'Tis true my form is something odd
but blaming me is blaming God,
Could I create myself anew
I would not fail in pleasing you.

If I could reach from pole to pole
or grasp the ocean with a span,
I would be measured by the soul -
the mind's the standard of the man.

I bought this book many years ago, unfortunately I made the mistake of lending it to someone and I never got it back. This is a remarkable book. I was touched by Joseph Merrick years ago. For the past nine years, I have been running the Joseph Carey Merrick Tribute Website. It is a site dedicated to Joseph, the person - not Joseph, the disability. I'm presently heading a London and Leicester (UK) campaign to have a commemorative plaque erected in his honour. He deserves to have a permanent tribute. He has done a great deal to advance medical science, through his skeleton, and thanks to him, there will one day be a cure for Proteus Syndrome. It's time the world said 'thank you'. Please give your moral support by visiting the site. I'm not sure if web addresses can be mentioned here, so simply type the following in your web browser: Joseph Carey Merrick Tribute Website

I inherited this book from a deceased family member. I had heard about David Lynch's movie about The Elephant Man, but I never saw it. Reading this book made me cry and empathize with Joseph Carey Merrick for his condition and the ostractize he received from the world based on his looks and not his soul.

Joseph Carey Merrick was the real Elephant Man not a fictional character. Joseph had a loving mother that died when he was a child and his father moved and remarried. His step-mother didn't like him and scorned him for his looks and his inability to find work due to his lameness, telling him that what she fed him was more than he earned. Eventually he refused to return home for meals because he didn't want to listen to step-mother barate him anymore. His father stopped looking for him, but did get him a hawker's license to hawk wares on the street. But people were afraid of him and would not buy his wares, and he acquired a gathering of curious people around him. His uncle gave him shelter for a while, but Joseph left there too. He worked in the workhouse a place of refuge and work for the poor and destitute for 3 years, but hated it and left. He ended up being exhibited as a sideshow freak under the name of "The Elephant Man" because his congenital deformity made it so that he resemble that of an elephant (or so the posters showed him to resemble). When he was at Whitechapel Road, across the street from the London Hospital Dr. Treves saw him for the first time and brought him to the hospital to examine him. Over the next few years Joseph was exhibited, his managers robbed him of his life savings and left. Joseph went back to Whitechapel Road and to the care of the only friend he knew . . . Dr. Treves. He spent his remaining years under the friendship and care of the staff at the London Hospital.

I loved this story. Michael Howell and Peter Ford told a true and compassionate account of Joseph Merrick's life. A man who was like any other human being with hopes and dreams with one setback.. His congenital deformity that prohibited his ability to be like, and experience and sleep lying down on his back like other people. Through all of years and hardships, Joseph was scared, but kind and kept a calm serenity inside himself about his condition. He had so much gratitude for the staff and his new friends who helped him, he made cardboard models and sent these things to those people who saw to his care in his appreciation for their help. The book also includes pictures how Merrick looked when he was admitted to the London Hospital, and a display of his skeleton after death.

I first read the original article on the elephant man Joseph Merrick by Dr Treves in a magazine in the mid 1970s. I then saw the movie in 1980. The movie peaked my interest for further info so I bought the book. The book not only goes into extensive detail of the disease but goes also extensively into Joseph Merrick's life as well as life in the Victorian era as it effected the common man. The imagery of the period was brought out by the writers: the London Hospital, the surrounding area, the showmen and their lives, etc. The research was very detailed, although later after the book's publication we learned of the possibility that Merrick suffered from Proteus and not pneumofibromatosis. This book should be read by anybody interested in these diseases as well as anybody interested in this time period.

wow, pow it's a good book. This book will help you with the blues lead guitar method.

It goes pop.. it goes pow... it goes wow wow wow.

I bought this book to learn the technique used in rock. Peter Gelling takes you through the 5 patterns, shows the relationship of each pattern to a chord rather than pattern 1 through 5, and teaches you a song in each pattern. He also presents some mixing of the patterns. The techniques hammers, pull-offs, slides, bends, etc. are all covered. He likes to incorporate blues licks in his songs from the old blues masters. I ran into a few of these licks while learning some of my favorite guitar solos.

