ignore Wallis—even if he is repeating many a lesson that those familiar with his work will already have learned.
The evangelical activist and writer (and editor of Sojourners), who has long defined the Christian Left, offers
autobiographical snapshots and a call to action. Wallis believes that the US is about to witness the eruption of a new kind of activism—one motivated by "spiritual values" rather than anger. Like so many in our 12-step age, Wallis is explicitly how-to, providing 15 easy-to-digest steps to activism. Buried beneath the formulaic packaging, though, are some insightful nuggets. In Lesson 5 ("Recognize the Three Faces of Poverty"), Wallis, long known for his work on behalf of the poor, urges readers to consider how material, spiritual, and civic poverty—not just the widening gap between rich and poor but also the decline in voting and the degeneration of political debate—are ruining the public life of the nation. In Lesson 6, he reminds would-be activists to "Listen to Those Closest to the Problem"—the poor themselves. In Lesson 7 ("Get to the Heart of the Matter"), Wallis takes on welfare reform, the market economy, and racism. Throughout, he reminds readers of just how much potential religion has to bring about social and political change—although this discussion is not helped by tired calls for increased ecumenism and horizontal (instead of, you guessed it, vertical) leadership. Wallis ends on an optimistic note: The transformation from disenchanted politics to spiritually infused politics (and the transformation from indifferent churches to churches committed to economic and social justice) is, in his view, well under way. Nothing particularly fresh, but with so few voices expressing similar commitments to ending poverty, we can’t afford to
ignore Wallis—even if he is repeating many a lesson that those familiar with his work will already have learned.Pub Date: March 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-375-50176-2
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2000
If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.
The authors have created a sort of anti-Book of Virtues in this encyclopedic compendium of the ways and means of power.
Everyone wants power and everyone is in a constant duplicitous game to gain more power at the expense of others, according to Greene, a screenwriter and former editor at Esquire (Elffers, a book packager, designed the volume, with its attractive marginalia). We live today as courtiers once did in royal courts: we must appear civil while attempting to crush all those around us. This power game can be played well or poorly, and in these 48 laws culled from the history and wisdom of the world’s greatest power players are the rules that must be followed to win. These laws boil down to being as ruthless, selfish, manipulative, and deceitful as possible. Each law, however, gets its own chapter: “Conceal Your Intentions,” “Always Say Less Than Necessary,” “Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy,” and so on. Each chapter is conveniently broken down into sections on what happened to those who transgressed or observed the particular law, the key elements in this law, and ways to defensively reverse this law when it’s used against you. Quotations in the margins amplify the lesson being taught. While compelling in the way an auto accident might be, the book is simply nonsense. Rules often contradict each other. We are told, for instance, to “be conspicuous at all cost,” then told to “behave like others.” More seriously, Greene never really defines “power,” and he merely asserts, rather than offers evidence for, the Hobbesian world of all against all in which he insists we live. The world may be like this at times, but often it isn’t. To ask why this is so would be a far more useful project.
If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-670-88146-5
Page Count: 430
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1998
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
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