History Books

I have always been fascinated by hospitals and reading this book allowed me to indulge my fascination. It basically depicts a year in the life of the administrators, doctors, social workers, and other personnel at a very busy Brooklyn hospital. Salamon depicts these characters so vividly, you'd think she was writing a novel. Her subjects definitely come alive on the page.

The primary function of the book is to depict the complexities of running a hospital. The secondary function is to depict the relationship between the hospital and the community it serves, which is traditionally centered on orthodox Jews. Thus, the book is also a fascinating study of orthodox Judaism, at least as lived out in Brooklyn. The area surrounding the hospital is increasingly multicultural (e.g., Chinese, Pakistani) and Salamon also does a great job of depicting these cultures with both clarity and sensitivity.

I have only a few caveats about the book. Much of its focus is on the hospital's cancer center, so it is very "heavy" reading material. It will have you thinking a lot about your own mortality. In no way is it a beach or bedtime read.

There is also a small section of the book concerned with "partial birth" abortion. I thought that it could have been more objective. (It seems clear from reading the section that Salamon is pro-choice, though she spares no gruesome detail in describing the procedure.)

Overall, though, I recommend this book. It packs a lot of interesting material into a reasonable number of pages. It will be a read you won't be able to put down.

Hospital is an amazing book, both as an stand-alone story and a exercise in the art of story telling. You'll enjoy "Hospital" if you enjoyed Salamon's "The Devil's Candy," only instead of experiencing juicy, morbid fascination via a Hollywood bomb, you'll experience a new sense of admiration for hospital workers and the author's talent.

In the beginning, I wondered whether it was possible for someone to bring a hospital to life. They're big, lifeless institutions that lack the drama and personality of similar organizations like a big business (Apple) with a rich history, right? Gay Talese was able to create magical stories about the Brooklyn Bridge and the New York Times, but he's Gay Talese. People loved those books and they helped form the foundation of his reputation. In my opinion, Salamon has reached that level as a storyteller with "Hospital." This is not an easy, cut-and-paste story. She pulls it off and proves she can write well about anything. Anything.

A great non- fiction book makes people do more than read to the end. With this one, I found myself searching out the origins of Hasidic vs. Orthodox Jews, and googling image after image of the characters. I HAD to see what Pam, Dr. Astrow and the others looked looked like.

Salamon became a word doctor, someone able to give life to what I considered to be nothing more than a lifeless institution. Anyone in the health care industry will relate to the travails, and those of us outside it will find a very informative snapshot into this world. As for Salamon, reading this story is like seeing Lenny Kravitz perform live; it's witnessing someone who was born with a gift and using it.

A great read. not only does this book give us an insiders look at healthcare in new york, but also shows us the struggles of new immigrants, and the problems that are facing our hospitals dealing with different languages and cultures. I think Ms. Salamom is a gifted writer and at the end of the day, you really beleive that everyone is trying to do the right thing, inspite of the red tape, bad behavior, money god and yes, diversity on steroids. Kudos to maimonides for allowing this to happen and giving us this wonderful opportunity to learn something new.

Although I was fascinated by the subject - having had relatives in the hospital, and I know many of the people mentioned, I found the book very hard to read.
There was no unifying theme, the book jumped from one subject to another. There was not a compelling narrative nor story line.
I was very disappointed!!

Do not buy this book. It makes patients look like a mass of whining, ungrateful people. Everyone from doctors to administration to hospital workers range from cynical to dissatisfied. Based on this book I would never go to this hospital.

A good review of the development of neoliberal ideology in public opinion, government policies and global relationships

This is a very rich book. The subject, neoliberalism, must be understood if we are to understand current politics. Harvey's other books--those I have in mind being THE NEW IMPERALIASM, LIMITS TO CAPITAL, THE CONDITION OF POSTMODERNITY--are equally illuminating. What I write here, I admit, does not constitute a review of the book, neither summarizing its contents or approach, nor offering any criticisms; it is merely an assurance that your study of this book (which I am on my second reading of after having read the first two of the books above-mentioned along with Naomi Klein's uncannily brilliant THE SHOCK DOCTRINE) will give you a good grounding in the matter he treats of: neoliberalism, "its origins, rise, and implications," and will give you a sharper and quicker sense of current national and world politics. Harvey possesses the three qualities of an academic writer that justify, almost demand, studying his work on a subject of this importance: he masters the materially relevant data (i.e., he is a genuine scholar), he thinks well, and he writes well.

I'm going to do something here that I rarely do: attempt a short review. There are many excellent reviews of this fine book that I don't need to add much except to say that I agree with the bulk of them. I believe that neoliberal ideas have caused incalculable harm over the course of the last several decades. There are signs of increasingly wide discontent and distrust of the kinds of economic prognostications put forward by people like Milton Friedman, Ronald Reagan (admittedly not a great economic thinker, but unquestionably the great popularizer of neoliberal ideas), and their ilk, seen in part by the great commercial success (and surprisingly popular reception) of books like Naomi Klein's THE SHOCK DOCTRINE. Increasingly, people are coming to understand that what is best for General Motors just might not be the best thing for the rest of the world. But there is little doubt that neoliberal and libertarian thinking (and yes, I do not think there are important distinctions between the two -- the best thing I've read lately about libertarianism came from the superb SF novel by Kim Stanley Robinson, GREEN MARS -- one of his characters thinks to himself, "That's libertarians for you -- anarchists who want police protection from their slaves") will continue to confuse thinking about economic and political ideas. But as those ideas have increasingly resulted in nothing more nor less than a shifting of wealth into the hands of a very small number of people, that vastly larger number of people (even in the United States, where economic inequality has been increasingly dramatically since 1979 -- neoliberal ideas were actually first embraced by Jimmy Carter, though with nothing like the religious fervor of Ronald Reagan), have started to realize that all "trickle down" economic policies are a massive con job.

Harvey in this book wants to present the history of neoliberal thinking. "Neoliberal" as a term is in common usage in many parts of the world, but not in the United States. "Neoliberalism" is not a left wing but is a right wing position. The two most famous neoliberal political figures were Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. Harvey's book is a marvelous recounting of that history and an accurate chronicler of the frequently devastating effects of neoliberal, free market principles. In particular, he writes of the catastrophic effects neoliberal principles have had through their forced acceptance in many non-European countries.

I find very little to differ with in this book, but I would make two distinct recommendations. First, if you want to read a book by David Harvey, there are three others that I would perhaps recommend more strongly than this. If you have any interest in the postmodern debate, his THE CONDITION OF POSTMODERNITY is one of the 3 or 4 greatest works in the field. Next, if you are interested in globalization, I would recommend THE NEW IMPERIALISM, which overlaps a good deal with THE HISTORY OF NEOLIBERALISM. Also, one of Harvey's earlier works, THE LIMITS OF CAPITAL, though a bit more challenging, is one of the best contemporary works extending Marxist (not Communist -- Harvey is both anti-Communist and a Marxist) ideas into a contemporary intellectual framework. So, my first recommendation is to look at those three books. My second is to look at Naomi Klein's THE SHOCK DOCTRINE for a more popular, entertaining exploration of much of the same territory as this book. She may lack some of Harvey's sophistication, but she surpasses him as a communicator.