...but you want to play Blues, this is the right book for you. I wanted to play blues, but I never studied any music theory, so I thought it would be impossible. But this book is great: it just teaches you the most important concepts of music theory, introduces you to the most famous blues rhytms, teaches you the blues scale... To those who start like me without knowing anything about theory I suggest to first start with the section about Rhytm and then to go on to the Scales ( in the book the two sections are in the opposite order ).
"From beginners to advanced guitarist..." also is true: there are really simple licks up to some solos I can't yet manage to play sound even after a year.
I hope you'll enjoy this book!

After piddling around on the guitar my whole life, I decided to get serious with the Blues. This book kick-started me into the blues style. With a solid background in chord formations, I flew through the book, but Gelling covers everything that a novice needs to know. The CD is a fantastic learning tool. I am now going through his lead guitar methods books now. For the serious guitarist, I also recommend Fretboard Logic by Bill Edwards, a book that will solve the mystery of the fretboard and take you to the next level.

This book would be perfect for a beginning guitarist or an experienced one who wants to learn the blues. If the reader does not know, the book shows all the chords in helpful diagrams and tablature. The book also touches on keys and scales. The audio takes all the guessing out of learning new songs and the wondering if your playing it right. A beginner will get a lot out of this book. If you want to get a firm base of blues, then buy this book.

This book is clear and gives you the basics for learning to play Blues on guitar. It explains the theory in a way that is easy to grasp. The lessons are well thought out and really make you feel like you are getting somewhere. The accompanying CD sounds good too. Each exercise is played with a solo over the top so it is good to listen to. I bought the book because I was out of my depth in a blues workshop - I'm now hanging in there, and can to play along in any key.

Thorough History of Protestant Bible in English in the United States. "In Discordance with the Scriptures" by Peter J. Thuesen, sub-titled "American Protestant Battles Over Translating The Bible". Oxford University Press, 1999.

This book presents a history of the revisions of the English translations of the Bible, Old and New Testaments. The book has, however, another central theme: the dilemma that Protestants face when they proclaim, "Sola Scriptura", or "scripture alone", while denying the necessity of a church body to pass on the acceptability of each revision. As a papist, I rely on the Pope to say that one version or another can be printed: "imprimatur". "In Discordance with the Scriptures", points out that Protestants have no such authority. This book records the arguments of Protestants in the United States over the authority that would accept (or reject) each new English translation. The old King James Version, "...deeply internalized by many Americans, and tacitly assumed to be the very Word of God, began to lose its unchallenged cultural hegemony". Page 42. It has always been a wonder to me that Protestants, who effectively demand the separation of church and state, tolerate a Bible with a King's name on it: a bible authorized by an alien king (James was a Scot, you know).

The author, Dr. Peter J. Thuesen, spends a good portion of the first two chapters on the influence that the Tyndale Bible had on the foundation of the translations of the Hebrew and Greek versions into English. Tyndale's work predates the King James Version (as does the Catholic English Bible, the Douay-Rheims version). Dr. Thuesen is ecumenical enough to mention the encyclical of Pope Pius XII, "Divino Afflante Spiritu" (Page 80), which encouraged Catholic scholarship in biblical matters in the late 1950s.

The book records the difficulties that different Protestant sects or denominations had with the translations that affected theological matters. For example, Isaiah 7:14, was given as child born to at "virgin" as a child born to a "young woman". Dr. Thuesen reaches to John Calvin and into the New Testament accounts of the Virgin Birth (Matthew 1:23) to defend the propriety of the literally correct translation of Isaiah as "young woman". The author further records that it is lamentable that in today's age a "young woman" is not synonymous with a "virgin".

Interestingly enough, throughout the book, the author considers the King James Version to be somewhat lacking in accuracy, and that the new revisions, such as the Revised Standard Version, (RSV), are better translations, clarifying some poorer renditions. He does not cover, however, the Christmas story from Luke, which I remember, as a young boy, noting that that Catholic version was "Peace on earth to men of good will", while the English King James version stated, "Peace on earth, good will to men". Big difference! Today, we have, "..Peace on earth to those on whom His favor rests". This brings up style. I wish that Dr. Thuesen had addressed style variations more completely. For example, again using Luke's account of Christmas, "A decree went forth from Caesar Augustus that the whole world was to be censored." is probably not acceptable in this politically correct, democratic world where emperors and dictators have been replaced by the democracy of the people. I would have like to see what Dr. Thuesen could have done with the changes in bible translations as the political scene in the world has changed.

