1 comments about Lincoln before Washington: NEW PERSPECTIVES ON THE ILLINOIS YEARS.

1. I'll admit, I'm a little biased toward the work of Douglas Wilson. I think he's done as much to forward the study of Lincoln's early life than almost anyone so I enjoy and appreciate all his projects. This book, obivously, grew from his study of William Herndon's informants. Wilson offers thoughtfull essays on a wide variety of subjects pertaining to the pre-presidential Lincoln. Some is completely new, some expands on some well-known material. In the end though, Wilson, presents his material in a very readable way that had me, anyway, looking at Lincoln from another perspective. That, to me, is what historical research should accomplish.

3 comments about Mary Tudor: The Tragical History of the First Queen of England.

1. There have been many biographies of Mary Tudor, the British contender against Elizabeth I for the throne of England. History being largely written by the winners, Mary Tudor became notorious for her lethal persecution of the Protestants, her unceasing efforts to deliver Britain to the Catholics, the loss of Calais to the fledgling British empire, and her decades long struggle to gain control of Britain that was to result in years of confinement by Queen Elizabeth and her eventual death at the headsman's axe at an advanced age. In "Mary Tudor: The Tragical History of The First Queen Of England", historian David Loades (Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Wales and an Associate of the Centre for Early Modern History at the University of Oxford) fully explores the dimensions of a complex life in a time of political volatility, religious wars, male domination of government, royal marriages for political advantages, personal devoutness, and a woman who was in many ways stronger than any of the men with whom she associated in her quest for royal power and Catholic supremacy. "Mary Tudor" is an articulate and very highly recommended work of impeccable scholarship that should be a part of every academic library British History & Royal Biography reference collection and supplemental reading list.



2. David Loades is an authority on Mary Tudor and a fine author. Just a point of clarification on the earlier review, however; the first reviewer confuses Mary Tudor and Mary Stuart, two very different rulers. Mary Tudor was the eldest daughter of Henry VIII and the only surviving child of Catherine of Aragon. She succeeded to the throne in 1553 after her brother Edward VI and died in 1558. She has indeed been criticized for what many consider her overzealous push to return England to Catholicism, but in her defense, she was doing what she thought was right.
   
   On the other hand, Mary Stuart was the cousin of Elizabeth I (who was in turn the younger sister of Mary Tudor and daughter of Anne Boleyn) and was the one ultimately beheaded during Elizabeth I's reign in 1587. It should be noted that Elizabeth I herself was briefly imprisoned by Mary I (Mary Tudor) but was released unharmed.
   
   This is a fascinating period of history and this book is a good starting point to learn more about Mary Tudor's brief and sad reign. Mary Stuart's life is also very interesting and Amazon carries several good biographies on her as well.



3. David Loades wrote a biography of Queen Mary Tudor fifteen years ago. His earlier work has been revised and looked at afresh in this biography written for National Archives in the UK. His biography has been based primarily on original documents about Mary in the archives - and many of these have been reproduced in this publication as well. Its something that serious historical authors used to do in earlier centuries and its actually welcome to see the practice return as a way of preserving this information if the original is ever lost (and that happened quite a bit).
   
   Loades has come to some unusal conclusions about Mary with a fresh look at her life - but I would also say that this is a very balanced assement of this woman who lived though a bitter divorce and the overthrow of all she loved in her youth. If you have an interest in Mary Tudor this book is one you should pick up.
   
   Bloody Mary

1 comments about Thaksin: The Business Of Politics In Thailand.

1. Pasuk is one of the most renowned economist in Thailand. Her books are mostly in English (in collarboratin with her husband, himself also a renowned thinker, Chris Baker). Now they take on a subject of Thaksin Shinawatra, arguably the most famous prime minister cum businessman in Thailand.
   Most of Thaksin's biographies in Thai are, I dare say, bias. They always portray him as a white knight, a self-made billionaire, and a man with a perfect happy family, intentionally overlooking his early failure as businessman and his well-connected background. While this book has admitted that it has not been written with 100% objectivity, it turns out to be the most objective book about the subject. It sheds the up and down of his business and political life, as well as the good and bad of his policy.
   One of the most revealing aspect in this book is the discussion of "Thaksinomics" and "dual track" policies, both of which make him a rising star in internatioal politics. Anyone who is interested in such subject should not miss this book at all.
   However, there are flaws in this book. Foremost is that most of the inputs come from newspaper, and writers add few inputs from their thoughts. Secondly, this book wrote about in 2004, and it would miss the most landslide victory in Thai history by his party. Also, it did miss his fall because of waves of corruption scandal.
   I hope that they would write a revised version, once everything is settled.

3 comments about My Twelve Years with John F. Kennedy.

1. The book was really great and I have read a lot of books on John F Kennedy. The book gave a human aspect of the campaign and the day to day life of the kennedy administration.



