Reappraisals: Reflections on the Forgotten Twentieth Century - Tony Judt

A collection of essays and book reviews on a variety of 20th century places, events and personalities. This book emphasizes the importance of remembering the lessons of that century, that might otherwise be forgotten.

While my lack of philosophical and historical vocabulary limited my understanding and enjoyment of the earlier essays on European intellectuals, I found the later parts Lost in transition, places and memories and The American half-century fascinating.

Without anything more insightful to say than can't be found elsewhere, I made a note of a few quotes from the later essays that struck me particularly:

The country that wouldn't grow up (Israel Liberal Daily Haaretz - May 2006)

Seen from the outside Israel still comports itself like an adolescent, consumed by a brittle confidence in it's own uniqueness, certain that no one understands it and everyone is against it, full of wounded amour-propre. Quick to take offense and quick to give it.

The Crisis, Kennedy, Khrushchev and Cuba

With hindsight, we can see that Kennedy managed to obtain the best possible outcome in the circumstances, he was not just lucky either, he was consistent. In rejecting the advise he was offered in hundreds of hours of secret meetings, he ran serious risks too. As he remarked to the assembled senior congressmen on the day of his press conference revealing the crisis:

"The people who are the best off are the people whos advise is not taken, because whatever we do is filled with hazards."

Of course Kennedy's motives were never unmixed and like any politician he sought to turn his management of the affair into a political asset.

The Illusionist - Henry Kissinger and American foreign policy

The years 1968 to 75 were the hinge on which the second half of our century turned.

Richard Nixon was, in one respect, a fortunate man. Felled by Watergate he has been resurrected, in some quarters, as an unlikely tragic hero. The greatest foreign policy president we nearly had, as it were ... Anyone tempted to give credit to such claims, should read William Bundy's book which anticipates what, one must hope, will be the considered judgment of history upon a troubled and troubling era in American public affairs.

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Dreamsongs - George R R Martin

The best fantasy is written in the language of dreams. It is alive as dreams are alive, more real than real ... for a moment at least ... that long magic moment before we wake.

Fantasy is silver and scarlet, indigo and azure, obsidian veined with gold and lapis lazuli. Reality is plywood and plastic, done up in mud brown and olive drab. Fantasy tastes of habaneros and honey, cinnamon and cloves, rare red meat and wines as sweet as summer. Reality is beans and tofu, and ashes at the end. Reality is the strip malls of Burbank, the smokestacks of Cleveland, a parking garage in Newark. Fantasy is the towers of Minas Tirith, the ancient stones of Gormenghast, the halls of Camelot. Fantasy flies on the wings of Icarus, reality on Southwest Airlines. Why do our dreams become so much smaller when they finally come true?

We read fantasy to find the colors again, I think. To taste strong spices and hear the songs the sirens sang. There is something old and true in fantasy that speaks to something deep within us, to the child who dreamt that one day he would hunt the forests of the night, and feast beneath the hollow hills, and find a love to last forever somewhere south of Oz and north of Shangri-La.

They can keep their heaven. When I die, I'd sooner go to middle Earth.

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New Moon - Stephenie Meyer

Most irritating protagonists ever. Persistantly, self deprecating, vacuous, idiocy nauseatingly obsessed with pompous, zealous, self rightousness.

It is part of the author's job to evoke an emotional response in the reader, but I think exasperation is probably not what Stephenie Meyer was going for.

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Twilight - Stephenie Meyer

Teen, Vampire, Romance. No way I am in that demographic. Well, maybe just a little bit.

With a hint of my own personal favorite, the argument from personal incredulity:

Well, where did you come from? Evolution? Creation? Couldn�t we have evolved in the same way as other species, predator and prey? Or, if you don�t believe all this world could have just happened on its own, which is hard for me to accept myself, is it so hard to believe that the same force that created the delicate angelfish with the shark, the baby seal and the killer whale, could create both our kinds together?

Pretty much where this argument belongs, in a book about Vampires.

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The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins

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