As a practicing Christian (Roman Catholic, but still a Christian), I wanted the book to cover more on the ecumenically acceptable translations of the Bible. The book's last chapter, "Epilogue" ended too soon for me, and I would recommend that future editions expand to consider Protestant/Catholic efforts on translations. Further, there is a need for a history or consideration of translations into other common languages. For example, a Seventh Day Adventist, who knocked on my door, became angry when I showed him that Luther's translation called "Exodus", "The First Book of Moses". In all, this book, by Peter J. Thuesen, is well written by a literate man, who attempts to present all sides fairly.

This book narrates the struggles within American Protestantism between liberals and evangelicals over the translation of the Bible. Written in a lucid academic style, the book reveals the bitter disputes and political wrangling that took place particularly over the publication of the RSV. One of the key insights of the writer is the struggle by evangelicals to uphold the self-authenticating nature of the Bible when clearly what was needed was some external authority akin to the external authority of the papacy in Catholicism. Whereas in Catholicism this authority lay in Rome, in Protestantism it usually took the form of various political and religious alliances (such as the NCC). Many books have been written that do a verse-by-verse comparison of translations and try to decide, "which is best". This book goes beyond that in an attempt to understand the etiology for the Protestant preoccupation with the "best translation". It also explains the political dynamics that led to the formation of the RSV and NIV. First class.

When something as sacred as the Holy Scriptures gets monkeyed with and becomes a political football, emotions are bound to be stirred. Such was the case when modern translations of the English Bible were issued in 1881 and 1952. Thuesen examines in a brief overview the controversies surrounding these and other modern Bible translations, as well as giving background on English Bible translations beginning with the work of William Tyndale in 1526. It was the Reformation which brought about the rediscovery of the Bible as a rule of faith and life. The Scholastics of the Middle Ages were caught up in an Augustinian view of Scripture which confined its precepts to a shadowy realm of symbolism and allegory. The Enlightenment brought about a desire to examine the Scriptures in their historical-critical context, which ultimately gave rise to destructive higher criticism and what Thuesen calls "lower criticism", which was the response of Bible-believers who nonetheless sought to understand the meanings and milieus of the Biblcal authors. By this time the King James Version of 1611 had become normative in the minds of churchgoers, and the idea of revising it appeared as tampering, even though two updated versions of the King James had been made in the eighteenth century. During the intervening time, however, two manuscripts dating from the fourth century A.D., Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus, had been discovered (in the Sinai and in the Vatican respectively), both of which were older than the manuscripts used by Erasmus in compiling his Textus Receptus in the sixteenth century (which had been utilized by the King James translators). By 1870 scholars in Britain and America felt that a new Bible translation was needed in the light of this new manuscript evidence. In the idealistic spirit of the time, it was also felt that a modern language Bible translation assembled by an ecumenical group of Protestant scholars would bridge the gaps between denominations. So the Revised Version was born, making its appearance in final form in 1881, under the watchful eye of committee chairman, theologian, and historian Philip Schaff. The American Standard Version of 1901 created less of a sensation, but the discovery of the Chester Beatty papyri--dating from the second century--in 1931 brought about a groundswell of interest in a new translation, which ultimately resulted in the Revised Standard Version, appearing in 1952. No Bible translation in history has been more thoroughly excoriated than the RSV, which was produced by a committee of scholars gleaned mostly from "liberal" colleges and seminaries under the aegis of the National Council of Churches. A handful of texts which the translators claimed to be clarifying by their translations appeared to many evangelicals and fundamentalists to be rendered in such a way as to cast shadows on cardinal Biblical doctrines. The primary example was that of Isaiah 7:14, in which the word rendered as "virgin" in the King James Version was translated as "young woman" in the RSV. This was seized upon by many as an underhanded attack on the doctrine of the Virgin Birth of Christ. Prominent men in the evangelical world went on the offensive against the "liberal Bible." In what must be one of the greatest oxymoronic statements in all of history, Baptist pastor Martin Luther Hux of Rocky Mount, North Carolina said of the RSV, "This has been the dream of modernists for centuries." Even Westminster Seminary's Cornelius Van Til got involved, saying, "Even...supposedly trustworthy neo-orthodox theologians were promiscuously drawing upon critical Kantian philosophy to ravish historic Christianity. Theological promiscuity was for fundamentalists perhaps the ultimate sign of an increasingly permissive society in which a 'young woman' and a 'virgin' were not always one in [sic] the same." The RSV translation committee answered every challenge with protests of loyalty to the cardinal doctrines of the Christian faith and disavowals of any desire to debunk the Virgin Birth or any other Biblical dogma. Eventually the controversy died down, but not before the production of the New International Version--a modern translation produced by scholars who all signed a statement testifying to their belief in the plenary inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture. What with the Living Bible, Good News for Modern Man, and the Readers' Digest Bible, the RSV looks relatively tame today. Thuesen does little to mask his sympathy for the RSV translators. Nonetheless, this is an enthralling story which will keep you on the edge of your seat throughout.

