A heartfelt exploration of Washington’s Christianity that will find an appreciative audience among both the faithful and the...
George Washington: soldier, patriot, president—saint? This book parses the founding father’s achievements through the lens of Christian theology, making some surprising observations along the way.
Blending the mythical and the historical to convey the holiness of its subject, this book is neither strictly a history nor a biography. Connell (The Secrets of Mary, 2010, etc.) details apocrypha unaddressed in the work of mainstream biographers: Washington’s seemingly mystical imperviousness to musket fire, his supernatural vision at Valley Forge and, Connell argues, his deathbed conversion to Catholicism. Like most hagiographers, Connell begins with a committed belief that her subject is uniquely touched by God, and the book is largely a rhetorical exercise in proving the truth of that assumption. This becomes uncomfortable since, of course, Washington is not a saint recognized by the Catholic Church; many scholars agree he was not Catholic, either, though he was, in fact, a Mason—a significant aspect of his spirituality that goes unmentioned here. The worshipful tone of Connell’s prose—“history has canonized” Washington, she says, describing him as a “mystical icon of heroic grace”—may rankle secular readers as well as the true faithful, who might justifiably wonder if either the author or the subject can claim legitimacy to such assertions. Although Connell never actually classifies Washington as a saint or argues outright for his beatification, and she never describes his exploits as miracles, her point is nevertheless clear and in concert with Catholic theology: God, or “Kind Providence” (Washington’s preferred term), actively worked through the great leader and chose him to found the new nation by God’s grace. This conviction leads Connell to some observations about American political philosophy that will delight some readers and provoke others, not least of which is the assertion that the Declaration of Independence and Constitution are rooted in the Bible. But in the end, all serious scholars agree that Washington was, indeed, a devout Christian, and the primary source material Connell has gathered here—including little-examined oral histories that deal with his spirituality—make her book a valuable addition to existing scholarship.
A heartfelt exploration of Washington’s Christianity that will find an appreciative audience among both the faithful and the patriotic.Pub Date: Sept. 30, 2013
ISBN: 978-1489589668
Page Count: 246
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Nov. 20, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An intimate memoir of the Negro Leagues by one of its greatest players. Though Riley (The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues, not reviewed) gets credit for helping Leonard write his autobiography, this book reads as if it were a verbatim transcription of Leonard's taped reminiscences. That is the book's weakness and its strength. It rambles and lacks consistent narrative structure, but it is also an important memoir of an era in American sports—and in American history—that has only begun to get the attention it deserves. The slick-fielding first baseman was one of the best hitters in the Negro Leagues from 1934 to 1950, and most observers believe that if it weren't for segregation he would have been a superstar in the major leagues. Leonard's memory is encyclopedic: He recalls plays and players from when he was a 13- year-old playing semi-pro ball in 1921 to his last game, at 47, in a Mexican league in 1955. He tells stories of grueling three-games- a-day schedules; of endless travel from one seedy segregated hotel to another; of lousy pay and breached contracts; and of winters spent in menial labor to make ends meet. Lou Gehrig, the white player to whom Leonard is most often compared, had a far more comfortable life, but Leonard expresses no rancor and only mild regret. Nor, at 87, does he romanticize the past. The Negro Leagues were not as good as the major leagues, he writes, and it is virtually impossible to measure black players of the era against their white counterparts. Leonard writes that Gehrig probably was a better player than he was. But he also wishes he'd had the chance to find out. An invaluable historical document and the record of a remarkable life.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-7867-0119-6
Page Count: 274
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1994
The candid, fast-moving memoir of a significant member of the Warsaw Ghetto's fighting underground. This is a marked contrast to Yitzhak Zuckerman's recent A Surplus of Memory (1993), also translated by Harshav. Although they worked together in the Jewish Fighting Organization (ZOB), the personalities of ``Antek'' and ``Kazik,'' to use their noms de guerre, could not have been more different. The older Antek (Zuckerman), head of the ZOB, was a consummate organizer, diplomat, and archivist, while the younger Kazik (Rotem) was a lover and fighter. Never hesitating to lead dangerous street-level missions dressed as a Gestapo collaborator or to venture through the vast Warsaw sewer system, Kazik ``argued bitterly'' with Antek against saving piles of records from the burning ghetto: ``And why endanger ourselves? For papers? For `history'?'' Because he looked enough like a member of the Polish gentile working class among whom he had grown up, Kazik operated as a tough member of the Polish resistance who could intimidate uncooperative Jews and gentiles. After the ghetto was systematically destroyed, Kazik, in fact, didn't hesitate to join the anti-Semitic Armia Krajowa Polish underground in its short-lived uprising against the Germans. His chutzpah is at its best when he cajoles these partisans into keeping up the fight so as not to be shamed by the superior resistance of the city's underfed and undersupplied Jews. He had the sensitivity to feel guilty when gorging on a farmer's banquet while his family and friends starved in their bunkers, but this guileless man of action wasn't one to pass up a good meal, an opportunity for revenge, or a love affair. Such qualities color this memoir with the personal, so that it transcends a historical document. The record of these desperate, brave days is enriched by the injection of Kazik's salty, active personality. (4 pages photos, not seen).
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-300-05797-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1994
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