OPINIONSnA Man for No Seasonnby Theodore Pappasn”It is not merely that speeches, statistics, and records of every kind must benconstantly brought up to date in order to show that the predictions of the Partynwere in all cases right. It is also that no charige in doctrine or in politicalnalignment can ever be admitted.”nConspirator: The Untold...

The Treasury ofnVirtuenby Clyde WilsonnThe New Jacobinism: CannDemocracy Survive?nby Claes G. RynnWashington, D.C.: NationalnHumanities Institute; 102 pp., $8.95nCniinontrary to widespread belief,nevidence is accumulating thatnWestern democracy is in continuousnand serious decline,” writes Claes Rynnin the opening of this eloquent, concise,nand hard-hitting manifesto that goesnimmediately to the heart of our times.n”Many commentators proclaim democracy’sntriumph over evil political...

ment in that regard doubtful. Alas, whynappeal to the need for a leavening ofnaristocracy and constitutionalism in thenlife of democracy? That question wasnsettled at Appomattox, a century and anquarter ago, in favor of aggressive andnself-congratulatory democracy. IfnAmericans had any real connectionnwith their constitutional traditions, thennthe Straussian sophistries (which Rynnskillfully skewers as the source of neoconservatism)nwould...

of her day, in an early letter to Lanen(August 13, 1921): “Lucy said manynthings which in my maturer days I cannapplaud. One being that politics wasnnot only no sphere for women but nonsphere for anybody.” For her part.nRose Lane is more relaxed and lessndidactic in her letters than in much ofnher published work. “I wish...

that, off and on, in this latest of hisnproductions. So the first thing to say isnthat if you’re looking to be entertained,nthen Amis’s Memoirs is quite a treat.nNow I’ve put it that way so that I willnfeel quite free — as a devoted fan ofnKingsley Amis — to grumble aboutnthese same disappointing Memoirs.nThe book’s a...

human eye, or maybe in war,nsoldiers become accustomed tonfaces in pain. But not I. Thesenwere children’s faces . . . filthy,nhungry, bruised, scared, oilnstained, burned. But alive.nAs are Nelson’s fictional creations, at anfar remove from the unfeeling, unreflective,nwraith-like ciphers who inhabitnso much of American writing. His storiesnare an antidote to despair, a propernrestoration of some...

OPINIONSnImagining the Westnby M.E. Bradfordn’The curious have observed that the progress of humane hterature (hke the sun)nis from the East to the West. . .”n— Nathaniel AmesnWestern Writers SeriesnEdited by Wayne Chatterton andnJames H. Maguiren101 titles to datenBoise: Boise State University;n$3.95 per copynA s both a reality and an interpretivenproblem, the American West hasnretained its...

The Best of OurnTimenby Geoffrey WagnernOur Age: English IntellectualsnBetween the World Wars — AnGroup Portraitnby Noel AnnannNew York: Random House;n479 pp., $30.00nElected Provost of King’s College,nCambridge, in his 30’s and subsequentlynVice-Chancellor of the Universitynof London, Lord Annan is a delightfulnperson who has given us andelightful book of scintillating eruditionnthat ranges far beyond the confines of...

strut his sexual bias. Oscar Wilde,nasked what he thought about socialism,nflapped a wrist and replied, “All thosenevenings.”nWith the advent of a permissivenessnlargely imported from America, liberalismnparodied itself in English intellectualnlife as in American; “The wall ofnsilence and ignorance crumbled in thenfifties and sixties.” And “No Governmentnhad ever contained so manynformer dons and intellectuals as thenLabour...

The coots and grebes seemnpainted therenThe alder boughs’ reflectionsnmakenNo ripple on the flood or airnRussell prefaces the poem with a linenfrom Luke’s Gospel, which he quotes innAnglo-Saxon, partly because he finds itnbeautiful and partly because he is contemptuousnof the pseudo-literary culturenof an England that has cut itself offnfrom its past in order to embrace televisionnand...

The Conquest of Paradise:nChristopher Columbus and thenColumbian Legacynby Kirkpatrick SalenNew York: Knopf; 453 pp., $24.95nThe Rediscovery of North Americanby Barry LopeznLexington: The University Press ofnKentucky; Unpaginated, $15.00nIn Search of Columbus: ThenSources for the First Voyagenby David HenigenTucson: The University of ArizonanPress; 359 pp., $24.95nPerhaps because it is itself so completelynahistorical, the left has angreat need...

