This monumental history brings to life the political leaders swept up in the slavery battle.
This second installment of an American history series focuses on the causes of the Civil War.
Fraser’s sequel to The Emergence of One American Nation (2016) explores two views of the United States: one based on traditional racial or ethnic views, the other on ideals of equality of all humans and their attendant, inalienable rights. One of the main factors the author highlights as leading eventually to the Civil War is that the nation’s creators essentially kicked the can down the road: “The founders left behind the twin problems of slavery and federalism, which were often two sides of the same coin, and they continue to bedevil their progeny.” Throughout this well-researched volume, Fraser elaborates on the signposts on the road to war. First was Thomas Jefferson’s westward-looking “Empire of Liberty” approach and the question of whether slavery would be allowed in America’s new lands. Then there was the ascent of Andrew Jackson, champion of racist “ethnonationalism.” Next came the rise of the abolitionists. The deal breaker was the election of Abraham Lincoln, an advocate of restricting slavery, as president in 1860. The ultimate result was the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter in 1861. Fraser’s massive work proves Santayana’s theory that those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it. The author deftly shows that, even from this nation’s earliest days, there were those who were concerned only with the prosperity of themselves and their families and others who thought it was morally proper to help those who were less fortunate. So what’s happening in the U.S. today isn’t something that’s new and different. These stances recur again and again throughout this engrossing tome (and will likely appear in Fraser’s future volumes as well). The author also paints vibrant portraits of the key players and others, such as Henry Clay, John Calhoun, and Stephen Douglas, by using the words of these figures and their biographers. Fraser reveals the philosophical struggles of those in the rooms where crucial decisions were made. He succeeds in putting human faces on what could be dry, drab history.
This monumental history brings to life the political leaders swept up in the slavery battle.Pub Date: Jan. 15, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-9970805-2-0
Page Count: 664
Publisher: Fraser & Associates
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Gibbins combines historical knowledge with a sense of adventure, making this book a highly enjoyable package.
A popular novelist turns his hand to historical writing, focusing on what shipwrecks can tell us.
There’s something inherently romantic about shipwrecks: the mystery, the drama of disaster, the prospect of lost treasure. Gibbins, who’s found acclaim as an author of historical fiction, has long been fascinated with them, and his expertise in both archaeology and diving provides a tone of solid authority to his latest book. The author has personally dived on more than half the wrecks discussed in the book; for the other cases, he draws on historical records and accounts. “Wrecks offer special access to history at all…levels,” he writes. “Unlike many archaeological sites, a wreck represents a single event in which most of the objects were in use at that time and can often be closely dated. What might seem hazy in other evidence can be sharply defined, pointing the way to fresh insights.” Gibbins covers a wide variety of cases, including wrecks dating from classical times; a ship torpedoed during World War II; a Viking longship; a ship of Arab origin that foundered in Indonesian waters in the ninth century; the Mary Rose, the flagship of the navy of Henry VIII; and an Arctic exploring vessel, the Terror (for more on that ship, read Paul Watson’s Ice Ghost). Underwater excavation often produces valuable artifacts, but Gibbins is equally interested in the material that reveals the society of the time. He does an excellent job of placing each wreck within a broader context, as well as examining the human elements of the story. The result is a book that will appeal to readers with an interest in maritime history and who would enjoy a different, and enlightening, perspective.
Gibbins combines historical knowledge with a sense of adventure, making this book a highly enjoyable package.Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781250325372
Page Count: 304
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 28, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
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