Partners in Command: George Marshall and Dwight Eisenhower in War and Peace
Updated 08/03/2009: I'm adding to this section, because this book is far more impressive and personally important than my previous post indicated.
I love history, especially a history that managed to capture the extent to which systemic events and circumstances were influenced by individuals. I think it helps me bridge the gap between my theoretical third image view of the world (admittedly imperfect and incomplete, yet I am still emotionally attached to what I've got) and how things actually get done in a world of individuals of competing motivations, egos, and quirks. This book captured both history and biography of two impressive Americans. I also appreciate how the men we admire and revere were imperfect, came from middling backgrounds, and yet transcended, or more accurately, transformed, their history into our history. They did this through a combination of choices, training, ambition, ethics, and especially partnership.
One of the anecdotes in the book implies that Marshall fully expected to be forgotten. "No one remembers the name of the Army Chief of Staff for the Union during the Civil War." But this "organizer for victory" has a lot to teach about leadership, organizational behavior, and operations. At an early age, he started collecting names of particularly promising young officers in a little black book, building in his mind the command staff that would fight a war that he knew was coming. He was largely right, though at times, the knowledge that a man was in Marshall's book made others hesitate to declare him unfit or incompetent (notably, Maj. Gen. Fredendall of II Corps in North Africa).
Both Eisenhower and Marshall were shaped by Fox Connor, a US Army general of World War I. Connor's famous dictum,
Never fight unless you have to, never fight alone, and never fight for long.
formed the core of the strategy used to fight and win the war.
The strain on both men at various points is heartbreaking to read. Marshall would go on walks with his wife, and apparently mutter, as if to himself, statements like "Happiness is for others."
The book wonderfully details the behind-the-scenes conversations, arguments, and egos that nearly torpedoed the Allied war effort. Like the Founding Fathers and all other great historic acts of teamwork and triumph, the legend tends to gloss over the fact that the winners won simply because they made fewer mistakes, and only by a narrow margin.
A lot of history, much of it probably unknown to the average American, is covered by these two men's careers. For example, the book has a very illustrative description of Eisenhower's reluctant service under MacArthur, including the use of US Army troops against the Bonus Army (a possible violation of the Posse Comitatus act of 1878, a VERY important piece of law). Perry also includes a discussion of Eisenhower's reluctant desire to stay quiet during Sen. McCarthy's attacks (which included comments about George Marshall "losing" China to the Communists) during the 1952 Presidential campaign that is both fascinating and painful to read.
This book inspired me to visit both the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, VA and the Eisenhower Family Farm in Gettysburg, PA. Pictures to both will be up shortly.
First read in 2007.
The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde is the single reason why anti-homosexual fundamentalists can be attacked for not having a sense of humor.
Well, that was provocative, and offensive, and probably wrong. But Wilde (as well as P.T. Barnum) have taught me that "The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about."
Don't believe me? See the influence (and pocketbooks) of the power pundits (e.g. Rush Limbaugh et al.) Loud and proud. Quiet and... what? Nothing neatly rhymes with quiet. You know why? Because no one cares enough to make that word. End of story.
I absolutely adore The Picture of Dorian Gray. I read it the summer of 2000, and while, despite modern technology and ancient vices, I probably had a less exciting summer than Wilde did a century prior, I did enjoy this book.
I think it's no coincidence that Irish-Americans are way overrepresented in Toastmasters (at least District 65 in New York). I base this on an unscientific sampling of the number of Irish drinking songs sung at the conference after-party. (I contributed with "Loch Lomond", which is not Irish. But I did provide an assist to "Wild Rover".) Ireland's a small nation, but it's turned out some absolute giants in English literature. I like Yeats' poems. People tell me that Joyce is great (which I'm inclined to accept) and readable (which, based on previous experiences, I sincerely doubt). But I absolutely adore Wilde's wit, and I haven't met a person who both (1) knows who Oscar Wilde is, and (2) doesn't find his wit devastatingly funny and effective. Can you imagine a man, today, telling a TSA representative "I have nothing to declare, except my genius"?
Dorian Gray deserves credit for being a book that effectively creates a brilliant story revolving around a single, somewhat understated supernatural (or, dare I say, sci-fi?) plot element - the picture that absorbs all the aging that corruption and dessication are believed to leave as evidence of sins.
Wilde is buried at the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. Chopin and Jim Morrison are buried there as well. But of course, Wilde's grave stands out. When I visited in 2005, his grave consisted of a marble stone supporting a stone angel in flight, anatomically correct and clearly male. The entire grave, including the anatomical correctness, was completely covered in lipstick kisses. A fellow wanderer was kind enough to take a picture of me kissing that grave,
It seems the late Harry Patch aged 113, the last surviving World War I vet from Britain, had it right. He attributed his long life to "cigarettes, whiskey and wild, wild women".
The Picture of Dorian Gray reminds me that great intellect should be matched with a great sense of humor, and that a great man will strive for both. It also tells me that my gay friends need to be funnier, or I'll ditch them for a fabulous Irishman.
First read in 2000.
The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
This book was assigned as one of two books for the 2001 Academic Decathlon competition, themed: Understanding the Self. Frankenstein was the other novel assigned.
I think it made my list because it is the book I've re-read the most over the last 10 years. It's not that it's a particularly deep, or complicated, or great book. I enjoy it. I think there is a part of me that, perhaps unhealthily, thinks or behaves as a man who has made some key mistakes over his life, and who, through journeys in time and mind, come to terms with them late in life. I think all of us, at any age, struggle with our past, and how best to make use of the time remaining us, and of the late-found and painful self-realizations that come with age and distance from the dramatic times that helped define our character.
I've read a couple other Ishiguro books, and found them similar in tone, but lacking something that I enjoyed tremendously in this book. Maybe, as an ethnically Japanese man living in the United Kingdom, his emotions and history informed the prose more than the others. Japan or anything Japanese plays no explicit role in the book, and attempts to find implicit references may have more to do with an obsession with an externally imposed identity on authors than any genuine flavoring. But I think it isn't a stretch to note that Japanese people are particularly obsessed with a sense of outward politeness. Perhaps this is one reason why Ishiguro seems to write so effortlessly in the world of antebellum and wartime British high society from the perspective of a butler.
First read in 2000.
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