Contemporary Review articles from June 2006

Contemporary Review archives from June 2006

Japan's strategic thinking.
June 22, 2006... THE doctrinal tradition of Realism has dominated the discipline of International Relations and is becoming enormously influential in Japan's foreign policy. Realism offers four major propositions about global reality: (1) independent sovereign...

Blair and his legacy.(Tony Blair)
June 22, 2006... Editor's Note: In May Tony Blair's government suffered a series of upsets that have led to the Tories, under a vigorous young leader, David Cameron, taking a significant lead in the opinion polls for the first time for almost fourteen years....

Bloggers on Blair.(The Little Red Book of New Labour Sleaze)(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Little Red Book of New Labour Sleaze (Politico's Media, 176 pages, [pounds sterling]7.79, ISBN 1-904-73416-2) is a fascinating book in two ways. It sprang from the effervescent prose of two of the most widely read political bloggers. Ian...

Israeli religious youth is moving away from Oliver Stone fundamentalism.
June 22, 2006... DURING the disengagement (unilateral withdrawal from sections in Palestinian territories) in August 2005 and the months before it, Jewish national-religious people were seen protesting vigorously against the disengagement on television screens...

The trial of Saddam Hussein: limits and prospects.
June 22, 2006... 'By what authority--legal, I mean--do you sit as a court to judge me?' Charles I, quoted in Geoffrey Robertson, The Tyrannicide Brief (2005), 6. PUTTING heads of state on trial is a complicated, and precarious business. Hauling...

Tiepolo and Ruisdael at London galleries.(Giambattista Tiepolo, Jacob van Ruisdael)
June 22, 2006... THE Courtauld Gallery's opulent set of oil sketches by Giambattista Tiepolo, until recently on display at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, forms the core of its latest exhibition, All Spirit and Fire (25 February-29 May). It is likely that most...

John Betjeman--a centenary view.
June 22, 2006... HAMPSTEAD and Highgate are districts in North London, rich in literary associations and none more so than the area where John Betjeman lived and which he made famous by his autobiography in verse Summoned By Bells (1960), St Anne's church at...

Wisdom's garden: lessons for Northern Ireland.
June 22, 2006... 'THE act of composing a garden', says Russell Page, who has composed many, 'is a question first of selection and then of emphasis'. These were certainly the two key operations that underlay my mother's efforts to cultivate the quarter-acre site...

Peter Ackroyd's Englishness: a continental view.
June 22, 2006... IN recent years it has become fashionable in Britain for politicians and writers to ask what it means to be 'English'. Some of this has been stirred by the effects of Britain becoming part, albeit a questioning part, of the EU and, even more,...

Art notes: Shakespeare at new haven.(William Shakespeare )(Brief article)
June 22, 2006... Searching for Shakespeare, an exhibition devised by the National Portrait Gallery, London, moves to the Yale Center for British Art from late June to September. Its purpose is mainly to assess the so-called Chandos portrait as a true effigy of...

Mitrokhin and the KGB--volume two.(The Mitrokhin Archive II: The KGB and the World)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Mitrokhin Archive II. The KGB and the World. Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin. Allen Lane. [pounds sterling]30.00. ISBN 0-713-99359-6. Only mentioning the acronym KGB, the Committee for State Security of the former Soviet Union,...

A literary critic on modern terrorism.(Holy Terror)(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Holy Terror. Terry Eagleton. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]12.99. x + 148 pages. ISBN 0-19-928717-1. One capacity of terrorism which is quite beyond doubt is to stimulate literary creation in its own analysis! The present...

A new history of Christian worship.(A Sociological History of Christian Worship)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... A Sociological History of Christian Worship. Martin D. Stringer. Cambridge University Press. [pounds sterling]40.00 (US$75.00). viii + 268 pages. ISBN 0-521-81955-5. This rather unusual book is by a social anthropologist who is Head of the...

William Boyd--the novelist as essayist.(Bamboo)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Bamboo. William Boyd. Hamish Hamilton. [pounds sterling]20.00. 672 pages. ISBN 0-241-14305-5. William Boyd is not apologetic about the time and effort he spends on journalism. Isn't this, he asks in this collection of articles, what...

Oxford's Authors in Context.(George Eliot)(Virginia Woolf)(Wilkie Collins)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... George Eliot. Tim Dolin. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]7.99 p.b. xix + 284 pages. ISBN 0-19-284047-9. Virginia Woolf. Michael Whitworth. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]7.99 p.b. xviii + 268 pages. ISBN 0-19-280234-8....