Harvey(H) has written an interesting book that ,unfortunately,confuses neoliberalism(libertarianism)with conservatism.This erroneous view is at center stage in the book whenever Adam Smith's name shows up in the discussions.H is badly mistaken when he claims that Smith's view was that "...the hidden hand of the market was the best device for mobilizing even the basest of human instincts..."(Harvey,p.20)such as greed.Smith's view was heavily qualified- in many cases such an approach would work but in other cases it would not work.For instance, consider the myth spread by the economics profession that Smith was opposed to tariffs.Smith was opposed to protective tariffs only.He favored revenue tariffs and retaliatory tariffs if there was any probability greater than 0 that such retaliation would result in the offending country removing the impediment to free trade.He would completely reject the neoliberal approach(IMF,WB,WTO) to the removal of protective tariffs,which was to end them as quickly as possible.Smith's policy is the exact opposite.Such tariffs are to be removed in very slow steps and in a careful manner so as not to create a problem of severe unemployment,which is exactly what has happened in practically ever country that has had to ask for the financial "help" of the Neoliberals.
It is not true that the Adam Smith Institute(Harvey,p.57) in New York supports the approach laid out by Smith in BOTH The Theory of Moral Sentiments(TMS,6th edition,1790) or the Wealth of Nations(WN,1776).The Adam Smith Institute is a libertarian organization whose members have no idea about what Smith said,either in theory or in practice(applied policy).
Finally,Neoliberalism is a failure by the standards of freedom contained in BOTH TMS and WN,and not just in TMS(Harvey,p.185).There is absolutely no conflict between the standards of freedom laid out in the best version of TMS, which was the sixth edition,and the WN.
Smith was the first to realize that there was a dark side(severe externality) to the combined operation of the Invisible Hand and the division of labor process.He spent 7 pages [Modern Library(Cannan)edition,pp.734-741)]pointing out that only the government ,by providing free,universal education to all, if necessary,could remedy this undepletable externality that could destroy the capabilities of the working and middle classes.

Harvey can earn 5 stars from me once he revises the coverage of Adam Smith so that it reflects what it was Smith actually said and recommended as policy and not what some economist ,who only knows how to manipulate a bivariate or multivariate version of the normal probability distribution,claims that Smith said or meant.

The traditional left, in its attempts to run for cover once the edifice of Marxism collapsed, found succour in many ideologies that seemed to explain power imbalance in economic and social relationships. Many of these "new ideas" such as Post-Structuralism and Foucaultian-based power theory, seem to offer a dope-laced understanding of the world and make very specific economic assertions about the world.

The central theme of this book, that economic power is being reconstituted in upper classes to a degree not seen since the 1930s, is a worthy and interesting idea. In fact the raw data indicates that more and more wealth, in percentage terms, is being concentrated into fewer and fewer hands -- especially since the breakdown of the postwar concensus and the demise of the welfare state. This being an economic statement should not be all that hard to prove. How this happens and why, and if the benefit is unjust, or disabling to certain notions of economic justice, Harvey offers little in terms of empirical facts.

Although David Harvey writes well, his evidence is a thin gruel of a single source study by those sympathetic to his cause, and also some sources far too generally cited to actually explain how and what is happening in economic terms. As such the house that Harvey builds is not one that I would like to live in. I found that I was constantly wanting him to prove his point, but could find no economic basis in his book to either explain this drain of wealth or to support his assertions of who and what institutions were making it possible. Instead there was only the strident and oft-repeated boot-strap ideologies each one trying to pick the other off the ground, but none being supported well enough to justify the explanation - in that sense it is similar to Marxism -- and endless series of conjecture with not attempt to look at alternative beliefs and certainly violating the principle of falsifiability.

In addition, there is also a deep suspicion on my part of any theory that attempts to foist a single theory to explain the actions of leaders as diverse as Deng Xiao Ping, Maggie Thatcher, Pinochet, Reagan -- indeed Swedish Socialist governments reconstituting new free market "reforms" is also seen as a direct result of Neoliberalism!!! It raises a critical question of what exactly isn't Neoliberalism?

Having said that, this book is a good read and does encapsulate the current accepted academic dogma of what Neoliberalism in fact describes. Harvey writes well, and undoubtedly the concentration of capital needs to be explained. It is however within the realm of economics that such assertions are proved. Harvey has a lot more work to do to prove his assertion.

I had expected a fictionalized narrative following the daughter of the famous astronomer. What I got was a detailed biography of Galileo himself. However, I still continued reading to the end.
With more warmth and humanity than your average historical account, Sobel's story weaves the life and family of its subject in among the facts of his life. Such things as his recurring illnesses and his struggles with the church authorities are brought to life and made more interesting.
I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the life of Galileo, or anyone who is interested in the day-to-day activities of Italy in the 17th Century.

