when Martin is describing how hard working the Nader workers were; Martin chooses to insert a quote by one of Nader's guys from Yale who attended at the same time as our current President, "When I [referring to the Nader worker] was studying..., Bush was getting drunk at the frat house across the street." These quotes appear to add little more than some cheap pot shot humor that should not be used in a serious biography.

   In any event, other than these unnecessary quips, the book is an interesting overview of Ralph Nader.




5. For as much as Ralph Nader has influenced and shaped events in this country, most people know next to nothing about the man. Nader has had a long, fruitful career fighting for those without a voice. In this book, Justin Martin has provided the most revealing, eye opening account of a truly great citizen.
   
   As far as biographies go, this book is pretty straitforward. Martin covers Nader's childhood, school days, college days, and then onto Nader's career in Washington D.C. Martin invterviewed members of Nader's family and also his friends to help accumulate the material for the book.
   
   Part of why this book seems so fantastic to me may have something to do with the fact that it's the only one of its kind. If you want to know about how Nader got to where he is today, Martin's book is the only one available. That notwithstanding, I think the book does a great job. The fact that Nader hasn't publicly spoken out against the book also speaks to its merit. If Nader didn't like this book, or thought Martin got anything significant wrong, I believe Ralph would have let us know about it.
   
   Hopefully all those angry democrats will sit down with this book and find out how much good Nader has done for this country...

4 comments about Peron: A BIOGRAPHY.

1. This is a monumental work by an author who made six trips to Argentina, and also traveled to Spain and Panama, while researching this book. The author refers to Juan Peron as the most remarkable and enduring leader in Latin American history. The author proceeds to describe this remarkable career, following Peron from his humble birth in rural Argentina, to his military training, to the Presidency (1946), exile, and return to Argentina in the early 1970s where he would die in office. Brief mention is made of Isabel's tragic and short reign as President after the death of her husband. Extensive information is also available regarding Peron's relationship with Eva Peron ("Evita"), with a few chapters devoted to her. A section of photographs is available as well.

   The author's description of Juan Peron is comprehensive and complex, and may therefore be best suited for someone already very familiar with Peron and contemporary Argentine history. If you are looking for a more brief and succinct historical rendering of Peron's career, you may want to look elsewhere, perhaps to JUAN AND EVA PERON by Clive Foss. My favorite biography of Juan Peron is PERON AND ENIGMAS OF ARGENTINA by Robert D. Crassweller. Crassweller explains in PERON AND THE ENIGMAS OF ARGENTINA that Peron was a product of the "Hispanic Creole" tradition, and that all his successes and failures can be seen within the context of that culture, and in many ways were *shaped* by that culture. In fact, Crassweller argues that Peron's real talent was his keen insight into the culture, his keen intuition in understanding how to reach out to and unify as many different segments of Argentina as possible. While Joseph Page does attempt to provide cultural insight, he does not succeed to the extent that Crassweller does.

   Joseph Page comes to a conclusion that may surprise many: that Juan Peron was a pacifist at heart; "He steadfastly rejected violence as an open instrument of policy." Page also points out the irony that Peron, once considered by some as a "South American Hitler," would have never plunged or plundered his country into war, and that it was the men who ousted Peron who went on to kill thousands of people.




2. Joseph Page's biography of Juan Peron is masterful in the breadth and scope that it covers. It not only does an excellent job of describing Peron's life and his impact on Argentina but you can also get a sense of the surrounding times and the development of the country. He spends quite a bit of time developing the backdrop for Peron's rise and his influence on the country. Due and fair consideration is given to the role of Eva Peron and for those who are interested in more I recommend the Navarro biography. The book is very well written and is a fast read. If you are interested in the Peronist party and this time in Argentina this is a great book to start with.