Churchill: the warrior as historian.(In Command of History: Churchill Fighting and Writing the Second World War)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... In Command of History: Churchill Fighting and Writing the Second World War. David Reynolds. Allen Lane. [pounds sterling]30.00. xxvi + 645 pages. ISBN 0-713-99819-9. Winston Churchill remains one of the mythical figures in British history....

Montgomery and the push to the Rhine.(The Battle for the Rhine 1944)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Battle for the Rhine 1944. Robin Newlands. Weidenfeld & Nicholson. [pounds sterling]20.00. 335 pages. ISBN 0-297-84617-5. This book covers the vital final seven-month period of the war in Europe. The advance from the Seine to the Rhine...

A disappointing Life of Lord Olivier.(Olivier: The Authorised Biography)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Olivier: The Authorised Biography. Terry Coleman. Bloomsbury. [pounds sterling]20.00. xvi + 607 pages. ISBN 0-7475-7798-6. This oddly disappointing Life comes with all the best recommendations. Terry Coleman has based his book firmly on the...

The Blitz revisited.(The Longest Night: Voices From the London Blitz)(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Longest Night: Voices From the London Blitz. Gavin Mortimer. Weidenfeld & Nicholson. [pounds sterling]18.99. 366 pages. ISBN 0-297-84638-8. The human mind picks and chooses. It plays knavish tricks. It blanks out the memories of the...

Vera Atkins--SOE's mystery lady.(A Life in Secrets: The Story of Vera Atkins and the Lost Agents of SOE)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... A Life in Secrets: The Story of Vera Atkins and the Lost Agents of SOE. Sarah Helm. Little, Brown. [pounds sterling]20.00. xxvii + 463 pages. ISBN 0-316-72497-1. It has become a commonplace to hold that espionage, counter-espionage and...

William Hogarth: a musicologist's progress.(The Enraged Musician: Hogarth's Musical Imagery)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Enraged Musician: Hogarth's Musical Imagery. Jeremy Barlow. Ashgate Publications. [pounds sterling]65.00. xix + 367 pages. ISBN 1-84014-615-X. Jeremy Barlow's title does not tell one precisely what his book deals with. It deals, in a...

The world of paperbacks.
June 22, 2006... Literary titles dominate this issue's releases from OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS with three volumes from The Oxford English Literary History. The first, by Professor Christopher Baldick, is the tenth volume, The Modern Movement ([pounds...

Europe after Rome: A New Cultural History 500-1000.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Europe after Rome: A New Cultural History 500-1000. Julia M.H. Smith. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]25.00. xiii + 384 pages. ISBN 0-19-924427-8. Prof. Smith, an expert in 'gender, religion, and politics in early mediaeval Europe'...

The Excellent Doctor Blackwell: The Life of the First Woman Physician.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Excellent Doctor Blackwell: The Life of the First Woman Physician. Julia Boyd. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]20.00. xix + 314 pages. ISBN 0-7509-4140-5. In 1849, in New York State, Elizabeth Blackwell became the first woman to qualify...

A Silver Legend: The Story of the Maria Theresa Thaler.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... A Silver Legend: The Story of the Maria Theresa Thaler. Clara Semple. Barzan Publishing. [pounds sterling]19.95. xii + 165 pages. ISBN 0-9549701-0-1. Long before the Latin Monetary Union or the Euro, Europe and much of the world had a common...

The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration. Bruce M. Metzger and Bart D. Ehrman. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]49.00. xvii + 366 pages. ISBN 0-19-516667-1. This title, which originates with OUP New...

The Cambridge Companion to Twentieth-Century Opera.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Cambridge Companion to Twentieth-Century Opera. Mervyn Cooke, editor. Cambridge University Press. [pounds sterling]45.00 (US$80.00). xlvii + 374 pages. ISBN 0-0-521-78009-8. The latest title in Cambridge's Companions to Music covers operas...

Saving the Daylight: Why We Put the Clocks Forward.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Saving the Daylight: Why We Put the Clocks Forward. David Prerau. Granta Books. [pounds sterling]14.99. xvi + 256 pages. ISBN 1-86207-796-7. In this absorbing book, which was first published in the US, Dr Prerau gives us the story of one...