Naming the Silencesnby Stanley HauerwasnGrand Rapids: Eerdmans;n154 pp., $9.95n^ ^’ I ‘ he first thing to understand isnA that we are all practical atheists,”nStanley Hauerwas once declarednin a phone conversation. “So when wenask, ‘Why does a good God allow badnthings to happen to good people?’ whatnwe really mean is, ‘Why doesn’t modernnmedicine cure cancer?'” Hauerwasnhas...

EncyclopedianBritannicanby Brian RobertsonnThe Birth of the Modern: WorldnSociety 1815-1830nby Paul JohnsonnNew York: HarperCollins;n1,095 pp., $35.00nPaul Johnson has done it again: henhas written a book so huge in scopenthat it fairly begs to be challenged bynacademics as a cursory treatment ofnhistory.nIn the course of one thousand pages,nThe Birth of the Modern: World Societyncovers subjects as diverse...

ty,” which have brought Christendomnto its current advanced state of decadence.nThe liberal ideology of progressnthat, by Johnson’s account, conferrednso many benefits on mankind, alsonconferred a smug self-reliance and anterrible alienation from the Creator,nthe frightening consequences of whichnwere not played out until our ownnunhappy century. The belief in theninevitability of progress, with its attendantnfaith in science...

at Pride-owned gas stations pulled gunsnon white customers, a Pride clean-upncrew robbed the Greyhound bus terminalnon their lunch break, and Pridentrucks served as mobile shooting galleriesnfor heroin addicts. Barry deflectedncriticism and discouraged investigationsnby a technique called “maumauing,”nsaying in effect: ” ‘Don’t ask,nhonky mother , because if youndo, we’re going to go out on the street,nand...

reform in American universities willnnot begin until the universities recapturenwhat Cardinal Newman calledn”the idea of the university,” the conceptnthat universities are institutionsnwherein students of superior intellectnand with “a special talent for articulatenessnand the pursuit of ideas in books”nmaster certain intellectual skills, readnspecified books {e.g., the ancient andnmodern classics), and take specifiedncourses in the arts and...

A Literary Lionnby Gregory McNameenA Life of Kenneth Rexrothnby Linda HamaliannNew York: W.W. Norton;n444 pp., $25.00nKenneth Rexroth and JamesnLaughHn: Selected LettersnEdited by Lee BartlettnNew York: W.W. Norton;n292 pp., $27.50nKenneth Rexroth (1905-1982) maynwell be the greatest unread writernAmerica has ever produced, and certainlynamong the most influential.nMuch postwar nonacademic poetrynowes its origins, its way of perceiving thenworld...

OPINIONSnBusiness as Usualnby Frank Brownlown’The effects of infantile instruction are, like those of syphilis, never completely cured”n— Robert BriffaultnIlliberal Education: The Politics ofnRace and Sex on Campusnby Dinesh D’SouzanNew York: The Free Press;n319 pp., $19.95nShortly before Christmas last, I heardna college president say, gesturingntoward a copy of Roger Kimball’snTenured Radicals, “That book is makingnmy job...

Kinsey, Sex and Fraud: ThenIndoctrination of a Peoplenby Judith A. Reisman andnEdward W. EichelnEdited by J. Gordon Muirnand John H. CourtnLafayette, Louisiana: HuntingtonnHouse; 256 pp., $19.95nWho now reads Alfred Kinsey?nAlmost no one. Who now remembersnthe great media event set offnin 1948 by the publication of his “monumental”nbook of 804 pages on SexualnBehavior in the Human...

The Christian Conditionnby M. Christiane von Kuehnelt-Leddihnn”Faith is required of thee, and a sincere hfe, not loftiness of intellect, norndeepness in the Mysteries of God.”n— Thomas a KempisnBernanbs Vivantnhy R.L. BruckbergernParis: Albin MichelnThis is, in fact, a book about twonmen, since, due to his strongnpersonality and his close relationship tonGeorges Bernanos, the author plays annimportant...

Beyond Hubrisnby Juliana Geran PilonnModernity on Endless Trialnby Leszek KolakowskinChicago and London:nThe University of Chicago Press;n304 pp., $24.95nWith disarming and hardly disingenuousnmodesty, Polish humanistnLeszek Kolakowski describes hisnnew anthology, Modernity on EndlessnTrial, as a loose collection of “semiphilosophicalnsermons” written overnthe course of a decade or so, purportingnto offer no original philosophy. Henadds, as an apparent afterthought,...