This book is great fun, if you are into role playing games. I think it gives good information about the Society of Creative Anachronism in the process of telling the tale. There are plenty of twists in the plot and many possibilies for the murderer.
The characters are likeable and fun to read about.

This is an excellent book, and part of one of my favorite series. However, for anyone hoping for a new mystery, prepare to be disappointed. Murder at the War is the original title of Knight Fall.

I greatly enjoyed this unusual and well-crafted mystery. The various Medieval recreationists and their activities which it vividly depicts are sympathetic and interesting, especially in the ways in which they affect the unfolding of the plot - one edition of this story is sub-titled, approximately, "A Medieval Mystery with a Modern Setting". Peter is a complex, very human detective.
This is the only entry in the Peter & Kori Brichter series in which the Society for Creative Anachronism has a major role, but they're all well-written stories ... so even if the SCA element was all that drew you to this book, I recommend you try the rest.
** I wish Ms. Pulver hadn't apparently stopped writing this series! However, she has apparently turned her attention instead to the Sister Frevisse Medieval series, which she [co-]authors under the name Margaret Frazer.

Over the past 50 years, the study of slavery has been one of the most dynamic and contentious areas in American History. A large volume of first-rate scholarship now exists on many aspects of North American slavery. This excellent book is a successful effort to synthesize the large volume of information on North American slavery. The book is organized chronologically, beginning with the Colonial period and progressing through the Revolution and the Antebellum period. Kolchin does an excellent job of describing the historical evolution of slavery in the USA. Another meritorious aspect is that Kolchin is an expert on the comparative history of slavery and provides useful comparative perspectives by comparing North American slavery with the features of other unfree societies. Kolchin is a clear writer and the book is very well organized. There is an excellent annotated bibliography which is a fine guide for readers interested in more specialized works on this topic. This is a must read for anyone interested in American History.

Kolchin offers his book as a concise, readable synthesis of the movements in the historiography of slavery in the United States. Influenced by the movement toward social and cultural history, he devotes considerable attention to slave life in the antebellum south and the effects of the particular situation of slavery in the United States in shaping slave culture. Kolchin also situates slavery in the U.S. in the context of the world wide institution with comparisons to the Caribbean, Brazil, and to the Russian serfs which both highlights the unique situation of American Slaves and emphasizes that the institution of slavery did not exist in a vacuum.

The book progresses chronologically from the 1619 arrival of slaves in Jamestown to a brief discussion of the end of slavery and the problems of reconstruction, with thematic treatments of slave life, white control and paternalism in antebellum slavery as well as white society, economy, and ideology in the American south.

In producing such a smooth synthesis, Kolchin admittedly sacrifices a certain amount of detail and nuance for the sake of flow and clarity. Disconcerting, at times is his lack of documentation, another victim of simplicity in Kolchin's approach. While accomplishing his goal of remaining clear and readable, the reader sometimes wishes for some assistance in discerning the origin or fuller development of a particular position or point. To his credit, Kolchin works references to the historiography into his text well, and he provides an exceedingly thorough bibliographical essay at the end, which is probably the strongest segment of the work. Still, the lack of documentation sometimes proves frustrating and thus counters the goal of smooth flow in the text.

In the final analysis, however, Kolchin produces an excellent, readable volume that accomplishes his goal of a balanced narrative that shows how slavery evolved over time in the United States. So too has it accomplished its purpose in enlightening beginners and enkindling much scholarly discussion.

It is impossible to over-state just what a superb book this is. Peter Kolchin covers the entire scope of slavery in America from its colonial origins to its destruction following the Civil War and everything else in between in an accessible and highly readable manner. From a casual, passing interest, right up to degree-level, "American Slavery" is nothing less than essential to anyone wanting to understand the 'peculiar institution'.