3. I always wondered about the live of this dictator. Everybody knows of his second wife Eva, and the various military regimes of Argentina. However Page makes the real Person shine through. This was a man who changed the balance of power in Argentina. His laws and measures uplifted the downtrodden workers and peasants. He also flirted with fascism and instituted terrorism in the late sixties and early seventies. He did much good for Argentina and spawned a movement that is still going in that country. There are both positives and negatives to this leader. Unfortunately, this man died in 1973, and left his country to spiral into dictatorship and terrorism as a result of his politics.
   
   Page captures the true Peron in this monumental work of close to 600 pages. He shows who Person really was, and descibes the qualities that made up this leader.



4. I was in college in the United States during the period of Peron's return to power, the collapse of his wife Isabel's regime and the subsequent "Dirty War" carried out by the military dictatorship that followed them. I was amazed at the extreme passion the Peronist masses showed for their beloved leader and, on the other hand, the way the military junta that overthrew Isabel quite openly carried out a reign of terror in a country that was not behind the Iron Curtain but was a part of the Western world and continued to carry out normal relations with the rest of the world. Everybody knew that the main torture center was the Naval Mechanics School and that the death squads of the notorious right-wing "AAA" drove around in Ford Falcon's. The regime's methods were right out in the open and it seemed they wanted people to know what they were doing and couldn't care less what the rest of the civilized world thought.
   
