1 comments about Jane, the Quene Third Consort of King Henry VIII (Studies in British History).

1. As far as I am aware, this is the only biography of Jane Seymour in existence, and Ms. Gross has done an excellent job with it. Having traveled to England herself and visited the Savernake, conducting research on the Seymour family that came to power some five centuries ago, she has uncovered a great deal of information on the mysterious woman who managed to supplant the wife Henry VIII moved Heaven and Earth to have and to hold. Though his first two marriages are well documented and both Katharine and Anne are popular figures in history, Jane Seymour has somehow alluded us. In Ms. Gross's novel one can trace her life as never before; the history of her family and her home at Wolfhall, interesting information on her parents and their influence on her life, and her story of coming to Court and serving the Queen(s) before her. By revealing some of the shadowy mysteries of Wolfhall, Pamela Gross has taken us beyond Alison Weir's or Antonia Fraser's thorough research on Jane's reign as Queen to further understand the woman wearing the crown. It's no pleasure read though; the book is made up like a research essay with footnotes and sources. For any fellow researchers, I think you will find "Jane the Quene" to be the ideal biography on Henry's third wife.

No comments about Elizabeth I.

3 comments about The Isherwood Century: Essays on the Life and Work of Christopher Isherwood.

1. "The Isherwood Century". What a great choice of title for this invaluable (and well edited) collections of essays, interviews, ruminations on the life and influence of Christopher Isherwood. While his is a household name, primarily beacuse of the worldwide success and endurance of "Cabaret" the musical based on his Berlin Stories (I am a Camera, Goodbye to Berlin, etc), this informed and endlessly interesting survey provides a fine documentation for Isherwood's position of importance on 20th Century literature, his positive role model for gay writers and all gay people who care about significant relationships, his courage as an early pacifist, his impact on those students fortunate enough to have studied in his unique classes. Reading first hand encounters from such a broad spectrum of friends and reporters always give a more fine tuned view than a straight out biography. And for a man whose literary skills polished the concept of autobigraphy that is matched by few others, this is quite an achievement.

   Reading "The Isherwood Century" is discovering an involved panorama of life in the past century - politically, artistically, internationally, psychologically, and spiritually. More than a memoir, this book remains intimate despite its scope. At last we have a reference (outside of his own wondrous diaries) that validates the greatness of this significant human being.




2. The Isherwood Century is an impressive collection of essays and interviews on the life and work of Christopher Isherwood, including a fresh, in-depth view of his literary legacy and continuing influence. Included are Katherine Bucknell (Who is Christopher Isherwood?); Dan Luckenbill (Isherwood in Los Angeles); Stathis Orphanos (In the Blink of an Eye: Evolving with Christopher Isherwood); Michael S. Harper (Ish circa 1959-1963); Michael S. Harper (Reading from Isherwood's Letter circa 1959-1963); Robert Peters (Gay Isherwood Visits Straight Riverside); Carolyn G. Heilbrun (My Isherwood, My Bachardy); James P. White (Write It Down or It's Lost: Isherwood as Mentor), and sixteen other informative and insightful contributors. The Isherwood Century is a "must" for all students and fans of Isherwood's accomplishments and thoughts.



3. As a long-time reader of Isherwood's novels, autobiographies and diaries, I thought I knew everything there was to know about him. I was wrong, and I'm happy to say that I learned a great deal about the intimate Isherwood (as opposed to the person he chose to reveal in his work) from this collection. The informal Isherwood is here in memoirs and reminiscences, first and foremost by his partner Don Bachardy. As you would expect, Bachardy's portrait of Isherwood is precise, detailed, affectionate and harrowing (his series of drawings of Isherwood's last days are included), but the memories of former students of Isherwood as teacher, mentor and friend are equally revealing. The professional Isherwood appears in previously unpublished interviews and memoirs by such colleagues as Carolyn Heilbrun, whose piece about her few intersections with Isherwood as a literary subject takes an interesting turn into recalling his profound kindness to her in a time of spiritual crisis. And the lively and accessible essays by literary scholars served first to remind me of what an original and vivid writer Isherwood was and second to send me back to the novels that so inspired me when I first encountered them. Isherwood achieved thrilling literary effects by combining witheringly accurate observation of his characters with a sensual evocation of time and place as if by magic. It seems only fitting that when the many writers here take very different beads on this complex man and artist what emerges from the collage of viewpoints is a surprisingly emotional and coherent portrait of the man himself.