I just picked this book up ata local antique book dealer. I have read and lived by his previous book " How to survive the Loss of a love". McWilliams words are soothing and have been a great comfort to me. No matter what state of "love" you are in, there is a poem for you. I know this one will be as dog earred as my other one.

The Hard Stuff..... the words drive the reader along the course of a love or several. The emotional appeal is excellent. So real and simple it is to accept, assimilate, understand, agree with McWilliams' words. This book is filled with words of self-discovery in a world of yearning, loving and perhaps, even blind, naive obsession. Each reader will discover phrases that ring through the mind long after the book is closed and set upon the shelf, such as "return the word naked." These private expressions are universally experienced. The words will return to you when you least expect.

This book was given to me several years ago yet it has been a guide and a consolation during times of romantic distress and of good times. His words touch upon the true feelings of love and loss, he truly gives his heart a voice. I would reccomend this book to anyone who has been in love, is in love, or ever even thought about love. Beautiful!

The book Judy Moody Saves the World, is about a little girl Judy Moody. The main characters in this book are: Judy a 11 yer old girl, Stink, Judy's younger brother, Rocky and Frank, Judy's best friends. In school, Judy likes to learn about the world and how she can be a person that will not litter, but throw away trash, and will recycle things, lilke bottles.I would recommend this book it people who like to read about saving the world and nature.

I love this book so much because it is funny, because her friends have to pick up a frog. Then her friends feel something warm -- guess what that was. There are no books better than Judy Moody. There are no books funnier than Judy Moody. And this is all that I can tell you about this book.

My seven year old daughter loved this book, and I did, too. There was a lot of humor, and my daughter was laughing out loud to parts of it. One thing I appreciated was that the book doesn't talk down to kids, the way I think the "Junie B. Jones" books do (by using improper grammar and words like "bestest" to seem cute). Highly recommended!

This is the second volume of Peter O'Toole's autobiography, and is devoted to his years as a student at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in the 1950s.

It's very much a stream-of-consciousness memoir: O'Toole reflecting on the drama (and ballet!) classes, his escapades with his fellow students, his loves, and - it being O'Toole - the drinking. All of it is told in his often quirky, yet enjoyable style - shades of Joyce yet accessible.

I thought that "The Apprentice" could be viewed as a series of anecdotes woven into a memoir, yet it's more than that: O'Toole flits back into childhood memories, then to later life in order to set his reminiscences into a wider context. The ghosts of actors past, most notably Edmund Kean, haunt O'Toole. There's both joy and sadness here - remembering recreates past happiness and a sense of history, but it also reminds O'Toole of what (and who) he has lost.

I confess an interest - firstly, (and most disturbingly for me) I recognised the names of many of the central London pubs O'Toole haunted in the 1950s - they are still there today though no doubt are much changed since O'Toole's heyday. More reassuringly, I met O'Toole recently (albeit briefly) and found him utterly charming (apologies for name-dropping).

In all, an enjoyable read, and indispensible for anyone wanting tips on how to take a double bed through the London Underground!

Peter O'Toole continues recounting his early years in the second volume of his biography. It has a slightly different style than the first volume (The Child), but is still extremely enjoyable. Highly recommended.

O'Toole has a gift for the English language -- you just want to read whole chapters aloud, to enjoy the sound of the words. There are also scores of laugh-out-loud funny anecdotes sprinkled throughout, all told with wry joy. This isn't a typical actor's memoir -- this is way more fun.

W. G. Sebald, "On The Natural History of Destruction," Random House, NY, 2003, originally published in German as "Luftkrieg und Literatur," 1999, translated by Anthea Bell.

During World War II, Allied bombers attacked 131 German towns and cities destroying 3.5 million homes and killing or injuring 600,000 German civilians. In 1997, Mr. Sebald gave a series of lectures on the literature describing the effects of these attacks. He was surprised that so little had been written about them. He infers that Germans are still in denial about these horrors of war. This volume summarizes his lectures plus the letters he received in response to news reports of his lectures. Appended are three additional essays.

