2 comments about Moura: The Dangerous Life of the Baroness Budberg.

1. Based on the book's description as "...a complex and compelling tale of political upheaval, espionage, sexual passion, and all the suffering wrought by war, poverty, oppression, and exile... told brilliantly with empathy and panache.", you might think this would be a fascinating read. But this book wasn't quite the read I thought it would be.
   
   Berberova really needed a strong editor to help her tighten her writing. There were too many people mentioned and the story tended to take so many tangents into other people's lives, making it difficult to get a strong sense of who Moura was.
   
   But you can get a sense of who Moura wasn't. She wasn't a great mom (but to her defense, that was probably the case of a lot of women in her situation), wasn't a great friend, and not too devoted to anyone except herself.
   
   The repeated name dropping made the book frustrating as well. Whether they were in her life for a week or a decade, it seems that Berberova mentions everyone Moura ever met. The index in the back of the book was necessary just to help distinguish the characters as there is little way to keep them all straight.



2. You've got to take this one in the right spirit. Berberova isn't a terribly good writer--discursive, disorganized, fatally susceptible to digression from almost any direction. Morever she doesn't seem particularly to like her subject--a failing perhaps more common among biographers than you might at first guess.
   
   So, as biography, not a delight. But as conversation--my, this is wonderful. Stick with it a few pages and let yourself hear the voice: you get the sense that you are in her kitchen, beside the samover, while she rattles on conjuring up ghosts, settling old scores, and generally jabbing the ribs of a whole generation of Russian emigres and their friends.
   
   The "Index of Names" at the end gives you some hint of what you are up against: some 60 pages, perhaps 600 names of all the people who wandered in and out of Moura's life, or cast a shadow over it. Who /did/ this index, anyway? It is a quirky marvel, not quite comprehensive but close enough that you want to keep it around for consultation in reading any number of other emigre works.
   
   Oddly--okay, not so oddly--the dominant figures in this tumultuous cast are not the author herself but two of the men in her life: Maxim Gorky and H. G. Wells. And what a pair of gasbags they turn out to be: writers of moderate talent and immoderate self-enchantment, too blinded by the mirror to understand anything about the dreadful world they lived in. Wells once tried to lecture Stalin on the state of the world; Stalin wasn't interested. Gorki actually moved back from exile into Russia, convinced he could make a difference; he died (or was murdered) somewhat the wiser.
   
   The Russians do seem to have a knack for memoir: think Herzen, think Nadezhda Mandelstam, think Trotsky's autobiography. In fairness, Berberova's memoir of Moura isn't a patch on any of these three, not in insight or imagination or literary skill. But it's its own self, and judged on its own terms, it makes a compulsive read.

5 comments about The Way We Were: Remembering Diana.

1. in this book you get a better feel of diana's day to day life and the pictures of the interior of her private quarters at kensington palace were very interesting to see. i am surprised that he was able to publish the pictures in his book. and what is buried in the garden really shocked me, just wonder what the outcome of that will be. her relationship with dr. hasnat was rather sweet and sad, never resolved. if di had lived i believe there would have been more to come with that relationship.paul also lets us in on the love hasnat had for diana. in many reports i read he seemed rather distant, but that wasnt the case at all. OH THE WHAT IF'S. the pictures alone are worth the price of the book. good read and i learned things i did not know... even after reading many books on diana.



2. Just as in a Royal Duty, in The way we were Paul Burrell allows us to know a little more about his life serving Princess Diana, as a butler and as a friend (friendship that other peolple didn't accept and gave him lots of problems after she died). Here he also reveals some secrets that let us know how Diana really was and who she was really in love with when she died. That information was a shock to me because I guess we all try to believe what the media sells not knowing that sometimes that's not the truth.
   I loved this book!



3. This is an excellent heart warming book that to me, gives a more accurate review of Princess Diana's life. It shows that she was human, compassionate and like the rest of us in this world had her own problems. It also shows a girl marrying an older controlling man and gave up her life the day she said "I do". I am not sure such a young person knew what she was about to give up. This book only allows me to admire this young Princess more today than yesterday. It is a book that I could not put down until I was finished through the final account of Diana's life, in tears. Worth every penny I paid for it.