GALILEO'S DAUGHTER
By
Dava Sobel
(Penguin Books 2000)
Sour Marie Celeste was the illegitimate daughter of Galileo Galelei - the eldest of his three, and only, children At the age of 13 her father had her admitted to the convent of San Mateo in Arcetri, where she would remain until her death at the age of 34 in 1634. Once admitted, or shortly thereafter, she started writing letters to her father - the most loving, beautiful, intelligent letters I have ever read. There aren't too many of them, but they have been preserved and form the excuse (if that is the right word) for this book - which is a part history of the life of Galileo, part comment on his times and a setting to publish the letters chronologically along with and in tune with events in his life.
Every school child knows something about Galileo - whether it was his "invention" of the telescope (he didn't invent it; he improved it immeasurably) or his "discovery" of the fact that it was the earth which revolved around the sun rather than vice versa - and this too was wrong, He didn't "discover" this. The sun-centered universe (heliocentered) had been discovered and described by Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543) in 1543, 21 years before Galileo was born in 1564. Using Copernican theory Tycho Brahe (1545-61) had fixed the positions of may stars both as to distance and location and Johannes Kepler (1591-1630) had established the planetary motion of the planets - or most of them. So it wasn't what he invented or what he "discovered" that eventually got him into trouble with the Catholic Church, it was the fact that he was by far the most gifted and the most prominent man to have advocated - or thought to advocate - the heresy of a heliocentered universe.
He had been a star from the start, one of the most gifted mathematicians of his age or any other, one of the few who, instead of taking things as they are said to be, tried to find out how they really are. And thus was one of the first true scientists, a man who dropped balls of different weights from the tower of Pisa, who rolled balls of different weight and different sizes down inclines of different pitches, who measured the tides, floating bodies - always studying motion and/or the laws of motion - and almost all of modern physics is the study of motion whether it's string theory - action at a distance - or general relativity or the measurement of the effect of a collision of protons in the CORE tunnel in Switzerland this summer.
He was always an academician, teaching mathematics at the University of Pisa or Padua or being the resident mathematician and experimenter for one of the Medici's. And on retainer to the same. He was always ill. He never married. His work was his spouse. However, he recognized his three children by his liaison with the beautiful Marina Gamba of Venice. Domestic life was not for him. To the end he worked and thought, living as a guest or retainer in many ducal palaces in Tuscany and Rome. He lived as an untitled man at the highest level of worldly or ecclesiastical aristocracy. He made enemies - many of them - but he persevered and died in a kind of house arrest at the age of 72, still working and under banishment for daring to support the idea that the earth moved about the sun which the Catholic Church, relying on Aristotelian and Pythagorean thought and on the literal word of Holy Scripter believed as holy writ that it was the sun which revolved about the earth.
I have just spoken of his many enemies and of the ducal residences in which he often made his abode: and the book is full of this detail - too full in my opinion. It would have been better if much of this had either been omitted or if Ms. Sobel had taken the time to tell us something about the governance of his time, I would have been much better informed had I known something of the Medici's or the Doges of Venice or the politics of the Popes who were involved in his life. And I would like to have known more about how people lived in his time.
Similarly I would have liked to know more about convent life. There is enough in the book to indicate that it was perfectly dreadful -cruel, inhuman by our standards. Hared work, cold water, bad food, no rest, small quarters, iron discipline and no sleep. The Hanoi Hilton in San Matteo. Why would anybody lived this way? And why did Galileo put his daughters "away" at age 13. He robbed them of a life! (The excuse given by Sobel is that he learned he had known enemies in court because of his success and wanted to protect them; but this doesn't wash with me. All he had to do was to acknowledge them and, as his heirs, they would have properly evaded his enemy's attempts to take his property. I think he put them away because he was selfish. He didn't want three illegitimate children to be staining his record as he surged his way upward, buoyed by talent and reputation.)
As Galileo stepped through his professional life he wrote to Sour Marie Celeste, but his letters did not survive. Her replies and her spontaneous letters to him did survive, however, and manly of them are quoted here. Would that all children would love their father so much. Would that any one of us would have a child as intelligent, as articulate as she. Would that she were here today - or those like her - to call our attention to enduring love as contrasted to the conditions in which we live.
There are a couple of other comments I want to get down here on paper before I quit. First - about Galileo's "Trial". It is covered accurately and well in the book. In brief Galileo had published in Dialogues the essence of Copernican thought spoken through the mouth of a neutral that was just saying what it was. Then there were two characters, one of which was Galileo under a false name, who discussed it. Thus he never on paper espoused the Copernican heresy. He just said what it was. He thought he had a deal with Cardinal Bellarmino (later Saint Bellarmine) that as long as he didn't teach or espouse it he was not in conflict with Church teaching. However, 15 years later he fell out of favor with Pope Urban VIII. His enemies in the Vatican called on the Inquisition to question him and it was as the result of this that he was sentenced to house arrests.
The trial is well covered in the book, but I wish Sobel had told us more about the Inquisition, how long it lasted, what it did, what procedures were followed, how it was independent (if it was) of the Vatican. What was the Index? What happened to people who wrote things that made their way to the Index of banned books? What kind of books? How many?
I also wish she had told us more about the thirty Years War because it is frequently mentioned and apparently played a direct role in the attitude of the Catholic Church at the time.
Woven through out this history of Galileo's life and the beautiful love expressed by his daughter (who was every bit as bright as he was) is the conflict between science and religion. Sobel never addresses it. But it's pretty clear to me. Religious belief cannot overrule, change or ignore true scientific discovery. And the greatest conflicts in this area have been the Galileo incident with respect to the heliocentered universe and Darwinism. God made the world and He made the rules of nature and God doesn't bend, break or ignore His rules because they are contrary to the ideas of His people

I've got a secret. This book is not really about Galileo's daughter, Virginia. It is about Galileo and his life and times as seen through letters from his daughter to him (the letters from him to his daughter were destroyed). As a book about Virginia, it is largely uninteresting and unenlightening. As a book about Galileo, it is terrific. Dava Sobel captures the essence of Galileo's work and his fight with the religious authorities. My emotions as I read the book were: enlightenment in that it shows Galileo to be a far better person than I had given him credit for; sadness because of how he was mistreated; amazement for the honor he showed in all his dealings; and frustration at how much science was held back by religious authorities. And it puts into perspective how little my own daughter actually demands from me. I strongly recommend this book and I look forward to reading other of Sobel's works, including Longitude.

This book must be read if not for the depth of the actual telling, then for the elegant writing itself. The intertwining of primary source material and the author's own pen is done beautifully. The story's theme of the supposed clash between faith and reason/ science is as relevant today as it was in Galileo's time. Food for thought.

My real issue with this book is that Sobel's writing leaves me cold. I had avoided reading this for a long time because I had not really enjoyed Longitude. But countless critical raves and the response from friends caused me to decide to give Galileo's Daughter a try.

The subject matter is interesting enough. The book is very little about Galileo's daughter and is more a book about the man himself. That is not really a bad thing, since there is sadly not very much to know about Suor Maria Celeste. The episodes Sobel chooses to highlight are interesting, and I believe she succeeds in making Galileo human to the readers.

I would be hard pressed to say what exactly it is that I do not like about Sobel as a writer. It is not something that I can easily articulate. I think that it has something to do with the fact that her prose feels like an overextended magazine article. Both in Longitude and in this book, I felt as though the material were too thin for the weight that she was trying to hang on the pages. I am not sure that this is true, and suspect it may have something to do with the structure. In any case, with both books I had the experience that I was quite impatient with the prose even as I was interested in the material.

If you are interested in scientific history and in the mood for some reasonably light reading, then my review should not discourage you from picking up Galileo's Daughter. Myself, I am probably going to avoid Sobel in the future.

As other reviews have more than aptly addressed the novel content of the book, the merit of the writing and, honestly, the unabashed and probably slightly biased love for Pixar, I think the only thing that I can add is my thoughts on the how the story of Pixar affected my own perspective and motivation as a artist and filmmaker. With each chapter that I read, I find that I am more inspired and motivated to push my own self further. It is the author's ability to communicate, in quite simple and, perhaps, slightly mundane descriptions, the passion and motivation of the likes of Ed Catmull and John Lasseter. The fact that there is no need for dramatization or exaggeration in this story of the evolution of this particular animation studio is merit unto itself. It is truly intriguing to know the steps, the missteps and the sheer luck that combined to make Pixar a possibility...a wondrous possibility to be sure. Though I admire Pixar, know that this book is not a series of simple pictures or short anecdotes to be easily digested like some "art of" books. It is detailed and biographical and likely, sometimes, offers a bit too much info for a casual reader. Overall, I find it a good book for artists in the industry as well as business folk who enjoy reading case studies on the evolution of successful businesses.

Being a stockholder of Pixar and Disney, and a San Francisco Bay Area resident... I have read many stories over the years [regarding Pixar] in our local newspapers, and it was great to be able to acquire more in depth details about the rise of Pixar from this book.

My company is in a related field so we have an inherent interest in Pixar and Disney, and the various bay area power personalities that run these two companies.

Over the years The Disney Company had moved away from the ideals that Uncle Walt set in place... and we feel that the merging of key creative people Like John Lassiter may help bring them back to Walt's original path.