“The choice between total perfectionnand total self-destruction is not ours;ncares without end, incompletenessnwithout end, these are our lot.”nFar from deploring his destiny awaynfrom his native Poland (having beennexiled in 1968, he divides his teachingncareer between Oxford and the Universitynof Chicago), Kolakowski valuesnexile as an existential manner of being.nIn fact, he considers it to be thendefining...

was not inevitable and that the UnitednStates bears the majority of the blamenfor its occurrence.nHughes at least has been consistent.nHe objected to all of the Truman ColdnWar initiatives, the Marshall Plan included.nIn 1948 he did join the Wallacencampaign, only to jump ship whennthe captain refused to jettison his communistnsupport. Nonetheless, Hughesnstill insists that Wallace was...

them or sympathize with them; I don’tnbelieve she even knows them. MarynGordon is brazen in announcing hernsuperiority to the community of whichnshe is the self-appointed spokesperson.nTo think of oneself as a writernof literature rather than anjournalist or a popular writer,none must think of oneself as ancitizen of a larger worid. By thisnI do not mean...

Yellow Periln(Part II)nby William R. HawkinsnThe Coming War with Japannby George Friedmannand Meredith LebardnNew York: St. Martin’s Press;n429 pp., $24.95nDo not be put off by the sensationalistntitle. This is a solid geopoliticalnand economic study of power in thenPacific during the 20th century. Basingntheir prophesy on the record, GeorgenFriedman and Meredith Lebard concludenthat a second U.S.-Japanese...

The United States has taken out thenwrong parts of the Cold War apparatus.nWashington has been cutting back elementsnof its own strength, rather than ofnthe strength of others. Nothing couldnbe more dangerous, than continuednAmerican pressure on Japan to increasenits navy, and to play a’ larger role innworld affairs. With the waning of thenSoviet threat, the United...

Stalin in Powernby Robert C. TuckernNew York: W.W. Norton;n707 pp., $29.95nStalin: The Glasnost Revelationsnby Walter LaqueurnNew York: Charles Scribner’s Sons;n382 pp., $24.95nN early half a century after theirndestruction, Nazi Germany andnAdolf Hitler remain the objects of greaternattention and hatred than do Stalinnand his Soviet Union, although thenextent of their crimes vi^ere similar andnStalin’s regime was...

Lamentations of a Recovering Marxistnby Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.n”Progress needs the brakeman, but the brakeman should not spend all his timenputting on the brakes.”n— Elbert HubbardnThe True and Only Heaven:nProgress and Its Criticsnby Christopher LaschnNew York: W.W. Norton & Co.;n591 pp., $25.00nThe case for pessimism has beenneasy to make since Lincoln, andnmandatory since Franklin Roosevelt.nToday,...

looked forward to the time when then”successive changes in human society”nwill have brought us to a time of “nonmaster save reason,” when “priests andntheir stupid or hypocritical tools will allnhave disappeared.” The proper responsento this sort of thing is that ofnTocqueville, for whom real progressnwas based upon religion. It is then”religious nations,” he said, which,n”thinking...

Fm Nobodynby Chilton Williamson, Jr.n”Literature, strictly consider’d, has never recognized the people, and whatevernmay be said, does not today. Speaking generally, the tendencies of literature, asnhitherto pursued, have been to make most critical and querulous men.”n—Walt WhitmannFiedler on the Roof: Essays onnLiterature and Jewish Identitynby Leslie FiedlernBoston: David R. Godine,nPublishers, Inc.; 161 pp., $19.95nIn a...

Divided Loyaltiesnby Katherine DaltonnReflectionsnby Graham GreenenEdited by Judith AdamsonnLondon: Reinhart Books;n325 pp., $19.95nGraham Greene died this year at 86, anripe old age that was no small accomplishmentnfor a man who at 19 playednRussian roulette on the Berkhamstedncommon until he grew bored with evennthe possibility of his own death. As an”semilapsed” Catholic who professednbelief (though not...

spotted from the world” he writes innstill another piece in this collection. Henfelt that in order to see one must stepnback, and for a man who prized in hisnown work its quality of detachment,nthe isolation of being a foreignernabroad, an Englishman in an Americannhemisphere, and a Catholic (howevernsemilapsed) in a pagan world, wasnall part of...

version of Private Lives”—at the RoyalnCourt in 1956; and I admit tonentertainment (little more) by subsequentnfringe theater in England, as alsonby some postwar cinema there. Thanksnto a fine dramatic tradition and intelligentnaudiences, Albion has enjoyed anrich mine of theatrical originality owingnto the presence of such playwrightsnas Osborne, Wesker, Pinter, Stoppard,nAlan Bennett, and Michael Frayn, tonsay...

a saving remnant: “One . . . had betternunderstand that there may, after all,nbe nothing left to save.”nYet in his own life, and sometimes innhis words, Berry holds out the possibilitynof a better future. Like the ChestertoniannDistributionists and SouthernnAgrarians before him, Berry is morenadept at criticism than at prescription,nbut he does sketch out the shape...

destruction of dams and the restorationnof free-flowing rivers; the establishmentnof huge tracts of wilderness andnroadless areas; and the practice of annidealized politics that admits of noncompromise. Much of Confessions ofnan Eco-Warrior is an extended politicalnpamphlet elaborating on these points.nIn ten years’ time, Dave Foreman’snbrand of radical environmentalism hasnserved both to polarize the ecologicalnmovement and to...