Victorian London: The Life of a City, 1840-1870.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Victorian London: The Life of a City 1840-1870. Liza Picard. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. [pounds sterling]20.00. xvi + 368 pages. ISBN 0-297-84733-3. This is the fourth of the author's studies in London life. Previous titles covered the sixteenth,...

Talking for Britain: A Journey through the Nation's Dialects.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Talking for Britain: A Journey through the Nation's Dialects. Simon Elmes. Penguin Books. [pounds sterling]14.99. xvii + 333 pages. ISBN 0-140-51562-3. This book, which draws on the BBC's 'Voices' survey and which was the basis for a Radio Four...

North-East Passage to Muscovy: Stephen Borough and the First Tudor Explorations.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... North-East Passage to Muscovy: Stephen Borough and the first Tudor Explorations. Kit Mayers. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]20.00. xiii + 241 pages. ISBN 0-7509-4069-7. The name of Stephen Borough is not well known yet he was one of the...

Cross River Traffic: A History of London's Bridges.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Cross River Traffic: A History of London's Bridges. Chris Roberts. Granta Books. [pounds sterling]15.00. x +196 pages. ISBN 1-86207-800-9. Mr Roberts is an enthusiast for London's seventeen bridges which he describes as 'an interesting...

The Brontes.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Brontes. Patricia Ingham. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]7.99. xx + 273 pages. ISBN 0-19-284035-5. This study, part of the Oxford World's Classics' 'Authors in Context' series, sets out to discuss the work not of one author but...

The Diary of John Evelyn.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Diary of John Evelyn. E.N. de Beer editor. Everyman's Library. [pounds sterling]14.99. lxx + 1013 pages. ISBN 1-85715-291-3. This edition, which includes the whole of de Beer's six-volume edition published in the 1950s, is introduced by Sir...

Victorian Print Media: A Reader.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Victorian Print Media: A Reader. Andrew King and John Plunkett. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]55.00. xv + 435 pages. ISBN 0-19-927038-4. The nineteenth century remains the great era of print during which the 'taxes on knowledge'...

Plantagenet England 1225-1360.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Plantagenet England 1225-1360. Michael Prestwich. Clarendon Press, Oxford. [pounds sterling]35.00. xxiii + 638 pages. ISBN 0-19-822844-9. This valuable volume in the New Oxford History of England starts with the beginning of Henry III's...

Whose Bible is it?: A History of the Scriptures through the Ages.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Whose Bible Is It: A History of the Scriptures through the Ages. Jaroslav Pelikan. Allen Lane. [pounds sterling]20.00. xi + 274 pages. ISBN 0-713-99877-6. Prof. Pelikan is a veteran historian of Christianity and here looks at the development of...

Miss Angel: The Art and World of Angelica Kauffman.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Miss Angel: The Art and World of Angelica Kauffman. Angelica Goodden. Pimlico. [pounds sterling]17.99. ix + 389 pages. ISBN 1-8441-3758-9. 'Miss Angel' was the name Sir Joshua Reynolds gave the Swiss-born and Italian-trained painter who arrived...

After the Victorians.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... After the Victorians. A.N. Wilson. Hutchinson. [pounds sterling]25.00. xiii + 609 pages. ISBN 0-09-179484-6. The author, a novelist, biographer, critic, journalist and something of a polymath, is also an historian: pace his earlier book, The...

An Alliance across the Alps: Britain and Italy's Waldensians.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... An Alliance across the Alps: Britain and Italy's Waldensians. R.D.Kernohan. The Handsel Press. [pounds sterling]12.95. iv + 185 pages. ISBN 1-871828-64-3. The Waldensians are a 'Christian community' (in Cross's careful terminology) that...

Gunpowder Plots.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Gunpowder Plots. Brenda Buchanan et al. Allen Lane. [pounds sterling]14.99. ix + 188 pages. ISBN 0-713-99886-5. Remember, remember, the fifth of November and the British have been remembering ever since 1605 when Guy Fawkes failed in his...

Globalisation and Poverty: Channels and Policy Responses.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Globalisation and Poverty: Channels and Policy Responses. Maurizio Bussolo and Jeffery I. Round, editors. Routledge. [pounds sterling]70.00. xviii + 232 pages. ISBN 0-415-34360-7. This collection has eight essays written by academics in the...

