Wednesday, January 27, 2016

“Rome: A Cultural, Visual, and Personal History”, by Robert Hughes


512 pages, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., ISBN-13: 978-0307268440

Robert Hughes’ Rome: A Cultural, Visual, and Personal History as a book by an author who seems to know the Roman terrain like the back of his hand, especially when discussing its art and architectural history, and because of this his book an enjoyable read overall. It is also, sadly, a rather careless book. Full of repetitions and the outright mistakes (ranging from the chronological order of some of the Caesars to the plot of Shakespeare’s King Lear). Hughes tells us that the project was pushed on him by his agent (shame on her) and he seems simply not to know enough to write a book about Rome from 800 BCE to today. His past work has usually been totally informed and incisive; long sections of the new Rome book are little more than medium length reviews of familiar material, punctuated, too rarely, with the brilliant, stimulating opinions and opinionatedness of the author. I suspect we are also seeing here signs of what may be a more and more common theme in books such as these: Little or no editing. After putting together this huge 500 page book, a no-longer-young Hughes was entitled to a first rate editor, who could easily have rescued him from the minor but constant and annoying repetitions that fill the book. Hughes deserved this careful editing; his readers deserved it too.

The author is at his best when examining works of art and artists, as when he observes that “Gazing on masculine nakedness was, of course, Michelangelo’s unwavering obsession” (pg. 230); there are many other pithy and amusing gems such as this sprinkled throughout the book, as well. On the other hand, the author seems to muddle up history or get thoroughly off track. For example, the chapter on Pagans versus Christians was the weakest in terms of topical interest and historical analysis. When discussing Constantine, the first Roman emperor who chose to convert to Christianity, the author made no mention that his mother was already a believer and was likely the instrumental cause for his conversion, irrespective of the “vision” at the Milvian Bridge. In the same chapter the author delves into Christian persecution of intellectual pagans, not naming one intellectual or philosopher, nor any specific anecdotes, and instead using a quote from Reformation Germany as an analogy, a clever anachronistic touch. Was it only the early Christian leaders who kept diaries and none of the persecuted pagans? Then in the chapter on the High Baroque, the author decides to turn his interest to the Basque country in Spain and provide his thoughts on Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuits. Not sure why this diversion on a character whose relevance to the book's topic is no more than nominal, as Ignatius never produced a work of art or architecture that we know of; could it be their militant Catholicism of the times?

Rome: A Cultural, Visual, and Personal History is easy to read and, overall, rather enjoyable. But it is written in a scatter-shot manner as to become distracting, starting off as the history of Rome, then turning into the story of early Christianity, before morphing into a primer on painting. It seems the author got carried away by one subject after another, following first one thread and then another. In the end it is many things, but certainly not the story of Rome.

Monday, January 25, 2016

“Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1945-1956”, by Anne Applebaum


608 pages, Doubleday, ISBN-13: 978-0385515696

Much has been written about how countries throw off the shackles of totalitarianism and move towards democracy, but few books explain the opposite: how do countries collapse and become totalitarian dictatorships, casting off freedom and democracy? In that respect, Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1944-1956 by Anne Applebaum is a fascinating glimpse into how so many radically different countries wound up being forced into accepting Communist governments at the end of World War II. Many Americans believe this occurred simply because these countries were occupied by Russian troops and that their conversion to Communism was a fiat accompli, but the reality couldn’t have been further from the truth. Most monarchs fought to retain their thrones and the reconstituted governments more or less resembled what they were prior to the war, and following Soviet occupation there was a fairly lengthy period of cohabitation where these liberated countries sought to determine their future course of governance; that they would automatically become Russian satellites was not necessarily a foregone conclusion, as witnessed in Austria.

In reality, any one of a number of Eastern European states could have fought more vigorously to have retained a democratic form of government, and Applebaum makes extensive use of recently declassified documents from archives in the former Communist bloc that help round out how events unfolded in this era. The result is both fascinating and shocking, adding further proof disputing the long held belief that somehow Roosevelt sold out Eastern Europe to Stalin at Yalta. What Applebaum lays out is events as they happened, taking into account the death of Roosevelt, Truman’s utter unpreparedness for assuming the Presidency, voters in the United Kingdom turning Churchill out of office at a critical point, and the general confusion over the political situation on the ground as the war came to an end. Clearly, Stalin had learned from the Communists’ lack of success at seizing control of various governments through armed revolution at the end of World War I; violent overthrow wasn’t going to work, but using political methods to seize the upper hand might, and it would have the added advantage of giving a veneer of legitimacy that he desperately wanted to lend his power grab.

