Making History
History is not one thing, but two. It is the past, and it is the story we tell ourselves about the past. Hilary Mantel explains the distinction: “History is not the past–it is the method we’ve evolved of organizing our … Continued
Young Radicals of the 1910s
“This is a story about hope and what comes after hope, and despair and what comes after despair.” (xiii) This may sound over-wrought, and it is. Jeremy McCarter can say that is what his book, Young Radicals, is about, but … Continued
Randolph Bourne: Educational Reformer
“There has been no handle by which heterogeneous minds and wills could be taken hold of and directed.” — Randolph Bourne, ca 1915 [198] “Sometimes, the most brilliant and intelligent minds do not shine in standardized tests because they do … Continued
Debt: The First 5,000 Years
In his Afterword to Debt: The First 5,000 Years, David Graeber says he wanted to write “a big, sprawling, scholarly book” of the kind people didn’t write anymore. [393] From a background in anthropology and ethnology, Graeber felt he had … Continued
Force or Choice?
In These Truths, Jill Lepore asks her reader to consider a central question as she makes her way through her 800-page survey of American history. It is a question first posed by Alexander Hamilton in 1787 in what became known … Continued
Ian Toll Does It Again
Twilight of the Gods is a thrilling conclusion to Ian Toll’s thirteen-years-in-the-making “Pacific War Trilogy.” The longest and, Toll admits, hardest of the three to write, the final volume is nevertheless a taut narrative of the war’s complex final year. … Continued
Ulysses Grant to the Rescue
To Rescue the Republic: Ulysses S. Grant, the Fragile Union, and the Crisis of 1876 is Bret Baier’s fourth biographical book. Even so, I couldn’t escape the feeling that he is playing at being a historian (especially since I can … Continued
Who Tells Your Story?
I finished Ron Chernow’s definitive biography of Alexander Hamilton this month. It is easy to see how Lin-Manuel Miranda was inspired to write a musical about this overlooked “founding father without a father.” His life is truly operatic. I could … Continued
A Bittersweet History of Sugar
Sorrow everywhere. Slaughter everywhere. If babies are not starving someplace, they are starving Somewhere else. With flies in their nostrils. Elizabeth Abbott’s “bittersweet” history of sugar is heavy on bitter, light on sweet. Slavery and exploitation dominate her compelling 400-page … Continued
Drinking in America
Susan Cheever’s Drinking in America is a strange book. It is interesting, entertaining, and informative, but it is also a bit odd. Deciding between it and Lender and Martin’s 1987 book of the same title, I opted with Cheever’s for … Continued