An insightful thesis on how history works, perfect for big picture buffs.
An examination of great upheavals from the past, emphasizing their common elements.
In the tradition of Paul Kennedy’s The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers (1987), University of Michigan history professor Potter delivers expert accounts of significant historical transformations, including the rise of both Christianity and Islam and the (in retrospect) ephemeral course of Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany, all of which illustrated three features: disruptive ideas that already existed in the society but in fringe movements; “repudiation” of principles of the old system; and a “group tightly organized around a charismatic leader who saw himself as creating a new political order.” Potter points out that mass misery often produces anarchy, but it takes organization to make a revolution. Thus, the teachings of Jesus sustained Rome’s Christian minority for three centuries until Constantine established it as the dominant force in the empire. Muhammad inspired fellow Arabs with revelations from God that superseded those given to Jews and Christians, but it was only after his death that Abd al-Malik bureaucratized his teachings to allow for Islam’s massive expansion. Marxists would have remained obscure 19th-century reformers if Lenin and his followers had not taken advantage of the disintegration of czarist Russia. According to Potter, the American Revolution succeeded because its chief figures, led by George Washington, knew what they wanted—not to destroy their government but to regain liberties enjoyed by earlier generations. Because its leaders lacked wide appeal and political acumen, the French Revolution succeeded only in exchanging a king for an emperor. Potter believes that today’s global retreat of democracy in favor of jingoism and autocracy is another transformation, but readers expecting to learn how this obeys his ongoing theme will be disappointed. The author holds a low opinion of both Donald Trump and Boris Johnson, noting that they lack the charisma of great leaders—although he has little doubt that they represent the wave of the future.
An insightful thesis on how history works, perfect for big picture buffs.Pub Date: July 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-19-751882-3
Page Count: 344
Publisher: Oxford Univ.
Review Posted Online: April 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
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 Yorkerstaff 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
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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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