   It seems that Argentina's descent into this hell of repression came about as a result of forces galvanized by one man, Juan Domingo Peron. Argentina, like the other countries of Latin America, although influenced by liberal, constitutionalist influences from the United States and Europe already in the mid-19th century, had great difficulty metamorphasizing into a stable democratic country, in spite of the fact that the population there, unlike in most of Latin America, was primarily of white European origin, without a large number of indingenous, Indian or mixed race people. It wasn't until the beginnning of the 20th century that a true liberal, pro-democratic political movement, called the Radical Civic Union (RCU) came into being, and the first truly free democratic election for President didn't come until about the start of the First World War.
   Argentina is a country blessed with natural resources and fertile farmland and became one of the richest countries in the world after World War I increased the demand for its agricultural products. In spite of this, the large working class had no real political representation and they were not, by and large, able to benefit from the wealth the country was generating. Argentina's democratically-minded middle class, which the RCU represented, did not identify politically or socially with the working class, which felt disenfranchised. Finally, as a result of the military coup of 1943, a military junta entered power that claimed to represent the worker's interests for the first time. The leading force in the junta was Peron, who was a Colonel at the time. He went to work to distribute the nation's wealth to this sector for the first time and greatly expanded their rights and benefits, but a darker side of him also showed in his pro-fascist tendencies. He was elected in a fair, democratic election to the Presidency in 1946, but his popularity, along with his charismatic wife, Eva, did not satisfy him, so he began using the law to crack down on the opposition groups. He squandered the nation's wealth bringing about an economic crisis, forcing him to take more and more demagogic stands, finally attacking the Catholic Church and encouraging street violence. The military (from which he himself came) finally decided to take action. An preliminary unsuccessful coup attempt led to indiscriminate bombing of the government center of Buenos Aires in an attempt to liquidate Peron, leading to the killing of hundreds of passersby. This already was a sign that the military, or at least parts of it, which had liberal elements in it, also contained other elements that believed in raw power and was indifferent to the lives of the country's citizens. This military brutality would come back to haunt the country 20 years later. Some time later Peron threw in the towel and resigned, fleeing ignominiously to Paraguay, eventually ending up in Spain some years later. Peronism was ruthlessly suppressed by the succeeding military regimes, but the body politic could not deal with the large, undigestable bloc of voters committed to Peronism and which was now disenfrachised. Attempts by sectors of the RCU led by President Arturo Frondizi were made to coopt the Peronists, but these failed miserably.
   It was in exile, while plotting to return to power, that the true cynicism of this man came out. In the 1940's he showed clear symapthy for the Axis powers and resisted American attempts to get Argentina to cooperate in the war against Nazi Germany. By the 1960's he sees that radical Marxists like Fidel Castro and Che Guevera were popular with the young so he started spouting "anti-Imperialist" and "anti-Capitalist" slogans. A major split developes in the Peronist movement back home between "right-wing Peronists" who in reality were basically like European Trade-Unionist Social Democratic party machine politicians, who were interested in bread-and-butter issues for their constituents and the perks of political office for themselves, and a more radical group, which in the late 1960's took on the name "Montoneros" who talked about radical Leftist upheaval in Argentina. Peron encouraged both sides, even seemingly acquiescing (if not actually encouraging) the assassination of the Peronist trade union Leader Augusto Vandor whom he suspected was not completely loyal to him, while letting the Peronist Left do the actual dirty work for him for supposedly "ideological" reasons. One would think cynicism of this type would alienate his followers, but the more the country sank into political chaos and violence in addition to economic difficulties, the more popular he became. Peoples' memories of Peron's presidency seemed to improve with time, with people forgetting the dark side of his rule. The assassination of former military President Pedro Aramburu led to a military reshuffle of the government and the emergence of a liberal, constitutionalist (by Argentine standards) military regime led by General Alejandro Lanusse. Lanusse tried to bring the Peronists fully into the political system, but without Peron himself (Lanusse thougtht, wrongly, that Peron himself would realize he was too old to resume office). Finally, Peron was allowed to visit Argentina and elections were called, but Peron was not allowed to run himself. As the country spiralled into more and more violence, Peron refused to condemn Peronist terror led by the Montoneros, who had taken credit for the murder of Aramburu. He tried to be all things to all people. He referred to himself as a "conductor" of an orchestra, getting everyone to do what he wanted, but many of his followers had other ideas.
   Even the liberal RCU, led by Ricardo Balbin, finally reconciled himself to the Peronist revival (he had been arrested and harrassed by Peron in the 1950's) in government. The Peronist party, led by a "left-wing" Peronist, Hector Campora, was elected President under the slogan "Campora to the Presidency, Peron to Power!" Many felt that Campora was sympathetic to the left-wing radicals and the Montoneros and this frightened many non-Peronists in the country.
   Peron then made his final return to Argentina, and from the moment he arrived, Campora's power evaporated and new elections were held in 1973 which Peron won easily. Balbin and the RCU didn't even put up much of a fight, apparently believing only Peron could bring the country together. Well, Peron couldn't. The movement began to fractionate as Peron, apparently influenced by his mysterious assisstant Jose Lopez Rega, who despised the Peronist Left was forced to take sides and finally take a clear stand. Violence increased as the Peronist Right and Left battled each other. A high ranking follower of Peron in the trade union movement, Jose Rucci, was assassinated, apparently by Montoneros.
   Peron died and left his widow, the Vice President, an insoluable dilemma, which she was unable to deal with. Ultimately, she was overthrown and a new military regime, very different from Lanusse's liberal one, came into power and with brute force, eliminated the Montoneros and the more radical ERP terrorist groups, in additon to thousands of non-violent political opponents of the regime (the "disappeared"), also leading to the disastrous Falkland Islands War with Britain. This was Peron's legacy to the country.
   
   The author of the book seems to have an ambivalent attitude to the Peron's. He praises him for "empowering the poor" and he also says that the claims that Juan and Eva stole huge amounts of money during his first time in power were greatly exaggerated. He says Peron, after the death of Evita, seemed to lose interest in being President, and thus he did not actively resist the coup that ousted him. In exile, the "conductor" played different groups off each other, telling them different things, and in the end all these intrigues blew up in the Peronist's face.
   
   Although the book was written in the 1980's it is still very relevant for today. The Peronists still are very powerful but they seemed to learn their lesson and are more respectful of the democratic process. However, in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez seems to be be replaying all the mistakes Peron made in his first Presidency....he was given a country with a lot of money in the bank, but he squanders it while using more and more anti-democratic methods to quash opposition. Latin America has a lot to learn from Peron's and Argentina's misadventures.

No comments about Alva Myrdal: A Daughter's Memoir (Radcliffe Biography Series).