Informative... Repetitive, part II

The Darkening Age: The Christian Destruction of the Classical World by Catherine Nixey is a revisionist history of the rise of Christianity, and the Christian destruction of the classical world. 

Although her thesis is a bit late (unless you are a Christian of a certain type, the fact that Christians destroyed or transformed much of the ‘pagan’ classical world is no longer a surprise) this is still an interesting book, especially for people with no background in this area of study.

But there are problems.  One flaw is that Nixey repeats herself a great deal, basically telling the same tale over and over.  There is little variation in the work, to the point where one feel the urge to skim.  A shorter book, or even a long paper would have been far more compelling to read.

Another flaw is that while Christianity is given some, but little, credit for saving works from the classical world, it is held completely responsible for the total loss of classical works.  Surely this is not true.  Much was lost from wars, fires, neglect, social and economic breakdowns.  Works from antiquity did always need Christians to hasten their disappearance.

Finally Nixey present Christianity in dark tones, hence the title.  But was it really as dark a force as Nixey account?  I think not entirely.  She takes some threads from Rome's marriage to Christianity, and from that, makes a whole cloth.  

Informative... Repetitive

American JewBu by Emily Sigalow is an academic (sociological) exploration of the influence Buddhism has had on American Jews.  Sigalow makes some keen observations, but the book is marred by a great deal of repetition.  She is constantly reminding us of what she is doing, showing us what she does, and then, recapping.  This gets tedious.

She also turns away from two of her more radical (and interesting) statements.  Toward the end she call the expropriation of elements of Buddhist practices by American Jews as whitening and colonial.  She mentions it, but fails to pursue it further.  This was a possibly interesting avenue of approach, but her study pursued it no further.

Certainly, if you are a Jewish person interested in Buddhism and want to see, in one place, how the intersections between the two religions started and developed, Sigalow’s book will be helpful.  But a tightening up of the book’s many repetitions could have made this a far better read.

Lacks Narrative Flow

Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World by Laura Spinney is certainly adequate to the task of explaining both the pandemic and the events that came before and after. I’d say Spinney’s book lacks the logical and organized flow that can be found in Barry’s work on the same topic, The Great Influenza.  Barry’s work has more push.  This book lags in certain areas, as if the author has lost herself in her own maze.  There is also a great deal of needless repetition, which further retards the book's energy and drive.  It is disheartening to read at times.

Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin

Timothy Snyder has done something very unique in Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin.  He has combined the history of these two totalitarian states, and their murderous political, military, and social policies, into one.  In the process, he shows how National Socialism and Communism, despite their antipathy, were complimentary in many, if not most regards.  Both were driven by the Utopian visions of Stalin and Hitler, who had no compunction of building their visions on piles of corpses.

Both men, and their systems, were also selective in their culling and creating of facts to justify failure.  You could never lose, even if it was your own fault, when your enemies were always ready to destroy you; when you could find people to accuse and murder.  Poland, Belarus, the Ukraine, and Jewish people, become both the enemy and the victim.  The numbers of victims are staggering.

For anyone interested in Holocaust studies, this book is vital.  By studying the wider range of Soviet and German mass murder in the 1930s and 1940s, Synder provides a new view to an already well-researched topic.

Nurture All The Way

Skin Deep: Journeys in the Divisive Science of Race by Gavin Evans, is a detailed exploration of the race science.  Notably, he follows the work of scientists who try and prove one race or ethnicity has a higher IQ than another, among other indicators.   Evans employs the work of other scientists who fail to see that so-called racial or ethnic background are the determiners of intelligence.  These scientists fall on the nurture side of the argument of the age old nature v nature battle.

So, this is an old argument, and common sense seems to dictate that our intelligence or other positive (or negative) traits are driven by a combination of the two.  Yet Evans points out that precious few behaviors or tendencies can be pinned to genetic inheritance alone.  The science does not back it up.

 

Evans takes down many race scientists in this work.  Probably too many for the casual reader.  If you are really into this subject, and are familiar with the literature, than this book is for you.

Back Home and then Back to Exile

The Legends and Myths of Hawaii, by David Kalakaua, has the subtitle “The Fables And Folklore Of A Strange People.” Published in 1888 by David Kalakaua, the penultimate Hawaiian monarch,  he tells the story of his people from ancient times to the early contact with Europeans.  He makes some interesting moves. He incorporates the history of the Hawaiian people with biblical history.  Many of his stories are about knights and princes who rise above their station in the fractured Hawaii before it was governed by Kamehameha, the first monarch.  A beautiful princess is usually involved.  There is a Victorian ring to their tone and structure. This book should be read at a leisurely pace.  Many of the stories are similar.  For most people, the names will be very similar as well.  No doubt this is a vital historical source for native Hawaiians. 

the paperback at Two Step, Hawaii

My particular paperback went along to our trip to the Big Island in early 2020.  While there, I noticed it had a stamp from Haleakala National Park, Kipahulu, Hawaii, which is on Maui.  When we drove north on the Big Island, we could see this side of Maui across the channel.  The book was ordered from Maryland.  It was originally in the library of the national park until at least 1998. After 1998 it left its home. In 2020 it has made its way back to its home, if only for two weeks.  Who knows, maybe this was not the paperback’s first trip to its homeland?  Maybe it will get back there again?