4. The author deserves to be knighted for his contribution to the public in writing this book.
   He is the only person who can be trusted to write truthfully and respectfully about Princess Diana. The book is poignant and I cried buckets of tears through every chapter. However, I found it to be emotionally healing and therapeutic too. If you loved Princess Diana and want to find some closure after the tragedy of her death, this book is a must.



5. No one knew the multi-faceted Diana, Princess of Wales like Paul Burrell did. Once again he evokes her memory and captures the majesty of the delicate chameleon we knew, simply and lovingly, as Diana. In a lifetime that was all too brief she accomplished what no other "Royal" has. Until the reign of Elizabeth II, no one really bothered about the monarchy. We came into the age of television and reached toward the age of technology as Elizabeth II was crowned and reached toward her reign as Queen in an age of enlightenment. I am quite certain she could never foresee the likelihood of a modern day Princess reaching out to the people in the way H.R.H. Diana extended herself and touched those she would never know or may never see again. The Monarchy seemed to be hidden behind palace doors, but not Diana...never Diana. The Queen has possession and guardianship of the crown jewels during her reign. The brightest of those was one she could never possess or pass on. The most brilliant and brightest star was Diana, the "Queen of Hearts" and the "People's Princess" who served her people by being out among them and giving of herself to them whenever and wherever she could. The charity in her heart was endless as she was tireless in her contribution to those who suffered. The Queen always thought she knew her people well. The death of Diana proved that to be a total misconception. It is my belief that since the British people had been exposed to another way of being and another way of doing things, they weren't going back to a time when things happened around them. It is also my belief that the next reign will take a lesson from Diana's ways and rule with true spirit, openess and generosity of heart. Thank you Paul, for another glimpse into your world with Diana!

4 comments about King Zog of Albania: Europe's Self-Made Muslim Monarch.

1. Ahmet Zogolli (Zogu, King Zog) is one of the great 'characters' of the early twentieth century. Born into a powerful clan in Northern Albania, he was destined to be a leader of men from birth. But Zog wanted to be more than just another petty warlord, he wanted to be a King. Jason Tomes has done a yeomanlike job of turning this 'myth' into a real person, he has shown him (as much as possible) with all his faults and gifts; trying his best to see through the smoke screen that swirls around him.
   
   The man who at 22 was a colonel in the Austro-Hungarian Army, Minister of the Interior at 24, President at 29, King at 34 and ex-King at 45, is not an easy one to pin down. Like Albania during the second half of the twentieth century, little was published or known of the goings on during the early days of the Republic/Kingdom. Even today, few people could tell you much about Albania, much less find it on a map. It was the only country carved out of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WW1 that did not have a nationalist movement. The country was created more to keep it out of the hands of Greece and Yugoslavia than anything else.
   
   Under the Ottomans, the valleys were divided up into separate administ- rative area that were each ruled by a Bey who then reported to a Pasha who had power over a larger district. Albania was made up of more than six districts one of which was Kosovo. When the Balkans were divvied up at Versailles, Albania ended up over 90% Albanian, but, leaving more Albanians living outside of the country than in. The Greeks wanted the South which was Greek Orthodox, and the Yugoslavs wanted the north which was Roman Catholic (as part of Croatia).
   
   Zog managed to set-up a government in Tirana (which was the middle of nowhere) and stage manage a government by playing off the different Beys against each other. He relied heavily on a gendarmarie that was primarily made up of his historical supporter (from the Mati Valley). While holding off both the Greeks and Serbs (Yugoslavs) he became more and more indebted to the Italians and finally lost his Kingdom to Mussolini in 1939.
   
   As an ex-King he only was acknowledged by Turkey and Egypt, and during his time in England during WW2 he was never given any recognition or money for guerilla warfare from the Allies. The country was handed to the communist insurgents under Enver Hoxha (with a lot of help from Stalin and Tito) at the end of the War. He finally died a recluse in the south of France.
   
   Tomes shows the tragedy of how Albania never was important enough to anyone but the Italians (and then as a colony) for Zog to be able to create a viable government. He talked as if he wanted to create a constitutional monarchy, but first he had to create a country and an educated middle class. He was not altogether altruistic, since he probably stole half the money that came into the country as aid from the Italians, but then he strikes one as a realist and put himself in the forefront whenever he could.



