Contemporary Review articles from December 2003

Contemporary Review archives from December 2003

In search of markets: transition economies in Eastern Europe.
December 1, 2003... THE countries of Eastern Europe after World War II, following the earlier Russian example, seceded from the market economy and installed command systems governed by central planning. But after 1990 all these countries underwent a political and...

A tale of two english spas.
December 1, 2003... AMONG small cities, the name of Bath must have the widest resonance. To some people, it means architecture--a lovely sequence of Georgian-style squares and streets extending from the Royal Crescent to the Holborne Museum and beyond. To others,...

Can we reduce some of the booms and busts in companies?
December 1, 2003... CORPORATE crashes are not new. Two of the biggest in history took place within months of each other almost three centuries ago--in Britain and France in 1720: the South Sea Bubble and the Mississippi Scheme. There are now concern about the...

International perspectives on the art of film making.
December 1, 2003... DURING the late 1990s, Studio magazine in Paris agreed to a request made by Laurent Tirard to conduct a series of 'master class' interviews with some of the most influential directors in the film industry. The transcripts of these interviews...

Lessons from the first century of air warfare.
December 1, 2003... DURING the hundred years that have elapsed since Orville Wright's first forty-yard flight near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, on 17 December 1903, air power has been a dominant factor in warfare. And though for most of the last half-century it has...

Queen Victoria's 'secret marriage'.
December 1, 2003... FROM time to time the British media is set in a frenzy when private papers figure on the auction circuit, or are re-discovered, appearing to 'prove' yet again that Queen Victoria contracted a secret marriage after the death of her beloved...

Aboriginal violence against women.
December 1, 2003... ELAINE Shaw was repeatedly raped and sexually abused from the age of four by her father and uncles. Her partner physically assaulted and psychologically tormented her, locking her in a room for three years to separate her from the children....

An amazing dreamcoat at the Royal Academy: the Lloyd Webber collection.
December 1, 2003... THE discourtesies extended to the collector, Andrew Lloyd Webber, by the London Evening Standard, The Sunday Times and The Guardian, were not only incivil but also irrelevant. I too feel blank about his musical entertainments. That has nothing...

The Riviera then and now.
December 1, 2003... THE searing summer of 2003 in France was already well en route at its beginning in late June. La canicule--front page then and right through August--was relentless, and I worried about dear friends, like a 93-year-old stuck in his Boulogne...

Infiltrating Al Qaeda.(Inside Al Qaeda. How I Infiltrated the World's Deadliest Terrorist Organization)(Al Qaeda and What it Means to be Modern)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Inside Al Qaeda. How I Infiltrated the World's Deadliest Terrorist Organization. Mohamed Sifaoui. Granta. [pounds sterling]6.99 p.b. 154 pages. ISBN 1-86207-682-0. Al Qaeda and What it Means to be Modern. John Gray. Faber & Faber. [pounds...

The unfinished story of Irish Home Rule.(Home Rule: An Irish History 1800-2000)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Home Rule: An Irish History 1800-2000. Alvin Jackson. Weidenfield & Nicholson. [pounds sterling]25.00. 405 pages. ISBN 0-184212-724-1. One cannot better begin a review of this book than by quoting from the final chapter. 'Home Rule is often...

Britain and Japan: a modern analysis.(Japan and Britain in the Contemporary World: Responses to Common Issues)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Japan and Britain in the Contemporary World: Responses to Common Issues. Hugo Dobson and Glenn D. Hook, editors. Routledge Curzon. [pounds sterling]65.00. ISBN 0-415-30414-8. During April 1600 the 160-ton Dutch merchantman, Liefde, came in...

The story of the King James Bible.(Power and Glory: Jacobean England and the Making of the King James Bible)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Power and Glory: Jacobean England and the Making of the King James Bible. Adam Nicolson. HarperCollins. [pounds sterling]18.99. 277 pages. ISBN 0-00-710893-1. King James VI (and First of England) has gone down in history as 'the wisest...

