The book—essentially an encapsulation of the author’s philosophy of politics and politicians—is a good choice for those who...
A U.S. Representative from Indiana for 34 years reviews the best of the commentaries he sent to his constituents during his years in office.
Hamilton (Global and International Studies/Indiana Univ.; Strengthening Congress, 2009, etc.) provides a solid look at the thinking, actions, and failures from the Lyndon Johnson years to the present. He covers each administration, listing accomplishments as well as the majorities in Congress. The short essays he sent on a regular basis gave the population of Indiana an illuminating view of what was going on in Washington, D.C. He deals with history, policy issues, and how Congress might work better. As a young representative, he learned from the best. As the Medicare bill came up for consideration, Wilbur Mills’ talent at consensus building and respect for minority views taught Hamilton how to get along in Washington. The author has a folksy style, making this book both informative and easy to read. The importance of Congress’ process and procedures hits home immediately, as we see how it has wandered away from its established practices for developing and passing laws. Hamilton’s views on politicians might just renew some readers’ faith in our elected officials. At once encouraging and enlightening, his writings stir hope, and what he says is still important all these years later. In spite of our ills and need for reform, Hamilton has an abiding belief in the essence of representative government and the search for the common good. The need for “civility in Congress,” he writes, “is an art that requires continual application.” He encourages us to find what is “right” in America and to see how well we have endured.
The book—essentially an encapsulation of the author’s philosophy of politics and politicians—is a good choice for those who want to believe in government again.Pub Date: April 18, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-253-02086-4
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Indiana Univ.
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
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