2. Noel Malcolm calls it fantastic - this should be enough of a reason for anyone who has interest in Balkan history and politics to read this book. Well researched, balanced but witty and with a tat of the usual Western cynical eye describing Balkan events, people or politics. I doubt there is a more well researched book ever written, in any language, on King Zog and the period of the Albanian Monarchy.



3. In hindsight, it was probably inevitable that King Zog of Albania would be driven from his throne in 1939. A British diplomat who worked with Zog found him amusing, but believed the King would probably end up assassinated. The conditions in Albania made that a very likely fate. It is a time and place well described in this groundbreaking biography of King Zog written by Jason Tomes.
   
   When Albania broke from the Ottoman Empire in 1913, it was a poor and rural country. The Ottomans had forbidden the teaching of the Albanian language in the schools and many of the people were illiterate. There had been very little done in recent years to develop the country and it was isolated from neighboring Europe by its mountainous terrain and perhaps because it was largely a Muslim country.
   
   The Ottoman system of benign neglect did nothing to discourage the clannishness of the Albanians. Europeans were skeptical that there could even be an independent Albania. Zog saw that it was necessary to make Albanians into citizens, instead of clansmen. This would not be an easy task. The "average Albanian knows nothing about nationality," Zog said. "He has always looked up to the head of his tribe, or his Bey, as the supreme authority."
   
   Ahmet Zog was born in 1895 in Mati environs. He spent some of his adolescence in Istanbul, soaking up the political atmosphere of the Young Turks. He returned when Albania was liberated and later fought alongside the Austrians against the Italians who were occupying part of Albania. The Austrians, who had designs on Albania, considered the young chieftain useful enough to keep in Vienna in case they would need him after the First World War. Later, Zog staged a coup d'état with the help of Yugoslavia and, during his reign, he made Albania into an Italian satellite state.
   
   Zog picked up foreign languages and some sophistication that many of countrymen didn't have, but he also needed to maintain his Albanian roots. Zog was born the son of a Mati Chieftain and his clansmen were his power base. As described in Edith Durham's "High Albania," northern Albania was the land of the blood feud, a place reminiscent of the West Virginia of the Hatfields and the McCoys, where people asked not what their neighbor died of, but who had killed him. His clansmen were both credits and debits to him. It was with their help (and well distributed gold) that Zog was able to overthrow the republican government of Fan Noli. Yet, even when he was trying to introduce laws outlawing blood feuds, he was obligated to participate in them to keep face with his clansmen.
   
   The story of Zog's reign is mostly one of manipulation by the Italians. The Greeks and Serbs were both interested in carving up Albania, but the Italians were the neighbors with the most money. The Italians built roads and sold the Albanians weapons (often hopelessly obsolete) and made Zogist Albania into a puppet state. For his part, Zog got a good deal of loot, including funds for "a white silk tunic with gold frogging, epaulettes...a white fur hat with plume, a black cloak, and white patent leather boots with gold spurs." Besides looking the part of a king, he became rich as one by often getting the better part of a deal, as when he pocketed 300,000 lira selling the Italians inaccessible forestlands in Mati. He always regarded refusing a bribe as looking a gift horse in the mouth, Tomes writes. After Zog was exiled from Albania, he moved from country to country burdened with the many cases of gold that he had acquired during his regime.
   
   Besides being a biography of a scoundrel dominated by an even bigger scoundrel (Mussolini), Tomes gives some interesting descriptions of Albania in the 1920s and 1930s. He describes the capital of Tirana as city that smelt of mutton and coffee grounds, which was covered in a cloud of dust in the summer and slimy mud in the winter, and where school children were required to recite a catechism that included the lines "where does the mud seem sweeter than honey? In Albania." Many Albanians were more Turkish in manner than the Turks in Atatürk's new republic, yet they were still drawn to European and American culture. Tomes writes about moviegoers who boggled at the fancy-dress films of Greta Garbo while scoffing at westerns and war movies as being hopelessly unrealistic.
   
