I have to admit, I am one of those naïve Americans that has walked around in a bit of a fantasy land when it comes to the history of Plymouth and the I have to admit, I am one of those naïve Americans that has walked around in a bit of a fantasy land when it comes to the history of Plymouth and the Pilgrims. From grade school, I knew they desired freedom to worship their religion without persecution. In order to do so, they faced a difficult journey aboard the Mayflower prior to landing on the shores of New England. There’s a giant rock on which they must have set foot after disembarking from the ship. I know the Pilgrims struggled to survive and the Native Americans came to their rescue. They celebrated the First Thanksgiving with the Native Americans, a holiday which we now sit down to every November in order to indulge and give thanks. Well, that’s it in a nutshell, right? Or so I believed! Nathaniel Philbrick, however, has set me straight and enlightened me way more than I could ever have imagined!
Mayflower is extremely well researched and undeniably well-written. However, it is quite dense with very detailed information regarding much more than the voyage of the Mayflower and the original settlement of Plymouth colony. Philbrick takes us beyond those years through the next couple of generations and presents a factual account of the violent and bloody wars fought between the New Englanders and the Native Americans. The first Thanksgiving most certainly did not end in a ‘happily ever after’ situation. There were numerous conflicts, various alliances between the New Englanders and Native Americans, and treachery. I was often quite shocked to learn of the behavior exhibited by some of the Pilgrims’ descendants. It wasn’t very pretty and not something I feel proud to claim as part of my American heritage. Speaking of heritage, Philbrick tells us that "In 2002 it was estimated that there were approximately 35 million descendants of the Mayflower passengers in the United States, which represents roughly 10 percent of the total U.S. population." Philbrick, however, does tell us the good with the bad and we also learn of some of the more upstanding descendants. Little tidbits of facts like this were what I enjoyed most about the book. It helped me slog through some of the more textbook-like sections when I knew I might find a little nugget of information I could perhaps share with the family at our Thanksgiving gathering in a couple of weeks from now. This may change the tone at the table a bit in the wrong direction, however - "Fifty-six years after the sailing of the Mayflower, the Pilgrims’ children had not only defeated the Pokanokets in a devastating war, they had taken conscious, methodical measures to purge the land of its people." Perhaps we will have to seriously indulge a bit before smashing the myth all to bits! My favorite little chronicle was one which involved Captain Benjamin Church, principal aide to Plymouth’s governor, Josiah Winslow. During one of the final skirmishes of King Philip’s War, several Native Americans were taken as captives. When Church asked one of the older captives his name, he was answered with ‘Conscience’. Philbrick tells us that Church replied, "Conscience, then the war is over, for that was what they were searching for, it being much wanting." Indeed!
I found this to be a worthwhile read, although a bit dry throughout the middle to last sections of the book. Last year I read Philbrick’s In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex and found it to be immensely entertaining and quite effortless. It read much like fiction, and so I expected much of the same with Mayflower. However, in my opinion, this was more like the sort of non-fiction book from which I previously steered away – one which presents copious facts and dates to the extent that I feel like I am back in school. Some readers that enjoy a myriad of detail will quite enjoy this. History buffs should have no complaints since Philbrick has done his job well here. Since I did enjoy parts of this book and am grateful to be considerably more educated on the topic of the Pilgrims and King Philip’s War, I have rated Mayflower 3.5 stars....more
Airs Above the Ground is a stimulating adventure through the Austrian landscape of the 1960s. If you are looking for a quick and entertaining diversioAirs Above the Ground is a stimulating adventure through the Austrian landscape of the 1960s. If you are looking for a quick and entertaining diversion from some of your more demanding literary reads, then this book may be just the ticket. I became a devoted fan of Mary Stewart this year when I discovered her Merlin and King Arthur series and am determined to read everything she ever wrote… no matter how long that may take! This book is completely different from that treasured series, but was gratifying in its own way.
Vanessa March and husband Lewis have been married for just two short years when it seems perhaps the honeymoon is over. Vanessa and Lewis have had a bit of a row. Lewis leaves for Stockholm on business while Vanessa stays behind in London to lament the fact that they have had to postpone a much needed vacation to the shores of Italy. Shortly thereafter, however, Vanessa discovers that perhaps his leaving was much more reprehensible than she had believed – a glimpse of a newsreel clearly reveals Lewis with another woman at the scene of a circus fire in Vienna. Vanessa is determined to uncover just why Lewis is nowhere near the city of Stockholm! It just so happens that Timothy, a young family friend in search of his father, needs a chaperone to accompany him to Austria. Vanessa and Timothy pack their bags and off they go on a somewhat reckless jaunt. This pair quickly find themselves smack dab in the middle of a mystery. The circus, the famous Lipizzaner horses, an ancient castle set in the middle of a rugged terrain, and some dramatic tension and a chase with the baddies add to the appeal of this book. "Possibly the very fairytale atmosphere of the castle – the lonely valley, the turrets, the moonlight, the battlements, this door with the griffin handle – the trappings of childhood’s dreams and of romance, once become actual, were seen to be no longer dreams but nightmare."
