Basque History
Not an Op Shop book, but one I’ve been looking forward to reading for a long time. Mark Kurlansky’s Basque History of the World is very well written and researched. I’ve been vaguely interested in this group of people for a while – I think I may even have done an assignment about them in early high school – and it certainly fits into my love of fairly obscure history. No Basque would thank me for saying that, I guess, but what I mean is that it is obscure in terms of the generally understood history of the world. The Basques as a nation do not seem to have had a huge impact on the world (although after reading this, I will passionately argue anyone who says that): to most people, they wouldn’t even seem to be a nation, since you can’t look up Basqueland on an average map and find defined borders. But, Kurlansky points out, they have had a huge impact – particularly on France and Spain (he concentrated mostly on the latter), and also on the rest of Europe and, consequently, the world. Who set up the Jesuits? That would be St Ignatius – or Ignatius de Loyola, a Basque, just to name one. Many of the other Basques who have had an impact are not acknowledged by name anywhere much, but their impact is certainly felt.
I love that Kurlansky included recipes in this book: although I don’t think I’ll ever use one (not knowing where I might find baby eels, and not being sure that I’d like to eat them anyway), it adds powerfully to the fact that this is a history of a people, who are still alive and very much kicking, rather than just being an academic look at some isolated, irrelevant people.
I really liked Kurlansky’s Salt, and I must get around to finding me his Cod.
Vietnam: A History
Being about to teach a class of Year 11s some Vietnamese history, I thought I should know a bit about it. Thankfully, we went to visit my family, and they may well have one of the world’s largest personal collections of books on Vietnam (Dad was a Vietnam veteran, and had a great interest in it). Well, that’s what it feels like, anyway. So I got Stanley Karnow’s Vietnam: A History, since what I really wanted was an overview of everything leading up to US involvement – I’m going to be teaching the French war, basically, up to the Geneva Conference in 1954. I’m not sure where to start; I’d like to do at least one lesson on China’s 1000-year occupation of Vietnam, as very relevant background…
Anyway, the book: it’s very good. I learnt an enormous amount just reading the first 4-5 chapters. I reallised I knew basically nothing about this area, and what it had gone through. For starters, I always just assumed that Ho Chi Minh was this scary Communist guy – and maybe later on he got really nasty, I’m not sure, I haven’t read that far – but from what I have read, I have the impression that he was far more of a nationalist than a Communist: no matter that he really did believe in the Communist ideas he was far more interested in getting Vietnam free of French rule, and avoiding American overlordship as well. He did, in fact, approach the US for help, but they didn’t want to get involved in Indochina – and they wanted to keep the French happy. Plus I guess they were already worried about the ‘domino effect’ of Communism…
As an historian I am fully aware of the impossibility of writing objective history, but Karnow seems to have had a good stab at it. He’s certainly not out to lionise the US, but neither does he paint a portrait of the poor suffering Vietnamese who only want to be left in peace. He seems quite fair to both sides, and seems to have gone to great lengths to be so – being a journo helped, of course, since as a reporter he got access to important people and has included many of their comments on various aspects of the history he’s writing.
This is a very good book, as an overview of Vietnam’s colonisation history. I think I might be able to use bits of it when I teach – maybe not this time, because I’m not sure what my supervisor will think about me not using the textbook – but when I’m out by myself (ack).
Ice Station Zebra
Another MacLean Op Shop purchase. I saw the movie years ago – I’m not even sure I saw all of it – so when I saw the novel I knew I wouldn’t be disappointed, partly also because it is MacLean. And it was good: another one where I was indeed mildly surprised at the resolution. I like it when that happens.
I have to say that being in a submarine under the polar ice-cap is not my idea of fun, and I’m just as happy never to get closer to it than through this book. Hmm, interesting – two books with ties to the Arctic, this and The First Horseman. As close as I’d like to get, thanks.
The Dark Crusader
Alistair MacLean is always good for a romping adventure story. I’ve read a few, although sometimes I get confused between him and Jack Higgins, which isn’t at all fair on either of them; I think partly it’s because they’ve both written Eagle books (Where Eagles Dare and The Eagle has Landed), and they have somewhat similar styles and subjects. Guns of Navarrone (only going by the movie; got the book somewhere…) seems like something Higgins could have written.
Anyway, this was another Op Shop purchase. I was expecting a near-trashy adventure – villains get done, hero gets girl and a commendation from the tight-lipped boss – and for most of it, I wasn’t disappointed. I read it in a bit over a day; it wasn’t at all heavy going, and it just unfolded nicely. It certainly kept me interested, and I was shocked and amazed by the conclusion; it was very well done indeed – I hadn’t expected a thing. Of course, with these sorts of books, I deliberately try not to work out what will happen in the end, just for the pleasure of being shocked: No, it can’t have been him!
I must admit, though, that I’m glad this wasn’t the first MacLean I’d read, otherwise I probably wouldn’t go looking for others; it wasn’t that great, although I still would recommend it for light holiday reading.
The First Horseman
I love Op Shops, especially their book sections. The St Vincent’s in Queenscliff, on the Vic coast, has the standard arrangement of 50c/paperback, and a lot of junk that you have to sort through to find anything worthwhile. But at 50c each, I think it’s worth spending a bit of time – and for me, $3.50 went an amazingly long way.