   Zog was a hard-working ruler and physically brave, but when the Italians overthrew him, the people hardly noticed. Tomes even writes that the invading Italians made the country more prosperous. When Zog (or "bird" in Albanian) became king and rather hopefully named himself King Zog the first, he was mocked abroad as King Bird I. Yet he couldn't name himself "King Ahmet" because he didn't want to be seen as a Muslim ruler and yet he couldn't disavow Islam. Looking at Zog's reign, it is easier to understand how later Albanian rulers became suspicious of foreign powers and organized religion.
   
   After Zog and the Second World War, the communists came to power under the Stalinist Enver Hoxha. His regime was so repressive that many Albanians today hold King Zog in some esteem. Tomes calls this a sobering thought.



4. Obscure subject, but a wonderful book -- thorough, well-researched, and well-written. If you're a history buff, this is a must-read.

No comments about Henry VIII (Routledge Historical Biographies).

1 comments about Sir William Wallace (The Scotish Histories).

1. I found this book a good source of knoledge put together from several other accounts. I have found that every author has a slightly diffrent account of the legand of William Wallace. This book puts those accounts together in a way that it gets the facts and legands to the reader in a fairly non-predjudice manor.

4 comments about The Windsor Knot: Charles, Camilla and the Legacy of Diana.

1. I thought that I knew all that there was to know about the whole Charles-Camilla-Diana triangle, then I started reading the Windsor Knot and I realized that I did not know all that much.
   
   The book is more than the story about Charles and Camilla and Diana's relationships with eachother. The author delves into the murky past of the players families and tells us about the some of the people that came before Camilla, Charles, and Diana.
   
   A very interesting, entertaining book!



2. Is there anything about the Di-and-Chuck saga that hasn't already been said? Christopher Wilson has decided that a book highlighting events from Camilla's perspective would fill a gap in the coverage of these events. It's a reasonable idea for a book, except that there's nothing to indicate he has talked directly to Camilla, and he's reduced to guessing what goes on in her mind.
   
   Nonetheless, the book is an easy read and approaches the well-known story from a different angle, adding a few tidbits such as describing the Queen's raging hatred of Camilla. According to Wilson, it was Camilla who encourged Charles to marry Diana. The book is rather ambivalent in its perspective on Camilla, suggesting she saw no ethical dilemma in cheating on her husband to be Charles' mistress and orchestrating the sham marriage between Charles and Di. Yet in other passages, Camilla is shown in a sympathetic light. Even if Camilla is responsible for her own fate, it can't be easy being the most hated woman in Britain.
   
   The book portrays Di's marriage as more of an empty shell than other authors have portrayed it. The author suggests Di knew what she was getting into, but was too naive and too intimidated to back out during the engagement. The marriage never had a chance; Di was never intended to be more than a showpiece. As the story is told in this book, the villain is Charles, who over and over is portrayed as self-centered even by the standards of royalty and utterly devoid of a moral compass or basic interpersonal skills.
   
   The early chapters cover Camilla's family history. Skip those and jump into the middle of the book which is far more interesting. The book, written in 2002, ends with the author speculating that everyone should brace themselves for a Charles-and-Camilla marriage announcement, which of course occurred in 2005.



3. As the Camilla PR campaign continues in the UK, it's helpful to remember her role picking out the "perfect mouse" for her lover to marry. As Diana herself expressed the dilemma: "there were three of us in the marriage so it was a bit crowded".

   Camilla selected the girl she thought would be too timid to object to the longrunning Charles/Camilla affair; slept with her lover days before the royal wedding, gave him trinkets and pictures to take with him on his honeymoon... no wonder Diana grew to hate both her husband and the "Rottweiler". One also wonders if Princes William and Harry will ever learn of the role Camilla (Queen Camilla) played in making their late mother so unhappy. The saga continues and I hope Christopher Wilson is there to cover it in his next book.




4. Unless you have NEVER read a SINGLE book on Diana and Charles, you will not find a scrap of new information here. I did not find a sentence that I have not read at least 10 times before. Additionally, it left out too much important information to be be a good, all-inclusive read.

1 comments about Richard 2 and the Revolution of 1399.

