A colorful account from a highly dedicated activist.
The memoir of a “green” radical.
Now in his mid-50s, Roselle, with the assistance of environmental journalist Mahan, looks back at nearly 30 years of troublemaking as an environmental activist. Coming of age as a hippie, high-school dropout and antiwar protestor—he bounced from his native Louisville to Los Angeles and elsewhere, making ends meet as a house painter, oil-field worker and ski bum—Roselle began his career as an activist in 1980 when he and others, traveling in a VW van, shouted “Hayduke lives!” (a nod to the eco-saboteur in Edward Abbey’s The Monkey Wrench Gang) and, then and there, founded the radical group Earth First! From those early days through his work with Greenpeace and the Rainforest Action Network, which he co-founded, Roselle has been deeply committed to using nonviolent civil disobedience to call attention to and force action on the destruction of wilderness. He recounts his role in blocking bulldozers to halt timber-industry incursions into Western roadless areas and in such iconic actions as hanging protest banners at Mount Rushmore and the Golden Gate Bridge. Disdainful of the Wilderness Society and other mainstream groups “too comfortable and professional” to risk civil disobedience, Roselle argues forcefully that only direct action can spur government to address the “crime” of deforestation. He takes pride in being viewed as a “nonviolent extremist” and contends that stopping climate change will require citizen action to pressure politicians addicted to coal-industry money. At the same time, he lambasts anarchists whose acts of arson and property destruction at such events as the 1999 Seattle meeting of the World Trade Organization reveal a lack of understanding of effective protest. “It takes more courage to sit in front of a bulldozer than to burn one,” he writes. His discussion of the painstaking training required for successful nonviolent activism helps explain why confrontational environmentalism has often proven a significant force.
A colorful account from a highly dedicated activist.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-312-55619-8
Page Count: 272
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2009
Less a sequel than an addendum, the book offers a close-up view of the Oval Office in its darkest hour.
Four decades after Watergate shook America, journalist Woodward (The Price of Politics, 2012, etc.) returns to the scandal to profile Alexander Butterfield, the Richard Nixon aide who revealed the existence of the Oval Office tapes and effectively toppled the presidency.
Of all the candidates to work in the White House, Butterfield was a bizarre choice. He was an Air Force colonel and wanted to serve in Vietnam. By happenstance, his colleague H.R. Haldeman helped Butterfield land a job in the Nixon administration. For three years, Butterfield worked closely with the president, taking on high-level tasks and even supervising the installation of Nixon’s infamous recording system. The writing here is pure Woodward: a visual, dialogue-heavy, blow-by-blow account of Butterfield’s tenure. The author uses his long interviews with Butterfield to re-create detailed scenes, which reveal the petty power plays of America’s most powerful men. Yet the book is a surprisingly funny read. Butterfield is passive, sensitive, and dutiful, the very opposite of Nixon, who lets loose a constant stream of curses, insults, and nonsensical bluster. Years later, Butterfield seems conflicted about his role in such an eccentric presidency. “I’m not trying to be a Boy Scout and tell you I did it because it was the right thing to do,” Butterfield concedes. It is curious to see Woodward revisit an affair that now feels distantly historical, but the author does his best to make the story feel urgent and suspenseful. When Butterfield admitted to the Senate Select Committee that he knew about the listening devices, he felt its significance. “It seemed to Butterfield there was absolute silence and no one moved,” writes Woodward. “They were still and quiet as if they were witnessing a hinge of history slowly swinging open….It was as if a bare 10,000 volt cable was running through the room, and suddenly everyone touched it at once.”
Less a sequel than an addendum, the book offers a close-up view of the Oval Office in its darkest hour.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1644-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 20, 2015
Harari delivers yet another tour de force.
A highly instructive exploration of “current affairs and…the immediate future of human societies.”
Having produced an international bestseller about human origins (Sapiens, 2015, etc.) and avoided the sophomore jinx writing about our destiny (Homo Deus, 2017), Harari (History/Hebrew Univ. of Jerusalem) proves that he has not lost his touch, casting a brilliantly insightful eye on today’s myriad crises, from Trump to terrorism, Brexit to big data. As the author emphasizes, “humans think in stories rather than in facts, numbers, or equations, and the simpler the story, the better. Every person, group, and nation has its own tales and myths.” Three grand stories once predicted the future. World War II eliminated the fascist story but stimulated communism for a few decades until its collapse. The liberal story—think democracy, free markets, and globalism—reigned supreme for a decade until the 20th-century nasties—dictators, populists, and nationalists—came back in style. They promote jingoism over international cooperation, vilify the opposition, demonize immigrants and rival nations, and then win elections. “A bit like the Soviet elites in the 1980s,” writes Harari, “liberals don’t understand how history deviates from its preordained course, and they lack an alternative prism through which to interpret reality.” The author certainly understands, and in 21 painfully astute essays, he delivers his take on where our increasingly “post-truth” world is headed. Human ingenuity, which enables us to control the outside world, may soon re-engineer our insides, extend life, and guide our thoughts. Science-fiction movies get the future wrong, if only because they have happy endings. Most readers will find Harari’s narrative deliciously reasonable, including his explanation of the stories (not actually true but rational) of those who elect dictators, populists, and nationalists. His remedies for wildly disruptive technology (biotech, infotech) and its consequences (climate change, mass unemployment) ring true, provided nations act with more good sense than they have shown throughout history.
Harari delivers yet another tour de force.Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-51217-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
Review Posted Online: June 26, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2018
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