A biography that awakens curiosity and whets the appetite for more information.
Stoneman (Pindar, 2014, etc.) sorts through millennia of literature and histories to try to reveal Xerxes, the powerful ruler of the Achaemenid Empire.
The author sets a difficult task, and he cites a vast array of sources—Ferdowsi, Herodotus, Ctesias, Plutarch, and everyone in between—in his quest for the truth about the Persian king who lost Greece. The first problem is that the largest empire the world had seen up to the fifth century B.C.E. had only oral history and little or no literature. The Greeks and Jews did, and they defined themselves in relation to Persia. Persia’s rule was the catalyst, and the Greek language enabled literature to emerge and circulate. The author carefully and concisely compares, refutes, and corrects names and events without tying readers’ brains in knots—no small feat. As Stoneman notes, “ancient writers were not, as a rule, interested in constructing biographies in the modern sense—certainly not on the scale of some modern tomes.” The description of the Persian character is one of the most valuable parts of the book. They were a peaceful people given to planting gardens—not for show, nor for sustenance, but to create a paradise on Earth. So why did Xerxes decide to attack the Greeks, ignoring the warning of his naval commander? The author supposes that, to prove his worth, he needed to carry out a “great deed,” which he did with the vengeful razing of Athens. What the Greeks saw as great victories at Salamis and even Thermopylae barely damaged the Persian Empire. Xerxes’ ultimate grand design was Persepolis, one of the great wonders of the world that was unfortunately mostly destroyed by Alexander the Great.
A biography that awakens curiosity and whets the appetite for more information.Pub Date: Oct. 6, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-300-18007-7
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: July 7, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2015
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
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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