5 comments about Vindication: A Life of Mary Wollstonecraft.

1. I actually preferred this over Frances Sherwood's novel about Mary Wollstonecraft. Whether you believe that Wollstonecraft had an affair with the painter Fuseli makes a big difference in how you perceive her. It makes her seem like a perpetual victim who was always making mistakes about men. This discredits Wollstonecraft as a pioneer of feminism. Lyndall Gordon rightly points out that there is no evidence that Wollstonecraft was involved with the married Fuseli and calls it "the Fuseli slander".
   
   On the other hand, Gordon does engage in speculation herself. They are mostly educated speculations and there is a good chance of them being true. I thought that the speculation that Wollstonecraft's lover Imlay was a spy had the least credibility because there are other explanations for his behavior that seem more likely to me.
   
   I was glad that Lyndall Gordon included such tantalizing bits about Shelley's first wife, Harriet Westbrook and Clare Claremont, the daughter of William Godwin's second wife. The little she has to say about them makes me think that they were extraordinary women and I'd love to know more.



2. In my opinion a better conceptualization Of Mary Wollstonecraft's
   Life, Ideas, and Experinences is author: Frances Sherwood
   Tile: Vindication.
   
   However the Gordon book is an adequate read



3. While I respect Gordon's decision to stick closely to journals and letters in writing her biography of Mary Wollstonecraft, I wondered why she offered so little in the way of the broader political world Mary was a part of it in the late 18th century, especial since she responded to it in her writings. The author offers little in regard to the meetings that were most intriguing, like the dinner parties hosted by her publisher, Joseph Johnson, that included leading revolutionary figures like Thomas Paine and her eventual husband, William Godwin. Gordon does talk about the revolutionary ferment in Britain at the time, but doesn't expand it into a broader discussion on how Mary's writings reflected these concerns, and how she managed to effectively escape censure, unlike Thomas Paine, who found himself being tried for sedition in absentia. What we get is a set of very intriguing stories, such as her long affair with Gilbert Imlay that took her to France and Scandinavia, that wet one's appetite but fails to satisfies one interest in her as a revolutionary figure.
   
   Mary Wollstonecraft reached a broad audience with her writings, in particular A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, which was in response to the new French government's Rights of Man. She, like other women who were part of the revolution, felt left out when the new government essentially turned its back on the rights of women. Mary avoided house arrest by secretly marrying Gilbert Imlay, an American in Paris. Gordon sets up many of the situations that befell Mary in Paris and her frustrating relationship with Imlay that came for nought after a long voyage to Scandinavia trying to recover his losses in regard to an ill-fated shipping venture. As with her brothers and sisters, Mary felt a strong responsibility to the man she loved, but this feeling was never fully reciprocated.
   
   Gordon shows in detail how Mary had to deal with the paternalistic world of the late 18th century, from her good-for-nothing father, to her miserly elder brother, and the varoious relationships of her friends and family. All this is well and good, but Mary was a political writer, and we get so little of her actual thoughts on government, which were the focus of her many writings.
   
   After all, Mary was one of the early suffragettes, and her writings form the cornerstone of feminist writings in the 19th century. Gordon alludes to Jane Austin and Virginia Woolf and other writers she felt were influenced by Mary in one way or another. Gordon had a pension for comparing Mary's real life to the fictional lives Austin had created in her novels. Time and time again, we read about what Mary suffered through, lending emotional weight to her writings, but there wasn't any real attempt to probe the intellectual origins of these writings. Mary may have saw herself as a new genus of woman, but her writings didn't come out of an intellectual void, and that is what is missing in this biography.



4. This book is not the place to begin if you are not already convinced of Mary Wollstonecraft's genius. I began reading to find the author referring to Wollstonecraft as a genius without any preface for this claim. I was immediately thrown out of the narrative by this assumption. The author describes each of the books that Wollstonecraft wrote without bothering to asses their merit for the reader, are we to take for granted that they were great literary works? I found this lack of any sort of judgment of the subject strange. The book similarly failed to engage me in the narrative. The author leaves her subject for long discussions of the history of the family that she was a governess for. This subject did not have enough baring on Wollstonecraft's life to make it worth including. That such a unique and groundbreaking woman should have her life reduced to so dull a narrative, with so many assumption about her life disappointed me. The book itself failed to hold my interest.