Central to his theme is the fire storming technique developed by the Allies to destroy major cities. Dresden, Hamburg, Cologne, Nuremberg, Ludwigshafen, Darmstadt, and Halberstadt are named as destroyed in this way. The destruction of Hamburg on July 27, 1943, by the RAF supported by the US Eighth Air Force, is described in gruesome detail. High explosive bombs weighing up to 4000 lb. were used to destroy windows and doors. They were followed by incendiary devices both light (to ignite upper stories) and heavy (to ignite lower floors). Within 20 minutes, massive fires were burning that created flames to a height of 2000 meters and hurricane force winds that stripped roofs from buildings and drove human beings along like torches. The fire burned intensely for three hours. Glass windows melted. Sugar stocks boiled. Corpses sank into molten asphalt streets. Survivors were found aimlessly wandering the streets-some carrying deceased infants. Numerous people died in bomb shelters, in cellars, and buried in the rubble. Flies, maggots and rats soon swarmed through the area. The stench of rotting corpses was everywhere. Eventually dense green vegetation grew over the ruins. Photos of the destruction at that stage are many. A selection of these photos is included in the book.

The letters Sebald received confirmed a general lack of detailed information. A few accounts were found in diaries and in several novels. Some accounts were privately published. An apparent taboo by publishers was reinforced by the poor commercial success of the few works that did make it into print. Considerable amounts of disinformation circulated in Germany making it difficult for individuals to know the facts of these raids. The author cites the traditional strict control of intimate feelings within the German family as one cause of the apparent lack of interest in the destruction caused by the war.

One book his letters did find is: Dr. Hans Joachim Schroeder, "Die gestohlenen Jahre-Erzaehlgeschichten und Geschichterzaehlung im Interview: Der zweite Weltkrieg aus der Sicht ehemaliger Mannschaftssoldaten, (The Stolen Years-Narratives and History in Interviews: The Second World War as Seen by Former Soldiers), Niemeyer, 1992. The author discounts this source as being surprisingly stereotypical.

Seebald's thesis may in fact be overdrawn. Numerous disasters-both natural and military-have occurred over the centuries. Few are described from the victim's viewpoint. The Japanese have publicized the effects of nuclear war using survivors' stories from Hiroshima and Nagasaki (seen here on public television), but similar accounts of the destruction of Tokyo or the Battle of Okinawa are lacking. Even reports of the London Blitz tend not to be told from the point of view of the victims.

The normal reaction to any tragic event is for people to get on with their lives as soon as they are able. Germans seem to have done that. Only Germans can decide whether they need to re-examine the pain of wartime destruction.

This volume is translated from German. It reads reasonably smoothly. Classical German is enamored with long, multi-clause, compound sentences. A few of these got by the translator. The second sentence of Chapter 1 runs 133 words. The Foreword ends with a 78 word sentence, followed by a 47 worder.

All of this is closely related to German efforts to come to terms with World War II. That process seems to be moving along. The current volume is a glimpse of that dialog. The book does demonstrate the difficulties Germans have writing about World War II-even 60 years after the event. Sebald retells the story of animals injured in the bombing of the Berlin zoo. Published soon after the war, that report reeks of Nazi propaganda. Later, in an apparent effort to ward off charges of Neo-nazism, he replies to a letter with charges of pseudo-intellectualism and with strongly anti-Nazi comments. No matter how innocent, any discussion of the war risks the suspicion of spin meisters. References. No index.

This posthumous volume of Sebald's non-fiction writing is a major contribution to German literary criticism and politico-cultural analysis. Accompanying his reflections on the traumatic impact of the air war against German cities are essays studying the very diverse reactions of three 'witnesses' of that time as reflected in their post-war literary works. In AIR WAR AND LITERATURE, originally presented as the Zurich Lectures, Sebald delves deeply into some very uncomfortable questions. The air war on 131 German cities killed some six hundred thousand civilians and destroyed more than the homes of seven and a half million people. Why have these events resulted mostly in public silence for decades? Why have so few literary works attempted to speak to the traumatic impact on the population? Most Germans seem to have tried to come to terms with the realities of the war years by suppressing their immediate pain and the longer-term suffering. Sebald has thoroughly researched a multitude of authors, both in fiction and non-fiction. Yet, he deems their explanations unsatisfactory. Heinrich Boell is cited as one of the early exceptions, yet publication of his book, The Silent Angel, was delayed by forty years.