1. Michael Bennett's new book about Richard II is thorough and thoughtful, much like his previous books on the Wars of the Roses. Many previous studies of Richard II have focused on the possibility of his decline into insanity. Bennett's book does not dwell on this at all, rather focuses on his actions and the consequences. The period around 1399 is very convoluted and Bennett sorts it out well. Since most accounts of the abdication/deposition were writtern by Lancastrian sympathizers, it was very interesting to read a well-reasoned, balanced account. (By the way, the Amazon entry for the book is incorrect; it should be Richard II and the Revolution of 1399 - not 1339!)

3 comments about Alfred the Great: War, Culture and Kingship in Anglo-Saxon England (The Medieval World).

1. Alfred, being the only English monarch styled "the Great", is a notoriously difficult subject to write history about. The Victorian cult of Alfred made him a marked man for the debunkers of the Dead White European Male focus of history. Attempts at an even-handed review of the Wessex king's life are fraught with peril.

   This book does the job magnificently. Alfred the warrior, ruler, innovator, strategist, and moralist are all presented well within the context of a 9th century Anglo-Saxon world. Alfred the pious and Alfred the ruthless are both shown as parts of the same man.

   While concluding that Asser's "Life" is a legitimate source of biography for Alfred, the author does not limit himself. Extensive use and comparison between versions of the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" is combined with what limited charter evidence survives, archaeological discoveries and an examination of coinage patterns to round out the picture of Alfred and his times.

   One major strength of this work is its very careful comparisons of Alfred and his activities to those of predecessor kings of Wessex and successor kings of the Anglo-Saxons. Alfred's reign is not studied in isolation. How Alfred was both traditional and innovative in contrast to his father and brothers helps place Alfred in the context of his times. The legacy which Alfred left his descendants (to become kings of all England) is given special attention.

   The author is circumspect in trying to get inside of Alfred's head. Alfred's physical afflictions are examined with an eye to a modern medical diagnosis and their effects on Alfred's personality. Using the marginalia in Alfred's own translations from Latin into the vernacular, the author tries to see inside Alfred the man - all the while cognizant that such a review is only speculative.

   This is a great book and a very good read.




2. I enjoyed this book and, unlike some others, was engrossed by the military expeditions of Alfred the Great. The author gives enough information that one can well imagine how incredible it was indeed to fight off the Vikings. Further, the defensive works and the creation of the burghs led to modern economic England, and this point is brought out quite well.



3. I bought this book on the recommendation of a professor of mine when embarking upon my senior thesis this spring, and though Abel's book did not end up playing a large part in my paper, I went back to this book after the term was over. This book was an easy, quick, and absorbing read, while informative, cohesive, and clear in its aims and the points it was trying to express. My only criticism might be a minor one -- As an English major, I am more interested in the ideological, cultural, or literary influence or views of an individual. Naturally, as a history professor, Abels interests were not the same as mine. He devotes a lot of the book to details of Alfred's battles with the Vikings, and at times, this failed to hold my attention. This criticism, as a result, is only the result of a personal preference.

1 comments about Later Chapters of My Life: The Lost Memoir of Queen Marie of Romania.

1. The autobiography of Marie, Queen of Romania, is well written, but somewhat florid and self congratulatory in its attempts to describe her feelings about events, particularly her appointment as the "face of Romania" at the Paris talks that brought the end of world war one in 1919. Her style is best when she is most lacking in self consciousness. Her estimates of the various players at the peace conference are penetrating and probably correct. Certainly her description of the war torn countryside of Europe through which she passed are graphic and emotionally moving visions.
   
   The book is probably most charming in its depiction of the family relationships within her own immediate household and in her extended family. The characterizations, especially of Edward and Queen Mary of England, provide a much more intimate picture of the royal family than most biographical and historical works are able to do.
   
   That this is significant to an understanding of the period is very evident when one realizes how throughly interrelated were all of the royal families of Europe. For them, the world war was not just a political issue, it was a family feud. Most of the contenders, with the exception of the United States, were countries lead by various descendants of Queen Victoria. In short, almost everyone on both sides of the conflict were cousins, aunts, uncles, even parents. That the conflict lead to emotional agony for many is certain, as the account of Maries' last meeting with her mother Alexandra shows. The authoress herself realizes that the world has changed, that her mother has little place in it, and at the end of her own life, that she herself has little place in it.
   