2. my twelve years is a very interesting book because
   it's the remembering of his secratary who know him.
   we can learn how he was and not only his politics.
   so read it!



3. I have this book Its a great book and gives you a glimps of the Man John Kennedy who was also President.Its a well rounded book giving the reader the feel of being there.

No comments about Franklin Delano Roosevelt, My Boss.

No comments about Robert A. Taft: Ideas, Tradition, and Party in U.S. Foreign Policy (Biographies in American Foreign Policy).

5 comments about The Black Room at Longwood: Napoleon's Exile on Saint Helena.

1. I read this book on a flight to France, and was mesmerized by the author's lapidary prose and his ability to bring to the reader a keen sense of loneliness and desolation. According to the author, Napoleon spent a good deal of his last six years trying to figure out what went wrong at Waterloo...the sort of torment worthy of Greek mythology. Feeling broken and forgotten, the former emperor, to quote General McArthur, "faded away", dying as much of depression as of physiological causes.

   A few days after finishing the book, I visited Napoleon's tomb at the Hotel des Invalides in Paris. It's very grand, and I'm sure he would have loved it. Enshrined, perhaps even resurrected, in this manner, Napoleon has the last laugh.




2. I went searching for a book about Napoleon for a friend. This is that book. If you want to know anything about Napoleon's last years, this isn't the book to read. I found this book dull to the extreme. It reads more like "what I did on my summer vacation.' I kept waiting to get into the informative part of the book but it never came. Kauffmann talks of paintings that aren't shown, quotes that came from other works as he wanders around Longwood.What the English women have to do with this book is a mystery. A complete waste of time and paper. Read something else if you want to know about Napoleon.



3. This is a strange mixture and I have to admit to very much disliking it when I first picked it up. It is a translated version of what was originally a French work and the English to me seemed a bit florid and dramatic. I am not sure if that is the translation or if the French naturally write in that style. I would however recommend people who are interested in Napoleon to persevere - it is a strange sort of book but worth the read.

   I say this for two other reasons - firstly because Kauffmann has read just about every primary source about Napoleon's exile on St Helens - a tiny island pretty much in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and secondly because Kauffmann knows first hand about captivity.

   After reading this book a little = and not enjoying it I read the author biography - this man spent some years as a captive in Beirut in the 1980's. Returning to the book I started to realise that this is more than just a book about Napoleon, or about a travellogue to the island. This is a story about captivity and its psychological side. Kauffmann is very clearly the right man to write about it. The oppression of captivity overwhelms the writing sometimes. Kauffman clearly found the place oppressive - he keeps talking of the town itself squeezed between two mountains - it is one of his repetitive themes and I get the sense that if he didn't sail out there expecting to dislike the place, his dislike of it coloured his later writings about it.

   I think this book could just as easily be named 8 days on St Helens as the book is divided into chapters for each day. So his trip is dealt with chronologically - the information about Napoleon ducks and dives - often with seemingly little logic to it. However if you are looking to learn about Napoleon's last years they are touched on - more so Napoleon as a man is revealed. His impatience (he drove each day on the island in a carriage with two wives of his officers - but went at such high speed as to throw them around - a demonstration of power?) his arrogance.

   There are also interesting insights into the man prior to his captivity - for instance I never knew Napoleon couldn't speak perfect French - (he spoke it badly and confusingly at times - muddling his words and pronunciations). However I don't think Kauffman explains anything new to most scholars of Napoleon. He mentions that Napoleon considered going to America before settling for surrendering to the English - why did he change his mind?

   So you can read this book on many different levels - a story of St Helens, a mixed bag of Napoleonic history, or a story of captivity. All have different merits in this - but they are all mixed together. I don't know that I would recommend making a special trip to get it - but worth reading if you haven't much else to do.




4. The author has a seemingly great idea : cruise to out-of-the-way St. Helena and combine a historical hunt with a modern day travelogue of his journey.
   
   The premise works well at some points, but lags quite often. The most annoying trait of the book is the author's tendancy to wax poetic for literally PAGES describing paintings or other works of art to be found in Longwood. I don't really understand what Mr. Kauffmann's opinion of "The Last Phase" has to do with Napoleon's exile.
   
   I've finished reading the book and I'm still actually not quite sure what I just read. It was certainly unique and well-written, I'll give Kauffmann that much. But I don't believe that I learned anything about Napoleon's exile that I didn't already absorb from more thorough, historical works. I genuinely expected to hear some unique tales and speculation about Napoleon's last days... but alas, none were to be had. This was a fruitless read if you're looking for fun or irreverant facts about Napoleon's final days.
   
   Bottom line : Not worth your time and money unless you are completely obsessed with Bonaparte, or if you plan to visit St. Helena at some point.



5. It may be fair to call this book a meditation on how some places are perfectly fit to induce particular states of mind. As promised by the title, "The Black Room at Longwood" describes the prison by describing its effect on the prisoner.
   
