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Title: The Penguin History of the United States of America by Hugh Brogan ISBN: 0-14-025255-X Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 30 October, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $18.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.12 (8 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A well-written history
Comment: As a one volume history of the United States, this book is hugely impressive. Mr Brogan is an English academic and therefore brings an outsider's perspective to the subject. It is clear that he has a huge admiration for the USA and its people, yet that does not prevent him from taking a critical approach when needed. His writing style is stylish, witty, intelligent and above all, immensely enjoyable.
Naturally, in a one volume treatment a certain "whistle-stop" method must be used in dealing with certain themes and events. However Mr Brogan is very successful in conveying a real sense of the sweep and pattern of history and in describing how the United States was shaped and moulded into what it has become today. Certain themes have to be focused on at the expense of others. For example, in sociological and domestic terms, the black civil rights movement is featured prominently, and probably rightly, as the dominant domestic issue certainly in post-war times. However, this seems to have been at the expense at other trends which heavily influenced the development of US society and its economy in the last 100 years, namely the unique geographical mobility of Americans within their own country and the successive waves of immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, topics which are touched on only relatively briefly.
Politically speaking, Mr Brogan comes across as a left of centre social democrat, hence FDR's New Deal social welfare initiatives are in receipt of particular praise and his detractors and opponents at the time subject to harsh criticism, prominent among these being the Supreme Court. FDR himself is described as someone whose "strength and ability went along with a profound, creative desire to shape America for a better future". Such men are therefore Mr Brogan's champions, men who were willing to fight against either of what he identifies as the twin evils which he have plagued US society, poverty and racism.
Nonetheless, free market Republicans need not feel completely alienated by this book, Mr Brogan is conspicuously fair-minded and balanced. For example, Ronald Reagan, who he rightly criticises for the "voodoo economics" he advocated and his morally questionable support of various murderous Central American regimes, is nevertheless described as someone who "responded to crises of every kind with eloquence, humour or courage, as necessary" and who recognised the appeal to Americans of strong, optimistic leadership, which suited him down to the ground as "he was by nature a cheerful soul". Less admiration is displayed for the cabal of Irangate conspirators he allowed to flourish in the recesses of the White House, in particular his "zealous but thick-headed assistant, Colonel Oliver North". Indeed.
The first edition of this book covered the period up to Nixon's resignation. This subsequent revised edition takes events up to around 1990 and the fall of the Berlin wall. A minor quibble therefore is the somewhat disproportionate attention given to Jimmy Carter and his presidency, added as part of the revisions. Fortunately it does not detract from a superb book.
Rating: 3
Summary: Informative but a little flippant and rushed
Comment: This book almost deserves 4 stars. Well written, informative, interesting. Unfortunately, the author moves through 400+ yrs all too quickly as well as jests and editorializes when words would be better spent imparting more information.
Although, I haven't yet found a better book. Outside of textbooks that is.
FYI, the author is British( i believe, not American for sure) so it is an outsiders perspective. Not bad or good, just different.
Rating: 1
Summary: Biased
Comment: I can't pretend to have read the whole book, but instead it was used as a reference to an essay that I wrote on the Declaration of Independence. I quote: 'For the preamble, in the name of the people, denies that the strong may legitimately oppress the weak; and asserts that all men and women, whatever their age, condition or origins; shall not be cheated of their birthright into misery; that this theme, of human freedom of dignity, is what politics is about.'
Magnanimous, stirring stuff, I agree. But completely false. It does not assert that all men and women are equal, it asserts that all men are created equal, and this is meant only in the tersest of terms, for it can mean equality only in life, when one considers the immense differences in wealth; not in liberty or the pursuit of happiness. It does not count slaves as men, nor does it state that the slave trade is wrong, as the good delegates of South Carolina and Georgia still wanted to practise it, and thus it was deleted from the draft of the document. Jefferson, author of the declaration, owned hundreds of slaves.
History is written by the winners, but it should be down to future generations to judge its accuracy. Hugh Brogan does the facts a disservice in this book, and it disappoints me that others rate it so highly.
But then I am English, and perhaps I'm just annoyed we lost the war.
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Title: The Penguin History of the World by J. M. Roberts ISBN: 0140154957 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: August, 1995 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: American Colonies (The Penguin History of the United States) by Alan Taylor, Eric Foner ISBN: 0142002100 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 30 July, 2002 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: The Penguin History of Europe by J. M. Roberts ISBN: 0140265619 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: December, 1998 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Twentieth Century: The History of the World, 1901 to 2000 by J. M. Roberts ISBN: 0140296565 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 05 December, 2000 List Price(USD): $20.00 |
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Title: Economics Explained: Everything You Need to Know About How the Economy Works and Where It's Going by Robert L. Heilbroner, Lester C. Thurow ISBN: 0684846411 Publisher: Touchstone Books Pub. Date: May, 1998 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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