May not appeal to a general audience, but an important resource for scholars and specialists in international law.
Firsthand account of the war crimes tribunals created in the 1990s to prosecute perpetrators of genocide and crimes against humanity.
Beginning in 1993, Scheffer (Law/Northwestern Univ.) led efforts to create tribunals for the former Yugoslavia, the Balkans, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Cambodia—all of which culminated in the establishment of the International Criminal Court in 2002. Working first as senior advisor to Madeleine Albright, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, and then as U.S. ambassador-at-large for war-crimes issues in the Clinton administration, the author was deeply involved in every aspect of the quest to bring to justice political and military leaders responsible for the murder and mutilation of millions. Scheffer re-creates the period of murder and ethnic cleansing, describes the politicking required to convince nations to act and weighs the successes and missteps of diplomacy aimed at creating a new era of international justice. “I saw so much misery for so many years that my memories remain consumed by human suffering,” he writes. His graphic descriptions of mutilated victims in hospital wards underscore the urgency of his pioneering work and explain his anger and frustration at the behavior of Western nations, which offered excuses and prevarications over apprehending war-crimes suspects, with the United States taking a “dangerously isolated” policy on the international court because of the Pentagon’s fear that U.S. soldiers abroad might be prosecuted. From the indictment of Slobodan Milosevic in Kosovo to the trial of Charles Taylor in Sierra Leone, Scheffer recounts the highlights of this “truly international counterattack on impunity for the worst possible crimes.” Reflecting after nearly a decade of battles, the author writes that international justice is the art of the possible and requires endless patience and persistence.
May not appeal to a general audience, but an important resource for scholars and specialists in international law.Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-691-14015-5
Page Count: 552
Publisher: Princeton Univ.
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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