The influence of Bertolt Brecht.(Brecht on Art and Politics)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Brecht on Art and Politics. Bertolt Brecht. Tom Kuhn and Steve Giles, editors. Methuen. [pounds sterling]25.00. 354 pages. ISBN 0-413-75890-7. It could be argued that a writer's influence on the way in which we think has become most...

Wilde v. Queensbury: the full text of the trial.(Irish Peacock & Scarlet Marquess)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Irish Peacock & Scarlet Marquess. Merlin Holland, Fourth Estate. [pounds sterling]18.99. 340 pages. ISBN 0-00-715418-6. The genius which Oscar Wilde claimed to put into his life most signally failed him that February day in 1895 when he...

The legacy of Michael Severtus.(Out of the Flames)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Out of the Flames. Lawrence and Nancy Goldstone. Century. [pounds sterling]12.99. 240 pages. ISBN 0-7126-7698-8. Michael Severtus is one of history's unacknowledged influences. Despite his major contribution to medical science, he died...

Books for Christmas.(reviews of eight books)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... With this month's expanded reviews section we are able to draw readers' attention to large format and illustrated books which otherwise might have been ignored in the pages of Contemporary Review but which deserve review. These are books which...

New and noteworthy.
December 1, 2003... W. W. NORTON's 'Critical Editions' have for many years enjoyed a high reputation for their scholarship and for the quality of their texts. This reputation has been maintained in Brian Johnston's new edition of Ibsen's Selected Plays ([pounds...

The world of paperbacks.
December 1, 2003... A newcomer to this column is PERSEPHONE BOOKS of Lamb's Conduit in London. This small publisher, which brings out eight new titles a year, has made a name for itself and has had three of its books read or adapted on BBC Radio Four--no mean...

Gulag: A History of the Soviet Camps.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Gulag: A History of the Soviet Camps. Anne Applebaum. Allen Lane. [pounds sterling]25.00. 610 pages. ISBN 0-713-99322-7. With the collapse of the Soviet Union the horrors perpetrated on its citizens for almost forty years still have the ability...

Rose Macaulay. Sarah LeFanu.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Rose Macaulay. Sarah LeFanu. Virago. [pounds sterling]20.00. 388 pages. ISBN 1-86049-945-7. In this touching and all-encompasing biography Miss LeFanu takes her readers to the heart of the almost (but not quite) forgotten twentieth century...

Until The Final Hour: Hitler's Last Secretary.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Until The Final Hour: Hitler's Last Secretary. Traudl Junge. Melissa Muller, editor. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. [pounds sterling]14.99. 261 pages. ISBN 0-297-84720-1. Hitler was a kind and considerate, though a trifle boring, employer--at least...

Military Executions during World War I.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Military Executions during World War I. Gerard Christopher Oram. Palgrave Macmillan. [pounds sterling]47.50. 228 pages. ISBN 1-4039-0694-7. The execution of front-line soldiers during the Great War for cowardice, desertion or capital crimes is...

The Stasi Files: East Germany's Secret Operations Against Britain.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... The Stasi Files: East Germany's Secret Operations Against Britain. Anthony Glees. The Free Press. [pounds sterling]20.00. 461 pages. ISBN 0-7432-3104-X. The East German secret police are perhaps more notorious today than they were when there...

Pepys and the Navy.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Pepys and the Navy. C.S. Knighton. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]20.00. 218 pages. ISBN 0-7509-2972-3. For most people, Pepys' fame as a diarist has overshadowed his importance in naval history. In this work the author, one of the...

Encyclopedia of Religious Freedom.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Encyclopedia of Religious Freedom. Catharine Cookson, editor. Routledge. [pounds sterling]85.00. 555 pages. ISBN 0-415-94181-4. Prof. Cookson has assembled a vast amount of information that will prove extremely useful to researchers and those...

Parting the Desert: The Creation of the Suez Canal.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Parting the Desert: The Creation of the Suez Canal. Zachary Karabell. John Murray. [pounds sterling]25.00. 310 pages. ISBN 0-7195-6160-4. This title, first published in the U.S. by Knopf, traces the history of the Suez Canal, the French-led...