   What she doesn't seem to realize is that the war was actually the death knell of the monarchical form of government and lifestyle as it had been practiced. Hereditary rule was being replaced by other ways of selecting governors. Marie's amusement over the American volunteers and their curiosity about a "real" queen reveals this blinkered point of view. Her use of the terms "peasants" in respect to the rural population of her country and her patronizing attitude toward them reveals the pitfalls into which this ancient form of government was headed and into which the Russian branch of "the Family" had already fallen.
   
   That Queen Marie was still functioning in the ancient mode of monarchy herself is apparent by the pride with which she recounts the connections she arranged for her children with other royal houses, arrangements which would hardly last much past her own life. The photo of the "Three Queens and the Infante of Spain"--Marie, two of her daughters and her younger sister Beatrice--is a little sad. The emotionally drained, almost tragic face of Beatrice, already facing issues in Spain, is virtually a prophecy for the three smiling queens in the future. Knowing as one does the end of the story, one can hardly be unmoved by the tender family scene the photo portrays: the last happy days.
   
   One has the sense that the lady was enough aware of world affairs and of the ways of the world to know already at the end of her life that Europe was again headed for a major war. Though she probably penned these last memoirs to preserve them from her son Carol II's interference, she probably also wrote them as a coda for the war through which she herself had lived and in which she had taken an active part.
   
   She certainly seems to have been abundantly aware of the failings of the 1919 peace accords even as they were being pounded out and signed. Most who study the two world wars as history congratulate themselves over seeing that the seeds of the second were sown in the first; but then, hindsight is 20-20. For the Queen, however, this knowledge was foresight. It was as if she alone could see, at the very beginning, that Europe had set itself up for a second great war by its own unwillingness to forgive.
   
   This is perhaps the very point at which the change in the political intellect changed. The cardinal point at which Monarchy died and Democracy/Socialism begins. The family feud was settled by outsiders, so-to-speak, making punishment and reparation the rules of the day. Family cannot afford to do this. Family must remember that it depends on all of its members, that it has interests in common, that hurt feelings have to be addressed. Democracy/Socialism knows no "feelings." Rule by the Demos-Athens aside-is a relatively new phenomenon, and it still has to struggle to learn what thousands of years of monarchy had learned the hard way. Marie is painfully aware that the terms of the peace agreement would not work, that it would cause anger and hate, and ultimately war. The years of peace were only going to be a period of catching political breath before the fight began again in ernest and with more ferocity. The so-called Great War would just be round one.
   
   My only complaint is that the authoress did not describe more events and more people. Much of the book is a repetitious self congratulation, an awareness of her place in history. This leads to saying the same thing in a dozen different ways which I found frustrating. The prose style moves along more smoothly when the author is focusing on others and events. Admittedly the book is an autobiography and the author a queen not a jounalist, but it could have used more focus. She doesn't really hit her stride until about a third of the way through the book, but by the final chapter one is wanting to hear more.

1 comments about The African American National Biography: 8-Volume Set.

1. The African American National Biography comes close to its promise - a single, definitive source for biographical information about every significant African American. Each of more than 4,000 entries include citations for further reading and obituaries, where available. Many also include photographs. The entries themselves are well written, and long enough to explore the lives in detail.
   
   There are two significant problems, however.
   
   Many entries have already become dated, and in the process, lack critical biographical information. For instance, the entry on Sam Gilliam fails to mention his 2005 retrospective at the Corcoran Gallery of Art and the massive accompanying catalogue. That catalogue is the most detailed look at his life and work. This may be related to the considerable amount of time it has taken for this work to be published.
   
   The binding of this set is glued, not sewn. For a title that retails for $100 a volume, and that will be heavily used in public libraries for the next couple decades, this is simply unacceptable. I'm sure that I'll be sending my library's copy off to the bindery in five or ten years at the most.
   
   If not for the above issues, I'd give this title five stars. I just hope that the second edition, these issues are resolved.