One of the books I got was John Case’s The First Horseman. Never heard of him, or it – although he also wrote The Genesis Code, which sounds familiar. Standard blurb – why, who, what? – clearly this was going to be about some sort of plague, but it’s not for a while that you find out it’s about someone doing bad things with the influenza virus. Written in 1998, it’s still quite a relevant topic, I think – bioweapons, etc, although currently North Korea (who get a look-see in this) are threatening with nuclear arms, not bio.
I liked it; not quite as trashy as I had expected, but not exactly the sort of thing to make you think particularly hard either. A nice range of characters: the not-beautiful-yet-still-appealing female scientist, intrepid journalist, etc etc… Some nice plot developments too; I wasn’t sure whether I liked the family stuff being put in, but I think in the end it served to deepen the main character a bit, which was fine: it didn’t detract from the story, either. I do like a book that is fine with hurting its main goodies, and not giving them superhero endurance (something like McLean in Die Hard).
I’m going looking for The Genesis Code.
Holiday reading
Having been on holidays, I’ve read a fair few books. Probably the best was The Cruel Sea , by Nicholas Monsarrat. My mum recommended this to me a very long time ago, and visiting her I finally decided to borrow it and read it. I knew basically what I was getting myself in for – WWII convoy ships would necessitate some drama and tragedy, because that was simply a reality of the situation… I’ve also read MacLean’s HMS Ulysses, which is on a similar subject, so I was somewhat prepared.
Mum had said this was the first book that she had ever read where she was sad to reach the last page, and I think I had the same feeling, although it wasn’t my first time. It is astonishingly well written; there were a few points where I almost cried – and that rarely happens. I was almost heart-broken at the end, both because it had finished and because the characters had suffered so much: and I know this was reality for many, many people in war.
The characters are fantastic, well drawn and realised. Monsarrat doesn’t fall into the trap of making all the combatants heroic, bearing up stoically under pressure and always self-sacrificial, which while painful to read sometimes made it all the more gripping, because they seemed so real, I guess. I appreciated the introduction to the novel: it acknowledged that while there were women affected by the events, the novel concentrates on the men just because that’s where the story lies, for him. However, I was quite shocked that he told the reader to expect the first ship to sink; I found that quite incredible, and I’m not sure whether it changed my approach to it or not… I guess it did, because I was always on tenterhooks, knowing that this could be their last convoy, that something could happen to them any time now.
A powerful, enthralling novel, anyway. Probably something that should be read by students of WWII and naval history.
The Plato Papers
This book spins me out.
I read it all in one sitting, this afternoon (it is only 139 pages), and I’m glad I did – it had a greater impact because of that, I think. It’s a bit weird, and I am left with a number of questions unanswered: what are these ‘people’ like – would they be recognisably human? How do they classify themselves if not by such systems as we deem fundamental, such as gender? Who are they? But it has also given me questions to ask about history as we tell it. If they can make the logical assumption that “Charles D”, author of The Origin of Species is Charles Dickens, and that it is “a comic masterpiece”, what sort of erroneous assumptions may we have made in our reconstructions? This is something that has always caused me some grief – in particular I’ve never really known whether or not to be suspicious of the ‘argument from silence’ line, since who knows what we may have lost between now and ‘then’? And then there’s the whole point of cultural context, let alone oral history…
It is a good book, for all that, and I think it should probably appear on the reading list for some history courses – like the prereq subject for honours at Melbourne – just to make people think.
Warriors of God #2 – who does he think he’s kidding??
Describing James d’Avesnes: “who apart from Richard was the most gallant and chivalrous warrior of the entire European army.” Sorry? What’s your definition of chivalrous here?? I don’t think that your discussion of Richard so far allows for him to be called the most chivalrous warrior in the army by any stretch of the imagination!
I don’t think he can make up his mind whether Saladin was a wonderful person or not; sometimes he is the oh-so-holy Defender of the Faith, and sometimes he is “cruelly” beheading Christians – how do you do that cruelly, anyway? I guess he doesn’t have to make up his mind, but in these sections it seems like he has, and then he changes it…
I’m about 2/3 through, and I’m glad to have read it for a look at the period and people but, obviously, I have some issues with the portrayals.
Warriors of God
It’s not as academic as I had hoped. The author, James Reston, has probably set out to write a very approachable books – and it is, which is great. However, it rankles when he says ‘one chronicle remarks…’ and doesn’t tell you which chronicle that is. And, probably the most annoying thing, he does not give much reason for wholeheartedly accepting the theory that Richard and Phillip Augustus were lovers… and that annoys me. I don’t care if they were, I just object to the unscholarly way he approaches it – like he’s sensationalising it, and making Richard seem more modern, or something.
He also seems to have a love of Saladin and rather ambiguous feelings towards Richard. Which is fine, and I don’t mind authors saying that, but I do think they should make an effort to present balanced evidence, however much that is possible when you’re writing history.
It is a good book, though, and I think it is a good introduction to the period and people. I even like that it has me annoyed and asking questions, because that gets me doing my own research.
New books
Very exciting – bought two new books today. Readings have a $9.95 table at the moment, so I got Peter Ackroyd’s The Plato Papers and Jim Paul’s Catapult: Harry and I build a Siege Weapon, which is apparently now ‘a much beloved classic’ although I’ve never heard about it before. So, they look good.
Randomly Yours, Alex 