The imperatives of starting and learning a job the last six months have left me behind my usual pace for blogging and reading. At last, here’s the latest:
What I’m reading: Jane Leavy, The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the End of America’s Childhood
My love of baseball and appreciation for Leavy’s book on Sandy Koufax prompted me to pick this up.
What I’ve just finished reading: Charles W. Eagles, The Price of Defiance: James Meredith and the Integration of Ole Miss, and Peter Gay, Modernism: The Lure of Heresy
Eagles effectively chronicles an important moment in the civil rights struggle. I wished for more about Meredith — a fascinating figure, both radical and conservative — himself, but the author’s focus is on the roles of the university and the State of Mississippi. Eagles’s closing chapter on the ways in which Ole Miss, where he has long taught, has tried — and failed — to come to grips with the legacy of this event is excellent.
I’ve long been an admirer of Gay, one of our great cultural historians, and with Modernism, he rewards the reader yet again, with intelligence, perception, and wit.
November 30, 2010 at 9:44 am |
Michael – I saw this post via Linked in updates! Hope your new job is going well. While not a historian, I love a good biography. Just picked up Chernow’s Washington: A Life. Chernow is among my favorite authors, and this book reminds me of how much I didn’t know about the Revolutionary War and George W. Terrific read. Best, Jody Lowe
December 7, 2010 at 5:31 pm |
Hi, Jody! The job is going well — very busy but productive. I trust things are well with you.
Thanks for the tip on Chernow; it sounds like a book that I should put on my radar as well.