Sebald contemplates the different causes for this persistent silence. For example, basing himself on a range of contemporary sources, he confronts the reader with a detailed description of the Hamburg firestorm. As disturbing as his account is, Sebald's reflective style makes it readable. His objective reporting neither criticises the Allies' campaign nor does he apologise for German actions leading to the war. He wonders, though, whether the depth of the traumatic experiences of this and other air attacks may have left many people numb and dazed, unable to express their reactions for a long time. The account of a young mother wandering through the station confused and stunned is one of several examples. Her suitcase suddenly opens onto the platform revealing the charcoaled remains of her baby.

Sebald's intent is not to shock but to explain the deep sense of loss that must have been felt by people like her. He further contends that at that time in the war, the growing acceptance of guilt for the Nazi's atrocities led in many civilians to an acknowledgment of justified punishment by the Allied forces. Last, not least, after the war many Germans experienced a 'lifting of a heavy burden' that they felt they had lived under during the Nazi regime. Concentrating on building the new Germany focused their minds on a better future. The publication (in German) of his Lectures in 1997 resulted in a range of reactions from readers. He reflects their varied views and comments in a postscript, thereby adding a fascinating 1990's dimension to his "rough-and-ready collection of various observations, materials, and theses".

The three authors who are the subject of the essays in this volume may be better known to students of German literature and culture. They represent a fine example of Sebald's skill as a contemplative and sensitive literary critic. At the same time, these essays complement Sebald's Lectures in a more fundamental way. In terms of coming to terms with the Nazi period and its atrocities, each one represents a specific type of German with his own means and ways of dealing with the recent past. Alfred Andersch is presented as having reinterpreted his personal history to fit his vision of self-importance in post-war Germany. Jean Amery, of half Jewish parentage, suffered through SS torture and survived various concentration camps. For the rest of his life, which he ended himself, he did not lose the nightmares of his torment. It was not until the mid-sixties, that he found his voice to impart his experiences in the form of essays on exile, genocide and resistance. Peter Weiss, who had lived in exile most of his life, found his self-expression mainly through painting and theatre productions until he published late in life his major fiction work, Aesthetics of Resistance.

This collection of "mediations on natural guilt, national victimhood, and the universal consequences of denying the past" is a significant socio-political document. Its importance for today's reader goes beyond the concrete German situation. As it addresses more fundamental issues of dealing with a society's traumatic past experiences, Sebald also confronts the need to develop the capacity to heal while learning and sharing the lessons from that past. [Friederike Knabe, Ottawa Ontario]

I found Sebald's descriptions of the Allied firebombing to be moving. One reviewer faults Sebald for his inclusion of several pages on the destruction of the zoo, because the reviewer thinks the original description that Sebald uses gives comfort to neo-Nazis. Perhaps it does, but that doesn't make it invalid. And if you look at the totality of this work, it certainly does not in any way condone Germany's Nazi past.

What Sebald is discussing is human memories of the bombings, and the repression of those memories. He isn't discussing the rights or wrongs of the bombings, which he mentions only briefly in what he calls a postscript. I don't think this should be used, as another reviewer has, to argue that he is minimizing German guilt. You could take the other point of view equally well: that he is minimizing Allied guilt by not discussing criticisms of the Allied bombing campaign. These issues are not germane to his narrowly-defined topic. In other words, the book is not a history of bombing, nor is it a discussion of the ethics of bombing civilians; rather, it is a description of what people remember about these events in later years.

I found the second part of the book, a discussion of Alfred Andersch, to be equally interesting. Here is a man who, according to Sebald, used his novels to rewrite the story of his life, and he wrote it as he probably should have lived it, rather than as he did live it. And he did this without ever apologizing for (or even admitting) his less than heroic behavior in real life.

The last two essays were less interesting to me than the rest of the work. They might be more useful to specialists in modern German literature. This brings me to what I consider a defect in this book. Surely the people about whom Sebald is writing are not household names in the U.S. I think that the translator or publisher should have included brief biographies of these individuals.

And while we are on this subject, I think the translator could have added to Sebald's footnotes too. In the section on Andersch, we are told that he divorces his wife in 1943 because she is Jewish, thus leaving her and their daughter at the mercy of the Nazi regime. But, although we are told of the fate of Andersch's mother-in-law, we are never told what happens to his ex-wife & daughter.

All in all, however, I think this work is well worth reading. It's not one that you will forget once you have finished reading it.