Barbarism and Religion.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Barbarism and Religion. Volume Three. The First Decline and Fall. J. G. A. Pocock. Cambridge University Press. [pounds sterling]45.00 and US$60.00. 527 pages. ISBN 0-521-82445-1. In this third volume Prof. Pocock continues his exhaustive...

Ralegh's Last Journey: A Tale of Madness, Vanity and Treachery.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Ralegh's Last Journey: A Tale of Madness, Vanity and Treachery. Paul Hyland. HarperCollins. [pounds sterling]14.99. 242 pages. ISBN 0-00-710600-9. In this book the author concentrates on the last five months of Sir Walter Raleigh's life....

Indonesian Destinies.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Indonesian Destinies. Theodore Friend. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. [pounds sterling]23.50. 628 pages. ISBN 0-674-01137-6. In this survey Mr Friend seeks 'to convey to the lay reader an idea of "Indonesia" and what it has...

Monturiol's Dream: The Extraordinary Story of the Submarine Inventor who Wanted to Save the World.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Monturiol's Dream: The Extraordinary Story of the Submarine Inventor who Wanted to Save the World. Matthew Stewart. Profile Books. [pounds sterling]15.99. 404 pages. ISBN 1-86197-470-1. Narcis Monturiol i Estarriol was the nineteenth century...

The Clinton Wars.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... The Clinton Wars. Sidney Blumenthal. Viking. [pounds sterling]25.00. 822 pages. ISBN 0-670-91204-2. This study, first published in the U.S., is by a journalist who became one of President Clinton's advisors between 1997 and 2001. Because of the...

Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded, 27 August 1883.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded, 27 August 1883. Simon Winchester. Viking. [pounds sterling]16.99. 432 pages. ISBN 0-670-91126-7. The eruption of the volcano on the island of Krakatoa, now in modern Indonesia, in August 1883 was the...

The Origins of World War Two: The Debate Continues.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... The Origins of World War Two: The Debate Continues. Robert Boyce and Joseph A. Maiolo, editors. Palgrave Macmillan. [pounds sterling]49.50. 397 pages. ISBN 0-333-94526-3. As the editors point out, the effects of the Second World War, 'the most...

George Washington's False Teeth: An Unconventional Guide to the Eighteenth Century.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... George Washington's False Teeth: An Unconventional Guide to the Eighteenth Century. Robert Darnton. W.W. Norton. [pounds sterling]16.95. 208 pages. ISBN 0-393-05760-7. Much, perhaps too much, attention has been paid by historians to the 'French...

The British Nuclear Weapons Programme 1952-2002.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... The British Nuclear Weapons Programme 1952-2002. Douglas Holdstock and Frank Barnaby, editors. Frank Cass. [pounds sterling]45.00. 168 pages. ISBN 0-7146-5382-9. The editors of this collection of twelve essays make their positions clear in...

Madame Tussaud: A Life and a Time.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Madame Tussaud: A Life and a Time. Teresa Ransom. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]18.99. 272 pages. ISBN 0-7509-2765-8. Madame Tussaud's has been for many decades one of London's prime tourist spots even after cinema and television have...

Language, Ideology, and Japanese History Textbooks.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Language, Ideology, and Japanese History Textbooks. Christopher Barnard. Routledge Curzon. [pounds sterling]55.00. 190 pages. ISBN 0-415-29797-4. This extensively researched and important study grew out of the author's work on text books used...

British Elections and Parties Review: Volume 13.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... British Elections and Parties Review: Volume 13. Colin Rallings, Roger Scully, Jonathan Tonge and Paul Webb, editors. Frank Cass. [pounds sterling]47.50. 312 pages. ISBN 0-7146-5526-0. The latest number in this prestigious series divides its...

Reporting the Raj: The British Press and India c. 1880-1922.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
December 1, 2003... Reporting the Raj: The British Press and India c. 1880-1922. Chandrika Kaul. Manchester University Press. [pounds sterling]49.99. 302 pages. ISBN 0-7190-6175-X. This study aims to give readers 'the first detailed analysis of how Fleet Street...