2D animation will never thrive like it did in the past, but with a little care and attention to "how things used to be" I feel that Mr. Lassiter and his team will be able to get Disney back on the right track.

Pixar had a tough past (mostly financial) to deal with, and we understand that because my company is essentially in the same position, as we struggle to leave our mark... This book really helped by showing that tenacity and "stick-to-it" qualities are key factors when you have ideals that you believe it.

If you have innovative ideas that you believe in strongly... this book will help you hang in there. It demonstrates that good things do happen to good people. I highly recommend this one for your collection.

Just got this in the mail today - have only just skimmed it and read parts here and there, but it looks like a great book. The chapters "Making it Fly 1 &2" really caught my interest.

I'm giving this review four stars - mainly because of Amazon and the USPS, the book was shipped to me in one of the flimsy mail pouches and it sustained damage during shipping. The top of the book looks like it was jammed in a machine and the cover binding was crushed to the point of breaking. Add to that the dust cover was really wrinkled from being in such a flimsy package. I know some people might complain that this ain't a good reason to deduct a star from the review - but I see this review in part covering the whole experience of getting this book to add to my collection/library - including the purchase and shipping.

It has lots good information about how the Pixar company developed over the years. sometime, it seems lost main stream. overall, it is still a good book to read.

I don't expect anyone to believe this, but I have to get it off my chest. Price's book gives credit to John Lasseter's wife for creating the character of Jessie in Toy Story 2. Nothing could be further from the truth. I wrote the second draft of TS2 as an independent contractor at Pixar for three months when Ralph Guggenheim was the producer and Ash Brannon was the sole director. Ken Mitchroney was a story artist on the project and the person who had recommended me to try to fix the ungodly mess that was the first draft. He had suggested the film have a cowgirl, and I agreed.

Ken did preliminary character sketches, one of which was quite similar to the final character (and modeled on his redheaded wife). The final design was done by Jill Colton, also uncredited. I created Jessie on the page -- she was named and partially modeled after my friend Jessie Horsting, former West Coast Editor of Fantastic Films Magazine -- along with most of the film structure as it currently exists (the major exception being the third act, which I was much less involved with).

Not only did Lasseter's wife not have a thing to do with the movie, Lasseter didn't have much to do with it either. I never saw him once during my time at the production (and his taking co-credit for, and accepting awards on behalf of, the movie was a factor in Ash Brannon [SURF'S UP] leaving Pixar as well). After I left Disney showed up with their army of useless middle management, fired everybody, replaced them with their corporate flunkies, and let the project languish for another year. Rita Hsiao wrote a credited version, yet as far as I know what she did was stick post-its under storyboards. But, you know, she worked for Disney and was credited with Mulan. Woo hoo.

Finally Lasseter threw Andy Stanton at the project, the smartest thing he could have done. He made changes I wish I'd thought of and gave it a strong third act. Of Rita Hsiao's influence on the script I can't imagine a trace. Yet when story credit was handed out, Disney (yes, Disney; nobody actually involved with the picture determined story credit, and as a result people who literally did not write a word on the project got equal or higher billing, along with, quelle surprise, the aforementioned Ms. Hsiao) did not credit my script. If anything, I created Jessie and the Woody's Roundup scenes.

Ken Mitchroney designed the character of Zurg as well. Ken was a friend of Ed "Big Daddy" Roth and has done a ton of Rat Finks and Hotrod/Tiki designs. Hey, what a surprise: Zurg is really a Tiki head! Look at him again. Ken also conceived, storyboarded, and pretty much created the traffic cone scene. He's the voice of Zurg on the ride at Disneyland.

Does Prices' book go even mention us? It is to laugh. This is just another book-length press release in which the writer nods his fannish head excitedly and scribbles on a legal pad while essentially acting as a mouthpiece for someone who is more than happy to take credit for the considerable work of others far more creative than he will ever be. It happily abandons any attempt at research and jumps on the bus of easily digestible corporate myth. Do you seriously think John Lasseter co-directed Toy Story 2? If you folks saw the pile of bodies those cute li'l characters stand on -- well, I have no doubt you'd still pony up your $12 and pack the theaters.

You never hear about this stuff because writers are afraid they won't work in this industry again. I, on the other hand, have nightmares that I will. Maybe this will help prevent that.

Is Price's book worthless because I didn't get credit? No, that's not the axe I'm grinding here. It's worthless because it's essentially a souvenir, a piece of memorabilia created, by proxy, by its subject matter. And I'm mad about it even now because I get to see paper towels and toy store aisles and coupon ads chock full of stuff that came out of my head (without any credit or compensation beyond a weekly salary -- and try finding a lawyer who will take on Disney), and continually witness people fed this lying corporate pablum, and here's yet another example by a lazy fanboy who doesn't bother to go beyond the same self-serving sources. It ain't so, folks.

This is a required text for a class of mine. Easy to read and follow along even if you're not a mathematically inclined person. Enjoy.

This is a great book whether you are a fan of, or a practicing mathematician. Good reading and a great library reference addition.

First things first: You have to really like maths to appreciate this book. If you have ever wondered how to prove Pythagoras' theorem geometrically, or would like to find out how Archimedes estimated pi, this is the book for you. If not, buy another.

The book has a good mix of stories, explanations and mathematical proofs. It actually answered questions I have been wondering about for a long time (proving Pythagoras' theorem and finding the formula for solving second order equations), but even if you are not the nerd I am, there is a big chance you will find this book fascinating.

This is a very nice and elegantly written book. The proofs of the theorems selected as great are presented in simple terms. They require no more then high school mathematics(although some of these proofs are not rigorous, for example on the summation of infinite series). The only problem I can see is with the choice of the theorems (too many from geometry) but of course that is a matter of taste. I would have given the book five stars if there had been a chapter on Godel's theorem in it.

William Dunham is the author of several books on the history of mathematics.

In this brief history of mathematics and mathematicians, the author, rather than writing a little bit about a large number of mathematicians, has provided longer treatments of a few. The 'few', naturally, being the most talented/famous from the earliest days. To include:

Hippocrates
Euclid
Archimedes
Heron
Cardano
Newton
The Bernoullis
Leibniz
Euler
Cantor

This book spends some time building and describing mathematical problems and concepts in ways that the average reader will understand. He also relates biographical information about the people who worked on them. Some of the history is quite fascinating, such as the practice in the middle ages of public challanges between mathematicians to solve problems, much like a gun fight of the Wild West.

This would make a good volume in any library.

Math teachers should own (and read) this.

All I could muster to make any of this book fit my reality. A good job of historical ancient history.

Zecharia has a vivid imagination, and a genius for manipulating history fragments - a science fiction Jim Jones. What will be next? I for one, refuse to accept that I was genetically engineered from female apes by aliens during ancient times. Ruled by aliens gods who governed the human race with a lust for power and by the navigation of the stars (sounds like Ronald Reagan).

Personally, I rather remained an ape then to be ruled by aliens who lived on a planet which is warmed by radioactive decay.

