An Italian-American Writer & Poet with a Yankee Outsider Perspective
I vaguely remember when Venice’s historic opera house burned in 1996, but now listening to John Berendt’s The City of Falling Angels, I find the story brought to life with all the shock, mess, and drama one would expect to … Continued
Barbara Tuchman’s The Guns of August about the first month of World War I is a truly magisterial work. “Magisterial,” suggesting pomp, command, wealth of resources, or in other words “magesty.” Not only is her English prose brilliantly crafted, rich … Continued
In the unexpected Minneapolis Museum of Russian Art, a show on the ground floor traces truly ancient cultures of the Ukraine–back 7000 years B.C.–using pottery, gold jewelry, and a huge stretch of the imagination. For one thing, it’s hard for … Continued
The more I listen to (well, read) about warfare, the more I’m learning about what makes a good general. Not a subject I’d ever have expected to fascinate me, but in the hands (well, voice) of a great historian, generalship … Continued
We just saw a filmed version of a play called “Collaborators,” by John Hodge, produced by the National Theater of London. Like the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, the National Theater has several stages: “Collaborators” was produced in its most intimate, … Continued
Most of the alliances that activated World War I were known to all the parties ahead of time: Britain’s crafting of Belgium neutrality and determination to protect it; France and Russia’s agreement to come to each other’s aid should Germany … Continued
It’s not a Star Wars character, nor the name of a deep sea creature. It’s a neurodegenerative disease that attacks the central autonomic nervous system. It’s caused (as much as is known) by long exposure to herbicides and pesticides. It’s … Continued
With my students, I’m reading a touching novel Obasan by Joy Kogawa (1981) Set in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada before, during and after World War II, Obasan portrays the suffering of Japanese “relocated” by the Canadian government. It’s actually … Continued
Though I didn’t realize her power when she was first publishing, Barbara Tuchman has since become one of my top three favorite American writers about history–Barbara Tuchman, Joseph Ellis and David McCullough. Ellis and McCullough are still alive, but Tuchman … Continued
J. Edgar, Leonardo DiCaprio and Clint Eastwood “The FBI in Peace and War”–was that the title of the radio drama? I never listened, but the music from a companion show, “Dragnet,” even now plays its “bum-bum-bum-bum-bumbumbum” through my head. As … Continued