   Kauffmann describes the sights and smells of St. Helen in such detail that its desolation is almost palpable. He makes many self-conscious efforts to find the relics and remembrances of its most famous prisoner. Kauffmann brings the place to life--but such a life--dreary and meaningless--and contrasts it with known preferences and dislikes of Napoleon so that every little pinprick can be felt.
   
   When I tried to picture as active a man as Napoleon Bonaparte in that place, I couldn't help but pity him (from my comfortable vantage point, in 2006). As described in the book, Napoleon's own mind was beginning to give way to the horror of that oppressed place by the time he died.

2 comments about Richard Nixon.

1. Psycobiograghies are new in genre, but they may be enlightening, provided the subject that is being studied is analysed deeply.
   So, to write a similar kind of work regarding so complex a man as was Richard Nixon requires a good amount of knowledge about his life, his personal and political choices and particularly the latter for the very reason that are the most delicate : how can this be accomplished with a book a mere 149 pages ? Inevitably the informations here given verge on the general and the analysis done seems to be a little bit amateurish. Although the book is good to read, it certainly does not say the last word on Nixon'personality - not in the least !
   In the end, I appreciate the choice of having chosen former president Nixon as a subject, but that would have required a very bigger work, at least three times as big as the size of the present book.



2. Just a quick review to help offset the irresponsible review by the person from Italy. It was clear to me that he had not read the book, but had only seen the number of pages in the book and made his rash conclusions based on that sole piece of evidence. But quantity does not by any means imply quantity. Idiota!

1 comments about A Reporter's Lincoln (Bison Book).

1. This edition is a modern update and expansion of memories and tales about Lincoln gathered starting in 1886 by Walter B. Smith then chief of the Washington bureau of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat. Even at that time the legends about Lincoln had begun to grow. Understandably what people remembered, or were willing to present, probably portrayed themselves in a favorble light and presented themselves as closer to Lincoln than they may actually have been. The author himself was not above presenting material from other sources as interviews he had personaly conducted. Keeping that in mind the book offers glimpses of an elusive historical figure from a variety of points of view from people who knew him. Editor Michael Burlingame does an admirable job of informing the reader of the limitations inherent in this kind of gahering oral history. There is a fascination to reading about Lincoln as known by political friends and opponents, relatives and fellow attorneys, merchants and those who knew him when they were children.

5 comments about Hitler: The Path to Power.

1. ...this book captivated my attention. Very clearly and well written, Flood takes you almost step by step from Hitler's early years as a floundering nobody to the flourishing of what became the Nazi party under his rule. Be advised that this is as far as the timeline goes. The historical context is thoroughly discussed, a necessity considering that the rise of a man such as Hitler happened as a reaction to the political and cultural and social stagnation that occured in Germany after WWI.



2. I cannot recommend this book enough for anyone interested in reading about the causes and origins of German fascism. Any book on Hitler can always veer off into the cartoonish, reinforcing the idea that the man was a monster. That approach devalues the very serious underpinnings of Hitler's ascent that Bracelen Flood describes: The Versaille Treaty and the short-sighted behavior of the victors of World War I; the intense racialism of Bavaria; the sheer incompetence of Germany's leaders; and the brilliance of Hitler's campaign to rule the country. Telling details are on every page of the book, but Bracelen Flood is very careful to qualify his observations when the evidence is conflicted. He sees the interaction between the anecdote and the big picture, using several devices to ground the reader in the reality of what happened. Best of all, Bracelen Flood's extensive research allows us to understand what people involved in the events were thinking. At several points, I was struck by how, above all else, Hitler was abetted by luck and the fact that he was consistently underestimated by people who should have known better. The end result is both a study of a pivotal portion of the last century and a valuable tool to ensuring that nothing like it ever happens again.



3. This well-researched journal of Hitler's early days will really get you thinking. You cannot understand World War 2 or the Holocaust without learning about what went on with this man before the age of 40. I recommend this to anyone and everyone who loves history or is doing a report. It is out of print so you can either get it used or get it at your local library. Whatever you do, you will enjoy this great book.



4. Here we have a terrifically lucid, readable, and even entertaining account that truly does answer the question, how such a seeming loser from nowhere could rise to become the undisputed leader of the German Nazi party. The tragic and horrible conditions in Germany between 1918-1924 are described in haunting detail, the economy a wreck with inflation reaching 1 billion% by the time of the Novemeber, 1923 Putsch. The cast of characters includes the mesmorizing speaker Hitler, plus the weird general Ludendorrf, Rohm, Hess, the Strassers, Drexler, Goring, and many others, including the WC Fields-like Putzi Hafstaengel, who kept contact with foreign journalists. And the actual events of the BeerHall Putsch have their horrid moments plus some Keystone Kops moments too! In short, about the best early Nazi history out there!



5. Another of a line in study of out of control power that changed the world. A study of Hitler that contributes to the greater picture of governmental agents of change.. Study with opinions.