Contemporary Review articles from December 2001

Contemporary Review archives from December 2001

Diplomacy, terrorism and the media: The new 'Great Game'.
December 1, 2001... RECALLED suddenly from active service just as he has taken command of a 'top hole' brigade in time for the big push on the Western front Richard Hannay GB, DSO is sent by his chief, Sir Walter Bullivant, on a vital mission. In a country house...

Britain's transport problems.
December 1, 2001... IT has been very evident for a long time that Britain's transport system is in a mess. A Government report released at the end of last month claimed that it is the worst in Europe. The root cause of this is geographical. Great Britain, ie,...

Salzburg: The sounds of music.
December 1, 2001... RISING majestically in a splendour which challenges even the surrounding Alpine peaks, the domes, spires and battlements of Salzburg herald one of Europe's richest treasure houses of architecture, history and music. Its abbeys, castles,...

A. L. Rowse: Historian and friend.(Obituary)
December 1, 2001... SADLY, A. L. Rowse died on my 50th birthday. But, due to the 11 hours time change across the world, the news did not reach me in Sydney, till Phyllis Cundy called from Cornwall, at 3am, the next day. Dear Phyllis, Leslie's ever loyal...

A personal experience of the Israeli--Palestinina conflict.(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... I'D overdosed following the ending of university exams and was lying in a bed in Haslar hospital having my stomach pumped. I was listening to 'Hey Jude' which had just been released and searching through the personal column of The Times for an...

Endangered languages - Lost worlds.
December 1, 2001... ON the best current estimates, the human race is losing two of its languages every month. There are now about 6,500 left. This is no small thing, for every one of those languages is the expression of a unique world-view. We are not talking...

Renaissance gothic at the national gallery.
December 1, 2001... READERS who missed the National Gallery's exhibition of the reassembled Pisa altarpiece by Masaccio, which ended on 11 November, need not be downhearted. The central panel of The Virgin and Child - appropriate at this time of year - is still...

Hamlet's Elsinore revisited.
December 1, 2001... SCENE, the courtyard of Kronborg Castle. 'The air bites shrewdly, it is very cold', says Hamlet. Horatio agrees: 'It is a nipping and an eager air'. The Danes, knowing their climate, have brought blankets to huddle in and hire more at the...

'The fuel tax protest and the crisis of parliament' (Vol. 278, No. 1621, p. 75): A Correction.(Correction Notice)
December 1, 2001... IN February 2001 Contemporary Review published an invited article concerning the implications of the way the government handled the fuel crisis of 2000 for our system of government. Unfortunately, for reasons that are not relevant here, the...

A Christmas compact disc: Christmas through the ages (Hyperion Noel 1).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... ANYONE looking for a musical gift for Christmas for a friend or indeed to treat himself could not do better than Hyperion's wideranging selection of Christmas carols and instrumental music from the last 700 years. All 23 selections come from...

The trees of Christmas.(Poem)
December 1, 2001... Under stern Nelson's warrior gaze, Amid these frigid, fearful days Rises up in London's historic heart, A glistening green tree of lights and love, Gift from Norway's kindly folk Remembering succour in the world's worst...

Palestine: Divided allies and conquering heroes. (Reviews).(The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948)
December 1, 2001... The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948. Eugene Rogan and Avi Shlaim, editors. Cambridge University Press. [pounds sterling]37.50 (US$54.95). 234 pages. ISBN 0-521-79476-5. To Israelis the 1948 Arab-Israeli war is "The War of...

Diplomats and the end of empire.
December 1, 2001... International Diplomacy and Colonial Retreat. Kent Fedorowich and Martin Thomas, editors. Frank Cass Publishers. [pounds sterling]35.00. 260 pages. ISBN 0-7146-5063-3. The concept of international diplomacy and the withdrawal from colonial...

Towards a fair capitalism. (Reviews).(Just Capital: The Liberal Economy)
December 1, 2001... Just Capital: The Liberal Economy. Adair Turner. Macmillan. [pounds sterling]20.00. 400 pages. ISBN 0-333-90071-5. When a string of former communist states along with China and Vietnam started to integrate into the market economy many saw...

Robert Louis Stevenson - A different view. (Reviews).(Louis: A Life of Robert Louis Stevenson)
December 1, 2001... Louis: A Life of Robert Louis Stevenson. Philip Callow. Constable. [pounds sterling]20.00. 336 pages. ISBN 0-094-80180-0. There are certain men and women who by reason of their genius, eminence, achievement, or idiosyncracy seem to exercise...

A new American Companion. (Reviews).(The Oxford Companion to United States History)
December 1, 2001... The Oxford Companion to United States History. Paul S. Boyer, editor. Oxford University Press. 940 pages. ISBN 0-19-508209-5. We live and read in a most companionable age. Anyone who wanders into a bookshop or looks through a publisher's...

New and noteworthy. (Reviews).(Bibliography)
December 1, 2001... Among autobiographies we have four new titles. The first, from ALLEN LANE: THE PENGUIN PRESS, is Paul Steinberg's Speak You Also: A Survivor's Reckoning ([pounds sterling]9.99). This moving account of a young Jewish student's life in Paris and...

The world of paperbacks. (Reviews).(Bibliography)
December 1, 2001... New releases from VINTAGE include Phillip Knightley's Australia: A Biography of a Nation ([pounds sterling]8.99), praised in this magazine as the best study of the Australian Commonwealth when published in hardback last year. Vintage has also...