Christians, we have another false prophet .... Sitchin. Someone sould tap Sitchin on the shoulder and tell him "Christianity is about a spiritual realm; not alien and a rogue planet."

Don't let the bad publicity against Mr. Sitchin influence your mind.
Many jealous people and especially failed writers hate him.
We all understand that.
There is a person in America who asked the authorities to put him in jail.
Crazy!
Only in America people massacre others with dirty words,
personality assassination and personal hatred. What they do?
They are incapable of writing successful books
so they began to throw dirt from their mouth
and snake-style criticism.

Mr. Sitchin is a remarkable writer.

Respected all over the world.

I collect all his books.

S. Mahdi, Cairo, Egypt.

Having read several of Sitchin's books before I read this one, I am amazed and so grateful that he has put all the elements of his work together into this one beautiful summary. Since the whole is greater than the parts, the book just brings our comprehension up to a new level. To my way of thinking, one cannot understand modern Middle Eastern politics without reading this book. In my own book, I praise Sitchin for his wonderful contributions to our knowledge of early world history.Seraphim Blueprint: The Power of Angel Healing

Some readers wonder why they thoroughly believe everything Sitchin lulls them to believe is real, while they also wonder why there is no index, bibliography or source references in his works. Why? Because these books are NOT FACT! They are cleverly wrought fiction, that is why. Even if we are prepared to forget that just because we desperately need a mythos that we can believe in as real.

Knowledge, cultural, rites, religious, civilizational bounties of Sumeria, Ancient Persia and Mesopotamia have been almost obliterated from the annals of easily discoverable Western scholarship, so someone like Sitchin can come along and invent the background and civilizational connections for us. He uses research of Samuel Noah Kramer, for example, who really did try -- and did a pretty good job at -- translating Sumerian cuneiform (and he has references in the back of his scholarly works. One thing that was discovered in the real Sumerian translations is that the Book Of Solomon from the Old Testament is a steal of the Songs of Inanna to her shepherd lover Dumuzi (aka Tammuz), that's right, not Hebrew, but Mesopotamian. It is time we discovered some true love again a little East of Jerusalem. It certainly needs to be remembered.

Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory, where are you now just when we need you? (Yes, she's Greek, sadly I don't know the Sumerian equivalent. Although I would bet that the Sumerian "Me" that is retained all the way through the Epics of Gilgamesh to the later Babylonian translations, linguistically are connected to Mne-monsyne, Memory. That's right the "Me" may not be an extraterrestrial computer or device, but something mne-monic, that is, a psychotechnology of remembrance--of always re-me-mbering who one is and where one ultimately springs from -- the stars, yes, dear being, the stars. Written on Ishtar's girdle and about the crown of the head. These memories are not Western, though we desperately feed upon them.)

Our solipsistic heritage still holds us back from embracing more of the world, and, I might add, being humbled by it, instead of merely following imaginative predilections based on our cultural conditioning. These, Sitchin largely serves and gives us reasons to nod and go back to sleep. For this, while relishing books of myth, history and reconstructions of the past, I keep clanging up against Sitchin's very focused, deliberate channelling of what he wants us to see and believe. Full marks to his intent, if you like to be led. There are others that truly must begin to see outside his square. Remember, no references cited because he is a lord of INVENTION, not an archeologist of fact. Then rest easy.

In very few pages, the author manages to give an excellent recap of the key events and forces which shaped church history in the first 6 centuries. He goes into enough detail, howwever, that I'll bet even avid readers of church history will still find here material previously unknown to them. His organizing the material according to topics rather than by a strict chronological order makes it particularily easy to understand how the church grappled with its' earliest issues and crises. He does not seem to hold any partisan view: he even seems to regret that Arianism did not take hold in the mainstream church!

This book can be recommended for readers at any level who wish to learn about church history.

One might suggest that any short one volume history of the early Church is doomed to failure based on the magnitude of the project. That being said, this book in my opinion is more successful in accomplishing its task than any other of its type that I have encountered. Henry Chadwick now in his late eighties has long been a fixture in British and North American intellectual circles. He is a theologian, churchman, and historian and is an ordained priest in the Episcopalian Church of England. This in some ways makes him exceedingly suited to the task at hand, but in other ways it helps explain the shortcomings of this book. Chadwick is primarily a theologian and scholar of patristics. And, a history of theology amounts to an intellectual history of the Church. This is where this book shines and is at times magisterial. When fully engaged in the thought of the Church fathers, Chadwick's brilliance and ability to clearly explicate the material he is dealing with is breathtaking. Conversely, when dealing with certain nuts and bolts issues of history one might well wish for more. And lastly, it is my opinion that his Anglican orthodoxy makes him well suited to write an evenhanded appraisal of the history of the early Church.

Chadwick quickly moves through the earliest history of the Jesus movement. I was struck by his straight forward gloss of scripture concerning the trial of Jesus which is still a matter of continuing scholarly debate. Moving from there he engages Gnosticism in counterpoint to early orthodoxy. The sub-apostolic period as the author titles the era of the early Church fathers is less well covered although it crops up in bits and pieces throughout the book. Thereafter, approximately twelve pages are devoted to the success and expansion of the early Church in the first two Centuries. The next sixty or so pages is devoted to what I consider to be the finest section of the book. It is concerned with the development of Christian thought, doctrine and Church history from Justin Martyr through Origen. The Arian controversy and the council of Nicaea are well covered. The interaction of Church and Empire during the fourth century is less well explained. In essence, sometimes orthodoxy is assumed where there is scholarly debate and Chadwick's engagement with a topic under consideration tends to vary with its relevance to doctrinal formation. This pattern persist throughout the book.

Interestingly, beyond the fall of the western Roman Empire, there is a gradual attenuation of interest in the East. After Nicaea, the issue of the person of Jesus is well handled through the council of Chalcedon. Justinian the Great and the fifth general council receive far less attention than they deserve. Maximus the Confessor and the sixth ecumenical council receive scanty attention at best on two pages!! In a book of this length one would suppose that such choices must be made. However, the predictability of these choices may be disconcerting to some readers. A fine chapter on Augustine is included which provides a clear explanation of the "filioque" clause and its rational. An interesting section on the development of papal authority from 350 CE through the pontificate of Gregory the Great and the mission to the western barbarians follows. The book closes out with a section on the liturgy which is adequate and a short discussion of Church art and music which unfortunately engages the iconoclastic controversy in a remarkably truncated fashion.

The subtraction of two stars is for the variable depth of coverage that permeates this work. An additional one star is added back on for a total of four stars because of the brilliance of Chadwick's intellectual history of the Church up and through the fifth Century CE. As I have said previously but must emphasize, when the author is engaged in the history of development of doctrine and the events and personalities surrounding it, this is a remarkable book. It may seem to some that I have been very hard on this book, and I will assume that the length of the book was a decision of the publisher who commissioned it rather than that of the author. However, I believe I have fairly described what a potential reader can expect to find in this book. Ultimately, an intellectual history of the early Church is primary in my opinion to the understanding of the broader topic. Therefore, I highly recommend this book to anyone with at least a cursory knowledge of the history of antiquity and Christianity. For advanced students and laymen, some of Chadwick's insights will challenge and inform all but the most well read on the history of the early Church.

