A superbly written narrative history that draws together and makes sense of scattered data, anecdotes, and minor episodes,...
British historian Merridale (Red Fortress: History and Illusion in the Kremlin, 2013, etc.) fills a lacuna in the canonical record of Soviet communism.
Like Sherman’s March to the Sea and Hannibal’s crossing of the Alps, V.I. Lenin’s rail journey from Zurich to Petrograd is one of the most storied journeys in history. It has long been known that Germany brokered the wartime trip, the aim being to enable Lenin to foment revolution and take Russia off the front. However, as the author amply shows, to say “Germany” is to speak too broadly, for while it was just a faction in the civilian government of that country willing to gamble on Lenin’s powers of persuasion, “other departments and agencies had budgets of their own” and were “pouring money” into propaganda and sedition so that Russia would sue for peace, leaving Germany to fight a single-front war against the Allies in the West. Of course, as Merridale also shows, the Allies had propaganda budgets as well, though in the end, all that money added up to an “egregious failure rate,” just as British efforts to turn Lenin back at the frontier failed. The author explores the behind-the-scenes machinations that led to Lenin’s return from decades of exile. Moreover, in vivid prose, she recounts the whole engine of revolution, giving immediacy to the details of Lenin’s arrival at the Finland Station and the electrifying result his presence had in an already revolutionary and decidedly mutinous Russia. She also emphasizes little-known aspects and players in the struggle, from the central role Pravda played in transmitting news and its ability “to speak directly to the dispossessed” to the work of the almost unknown revolutionary leader Irakli Tsereteli.
A superbly written narrative history that draws together and makes sense of scattered data, anecdotes, and minor episodes, affording us a bigger picture of events that we now understand to be transformative.Pub Date: March 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-62779-301-8
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Metropolitan/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Jan. 23, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017
James Baldwin has come a long way since the days of Notes of a Native Son, when, in 1955, he wrote: "I love America more than any other country in the world; and exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually." Such bittersweet affairs are bound to turn sour. The first curdling came with The Fire Next Time, a moving memoir, yet shot through with rage and prophetic denunciations. It made Baldwin famous, indeed a celebrity, but it did little, in retrospect, to further his artistic reputation. Increasingly, it seems, he found it impossible to reconcile his private and public roles, his creative integrity and his position as spokesman for his race. Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone, for example, his last novel, proved to be little more than a propagandistic potboiler. Nor, alas, are things very much better in No Name In the Street, a brief, rather touchy and self-regarding survey of the awful events of the '60's — the deaths of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, the difficulties of the Black Panther Party, the abrasive and confused relationships between liberals and militants. True, Baldwin's old verve and Biblical raciness are once more heard in his voice; true, there are poignant moments and some surprisingly intimate details. But this chronicle of his "painful route back to engagement" never really comes to grips with history or the self. The revelatory impulse is present only in bits and pieces. Mostly one is confronted with psychological and ideological disingenuousness — and vanity as well.
Pub Date: May 26, 1972
ISBN: 0307275922
Page Count: -
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A surprisingly warm and consistently outspoken retrospective for both fans and celebrity followers.
The self-described “king of all media” shares personal introspection and favorite celebrity interviews in his first book in two decades.
Stern (Miss America, 1995, etc.) is in top form in this entertaining amalgam of intimate confessional and Q-and-A archive. Opting for an older, wiser perspective this time around, the author strips away the juvenile raunch and sophomoric humor that made his first books runaway bestsellers. The book’s introduction, a meaty, contemplative 19-page affair, finds Stern, 65, candidly discussing his struggles with OCD, random regrets (namely his treatment of Robin Williams and Rosie O’Donnell), greatest moments (interviews with Conan O’Brien and Paul McCartney, animal rescue efforts), his move to SiriusXM in 2006, and the day he inexplicably took a rare show-day off to attend to an undisclosed cancer scare. It’s a kinder, gentler, all-grown-up side of the shock jock, which he credits to aggressive psychotherapy and his second wife, Beth. However, it’s the intimate, provocative celebrity interviews that make up the bulk of this weighty tome and which the author admits “represent my best work and show my personal evolution.” With his advancing age came wisdom, humility, empathy, and a dramatic sea change in the show’s direction and focus, as evidenced in more nuanced, probing interviews with Courtney Love, Joan Rivers, Michael J. Fox, Chris Cornell, and Lady Gaga, among others. Stern introduces each conversation with his personal perspective on the individual and the impression they made. His honest conversations with actors, music legends, and others represent an eclectic cross-section of celebrities, and his questions range from the piercing to the downright ridiculous. Perhaps the book’s most startling interview segments are those with a pre-presidential Donald Trump, whom Stern has interviewed dozens of times. Throughout the book, which is divided into thematic sections (“Sex & Relationships,” “Money & Fame,” “Drugs & Sobriety,” “Gone Too Soon,” etc.), the author’s personal growth and enduring legacy as a broadcast pioneer and unique profiler are on full display.
A surprisingly warm and consistently outspoken retrospective for both fans and celebrity followers.Pub Date: May 14, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-9429-0
Page Count: 560
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2019
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