This history of World War II should occupy an eminent position in any collection of studies on that conflict; it is a comprehensive treatment of its subject that stands head-and-shoulders above most of the stream of books issued since its publication in 1989. I reread it recently and have consulted it frequently. For many years, John Keegan...
Islands of Abandonment: Nature Rebounding in the Post-Human Landscape, by Cal Flyn (Viking; 384 pp., $27.00). In our era of ecological angst, many are desperately seeking strategies to mitigate human damage, but Scottish writer Cal Flyn suggests a holistic new way—one that is simultaneously haunted and hopeful—of seeing these problems. She writes often in sorrow, sometimes in righteous...
Christianity and Social Justice, by Jon Harris (Reformation Zion Publishing; 160 pp., $14.99). In this slim discussion of social justice and its relationship, or non-relationship, to Christianity, Jon Harris, a Protestant theologian and Baptist minister, addresses the topic long after he observed the “incursion made by the social justice movement” into the Baptist seminary where he...
The philosopher and commentator James Burnham (1905-1987) was one of National Review’s founders and senior editors. Having broken with Trotskyism, he became one of those thinkers in the tradition of Edmund Burke and James Fitzjames Stephen, who, if not enthusiastic about modern democracy, were classic defenders of free institutions. He attained fame for his 1941...
A Most Interesting Problem: What Darwin’s Descent of Man Got Right and Wrong about Human Evolution Ed. Jeremy DeSilva Princeton Universtiy Press 288 pp., $27.95 The complex debate about the place of Darwinian theory in discussions about humankind’s nature has been further complicated by an academic left that has taken up trashing Darwin—who is, after...
Maverick: A Biography of Thomas Sowell by Jason L. Riley Basic Books 304 pp., $30 It is hardly surprising that an economist and historian of ideas who spent a long career arguing against the conventional wisdom of politicians and policy wonks would have a biography about him titled Maverick. It is much more surprising...
What makes a great novelist? Genius—the ability to see connections hidden from most of us—obviously helps, but if great novels are great commentaries on the human condition, then living in a rich, stimulating, and challenging environment may also be essential. A.N. Wilson’s brilliantly unorthodox literary biography of Iris Murdoch—perhaps the greatest novelist writing in...
The Madman’s Library: The Strangest Books, Manuscripts and Other Literary Curiosities From History by Edward Brooke-Hitching Chronicle Books 256 pp., $29.95 Books are the “emblem of civilization,” Edward Brooke-Hitching writes in a new book that explores the strange history of the medium. The earliest books were used to establish and uphold administrative, legal, and taxation...
At first blush, the 1989 film Driving Miss Daisy seems innocuous. Its plot centers around the relationship of an aging Jewish matron, Daisy Werthan (Jessica Tandy), and her black chauffeur Hoke Colburn (Morgan Freeman). Yet a recent rewatch caused me to notice irksome elements of the plot I missed the first time around. This has...
Professor Zbigniew Janowski, in his essay “Equality’s Third Wave,” (January 2022 Chronicles) has hit the nail on the head. Equality isn’t good enough, but equity and diversity should prevail. Quality and merit are gone; second-rate is now good enough. We have watered down our core values to the lowest common denominator! —Lynn Paskow Savits Aventura,...
Should We Stay or Should We Go: A Novel, by Lionel Shriver (HarperCollins; 288 pp., $26.99). Who but the clinically insane would complain about the extended life expectancies in the Western world? We now expect modern science will teleport us to an earthly utopia, and the more time we spend there, the better. The global economy...
Minds Wide Shut: How the New Fundamentalisms Divide Us by Gary Saul Morson and Morton Schapiro Princeton University Press 336 pp., $29.95 Fundamentalism has long been considered a religious phenomenon, a narrowmindedness that only afflicts Bible-thumping extremists. Yet fundamentalist thinking is everywhere today, and leads naturally to the authoritarian mind and the one-party state....
Much has been said and written about the growing divide in American society between left and right, including in the pages of this magazine. But there is another growing divide in this country that is arguably more urgent, one that transcends ideological differences. It is a fight between those who seek to preserve order and...
Science Under Fire: Challenges to Scientific Authority in Modern America by Andrew Jewett Harvard University Press 368 pp., $41.00 I came of age intellectually during the academic science wars of the 1990s. I was just beginning my dissertation when physicist Alan Sokal created a scandal for leftist postmodernist enemies of science by getting his...
What makes a prince? Machiavelli had some ideas. “Above all he should do as some excellent man has done in the past who found someone to imitate who had been praised and glorified before him,” he wrote. “[One] whose exploits and actions he always kept beside himself, as they say Alexander the Great imitated Achilles;...
Guillaume Faye: Truths and Tributes by Pierre Krebs, Robert Steuckers, and Pierre-Émile Blairon Arktos Media 210 pp., $27.50 La puissance et la foi: Essais de théologie politique by Alain de Benoist PG de Roux 336 pp., EUR$39.00 I stumbled upon the writing of Alain de Benoist more than a quarter century ago as a graduate...