The Origins of Sectarianism in Early Modern Ireland.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Origins of Sectarianism in Early Modern Ireland. Alan Ford and John McCafferty, editors. Cambridge University Pess. [pounds sterling]50.00 (US$90.00). ix + 249 pages. ISBN 0-521-83755-3. This collection of eleven essays originated in a...

George IV: A Life in Caricature.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... George IV: A Life in Caricature. Kenneth Baker. Thames & Hudson. [pounds sterling]24.95. 224 pages. ISBN 0-500-25127-4. George IV remains, probably, the most caricatured sovereign in British history. Here Lord Baker makes use of his own large...

Field of Fire: Diary of a Gunner Officer.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Field of Fire: Diary of a Gunner Officer. Jack Swaab. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]19.99. xiv + 290 pages. ISBN 0-7509-4275-4. Jack Swaab enlisted in the Royal Artillery in 1939 and, after he had turned twenty-four, kept a diary from 20...

Studio A: The Bob Dylan Reader.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Studio A: The Bob Dylan Reader: Benjamin Hedin, editor. W. W. Norton. [pounds sterling]9.99. xvi + 336 pages. ISBN 0-393-32742-6. Martin Scorsese's mammoth recent documentary on Bob Dylan, No Direction Home, co-funded by the BBC and PBS, and...

The Seven Sages of Rome (Midland Version). Edited from Cambridge, University Library, MS Dd.1.17.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Seven Sages of Rome (Midland Version). Edited from Cambridge, University Library, MS Dd.1.17. Jill Whitelock, editor. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]45.00. lxxx + 183 Pages. ISBN 0-19-722327-3. The Seven Sages of Rome was 'one of...

East against West: The First Encounter. The Life of Themistocles.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... East Against West: The First Encounter. The Life of Themistocles. Dmitry Shlapentokh. Ludmila Prednewa, translator. Publish America. US$19.95. 189 pages. ISBN 1-4137-5691-3. In this challenging study, Prof. Shlapentokh, who teaches in the...

The Secret Garden.(Brief article)(Book review)(Children's review)
June 22, 2006... The Secret Garden. Frances Hodgson Burnett. Gretchen Holbrook Gerzina, editor. W.W. Norton. [pounds sterling]6.99 p.b. xi + 453 pages. ISBN 0-393-92635-4. This new addition to W.W. Norton's famous 'Critical Edition' series has been prepared by...

Stalin's Folly: The Secret History of the German Invasion of Russia, June 1941.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Stalin's Folly: The Secret History of the German Invasion of Russia, June 1941. Constantine Pleshakov. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. [pounds sterling]20.00. 336 pages. ISBN 0-297-84626-4. Historians have gained enormously by the opening of Russian...

Debs at War: How Wartime Changed Their Lives 1939-1945.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Debs at War: How Wartime Changed Their Lives 1939-1945. Anne de Courcy. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. [pounds sterling]20.00. 288 pages. ISBN 0-297-82930-0. The author's concern is with the effect of the war on the lives of upper-class girls. In many...

The Third Reich in Power 1933-1939.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Third Reich in Power 1933-1939. Richard J. Evans. Allen Lane. [pounds sterling]30.00. xvii + 941 pages. ISBN 00-713-99649-8. This study may be regarded as a sequel to the author's earlier title, The Coming of the Third Reich. It begins in...

Christopher Marlowe: Poet & Spy.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Christopher Marlowe: Poet & Spy. Park Honan. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]25.00. xv + 421 pages. ISBN 0-19-818695-9. As Prof. Honan writes, Marlowe's life 'is the most spectacular of any English dramatist'. Because it is so it is...

Katyn and the Soviet Massacre of 1940: Truth, Justice, and Memory.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Katyn and the Soviet Massacre of 1940: Truth, Justice and Memory. George Sanford. Routledge. [pounds sterling]65.00. xvi + 250 pages. ISBN 0-415-33873-5. This book tells the story of the Soviet Communists' massacre of some 22,000 Polish...

Days from a Different World: A Memoir of Childhood.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Days from a Different World: A Memoir of Childhood. John Simpson. Macmillan. [pounds sterling]18.99. xiv + 413 pages. ISBN 1-4050-5004-7. The author is the world affairs editor of the BBC and is often heard and seen philosophising on the state...