"[Eusebius of Caesarea] was tempted to see evidence of the power of Christianity in its social or worldly triumphs, expressed in ... or in the adherence of distinguished intellectuals like Origen. Towards such triumphalist assumptions a 20th-century Christian is likely to be cool and reserved." H. Chadwick


Chadwick's Integrity:
This is what makes Chadwick's approach analytically reflective and more sound in his deductive interpretation than the famous first early Church Historian.
Most of the reviews evaluated this comprehensive 'History of the Early Church' in general terms, or compared it with other available works, based on reconstruction of ecclesiastic events, and controversies. Without a concise 'Search Inside this Book,' prospective readers could not relate most reviewers evaluation with the book thematic treatment, author's methodology, or style.

Topical Approach:
The book contents reflect the eminent patristic scholar and early Church historian approach to history implied in his book does evoke ecumenical impartiality and underlines that the early Church was most active in its eastern informed centers in Alexandria and Antioch. He advances his case, in first book quarter, from its Jewish background emerging from the Apostolic age to the foundation of the Roman Papacy. On his engaging account, the genuine historian advances from the earliest Church to the Gentile assembly (Ecclesia), and its encounter with the Roman Empire. He then explores the bonds of unity, and Gnostic diversity, elaborating on the Bible and forms of Ministry subjecting faith to order. The geographical expansion of the church is linked to early defense of faith as a cause of growth and success.

Church Fathers:
In the next three chapters the reader enjoys Chadwick's masterful expertise in patrology, encountering through Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen, early controversies. He then ably interprets Third Century society, Pagan revival, persecutions and their consequences. Constantine and the first Council of Nicaea, are discussed within the serious Arian controversy and the conflict of Paganisam with Christianity, covering the Fourth Century and Church State and society in the first half of his essay.

Monasticism to Papacy:
In 'The ascetic movement' the author attempts to find reasons for the attitude of detachment by monastics after the virtual capture of society by the Church, and the rise to eminence of the Bishops in the Fourth century. He follows that with Chrysostom's tragedy, a consequence to the controversy about Origenism, and his advocates against aging Epiphanius fundamentalism. Meet with Diodore, Theodore, and Appolinaris to the Christological controversy between Alexandria and Antioch represented by Cyril and Nestorius, and its aftermath. The author then develops Latin Christianity, started by Augustine. He ends his study with theological issues, The Trinity, the Donatist schism, and Pelagian controversy. At the end he gives a fascinating condensed review of Worship in liturgy, daily office, and Church music. He gives a glimpse of Christian Art, with a brief account on icons and their veneration in the Byzantine Church.

Historic Conclusion:
Chadwick concise conclusion summarizes his findings on the apostolic church continuity with Israel, authority in second-century church, evolution of Christian doctrine in opposition to heretical thought, Christian penetration among the educated and elite, Christianity as religion of the empire, and ascetics withdrawal. He concludes with the rise of papacy by Gregory the great, and separation from Greek speaking churches.

This is a great introduction to the early church. While it provided an interesting history, the stories of the early church leaders and martyrs also were inspirational. Reading about these early heros renewed my faith in what the Catholic Church is really about. Jesus did matter and is just as relevant today.

"The Early Church" provides the reader with an excellent history of the first six centuries of Christianity. Author Henry Chadwick covers structural and doctrinal development, along with the rise and fall of heresies and introductions to the leading characters of the period.

This excellent book provides an overview of so many things which casual students of Church history probably heard of but may not have really understood. From my reading of this book I have a better understanding of early heresies including Arianism (Jesus was not co-eternal with the Father), Donatism (no reconciliation with apostates) Manichaeism (a secret, gnostic type sect) and Pelagianism (denial of original sin). The role of councils, such as Nicaea, in combating heresy and guiding the development of orthodoxy is made clearer. A greater understanding of the roles of the Church Fathers such as Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Origen, Tertullian, Theodore of Mopsuestia, St. Jerome and St. Augustine is gained by the reader of this book.

From a theological or historical perspective this book is a treasure. One test I apply to books is whether they inspire me to study more. This one does. I am confident that it will do the same for you.

Well this is a true horror story. One that may well be true and one that we may not be able to change without a revolution.Power for Power: in the name of God, Big G thank you.Humble also. What we are really looking at--in my view is a country with little or no mental heath care for most AND a poor education system People look for "THE TRUTH."

We are a nation of sales people. Surprise! Someone has something to sell. What worries me is how many buy it. A God based fire sale for unregulated capitalism."The Plan" for the end of representative government.Just check with the top dog that talks with God....or maybe put him on the right meds. It will be a him. The ladies are gracious and submissive in this group--even some big names in the feminist movement.And they like it that way. Sorry no fems allowed.

Jeff Sharlit is a fine writer that does his research and writes in a clear style that holds you page after page. Jeff hope you read this. Please read Neil Postman's " The End Of Education". Postman's plan may be the cure. We need more good small g gods. A Big G God with followers that are tolerant would also help. Or maybe it's time to become intolerant of these treasonous powerfreaks that hide behind God.

Mr. Sharlet deals with a good number of facts about a group which has influence in politics. That is good. But there is intertwined some failed terminology and off-topic material that I find disturbing.
Off-topic: Why deal at all with Campus Crusade ("Christian Embassy")?
Inconsistent terminology: Is this group really "fundamentalist" or even representative of fundamentalism? Two stories emerge -- they are and tehy are not.
Does he understand?: The statement that they are merely followers of Jesus reflects some postmodern thinking. I don't know that Mr. Sharlet caught that very clearly. Apparently this was also unclear to some other reviewers.
The history section is thorough but will bog down many readers. It is scholarly to do this, but further peer review would have been helpful. In that light, the research and energy are good but the taint of such inconsistency damages an otherwise useful work. My suggestion to Mr. Sharlet would be to have a *critic* peer-review his work in order to gain additional clarity.

This is an excellent book for understanding both the public face of evangelical Christianism in the US and, perhaps more importantly, at least one very powerful and influential largely secret group: The Family.

Central to the Family's ideology is what Sharlet calls "American fundamentalism, a movement that recasts theology in the language of empire" (p. 3). The US, it believes, has the divine right to rule the world, either directly or indirectly. Any nation or individual who stands in the way of the American empire is, from this standpoint, thwarting the will of God and hence, evil. Reagan's language of the "Evil Empire" and Bush's of the "Axis of Evil" take on new meaning in this light.

Embedded in the notion of American empire are the ideas of "biblical capitalism," anti-labor unionism, free trade, and economic inequality. The poor will always be with us. Just as any opposition to American political dominance goes against God's plan, so too is any effort to organize labor, limit free trade, or abolish poverty.

The fact that there are individuals who believe that an American empire, free-market capitalism, and economic inequality are God's will is mildly troubling. The fact that many of these individuals are high-ranking government officials, heads of large and powerful corporations, and military leaders is a matter of great concern. (Also, the fact that this organization has received very limited attention by the mass media is also a cause for concern.)