5. This is a beautifully written biography about a fascinating woman. While she was a serious thinker in advance of her times, her life was of the stuff that would make a good romantic novel. The backdrop is not only England and Ireland, but the French Revolution and includes the machinations of various representatives of the fledgling United States stationed in Europe. No less interesting are the chapters on the women who were her biologic and ideological heirs including her second daughter who married Shelley and wrote Frankenstein.

No comments about David & Winston: How a Friendship Changed History.

5 comments about Daphne Du Maurier, Haunted Heiress (Personal Takes).

1. If you are looking for a biography on Daphne Du Maurier, I would not recommend Haunted Heiress. This is a rambling, free form work of literary criticism. You would do better to check this book out from the library rather than paying the steep price.
   
   You can learn more about the story of Du Maurier's life by doing a web search.
   
   Also, if you are interested in visuals, there are none in Haunted Heiress, save for the cover. The text did conjure up some mental images of Ms. Auerbach, though... (narcissistic, cranky, and snobbish) but none of Daphne Du Maurier.
   
   I did very much appreciate Ms. Auerbach's observations on Du Maurier's affinity for the way men can live their lives, with more freedom and flexibility.
   
   I wish Ms. Auerbach would have done more research on Du Maurier's life and interwoven it with her pop-up thoughts on this book or that.



2. Auerbach, a professor of literature at University of Pennsylvania, dazzles the reader with her fascination for the writings of Daphne Du Maurier, the writer unfortunately best known for the so-called Gothic novel, 'Rebecca'and various film adaptations like Hitchcock's 'The Birds' and Roeg's 'Don't Look Now'.
   As a young summer camp participant in the early 50s, Auerbach found herself both entranced by Du Maurier's vicious protagonists and repulsed by her label as a 'romantic' writer of escapist woman's fiction. Her analysis of Du Maurier's work vehemently disputes Du Maurier's dismissal by critics; Auerbach finds her male centered stories brimming with fully drawn characters that derive their strength from a violent/murderous reaction to the females who enter their lives. Du Maurier's female narrators (1st person or otherwise) depend upon their omnipotent male counterparts for identity; the so-called romances of Rebecca, Jamaica Inn and Frenchman's Creek are not driven by love as they are erroneously depicted in the corresponding movie adaptations, but revolve around the transition of the female acquiescing to the strength of the male and becoming dependent on him for identity and definition. These female protagonists, like Du Maurier, herself, initially possess the characteristics of young boys and only become women by losing their independence. Above all, Auerbach describes Du Maurier's haunted inheritance: the necessity of keeping of her heritage alive as initiated by her grandfather George, author of 'Trilby' and her actor father ,Gerald.
   
   This is not a biography of Daphne Du Maurier, but rather a literary critique of her many novels and fantastic short stories. As it relates to Du Maurier's fiction, Auerbach eludes to Du Maurier's penchant towards lesbianism, citing Margaret Forster's book, "Daphne Du Maurier: The Secret Life of the Renowned Storyteller" as her source. She analyzes the movie adaptations, finding Hitchcock's 'Rebecca', 'Jamaica Inn' and 'The Birds' inferior to the original thoughts as penned by the author, herself.
   
   As I have found myself compelled over the years to reread Daphne Du Maurier's lesser known masterpieces, like 'The House on the Strand', 'The Scapegoat', and 'My Cousin Rachel', I fully understand Auerbach's fascination with the author and the strange almost spellbinding hold she has over her readers. I recommend this book to anyone who has been under the Du Maurier spell and realizes that she is much, much more than just a escapist romance writer. Like Patricia Highsmith, her amoral comments on male/female relationships wickedly define the 20th century.



3. Du Maurier is the author of almost twenty novels, articles, plays, memoirs and short stories; yet is known for a relatively limited handful of popular works. Daphne Du Maurier: Haunted Heiress analyzes her lesser-known volumes and their characters, providing a strong literary analysis of metaphors in her writing, and ethnic and social observations of her choices and times. The result is a revealing, absorbing study.



4. This book is a great complement to du Maurier's fiction. Auerbach has written a very personal account of du Maurier's life and its relation to her writing. I liked the intimate tone of the book, as if you were talking to Auerbach over coffee; there is nothing over-blown or haughty. Auerbach's analysis of how du Maurier's stories were (mis-)adapted for film is brilliant, as well as Auerbach's discussion about du Maurier's sexuality and prejudices. Quite enjoyable.



