An accurate narrative, but the lack of nuance makes for a painful account that will keep readers gnashing their teeth...
Intense history of a vicious confrontation between whites and Indians in 1850s Washington Territory.
Pulitzer Prize–winning historian and journalist Kluger (Seizing Destiny: The Relentless Expansion of American Territory, 2007, etc.) writes accessible prose and turns up fascinating obscure records, but readers will quickly suspect that this story doesn’t end well. A central figure, Isaac Stevens (1818–1862), became the first governor of the Washington Territory in 1853. His major task was to facilitate white settlement by removing indigenous tribes. To achieve this, he sent representatives to survey their lands and, with no tribal input, choose a reservation. After drawing up a written contract, they called tribes together to feast and listen to whites extol its benefits, including promises of schools and farm equipment. Kluger points out that the Indians were illiterate, did not understand contracts and had no concept of land ownership. Despite their unease, most—according to white observers—signed. One leader, Leschi (1808–1858), protested and organized resistance during the 1855-6 Puget Sound War but was defeated, captured and, despite appeals from some whites, hung (though obviously useless to him, Leschi was exonerated in 2004). Forced onto tiny reservations, the tribes sunk into poverty, and their number dwindled. By the end of the 20th century, most whites agreed that they had treated the tribes badly, and legalization of Indian casinos has stimulated some prosperity for the survivors. Kluger does not conceal his indignation, painting a portrait of the whites as greedy, materialistic and racist, with a few ineffectual exceptions. The tribes are portrayed as modest hunter-gatherers, devoutly in tune with nature.
An accurate narrative, but the lack of nuance makes for a painful account that will keep readers gnashing their teeth throughout.Pub Date: March 3, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-307-26889-1
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Dec. 2, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2010
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
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.
Rootin’-tootin’ history of the dry-gulchers, horn-swogglers, and outright killers who populated the Wild West’s wildest city in the late 19th century.
The stories of Wyatt Earp and company, the shootout at the O.K. Corral, and Geronimo and the Apache Wars are all well known. Clavin, who has written books on Dodge City and Wild Bill Hickok, delivers a solid narrative that usefully links significant events—making allies of white enemies, for instance, in facing down the Apache threat, rustling from Mexico, and other ethnically charged circumstances. The author is a touch revisionist, in the modern fashion, in noting that the Earps and Clantons weren’t as bloodthirsty as popular culture has made them out to be. For example, Wyatt and Bat Masterson “took the ‘peace’ in peace officer literally and knew that the way to tame the notorious town was not to outkill the bad guys but to intimidate them, sometimes with the help of a gun barrel to the skull.” Indeed, while some of the Clantons and some of the Earps died violently, most—Wyatt, Bat, Doc Holliday—died of cancer and other ailments, if only a few of old age. Clavin complicates the story by reminding readers that the Earps weren’t really the law in Tombstone and sometimes fell on the other side of the line and that the ordinary citizens of Tombstone and other famed Western venues valued order and peace and weren’t particularly keen on gunfighters and their mischief. Still, updating the old notion that the Earp myth is the American Iliad, the author is at his best when he delineates those fraught spasms of violence. “It is never a good sign for law-abiding citizens,” he writes at one high point, “to see Johnny Ringo rush into town, both him and his horse all in a lather.” Indeed not, even if Ringo wound up killing himself and law-abiding Tombstone faded into obscurity when the silver played out.
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.Pub Date: April 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21458-4
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