Sharlet makes it clear that he is no conspiracy theorist. Family, he says, is "not a conspiracy. Rather, it's a seventy-year-old movement of elite fundamentalism, bent not on salvation for all but on the cultivation of the powerful, "key men" chosen by God to direct the affairs of the nation [and the world]" (p. 7). He repeats this claim later in regard to the founder of the Family, when he says "Abram's upper-crust faith was not a conspiracy, but it was not meant for the masses either" (p. 92).

The legal definition of a conspiracy is "an agreement by two or more persons to commit a crime, fraud, or other wrongful act." So long as no two members of the Family, over the past seventy years, have discussed or plotted any illegal activities, then there is no conspiracy. But the very existence of a highly secret organization made up of influential individuals who believe in world dominance and who have an elitist outlook naturally raises the suspicion of conspiracy. One of the underlying principles of any democratic nation is that the public's business should be discussed in public.

The Family should be required reading for people who write about national and international events and for students of American government. It should also be required reading for students of religion and for liberal Christians--Christians who believe that they are called upon to serve the poor, the sick, and the homeless (not the rich and powerful) and for those who do not equate the Kingdom of Heaven with an American empire. For Christians who place their loyalty to God above their loyalty to free-market capitalism or the US, this book might serve as an object lesson of the dangers associated with conflating God and Caesar.

For a very different take on the relationship between Christian faith and national government, I would recommend The American Empire and the Commonwealth of God: A Political, Economic and Religious Statement, by David Griffin. This book argues, among other things, that religion is, or should be, the best bulwark against excessive nationalism, economism and imperialism.

The author of The Family, Jeff Sharlet, has written a lengthy expose of The Fellowship, a clandestine 501(c)(3) "ministry organization" housed inside the beltway of Washington D.C. that is perhaps best known for its sponsorship and production of the National Prayer Breakfast as well as affiliated prayer breakfasts around the world. For clarification purposes of this review, Sharlet refers to The Fellowship as "the Family." Sharlet unwittingly infiltrated The Fellowship several years ago and wrote about it in Harpers. This book represents a lengthened treatise on the same.

The subtitle of the book, however, is misleading in terms of historical word usage. To call The Fellowship a fundamentalist organization is a far, far reach in terms of the past and present theological understanding of the word in relationship to this organization. Protestant fundamentalists are those who possess high convictions concerning the preeminence of the Bible; in Christendom they are the defenders of the faith.

In Sharlet's own words, associations and definitions of The Fellowship, he himself defines the group's members to be anything but the subtitle he chose to give them.The astute reader will become suspicious as to why Sharlet or the publisher defined them as such: was it for purpose of book sales? To have subtitled The Family as The Secret Cult Group at the Heart of American Power would lack relevance to secular concern over the Religious Right movement in America. The subtitle is a clumsy attempt to tie them in, as though they are a covert arm of the movement. His attempt to do so is recorded on page 3: "[The Fellowship] were members of a very peculiar group of believers, not representative of the majority of Christians but of an avant-garde of the social movement I call American Fundamentalism." But he quickly admits, as soon as page 43, "The more I learned about the Family, the more difficulty I had in classifying its theology..."

To illustrate the point, notice the following definitions and associations used by Sharlet in his book:

A non-biblical group, page 61:
"In 1935...When the family began as a businessman's antilabor alliance in Seattle ... [their] origins lie not in the New Testament, which is ultimately little more than a fabric from which the Family constructs contemporary realities..."

A non-Christian group, page 14 & 15:
"We're not even Christian," he said (Sharlet is quoting a man named Zeke at The Fellowship's training center, Ivanwald). "We just follow Jesus." Sharlet responds, "this Jesus did not demand orthodoxy." Sharlet goes on to state that when Zeke quit his job and moved to The Fellowship's training center, he was told, "he'd meet another Jesus..."

A Buddhist group, pages 51-60:
"Not for aesthetics alone, I realized, did Bengt and the Family reject the label Christian. Their faith and their practice seemed closer to a perverted sort of Buddhism, their Christ everywhere and nowhere at once, His commands phrased as questions, His will as palpable as one's own desires" (p. 51) "I've been...trying to fit the religious practice I found in that Arlington cul-de-sac (The Fellowship's Training Center) onto a spectrum of belief where it seems to have no place" (p. 56). "I went to the Billy Graham Center Archives at Wheaton College, where the Family had deposited more than 600 boxes of documents, and I sifted through these seventy years of history in search of explicit theology, an explanation of what I had encountered...but most of all there was a mood...men would come from around the world to spend time with Doug Coe, or his predecessor, Abraham Vereide, to catch the spirit of the work...one did not learn anything; one found it in one's own heart" (p. 60).

A mystical religion for the elite, pages 89, 91, 98:
Speaking about his research on Vereide, Sharlet states, "In April of 1935 [Veriede] received not instructions for the day before him but a vision for the decades; God's hand moving His people in an entirely new direction. The revelation God gave him was simple: To the big man went strength, to the little man went need. Only the big man was capable of mending the world" (cf. p. 92; 159). "Abraham would become an exponent of a religion for the elite....for men who believed in their own goodness and proved it to themselves and each other by commending Christ and the next fellow's fine effort at following His example."

A neoevangelical group, page 43:
"Neoevangelicals distance themselves from populist fundamentalism, which they consider a folk--read: white trash--religion."

A liberal Protestant group, page 139:
"Abram soon joined Peale [Norman Vincent] as one of the twelve, a council ... bent on working behind-the-scenes to rebrand fundamentalism in Peale's feel-good terminology." (Cf. p. 135).

A dominion theology group, pages 44, 45, 111:
"Dominionists want to reconstruct early Christian society, which they believe was ruled by God alone." "This goal will be achieved through The Fellowship's "core group agreement." "These core, or cell, groups have hierarchical structure, at its heart would stand Doug Coe (the president of The Fellowship), said by the brothers to be as close to Jesus as the disciple John!" "Abraham agreed to use the `Bible as blueprint' with which to take back first the city, then the state, and perhaps the nation from the grip of godless organized labor." (Cf. p. 191; 218).

An anti-church group, page 213:
`"Doug [Coe] hates church' one of his followers, a former aide to [Senator Mark] Hatfield told me. (Coe considers church irrelevant to the real Jesus encountered in one's prayer cell." (Sharlet here supports this statement in a footnoted article from Christian Leadership magazine).

The Fellowship, if Sharlet's internal descriptions are correct (and I believe they are from my more than 30 years of interactions with the group), is anything but a Protestant fundamentalist group. Even if his labeling is off, however, his book serves a tremendous purpose in outing a potentially heretical organization that appears to pimp Jesus to politicians throughout the world. In this sense, Sharlet may be right on target.

"The Family" wants to lead Americans out of Democracy and into a world run by elite, fundamentalist, Christian leaders.

