by Arthur M. Schlesinger ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 1956
In Schlesinger's view, Roosevelt is the summation of an era in American social, political and economic life. He corresponds, in this respect, to Napoleon; anything about him, whether bearing directly upon his personal achievements or concerned merely with the period in which he lived, is of the same historical substance, compellingly important. The truth of Schlesinger's book is that it uses instances- small and large- of national crisis, statements of opinion, personality sketches, syntheses of philosophic and psychological forces, and even the biographical circumstances of its central hero as exemplifications, as viewpoints, and mass prisms for an almost indefinable movement or idea or embodiment which is the raw nature of 20th century history in America. The materials are transcended and transfigured, and in this creative act their inherent meaning is exposed. With an astonishing sense of the appropriate, the essential, Schlesinger writes of Lillian Wald and Hull House, Coolidge, Wilson, Harding, Hoover's bitterness toward his incumbent, Al Smith's connivance during the Presidential nominations, strikes and bonus marches, reduction of tariff, socialism's brief flowering and adherents, John Dewey's influence, and of course F.D.R. in his countless aspects as son, husband, unvanquished polio victim, magical charmer and unalterably reserved friend, speech-maker, dreamer, wit. If only time itself can permit of a fair, final estimate of Roosvelt, so only time will give full measure to this early appraisal which seeks to draw upon all that is fresh and demonstrable about the man- the phenomenon. Not to be missed by any person with a potential interest in the subject.
Pub Date: March 1, 1956
ISBN: 0618340858
Page Count: 580
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 22, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1956
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by David Grann ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 18, 2017
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
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Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorker staff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
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by Elie Wiesel & translated by Marion Wiesel ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 16, 2006
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
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by Elie Wiesel ; edited by Alan Rosen
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by Elie Wiesel ; illustrated by Mark Podwal
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by Elie Wiesel ; translated by Marion Wiesel
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