History & Criticism Books - Page 6

The Grapes of Wrath: Text and Criticism; Revised Edition (Viking Critical Library)

John Steinbeck

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 594 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Get ready to relive these times soon! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The second Steinbeck book that I've read as an adult, and probably one of the best books I've ever read. I had no idea California was so messed up until I read it. Unlike some modern readers who may complain about the alternating chapters, one dealing with plot and the other with seemingly irrelevant information, I thought that they added a lot to the book and gave it the feeling that there was more to it than just the story of one family. Everyone needs to read this book. The movie's also great, and I can't say that either one is better than the other.

A handsome edition 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This edition is a nice way to add The Grapes of Wrath to your collection. The book itself is a must. It's hard to explain how Steinbeck sucks you in with his writing, but the Joad family's journey across the country is a visceral and moving one. Very enjoyable.

Take in the magic of Steinbeck's writing 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

One of my favorite books is East of Eden, I also loved Of Mice & Men. I'd never read Grapes of Wrath for school, like most people, I figured it was about time. Having high hopes, I was a little disappointed. I did not like it nearly as the other Steinbeck's I'd read. But, still the overall work makes an amazing piece of history, fiction and memorable tale. Personally, I think it's highly relevent at this period in time with what our country is going through.

Mainly, this book was a little tough to keep reading on, as the story didn't immediately grip me. I was about half way through before I really got into it. Before I really began to care about the characters and get where this novel was going or what it was trying to convey. Yet there were times when I'd just sit back and slowly read a page and take in the beauty of what was written.

I did give it 4 stars because I think the writing, the story that it tells about the Oklahoma farmers & migrant farmers and the symbolism was phenominal! To me this book tells the story of our history, one that is important to tell and remember. There's a reason it won the Pulitzer.

Editorial Review:

Forced from their home, the Joad family is lured to California to find work; instead they find disillusionment, exploitation, and hunger.

They Say/I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing

Gerald Graff, Cathy Birkenstein

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 22 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

The Contemplative Mind 3 out of 5 stars.
5 of 8 people found this review helpful.

Well, ok, here's my argument.

I say what is lacking in Gerald Graff's teaching philosophy is vision.

As president of the MLA Graff is a widely respected and influential figure, but what is lacking in his many books and articles is a vision of the intellectual life that transcends the kind of partisan bickering that marks so much of public life in American politics and education and media and champions the kind of broad-mindedness that sees beyond divisions and polarities (which are sometimes deep but often superficial) and works toward a higher synthesis, a larger vision, a longer view.

For example: A superficial gloss of the the culture wars would see two sides arguing from incommensurable positions, but if one steps back and surveys the field the two positions can be seen to be arguing toward the same end. Both sides believe in democratic principles of fair play and equal opportunity and academic freedom and the pursuit of the individual as well as the common good. Often the discussion gets bogged down because each side misunderstands the other side's position and therefore is suspicious of the other side's intentions so the dialogue never progresses past the level of mutual misrepresentation and mutual distrust.

I'll try to clarify by accurately representing each side's position and intentions. Each side has their ideal of what a university's mission should be and they are not mutually exclusive ideals. The social and cultural progressives believe that the liberal project has either been unsuccesful or is incomplete and that it is the American intellectual's duty to make America live up to its initial promise. Thus many progressive intellectuals do what amounts to social work by securing the rights of special interest groups (gender, racial, ethnic, queer). They do this not just by changing laws but also by changing the way we practice culture. The progressive does not necessarily see this as the only end of education but as an essential part of the work that they do. The social and cultural conservative believes essentially the same thing. They talk of preserving a tradition by teaching a core curricula and core values but egalitarianism and freedom are our core values and preserving these shared values means securing them for everyone, otherwise they are no longer shared values. As for cultural literacy there has never been one cultural literacy in American life, but multiple literacies. Multiculturalism is simply a new name for what has always been this nations reality; we are and having always been a collection of diverse peoples with diverse backgrounds, levels of education, and interests. But the common interests of our national public life have been consistent.

Since Alexis de Tocqueville we have heard voiced accusations that America is anti-intellectual. I think there is a mistrust of intellectuals in this country largely because there is a misunderstanding as to what they do. Graff speaks to us about how to teach persuasive writing but he rarely says anything about the higher aims of education. I think the higher aim of education is a broadness of mind that encourages students not to enter the fray and the partisan bickering that so often passes for discourse but to rise above the fray.

Teaching the controversies means that we no longer read the best essays only current ones. The best essays present us with minds that are not contestatory but contemplative. These essays present us with the best models of the intellectual life and the best way to live, and this should be the aim of education.