Defenders of the union: A survey of British and Irish unionism since 1801. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Defenders of the Union: A Survey of British and Irish Unionism since 1801. D. George Boyce and Alan O'Day, editors. Routledge. [pounds sterling]55.00. 337 pages. ISBN 0-415-17421-X. This collection of sixteen essays into various aspects of...

Bloody Mary's Martyrs: The story of England's terror. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Bloody Mary's Martyrs: The Story of England's Terror. Jasper Ridley. Constable. [pounds sterling]18.99. 246 pages. ISBN 1-84119-335-6. The author is part of a dying strain in English life and biography: the committed Protestant who adheres to...

British quakerism 1860-1920: The transformation of a religious community. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... British Quakerism 1860-1920: The Transformation of a Religious Community. Thomas C. Kennedy. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]60.00. 477 pages. ISBN 0-19-827035-6. This study concerns the struggle within the British Society of Friends...

Kant: A biography. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Kant: A Biography. Manfred Kuehn. Cambridge University Press. [pounds sterling]24.95 (US$34.95). 544 pages. ISBN 0-521-49704-3. In the prologue to this splendid biography Professor Kuehn reminds readers that 'biographies of philosophers are...

Shadow of a revolution: Indonesia and the generals. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Shadow of a Revolution: Indonesia and the Generals. Roland Challis. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]19.99 (US$29.95). 260 pages. ISBN 0-7509-2453-5. The author was South-East Asia correspondent for the BBC from 1964 to 1969 and uses his...

Public and private: Legal, political and philosophical perspectives. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Public and Private: Legal, Political and Philosophical Perspectives. Maurizio Passerin d'Entreves and Ursula Vogel, editors. Routledge. [pounds sterling]45.00. 201 pages. ISBN 0-415-16683-7. This collection of nine essays probes the various...

The worlds of Galileo: The inside story of NASA's mission to Jupiter. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... The Worlds of Galileo: The Inside Story of NASA's Mission to Jupiter. Michael Hanlon. Constable. [pounds sterling]20.00. 228 pages. ISBN 1-84119-283-X. In this well illustrated book the author, senior science commentator on the Daily Mail,...

The full Monty. volume I: Montgomery of Alamein, 1887-1942. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... The Full Monty. Volume I: Montgomery of Alamein, 1887-1942. Nigel Hamilton. Allen Lane: The Penguin Press. [pounds sterling]25.00. 902 pages. ISBN 0-713-99334-0. Readers might well be confused by the appearance of this book, the first in a...

The Cambridge companion to Vermeer. (Reviews).(Brief Review)
December 1, 2001... The Cambridge Companion to Vermeer. Wayne E. Franits, editor. Cambridge University Press. [pounds sterling]47.50 (US$69.95). 241 pages. ISBN 0-521- 65330-4. After an introduction by the editor, a professor of fine arts in Syracuse University,...

Understanding the industrial revolution. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Understanding the Industrial Revolution. Charles More. Routledge. [pounds sterling]45.00. 188 pages. ISBN 0415-18404-5. The aim of this study is to 'make the Industrial Revolution more comprehensible to students and non-economic historians'. By...

Peacemakers: The Paris conference of 1919 and its attempt to end war. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Peacemakers: The Paris Conference of 1919 and Its Attempt to End War. Margaret Macmillan. John Murray. [pounds sterling]25.00. 574 pages. ISBN 0-7195-5939-1. The defeat of the Ottoman Empire, Imperial Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire,...

The intellectual life of the British working classes. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... The Intellectual Life of the British Working Classes. Jonathan Rose. Yale University Press. [pounds sterling]29.95. 534 pages. ISBN 0-300-08886-8. The self-educated working man, whose numbers proliferated in the nineteenth century along with...

Mystics of the Christian tradition. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Mystics of the Christian Tradition. Steven Fanning. Routledge. [pounds sterling]45.00. 279 pages. ISBN 0-415-22467-5. Mystics seek to know God while stressing 'the inability of human reasoning to know the incomprehensible deity'. Knowledge...

Peter the great: The struggle for power, 1671-1725. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Peter the Great: The Struggle for Power, 1671-1725. Paul Bushkovitch. Cambridge University Press. [pounds sterling]47.50 (US$69.95). 485 pages. ISBN 0-521-80585-6. This study, part of Cambridge's 'New Studies in European History', seeks to do...

The real Mrs Miniver: Jan Struther's story. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... The Real Mrs Miniver: Jan Struther's Story. Ysenda Maxtone Graham. John Murray. [pounds sterling]17.99. 314 pages. ISBN 0-7195-5541-8. During the present terrorist crisis, a New York Times columnist invoked the spirit of Mrs Miniver. Mrs...

The war in croatia and Bosnia-Herzogevina 1991-1995. (Reviews).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... The War in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzogevina 1991-1995. Branka Magas and Ivo Zanic, editors Frank Cass. [pounds sterling]45.00 (US$62.50). ISBN 0-7146-820-1. The last decade of the twentieth century, like the first, was dominated by the Balkans....

Israeli Egyptian relations 1980--2000. (Review).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... Israeli Egyptian Relations 1980--2000. Ephraim Dowek. Frank Cass. [pounds sterling]35.99. US$49.50. 355 pages. ISBN 0-7146-5162-1. The author, who was born and largely educated in Egypt, went to Israel where he eventually became a diplomat: for...

The Saints of Cornwall: 1500 years of Christian landscape. (Review).(Brief Article)
December 1, 2001... The Saints of Cornwall: 1500 Years of Christian Landscape. Catherine Rachel John. Tabb House. [pounds sterling]19.95. 149 pages. ISBN 1-873951-27-2. This book concentrates on one part of Cornwall's rich and unique cultural heritage for saints....