War Girls: The First Aid Nursing Yeomanry in the First World War.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... War Girls: The First Aid Nursing Yeomanry in the First World War. Janet Lee. Manchester University Press. [pounds sterling]30.00. xiii 269 pages. ISBN 0-7190-6712-X. Manchester University Press has built up something of a reputation for what...

The Discovery of Egypt: Vivant Denon's Travels with Napoleon's Army.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Discovery of Egypt: Vivant Denon's Travels with Napoleon's Army. Terence M. Russell. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]20.00. xxii + 266 pages. ISBN 0-7509-4145-6. This fascinating study sheds light on a man whose exploits are largely...

Mussolini's Italy: Life under the Fascist Dictatorship 1915-1945.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Mussolini's Italy: Life under the Dictatorship 1915-1945. R.J.B. Bosworth. Allen Lane. [pounds sterling]25.00. xxvi + 692 pages. ISBN 0-713-99697-8. This study is a sequel to the author's study of Mussolini, The Italian Dictatorship: Mussolini,...

Our Island Story: A History of Britain for Boys and Girls from the Romans to Queen Victoria.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Our Island Story: A History of Britain for Boys and Girls from the Romans to Queen Victoria. H.E. Marshall. Galore Park in association with Civitas. [pounds sterling]19.99. xviii + 494 pages. ISBN 1 902984-74-9. This famous schoolbook was first...

Nation & Novel: The English Novel from its Origins to the Present Day.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Nation & Novel: The English Novel from its Origins to the Present Day. Patrick Parrinder. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]25.00. ix + 502 pages. ISBN 0-19-926484-8. The author's aim is to give a history of the novel as it relates to...

Arthur Miller: A Playwright's Life and Works.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Arthur Miller: A Playwright's Life and Works. Enoch Brater. Thames & Hudson. [pounds sterling]15.95. 144 pages. ISBN 0-500-51242-6. In this illustrated biography--there are some seventy illustrations--Prof. Brater sets out to describe not just...

Nicholas Nickleby.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Nicholas Nickleby. Charles Dickens. Duckworth. [pounds sterling]25.00. xxxv + 835 pages. ISBN 0-7156-3473-9. This new and impressive edition of Dickens' third novel is part of a major new publishing venture undertaken by Duckworth in...

The Dreyfus Affair: A Chronological History.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Dreyfus Affair: A Chronological History. George R. Whyte. Palgrave Macmillan. [pounds sterling]95.00. xxxiv + 526 pages. ISBN 1-4039-3829-6. This detailed chronology has taken years to compile and is designed to let readers 'follow, on a...

Khartoum: The Ultimate Imperial Adventure.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Khartoum: The Ultimate Imperial Adventure. Michael Asher. Viking. [pounds sterling]25.00. xxx + 450 pages. ISBN 0-670-87030-7. The death of General Gordon at Khartoum in 1885 gave the late Victorian Empire a hero and martyr perhaps equalled...

The Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea, 2d ed..(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea. I.C.B. Dear and Peter Kemp, editors. Oxford University Press. [pounds sterling]30.00. ix + 678 pages. ISBN 0-19-860616-8. This exhaustive reference book was first published in 1976, and we here have a...

The Faber Book of 20th-Century German Poems.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Faber Book of 20th-Century German Poems. Michael Hofmann, editor. Faber and Faber. [pounds sterling]9.99 p.b. xxiv + 215 pages. ISBN 0-571-19703-5. This paperback original is edited and introduced by one of the leading German translators,...

The Geneva Convention: The Hidden Origins of the Red Cross.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... The Geneva Convention: The Hidden Origins of the Red Cross. Angela Bennett. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]20.00. xii + 236 pages. ISBN 0-7509-4147-2. The Geneva Convention remains perhaps the most cited and least understood document in...

Those Who Trespass against Us: One Woman's War against the Nazis.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Those Who Trespass Against Us: One Woman's War Against the Nazis. Karolina Lanckoronska. Noel Clark, translator. Pimlico. [pounds sterling]14.99 p.b. xxiv + 341 pages. ISBN 1-8441-3417-2. This Pimlico Original brings to English readers the...

Engineering the Ancient World.(Brief article)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... Engineering the Ancient World. Dick Parry. Sutton Publishing. [pounds sterling]20.00. xiv+242 pages. ISBN 0-7509-3833-1. This study is concerned with explaining the 'remarkable civil engineering achievements of the ancient world'. The author is...