Editorial Review:

At a time when so many lament the decline of writing skills among Americans, They Say/I Say teaches the core moves of effective argumentative writing. Suggesting that there are certain moves that experienced writers use instinctively, and that the moves can be learned, this book offers a number of imaginative templates for doing so. Praised for "demystifying the tricks of the writer's trade," They Say/I Say grows from Gerald Graff's award-winning Clueless in Academe.

Invisible Man (Modern Library)

Ralph Ellison

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 281 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A classic.. 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This novel is a classic and a must read for any one, especially any American, of any color, race, or religion. Although it was written several decades ago, much of it still applies today.

Editorial Review:

Invisible Man is a milestone in American literature, a book that has continued to engage readers since its appearance in 1952. A first novel by an unknown writer, it remained on the bestseller list for sixteen weeks, won the National Book Award for fiction, and established Ralph Ellison as one of the key writers of the century. The nameless narrator of the novel describes growing up in a black community in the South, attending a Negro college from which he is expelled, moving to New York and becoming the chief spokesman of the Harlem branch of "the Brotherhood", and retreating amid violence and confusion to the basement lair of the Invisible Man he imagines himself to be. The book is a passionate and witty tour de force of style, strongly influenced by T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land, Joyce, and Dostoevsky.

Running with Scissors: A Memoir

Augusten Burroughs

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 829 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

about the worst book I have read during 2008, NO, I did not even finish it. 1 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

I tried to read it, I gave it a good shot but.... it's total trash.
nothing funny about it, plain trash.

I wish I could get my money back.
I just threw the book in the ...... TRASH !

don't buy it, don't read it.

Hans Muellers

Editorial Review:

RUNNING WITH SCISSORS is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her psychiatrist, a dead-ringer for Santa and a lunatic in the bargain.Suddenly, at age twelve, Augusten Burroughs found himself living in a dilapidated Victorian in perfect squalor.The doctor's bizarre family, a few patients, and a pedophile living in the backyard shed completed the tableau.Here, there were no rules, there was no school.The Christmas tree stayed up until summer, and Valium was eaten like Pez.And when things got dull, there was always the vintage electroshock therapy machine under the stairs.... RUNNING WITH SCISSORS is at turns foul and harrowing, compelling and maniacally funny.But above all, it chronicles an ordinary boy's survival under the most extraordinary circumstances.AUTHORBIO: Augusten Burroughs is the author of SELLEVISION.He lives in New York City.

The Ten Cent Plague: The Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America

David Hadju

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Editorial Review:

In the years between World War II and the emergence of television as a mass medium, American popular culture as we know it was first created in the pulpy, boldly illustrated pages of comic books. But no sooner had this new culture emerged than it was beaten down by church groups and a McCarthyish Congress.

In The Ten-Cent Plague, David Hadju reveals how comics, years before the rock and roll revolution, brought on a clash between postwar children and their prewar parents. Created by outsiders from the tenements, garish, shameless, and often shocking, comics became the targets of a raging generational culture divide. They were burned in public bonfires, outlawed in certain cities, and nearly destroyed by the televised hearings orchestrated by Congress. The Ten-Cent Plague radically revises common notions of popular culture and the divide between "high" and "low" art.

All Quiet on the Western Front [Classics Illustrated]

Erich Maria Remarque, Ken Fitch

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 455 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A Great Work 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

I am a soldier with the US Army who has been deployed to Operation Iraqi Freedom twice and Operation Enduring Freedom once. And yes I have lost some close friends to these wars.

I must say this is one of my favorite books on war that I have read next to the Red Badge of Courage. Yes soldiers are opened minded, I do know that this book focuses on the darker side of War and is considered an Anti-War Novel. I do not want to go into specific details of the book; it is something you should experience for yourself.

I will say that it is interesting how this is the German Army in World War I and yet there are many similarities of things that I have gone through that are almost 100 years later in the American Army. These are the same trials and tribulations that a soldier is put through no matter what time period you are in, the interpersonal relationships where the people around you become your family and the tragedy that you experience.
And the fear of being in combat and how after awhile you become numb from it.

"This does not mean that you are war mongers. On the contrary, the soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war. But always in our ears ring the ominous words of Plato that wisest of all philosophers, 'Only the dead have seen the end of war." General Douglas MacArthur

Editorial Review:

ONE OF TWELVE TITLES IN VINTAGE'S A FORMAT WAR PROMOTION The Greatest Novel about the First World War and an International Bestseller All Quiet on the Western Front is probably the most famous anti-war novel ever written. The story is told by a young 'unknown soldier' in the trenches of Flanders during the First World War. Through his eyes we see all the realities of war; under fire, on patrol, waiting in the trenches, at home on leave, and in hospitals and dressing stations. Although there are vividly described incidents which remain in mind, there is no sense of adventure here, only the feeling of youth betrayed and a deceptively simple indictment of war - of any war - told for a whole generation of victims.