Jeff Sharlet's The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power, describes the seventy-year history of the Family, or Fellowship, from its beginnings to the present day. This secretive group, now headed by a very private Doug Coe, has invaded the halls of our government, "spiritually" guiding leaders across the globe -- from vicious dictators to corporate CEOs and American politicians -- with a spirituality that claims to be a personal guidance by Jesus, having no accountability to anyone but Jesus. But the Jesus they espouse is neither the Prince of Peace nor the Savior of the poor and down trodden. No, He's a God of Power who forgives and forgets whatever methods the leaders use to control their populations and maintain or gain their power.

The Family does not advocate violence, it merely ignores it. For example, the blood-thirsty Suharto of Indonesia is a member of one of the many Prayer Groups located throughout the world, and is on friendly terms with the Family Leadership. The annual National Prayer Breakfast and the weekly prayer gatherings in the Senate are quietly planned and directed by Doug Coe. What the National Prayer Breakfast does for those seeking power is provide them with contacts with other powerful leaders, including the President.

Though not directly connected to the popular Christian Right, the Family uses its power and feeds its paranoia with highly charged "issues," keeping them in line and supporting their leaders.

I came away from reading this book with an alarmed sense that an insidious cancer has invaded and is undermining our democracy. It's well worth reading.

-- Joan Burds

One must be a drooling English major to read, much less, enjoy this book.
It has nothing to do with reality.

Another must-read for anyone interested in great literature. From the sublime to the mundane, Fussell is most fascinating. This can be a fairly quick read -- perhaps a long weekend for most, but then you will find yourself returning to re-read certain chapters, and it will definitely end up on your desk as a reference book. I was most pleased to see many references to the Bloomsbury Group, but I was surprised that there was no mention of JRR Tolkien whose The Lord of the Rings, I believe, had its genesis in the trenches of WWI.

This book is some 25 years old, but still shares with Edward Said's "Orientalism" the prize for best literary criticism. Unlike Said's book, however, Fussell's analysis has never been attacked or questioned; it has only gained in stature over the years. It is, quite simply, a beautiful book and was rightly recognized when it first appeared as an instant classic. It was written at a time when historians were just beginning to crawl around old battlefields looking for new ways to tell the story of war. Fussell got down and dirty in the trenches of France and came back with a story of how the gruesome battles of WWI shaped a generation of English writers and artists. There is not much new that can be said about this superb book, except that there has been no better book written since its publication by an American on literature.

This classic by Paul Fussell should be required reading on most college campuses. His prose is impeccable. I have read every Fussell book I can get my hands on. He is one of the best.

On one level, Fussell writes about World War I, and his unsparing depiction of the industrialized killing in this first "modern" war will acquaint readers with a war that now seems very distant. On the second level, he shows how British World War I soldiers viewed their experience through the literary and popular culture they brought to the trenches--through ideas of the pastoral, of epic sacrifice, of manly strength and beauty. Fussell brilliantly links "The Oxford Book of English Verse" and the battlefields of France. His discussion of how the poppy came to be a symbol of this war is alone worth the price of the book. Finally, and most interestingly, there is Fussell's idea that this particular past is not distant at all. He not only points out how accounts of the second World War were influenced by accounts of the first, but suggests how some of the ways we currently think about war are shaped by the Great War. One wonders, in the midst of it, what myths of our own we bring to our conceptions of the War On Terror.

Bao Ninh's book is a difficult read, due in part to the translation, I suspect. Other reviewers have also made this observation. The book offers a rare look at the war from the view of an NVA soldier. Ninh writes in a highly unusual style -- difficult to understand without a good deal of thought. Duong Tu Huong, another well-known Vietnamese writer of Ninh's generation, is more accessible for Western readers in my judgment. The veteran who narrates this book is a tortured soul, maybe not entirely sane. Unlike most Vietnamese, he is cut off from a living community. What he has are his memories and the ghosts of his friends. He is memorable, disturbing, but not easy to know.

If you want to understand what it was like to fight the war from the other side, The Sorrow of War is a must read. The author, Bao Ninh, a North Vietnamese regular, fought for ten years, not 365 days. This book puts a face on those nameless NVA soldiers who died in what the Vietnamese call "The American War." Bao Ninh is the Tim O'Brien of Vietnam and the two novels - The Sorrow of War and The Things They Carried - are all you need to understand the life of the grunt and the effects of war on the soldiers of both sides.

This text does indeed read like a journal. The closing of the book suggests that it is indeed a journalish/novel discovered. I'm left to wonder if the book was written like this on purpose, or if ineed there was a 'discovered memoir.'

That said, it jumps around alot, but encompases the main character's throughout, and therefore shows the lifetime effect of the war.

My father was a front line linguist in the army, and never talks about it. I have a little understanding as to why.

While this text 'humanizes' the North Vietnamese, by all means, as some comments suggest, they were not the helpless victim. Forget not the shameful acts of so-called academia in the poor and hate treatment to our own soldiers upon returning from Nam. Grr!

Not a great literary text, but definately a good journal to give insight into war.

In his novel in a novel Bao Ninh gives us a rare insight into the war scene of those who beat the Americans and their allies in Vietnam. His sometimes brutally violent and emotional picture shows that war everywhere is a `Jungle of Screaming Souls', causing psychological ruin and familial and social destruction. For the rest of their lives, it will leave deep inextinguishable scars in those who were lucky to survive

The horror scenes resemble pictures of Hieronymus Bosch: `only his skeleton was complete, like that of a frog thrown into a mud patch. Crows had pecked away Car's face; his mouth was full of mud and rotting leaves.'
It is a world of hunger, malaria, ulcers, hallucinations and nightmares (`groups of headless black American soldiers carrying lanterns aloft'); not only of heroic battles, but also of desertions and political indoctrination (`the anti-intellectual atmosphere of the state ideologies').
The losses are tremendous: `the short story of my life. First my brothers, then my mother, then my husband, then my son.'
After the war, integration in the civil society is difficult: `impoverishes demobilized soldiers, playing cards, smoking pot and other weeds, most of them unemployed.' Family lives and loves from before the war are completely shattered.

For Bao Ninh, `the divine war had paid him for all his suffering and losses with more suffering and losses at home.'
He rote this book, `to rid myself of these devils, to put my tormented soul finally to rest instead of letting it float in a pool of shame and sorrow.'

This `Path of no Glory' should not be missed.

Bao Ninh's only novel is a memorable one. "The Sorrow of War" was originally published in Vietnam in 1991 under the title "The Destiny of Love". Indeed, the book is both a war novel and a love story. The story's protagonist is Kien, a war veteran who served 10 years in the North Vietnamese army. He suffered through a tumultuous separation from his childhood sweetheart early in the war, only to be reunited with her later in life (but earlier in the book).

Many reviewers have pointed out that "The Sorrow of War" is chaotic in its story-telling, that the narration rambles, and the timeline whipsaws the reader from the distant past to the present. All true points. Although the book is a slender 224 pages, the herky-jerky style makes for an unsettling read. But Ninh's approach is highly effective. He conveys the emotional and physical anguish of Kien and those around him poignantly, mimicking in his style the angst of his characters.

Word has it that Bao Ninh has written a second novel, but isn't satisfied enough to publish it. That could well be. The literary success of "The Sorrow of War" won't be easy for him to match, or for any other writer taking on the subject of 20th-century conflict.