I didn’t know much about the Lipizzaner horses prior to reading this, but the bit of history regarding this graceful creature provided here was very interesting. There are some lovely passages illustrating the beauty and majesty of this horse, and more specifically the ‘airs above the ground.’ "For one superb moment he was poised there, high in the air, caught and lit dazzlingly white by the great lights, all four legs tucked neatly under him, all his jewels flashing and glancing with a million colours, but not, it seemed, more brilliant than the gleam of the muscles under the white skin or the luster of the steady dark eye. One looked for his wings."
I recommend this book to anyone that enjoys the writing of Mary Stewart, those that want an entertaining mystery free from gruesome descriptions, and readers interested in a 'crash course' on the background of the legendary Lipizzan stallions. ...more
"Ah my brother, don't you see? The ultimate technological achievement will be escaping from the mess we've made. There will be none after that 4 stars
"Ah my brother, don't you see? The ultimate technological achievement will be escaping from the mess we've made. There will be none after that because we will reproduce everything that we did on earth, we'll go through the whole sequence all over again somewhere else, and people will read my paper as prophecy, and know that having gotten off one planet, they will be able to destroy another with confidence."
When I began reading this book, I had no idea that Homer and Langley Collyer were real-life hoarders and recluses living in Harlem in a Fifth Avenue brownstone during the first half of the 20th century. They became legendary after their bodies were found in 1947 amongst nearly 120 tons of junk ranging from anything and everything from ceiling-high stacks of newspapers to pianos to a Model T Ford planted right in the middle of their living quarters. E.L. Doctorow takes these two eccentrics and fictionalizes and humanizes them to a degree that allows the reader to perhaps understand their motives as well as to possibly provide us with a warning as to what may happen in a society where we accumulate more and more to the point that we become blinded to reality and the world around us.
In Homer & Langley, Doctorow expands the life of these characters beyond their demise in 1947 and instead we get a view of them from their childhood and straight into the 1970's. In so doing, the author allows us to get a broad overview of the historical events of this time period, ranging from WWI to the Vietnam War. We gain a perspective of these events through the two brothers and the people to whom they come in contact with throughout their lifetime. In this story, Langley is a victim of mustard gas in WWI and returns to his home and his brother not only as a troubled man but also one full of ideas and theories about mankind. Langley begins a daily perusal of any and all newspapers he could obtain and begins to accumulate "stuff" in order to perhaps make sense of a world gone awry.
This novel is actually told through the narration of Homer looking retrospectively at the lives of the two brothers. "I'm Homer, the blind brother. I didn't lose my sight all at once, it was like the movies, a slow fade-out." For a person without sight, Homer instead has a sharpened awareness through his other senses as well as keen insight into the world around him. He and Langley encounter a motley assortment of persons throughout their time, including gangsters, prostitutes, musicians, immigrants and hippies. They host parties; they wrestle with the authorities, including the electric and water companies and the health department; they fend off the abuse of rude children. At times, the glimpse at life and its absurdities was almost comical. While at the same time, Homer's introspective viewpoint was intensely stirring. Homer yearned for love. "I still had hopes of finding someone to love but felt as I had never before that my sightlessness was a physical deformity as likely to drive away a comely woman as would a hunch of the back or a crippled leg. My sense of myself as damaged suggested the wiser course of seclusion as a means of avoiding pain, sorrow, and humiliation."
This was an engaging yet deliberate look at a couple of fascinating and quirky individuals. E.L. Doctorow managed to capture a bit of the nostalgia of times gone by in an ever-changing city. Ultimately, as Homer and Langley plunge further into their own private darkness, they become more and more shut off from society. It is interesting to reflect personally on our own lives. In the end, what is our legacy – is it the objects that we have left behind? How will we be remembered? It is our story that perhaps matters the most. "Given who I am what is there to write about?... Exactly who you are. Your life across from the park. Your history deserving of the black shutters." ...more
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