Nathan Englander

Louisiana rambles

Forgotten men?

Shlaes (a visiting senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and a syndicated columnist at Bloomberg) reviews the history of the Great Depression in the United States, arguing that its duration stemmed in large part from too much federal intervention in the economy, rather than too little. In seeking to help the "forgotten man" man of Democratic political advertising, she argues, the Roosevelt administration made a scapegoat of another "forgotten man," the American businessman.

Bullshit.

1781-1997

Que farei quando tudo arde?

Good people do evil things

GN owns, not HW or PN.

Lifton is perhaps best known as the author of “Death in Life: Survivors of Hiroshima,” published in 1967, which received a National Book Award.

During the Korean War, Lifton served as a psychiatrist in the Air Force, where his duties included interviewing returning American P.O.W.’s subjected to psychological manipulation by their captors — what the Chinese called “thought reform” and the United States denounced as “brainwashing.” Discharged in 1954, he undertook his first research project in Hong Kong, where he interviewed Chinese refugees who had undergone Maoist mind conditioning in Communist prisons. All his subsequent research was devoted to “trying to make use of my background as a clinician to identify psychological experiences of people caught up in historical storms.” He has been particularly interested in the phenomenon of “psychic numbing,” the way some people can be oblivious to the sufferings of others. This, Lifton says, facilitates the commission and acceptance of atrocities. At bottom, “Witness to an Extreme Century” is a book about scholarship and activism, and the links between the two.

Financier of the American Revolution

A quirky quest, indeed

Sprawling novel of China

Planet Arctic

GW's maps

Schecter, Barnet.  (2010). George Washington's America: a biography through his maps. NY: Walker &Co.

Colon (Anatomy)

Malden, Carla. (2011). Afterimage: A Brokenhearted Memoir of a Charmed Life. Globe Pequot Pr 2011.


Kirkus Reviews
A searing account of how the author coped with her husband's year-long struggle with colon cancer and his untimely death. Emotionally raw from start to finish, the story makes for admittedly difficult reading. What saves it from sinking into pure melodrama are its fleeting moments of humor and the fact that it also celebrates a rare and profound love that transcended death. A brutally candid memoir of the "all-consuming and profoundly uncomplicated" power of grief.

Forgotten garden

Booklist: All the pieces don't quite mesh, but it's a satisfying read overall, just the thing for readers who like multigenerational sagas with a touch of mystery.

A history of erotic encounters

Bernstein, Richard. (2009). The East, the West, and sex. New York: Knopf.

Kirkus: An investigation of the Western male's age-old attraction to Asian women. In an effort to be fair and nonjudgmental, Bernstein offers feminist viewpoints as well.A diligent scholar pursues a subject given to theories of exploitation and dehumanization, but intriguing any way you look at it.

Stuart, Julia. (2008). The matchmaker of Perigord.New York: Harper.



Kirkus: First-time novelist Stuart would have benefited from more editing, but she does manage to richly evoke the fecund sights and smells of rural France. A slightly verbose, yet still delightful, excursion to a kinder, gentler place.

Novelist of Life in Nazi-Run Europe

Found this by pure chance. fascinating.

As sure as the sun

Work

The pleasures and sorrows of work / Alain de Botton. 

Story of Edgar Sawtelle

A tale reminiscent of "Hamlet" that also celebrates the alliance between humans and dogs follows speech-disabled Wisconsin youth Edgar, who bonds with three yearling canines and struggles to prove that his sinister uncle is responsible for his father's death.

Age of abundance

Lindsey, Brink. (2007). The age of abundance: how prosperity transformed America's politics and culture. NY: Collins.   306.342 L

Kirkus Reviews

Americans have become libertarian and don't even know it, declares the research head of the (libertarian) Cato Institute.

A thoughtful attempt to explain—and claim—the broad center in the middle of our political squabbling.

Love and humor

A novel bookstore

Cossé, Laurence. (2010). A novel bookstore (translated from the French by Alison Anderson). NY : Europa Editions.

Looking through NEW books to select those that should be made 28-day books, I found this one; its cover reminded me of Elegance of the Hedgehog (which I left as NEW, out of sentiment).

Kirkus: The book's real strength is its romances—of both the bookish and human varieties. In attention to matters of the heart the story is redeemed, delivering a touché where its original thrust misses the mark. A literary idyll preselected for bookworms and bibliophiles.

Booklist Reviews: Wry, sly, and coyly seditious, Cossé's piquant satire is a subtly wrought manifesto against blatant consumer manipulation and media malfeasance.

Superorganism