5. Although the HAUNTED HEIRESS attempts to instill in the reader the notion that Daphne du Maurier's works do not fall into the "romance" genre, she fails to convenience the reader of this. Even drawing comparisons to du Maurier's grandfather and contrasts to the great Brontës, all is lost in her attempt to move Daphne du Maurier out of this shallow genre and into one of a more academically acceptable category. Her supportive arguments are grotesquely silly and oftentimes clouded by an awkward, pompous writing style.

1 comments about Charles I.

1. A readable and balanced portrayal of Charles, showing his virtues as well as his faults. Charles was the wrong man for his circumstances, but not totally evil or inept at everything. He learned the wrong lessons from his life experiences, and in the end his private virtues such as loyalty to his servants meant he could not compromise when it was necessary. This biography gives good insight into Charles and what went wrong.

No comments about The Gentle Lochiel: The Cameron Chief and Bonnie Prince Charlie (Scots' Lives).

No comments about Churchill Goes to War: Winston's Wartime Journeys.

5 comments about The True Intrepid.

1. Bill Macdonald has contributed valuably by sleuthing some of the past of the mythic character, Sir William Stephenson.
   
   Macdonald is a journalist from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, who on hearing of the death of Stephenson in 1989, decided to investigate the past of a man who hailed from Winnipeg and was entrusted by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill with serving as his intelligence czar in North America during World War II.
   
   Fortunately for history, Macdonald was able to uncover glimmers of the truth of Stephenson's humble origins; his move to Britain during the 1920s and 1930s; and his businesses. One was steel; through the steel industry, Macdonald may have come to appreciate the Nazi commitment to expanding its military. Churchill became prime minister after the British debacle at Dunkirk. He promptly dispatched Stephenson to the U.S. Based at Rockefeller Center, Stephenson established an aggressive intelligence program and helped advise the U.S. in formation of what became the O.S.S., predecessor of the CIA. Macdonald interviewed a former Univ. of Toronto professor who directed the vital communications links conveying Nazi communications intercepts among British, Canadian, and U.S. codebreakers.
   
   Behind the stories and myths surrounding Stephenson, Macdonald has shone light on some important, classified aspects of World War II. When I read the first edition of this book, I found the story somewhat hard to follow and strange, though also strangely plausible. For the paperback edition, a former CIA staff historian has offered an introduction, probably because he would have had the same reaction.
   
   I am reminded of another recent book (The Secret of Hut 26) reporting how the U.S. developed computers in Dayton, Ohio for attacking Nazi codes. The story was revealed by veterans of this endeavor wishing to report their contribution, 50 years later. Similarly, interesting stories and people, can arise from Winnipeg. Owing to the highly original investigative reporting, I give this book 5 stars.



2. MacDonald has successfully revealed much of the often clouded life of Intrepid, a man whose primary career goal was - of course - to remain in the shadows. The immensely likeable and non-descript Stephenson (Intrepid) was the penultimate spy: you wouldn't notice him in a crowd and if you did, you'd find yourself charmed and at ease. This side of the man has been overlooked in past books, but MacDonald reveals just how significant this particular trait is to an effective intelligence officer. In Stephenson, readers will learn how charm hid the great depths of intelligence, honor and violent resolve that made Intrepid a name to admire in the history of his profession. MacDonald also offers a highly-readable, compelling look at the events of Intrepid's life, keeping an admirable balance between objectivity and the thrills of a good story. David R. Bannon, Ph.D.; author "Race Against Evil."



3. If the 20th century was to be represented by 4 or 5 individuals, William Stephenson would have to be one of them. By this I mean that his life was incredible. He would be worthy of an interesting biography in any of the lives that he led: a scientist, a businessman or a spymaster.

   The book goes into much more detail of Intrepid's life, as well as those of some of his associates than the famous Man Called Intrepid book (which is worth reading as well!). This book will inspire and awe anybody! Well researched and well enough written.




4. A thoroughly researched and well documented account of the quintessential North American spymaster William Stephenson. New information dispels past myths about a fascinating man who, with the help of his "unknown" agents,played an crucial role influencing the events of the Second World War.



5. This book researches and chronicles in great detail the life of one man who, while obscure and unknown, played a pivotal role in the unfolding of World War 2. This book tells an important history and heightens my appreciation of some of our stories that has never been adaquitely told.