The Master and Margarita (Modern Classics)

Mikhail Bulgakov

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Total reviews: 344 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Mikhail Bulgakov's devastating satire of Soviet life was written during the darkest period of Stalin's regime. Combining two distinct yet interwoven parts-one set in ancient Jerusalem, one in contemporary Moscow-the novel veers from moods of wild theatricality with violent storms, vampire attacks, and a Satanic ball; to such somber scenes as the meeting of Pilate and Yeshua, and the murder of Judas in the moonlit garden of Gethsemane; to the substanceless, circus-like reality of Moscow. Its central characters, Woland (Satan) and his retinue-including the vodka-drinking, black cat, Behemoth; the poet, Ivan Homeless; Pontius Pilate; and a writer known only as The Master, and his passionate companion, Margarita-exist in a world that blends fantasy and chilling realism, an artful collage of grostesqueries, dark comedy, and timeless ethical questions.

Although completed in 1940, The Master and Margarita was not published in Moscow until 1966, when the first part appeared in the magazine Moskva. It was an immediate and enduring success: Audiences responded with great enthusiasm to its expression of artistic and spiritual freedom. This new translation has been created from the complete and unabridged Russian texts.

Adventure of Huckleberry Finn (A+ Audio)

Mark Twain

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 514 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Finn & Sawyer Part 2 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Everyone should read or re-read this classic. Most of us read it in school, probabaly not in its entirety. Schools struggled then and now with the use of the N word, although teenage boys in the 1830's clearly would never have heard a synonym.

These adventures are a classic. The royals were a hoot, how many failed fraudulent enterprises could they invent before the inevitable tar and feathering. Huck and Jim are on the run from an abusive father and the law, respectively, and Twain shows all people have a great deal in common, in spite of theories prevalent in the antebellum era.

I'm not sure why Tom Sawyer needs to show up to conclude this thing. The ending could work without him, maybe Twain not sure that Finn could carry the book or film alone.

Editorial Review:

An abridged audio version of Twain's classic novel of life on the Mississippi and of Huck Finn's attempt to help an escaped slave is accompanied by a guidebook containing a glossary, character list, scene-by-scene synopsis, and study references. Narrated by John O'Connell.

Margaret Atwood's the Handmaid's Tale (Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations)

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 565 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Disappointed 2 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

This book came highly recommended from friends and family. I must be the black sheep because it did nothing for me (well - it did annoy me a lot). I disagree with many of the negative comments - I simply do not care if it's anti-Christian (it's anti-fundamentalist, and if Christians automatically assume she's refering to Christianity alone, if that's how her depiction of this fictional society immediately says "Christianity" to you, you might want to do a little soul searching on your choice of religion). I dislike this book because the plot alone is so overdone and cliched (Orwell did it much better and with greater and quieter horror implicit in the plot). Atwood seems to think we need to be hit over the head with her point that fundamentalists in Western society (especially the U.S.) attribute every disaster to us just not being Right With God, and the solution to life's iniquities and tragedies is a return to the era of extreme religious control of society. I actually agree with her view, but the book is just too literal - the "mating" scene (as I call it) with handmaiden, husband and wife screams "Oh my god, isn't this AWFUL?". Yeah, if I cared anything about the 2 dimensional characters, it would be. The evil are evil, the good are dull, and both extremes have no subtlety. It's also predictable and not very original premise that the sexually repressed think of little other than sex, and those that aren't having sex are a pretty surly bunch. The writing is self-conscious and the ending is so lame (forgive me, but it is the word that comes to mind -imagine it with all the condescending distain of a 15 year old). Unfortunately, it has prevented me from reading anything else by Atwood. I shouldn't allow it, but I don't think I could approach her work without trying to find fault with it.

Editorial Review:

Atwood's best-known novel depicts one woman's struggle to survive in a futuristic society in which women have become property.

The title, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid's Tale, part of Chelsea House Publishers’ Modern Critical Interpretations series, presents the most important 20th-century criticism on Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid's Tale through extracts of critical essays by well-known literary critics. This collection of criticism also features a short biography on Margaret Atwood, a chronology of the author’s life, and an introductory essay written by Harold Bloom, Sterling Professor of the Humanities, Yale University.