Things Worth Dying For: Thoughts on a Life Worth Living by Charles J. Chaput Henry Holt and Co. 272 pp., $25.99 “Death is common to us all,” goes the old adage. The subject of mortality is certainly pertinent, given the current “great plague,” against which safety is dispensed by way of the great fear. It...
OLD HENRY (2021) Written and Directed by Potsy Ponciroli ◆ Produced by Michael Hagerty and Shannon Houchins ◆ Distributed by Shout! Studios The weight of the past so often looms large in the Western film genre. In classic films like The Gunfighter (1950), High Noon (1952), Ride the High Country (1962), or Unforgiven (1992), the plots...
Enemies Among Us: The Relocation, Internment, and Repatriation of German, Italian, and Japanese Americans During the Second World War, by John E. Schmitz (University of Nebraska Press; 430 pp., $65.00). How can we possibly avoid history’s repetition when we don’t learn anything from it in the first place? For 50 years after World War II,...
Milk cartons carry expiration dates. But, for obvious reasons, they don’t need them. History books don’t carry expiration dates. But, for less obvious reasons, they do need them. History books expire when archival discoveries supplant earlier narratives or when new interpretive theories emerge. Lucky for historical posterity, decades more will have to pass before Matt...
The Soul of Politics: Harry V. Jaffa and the Fight for America by Glenn Ellmers Encounter Books 408 pp., $31.99 Glenn Ellmers, a former student of Harry V. Jaffa associated with the conservative Claremont school of thought, has produced an exhaustive study of his mentor. Ellmers has pored over Jaffa’s available writings, including a dozen...
Stalin’s War: A New History of World War II by Sean McMeekin Basic Books 864 pp., $40.00 This massive tome is more than a new history of World War II. It is above all a depressing confirmation that the crimes against humanity committed by Stalin’s regime, including during the war, were comparable to those of...
The plot of the Woman of the Inner Sea may strike one as interesting for a children’s book: An Australian woman leaves Sydney incognito for the interior and makes friends with a kangaroo and an emu. But Thomas Keneally’s novel is for adults and contains a complex structure, a rich cast of characters, and nuanced...
Klara and the Sun: A Novel, by Kazuo Ishiguro (Knopf; 320 pp., $28.00). A conservative disposition imposes costs but limits downside surprises. If you always expect rain, you have to lug your umbrella around wherever you go. But you never get wet. Likewise, if you see life through a Menckenian lens, worstcase scenarios sometimes play...
Britain at Bay: The Epic Story of the Second World War, 1938–1941 by Alan Allport Knopf 608 pp., $35.00 “The Second World War,” says Britain at Bay’s flyleaf, “was the defining experience of modern British history. It is our founding myth, our Iliad.” It is also the inspiration for a continued outpouring of national self-congratulation,...
The New York Times’ 1619 Project and the Racialist Falsification of History by David North and Thomas Mackaman Mehring Books Inc. 378 pp., $24.95 1620: A Critical Response to the 1619 Project by Peter W. Wood Encounter Books 272 pp., $28.99 Imagine a country in which the major newspaper of its most populous city launches...
The Man Who Would Be King Written and Directed by John Huston ◆ Produced by John Foreman ◆ Distributed by Columbia Pictures With Afghanistan on the mind, as President Biden tries to benightedly disengage from America’s longest war, it seems a worthy time to revisit John Huston’s 1975 adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s The Man Who...
SIN (IL PECCATO) Directed by Andrei Konchalovsky ◆ Written by Andrei Konchalovsky and Elena Kiseleva ◆ Produced by Alisher Usmanov ◆ Distributed by Corinth Films Despite its potentially salacious title, Sin (Il peccato) is thankfully not another sordid tale about an artistic genius lured into fleshly temptations, having a crisis of faith, or battling with...
Homo Americanus, by Zbigniew Janowski (St. Augustine’s Press; 250 pp., $24.00). Polish American political thinker Zbigniew Janowski examines the reasons that modern American democracy has taken a totalitarian turn. Contrary to the happy talk coming from establishment conservatives about the need to spread America’s so-called liberal democratic values everywhere, Janowski paints a dark but compelling...
Although H. L. Mencken could discern “no plot whatever” in Sinclair Lewis’ Babbitt, he still praised the novel as “a social document of a high order.” The 1922 classic mordantly sketches a bygone America and the paladins who made it run. Even today, the title character’s surname still mocks guileless Americans who conform unthinkingly to...
Beyond Order: 12 More Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson Portfolio 432 pp., Hardcover $29.00 The Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas are Killing Common Sense by Gad Saad Regnery Publishing 235 pp., $28.99 Walmart is for deplorables, the left tells us. If that is so, then Jordan Peterson and Gad Saad must...
The Last American Aristocrat: The Brilliant Life and Improbable Education of Henry Adams by Davis S. Brown Scribner 464 pp., $30.00 Henry Adams (1838-1918) was born in the waning years of the early Republic. As he entered into adulthood after the Civil War, the country he saw emerging did not please him. The new...
American Catholic: The Politics of Faith During the Cold War by D. G. Hart Cornell University Press 280 pp., $29.95 “What the hell is an encyclical?” is probably the most honest and articulate response ever uttered by a Catholic politician in the United States. It was mouthed by New York’s first Catholic governor, Al...