Many of these Eastern and Central European countries were early 20th Century creations, bits of the former Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires who had asserted their self-determination and ascendant nationalism. Casting off the supranationalism of those former empires they were politically independent, yet dependent-still on support for self-defense and slow in developing strong political and judicial institutions. As most quickly crumbled under German domination when war broke out, they subsumed to that same domination, weakening what little they had developed. Many of these nations were collaborating with the Germans rending their governments discredited when the war ended. The vacuum created in the political sphere war’s end gave an opportunity and opening for Communist leaning or affiliated parties to gain greater dominance. The largess from Soviet Russia during those desperate times of food shortages opened the door for friendlier relations, while paranoid Soviet reaction to U.S. policy following the war created tensions that began to drive a wedge between those Central and Eastern European nations and the West. It is the slow ratcheting up of those tensions that Applebaum captures so well here; the flashpoints and ruptures that created more cracks and breaks between East and West, with Central and Eastern Europe used as pawns between the two.

That these nations’ forged closer ties to Soviet Russia was not inevitable, and although all eventually subsumed their individual, nationalistic ambitions and desires and were forced back into a grand supranational allegiance; this time not to empire, but to global Communism. Applebaum adds greatly to our understanding of this complicated era which has only recently begun to be examined more closely. This book is full of keen insight and sharp prose, and I wish that more historians had Applebaum’s ability to simplify the complicated.


Wednesday, January 20, 2016

“Vivien Leigh: A Biography”, by Anne Edwards


319 pages, Simon & Schuster, ISBN-13: 978-0671224967

Scarlett O’Hara will live as long as women dream romantic dreams, and Vivien Leigh, the young woman who won the part in the 1939 movie Gone With the Wind – after a long and brilliantly executed campaign (and thereby coming to embody the dream for as long as celluloid lasts) – must be considered one of Hollywood’s timeless beauties…alas, as Vivien Leigh: A Biography by Anne Edwards makes clear, Leigh’s life eventually took on a darker tinge, and for anyone who simply enjoyed her highly-charged scenes with Clark Gable’s Rhett Butler could never imagine the ultimate sadness of her life. Like so many beautiful woman who’s ever been queried on the subject, Leigh did not think herself beautiful; she thought her hands too big, her neck too long (she once spent six hours in a dress-fitting session, insisting the designer hide her “too-long” neck), her legs too fat, and though she gave the world superlative performances on stage as Ophelia and Cleopatra, and onscreen in That Hamilton Woman and A Streetcar Named Desire, as well as Gone With the Wind, she never felt herself to be that good an actress.

She also never thought herself worthy of Laurence Olivier, the Prince of English Players, whom she won, as lover and husband, after another long and brilliant campaign and a notorious love affair. Leigh loved Olivier with a passionate, tremulous intensity, and felt their life together must also be perfect; if he was the King of Players, she must be the Queen. So she deprived herself (and us) of numerous film parts, making movies only when she needed the money. She hid her Oscar for Gone With the Wind until Olivier had one of his own, and so would no longer be jealous. She, in fact, stayed with him regardless, while he thought only of his career (mind you, he repaid her love and loyalty for many years, staying with her even after her serious emotional problems became apparent; she drank too much, smoked too much, worked too hard, and slept too little).

Friends and family learned to chart the terrible manic/depressive cycles; she’d fight the onset of her attacks courageously, then be overwhelmed – screaming obscenities and groundless accusations against her friends, tearing her clothes off and have to be physically restrained, fanaticizing about “guiltless sex” with working class men and making advances to taxi drivers and delivery men (she identified herself so strongly with Blanche du Bois, her part in Streetcar, that she used some of Blanche’s dialogue in her own life without realizing it). The treatments prescribed for her illness were as terrible as the attacks; electroshock, immersion of her body in ice, then in water as hot as she could stand. However, she never lost her courage, even after Olivier left her for Joan Plowright. Her final illness left an important part open for Elizabeth Taylor in Elephant Walk.

Edwards has handled Leigh’s life with remarkable sensitivity and perception. She’s fair to Leigh and to the other people in her life, most especially Olivier. Her language is sometimes lazy – just how many times can you describe Olivier as “manly” or say that Leigh “had never looked more beautiful”, anyway? – but this is that rare book that’s even better than its jacket promises.