The Poisonwood Bible (Barnes and Noble Reader's Companion) (Barnes & Noble Reader's Companion)

Barbara Kingsolver

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 1424 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

"Gripping story of growing up and finding meaning in life" 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

A masterpiece of literary craft and social conscience. A well-researched and biting critique of American imperialism in Africa in the 1950s and '60s, and a matching parable of religion at its worst (and best, thanks to Brother Fowles), all rolled into a gripping story of growing up and finding meaning in life. The multiple first-person structure (wonderfully easy to follow) is pure writer's genius. (I fell in love with Adah!)

My Introduction to Writing 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This is a book folks have probably already described as one of those you'll compare all that you've read before and since. I will describe it as my introduction to literature, to writing. Perhaps I'm late to the party, what's new? The book was an Oprah book, so lots of us have already been all over this juan, and writefully so.

This story is told first person by 5 persons. I would say girls or women, but can't because it's not that simple, better than that and it wouldn't be fair. A mom and four daughters. Each and every one of them tell this story in turn. These ladies go to Africa with their baptist minister dad, Nathan Price. I want to tell you about these Prize girls and their mom. I'll let them tell you about brother Nathan Price and the other parts. This wheel has already been invented and perfected.

I was thinking earlier today that stories must dream of being told by Kingsolver, like (may god forgive me) an egg wants to be an Egg McMuffin in a corny McDonalds kind of way. To be told by Kingsolver is to be told well. She goes in and doesn't come back out until there are no story prisoners left behind. Like a net dropped into the ocean and brought up and released on deck. The details are there jumping all over the place in plain sight now, as exciting as all get out. Everyone of them will be touched and moved to their rightful place. Every marvelous one of them. I had no idea there was that much just under the surface.

Barbara does 5 entire souls in about 543 paperback pages. Before I finished I knew I was going to go again, and I did. I'm like what am I gonna read now?

From Rachel, the oldest daughter: If anyone presumed I was too young for a conversation about adulters and not getting babies they had another think coming.

From Leah, one of the twins: It struck me what a wide world of difference there was between our sort of games -- "Mother May I?", "Hide and Seek" -- and his: "Find Food", "Recognize Poinsonwood", "Build a House". And here he was a boy no older than eight or nine. He had a younger sister who carried the family's baby everywhere she went and hacked weeds with her mother in the manioc field. I could see that the whole idea and business of childhood was nothing guaranteed. It seemed to me, in fact, like something more or less invented by white people and stuck onto the front end of grown-up life like a frill on a dress.

From Orlenna, mom: I was just one more of those women who clamp their mouths shut and wave the flag as their nation rolls off to conquer another in war. Guilty or innocent, they have everything to lose. They are what there is to lose. A wife is the earth itself, changing hands, bearing scars.

From Adah, the other twin, my favorite: And all of us with our closed eyes smelled the frangipani blossoms in the big rectangles of open wall, flowers so sweet they conjure up sin or heaven, depending on which way you are headed.

From Rachel, describing her twin sisters: They spent so much time staring at each other's faces before they were born they can go the rest of their lives passing up mirrors without a glance.

From Leah describing Mama Tataba, their house-mom. She had a blind eye. It looked like an egg whose yolk had been broken and stirred just once. As she stood there by our garden, I stared at her bad eye, while her good eye stared at my father.

From Adah: Silence has many advantages. When you do not speak other people presume you to be deaf or feeble-minded and promptly make a show of their own limitations. ... It is true I do not speak as well as I can think. But that is true of most people, as nearly as I can tell.

And one more from mom: I know how people are, with their habits of mind. Most will sail through from cradle to grave with a conscience clean as snow. It's easy to point at other men, conveniently dead, starting with the ones who first scooped up mud from riverbanks to catch the scent of a source. Why, Dr. Livingstone, I presume, wasn't he the rascal! He and all the profiteers who've since walked out on Africa as a husband quits a wife, leaving her with her naked body curled around the emptied-out mine of her womb. ...

This is a book I'll always have a copy of to lend, if I'm lucky to have copies of any. There is just so much in this book, so much to love about these women and Africa. The excerpts above are just that, excerpts. None of us can be rightfully described by an excerpt. No way. But a glimpse. The bar has been raised by Kingsolver.

Editorial Review:

Barbara Kingsolver's national bestseller The Poisonwood Bible paints an intimate portrait of a crisis-ridden family amid the larger backdrop of an African nation in chaos. Critics and readers alike have acclaimed the novel as the greatest achievement of one of America's foremost living authors. Examine how the tragedy of the Price family mirrors the political unrest in the Congo, how the novel views religion and marriage, and how Kingsolver reconciles the demands of art with her belief that writing should support a political cause.