The Green Knight Directed and written by David Lowery ◆ Produced by Ley Line Entertainment ◆ Distributed by A24 In a world where chivalry is an alleged tool of the patriarchy, it seems odd that the story of the Green Knight, one of the most famous tales of the Arthurian legend, remains popular today....
Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents by Rod Dreher Sentinel-Penguin Books 256 pp., $14.69 Rod Dreher is not the first to argue that America, and much of the West, has undergone a radical transformation in the post-World War II era. More specifically, we are moving at an ever-accelerating pace toward “soft totalitarianism,”...
The Basic Symbols of the American Political Tradition (1995) by Willmoore Kendall and George W. Carey Catholic University of America Press 168 pp., $19.95 Ask the average American what his country stands for and he will likely answer “equality.” If that person studied a bit of American history, he or she would then cite the...
The Last Brahmin: Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. and the Making of the Cold War by Luke A. Nichter Yale University Press 544 pp., $37.50 Even before the Kennedys took center stage in American mythology, Americans have had their share of legendary families, the decline and fall of which have been staples of both history and...
Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism by Anne Applebaum Doubleday 224 pp., $25.00 Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present by Ruth Ben-Ghiat W. W. Norton & Company 384 pp., $28.95 For some among the chattering classes, the electoral defeat of Donald Trump in November must have been a mixed blessing, though they doubtless could...
Northwestern Europe’s early development owes much to the Carolingian dynasty, which led Germanic society into Christendom from the dead end of paganism. It set the stage for the lush flowering of knightly culture, with its ideals of chivalry, courtesy, and courtly love, which established the Western habit of mind. This Western ethos is rooted in...
Stillwater Written and directed by Tom McCarthy ◆ Produced by PGA ◆ Distributed by Focus Features Body and Soul (1947) Directed by Robert Rossen ◆ Screenplay by Abraham Polonsky ◆ Produced by Enterprise Productions ◆ Distributed by United Artists A good example of what not to do when using a real-life story as...
Homeland Elegies: A Novel, by Ayad Akhtar (Little, Brown & Co.; 368 pp., $28.00). Mark Twain wrote in his 1897 travel book, Following the Equator: “Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.” That saying came in handy as I read this book, described on...
Becoming Elisabeth Elliot, by Ellen Vaughn (B&H Books; 320 pp., $24.99). This is the official biography of the wife of famed missionary martyr Jim Elliot, who was killed along with four other missionaries while attempting to bring the Gospel to a group of savage natives in the South American jungle during the mid-1950s. Elliot was...
Miss Benson’s Beetle by Rachel Joyce New York: Dial Press 368 pp., $18.00 Why read fiction? It’s life without consequences. Reading Miss Benson’s Beetle, a novel of manners that successfully mixes satire, farce, adventure, and mystery, reminds one of the value of imaginative literature. Most of the action takes place after World War II, while...
Iconoclasm, Identity Politics and the Erasure of History by Alexander Adams Societas 180 pp., $29.90 The ill-starred year of COVID saw another, more localized, virus—an outbreak of attacks on public monuments in several countries, particularly in the United States and Britain. While this sickness presents itself as a skin-disease, only scarring symbols, its virulency attests...
“After the quiet 1950s…incidents of political violence again became more frequent and now we may be in the middle of another wave of sociopolitical instability.” Thus five years ago wrote Peter Turchin, a University of Connecticut professor specializing in “historical social science,” a.k.a. Cliodynamics. After 2020’s violent nationwide political protests and the pandemic’s destruction of...
The WEIRDest People in the World by Joseph Henrich Picador 704 pp., $24.00 Christianity has blessed us with essential elements of the Western world that we should want to preserve, even while it has also produced corrosive pieces of our current cultural predicament. The bizarre political quasi-religion of antiracist wokeism, with its ressentiment-driven obsession with...
Who Is My Neighbor? An Anthology in Natural Relations, by Thomas Achord and Darrell Dow (584 pp., $24.99). The headmaster of a classical Christian school has teamed up with a statistician to collect and sort thousands of quotations pertaining to human relationships from myriad religious, political, and historic figures. The result is an invaluable reference for patriots...
The Life of William Faulkner. Volume 1: The Past Is Never Dead, 1897–1934 512 pp., $34.95 The Life of William Faulkner. Volume 2: This Alarming Paradox, 1935–1962 656 pp., $34.95 by Carl Rollyson University of Virginia Press Readers might be excused for exclaiming, “What! Another Faulkner biography?” Yet one can make a case for a...
The Devil You Know: A Black Power Manifesto by Charles Blow Harper Collins 256 pp., $26.99 Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson Random House 496 pp., $32.00 The verbal tics of the orthodox Marxist vocabulary in mid-20th century Europe made it virtually impossible for communists to camouflage themselves. Ex-communist author Arthur Koestler...
This extraordinary tome proposes a cure for our cultural illness: the resurgence of the muscular Christianity that once permeated higher education. The success of Fulton Brown’s project is far from assured, but in this essay collection she embraces the task with zealous ecstasy. The book is ostensibly the story of the author’s unlikely relationship with...