The device of acknowledging thenpull of another point of view but consigningnit, a tad regretfully, to the dustbinnof history, supports the authornthrough an astonishing amount of conservativenreading. And her interpretationsnof what she reads are often faultynand reductionist; consider, for instance,nthis doubly erroneous summary:nWestern Christianity hasnalways had a tendency, wellnexemplified in Saint Augustine,nto believe that sins...

reform, the collapse of the Soviet Unionnwill be unstoppable.nWill Communist Party ofEcials notnmerely threaten but actually precipitatena war rather than lose power? For annanswer to this, I telephoned Beichmannin his British Columbia eyrie. He hadnjust returned from a fortnight in Washington,nD.C., where he met with seniornCIA officials, apparently. No, hensaid, he wasn’t predicting a vt’orld...

OPINIONSnRevolution and the American MindnRevolutions: Reflections onnAmerican Equality and ForeignnLiberationsnby David Brion DavisnCambridge: Harvard University Press;n130 pp., $19.95nFood lines lengthen in Moscow;nshow trials continue in Beijing;nbicycles replace motor vehicles in Havana.nAs the Warsaw Pact and BeriinnWall crumble, so does the standing ofnMao and Che, even on college campuses.nThe closing of this millenniumnmay not bring the...

L’affaire De Mannby Milton J. Rosenbergn”Colleges and books only copy the language which the held and the workyard made.”n— Ralph Waldo EmersonnSigns of the Times:nDeconstruction andnthe Fall of Paul de Mannhy David LehmannNew York: Poseidon Press;n318 pp., $21.95nThere is mention in the Englishnannals of the 14th century ofnsyphilis as “the malady of France.”nInevitably, blame was...

Win or Losenby William R. HawkinsnSecrets of the Vietnam Warnby Lt. Gen. Phillip B. DavidsonnNovato, California: Presidio Press;n214 pp., $18.95nWhen Desert Storm commandernGeneral Norman Schwarzkopfnthanked President Bush for letting thenmilitary fight the Gulf war on its ownnterms, he was expressing an idea deeplynfelt in the Pentagon for over twentynyears: “No more Vietnams.” BothnSchwarzkopf and his...

we hear critics of President Bush claimnthat he is spending too much time onnforeign policy, while neglecting domesticnaffairs.nAnother major problem was thatnDefense Secretary McNamara and hisncivilian planners had adopted a “counter-insurgency”nmodel that violated basicnstrategic principles. To Davidson,nstrategy implies that one “use one’snstrength against the enerhy’s weaknessesnwhile negating the reverse; seize andnhold the initiative.” In Vietnam,...

ancestry can live in America ‘for anthousand years’ without becoming annAmerican? In short, are you a vengefulnblack racist? Perhaps a masochisticnwhite flagellant? If so look no further. Inhave found the impartial televisionnshow of your dreams.”nBut there is far more to these essaysnthan fun at the expense of trendynpolitical messages. Grenier’s commentarynhelps us to confront and...

his description of Mott, a minor gringo:nMott always looked sprightlynand pleased with himself, likenHarry Truman at the piano,nwith his rimless glasses andnneatly combed hair. He hadngone crazy in the army andnnow received a check eachnmonth, having been declarednfifty percent psychologicallyndisabled. Had they determinednhim to be half crazy all the timenor full crazy half the time?...

scattered ranch families, the areandoesn’t see much in the way of humannbeings.nIn the late 1970’s, Stephen Bodio, anBoston-based writer, amateur naturalist,nand falconer, happened into Magdalenanon the way somewhere else. Hennever left. With his friend Betsy Huntington,nand an assortment of birds,ndogs, snakes, and books, he took upnresidence in a ramshackle two-storynhouse along U.S. 60 and set...

OPINIONSnVisions and Revisionsnby Alan J. Levinen”A morsel of genuine history is a thing so rare as to be always valuable.”n— Thomas JeffersonnThe Duel, 10 May-31 July 1940:nThe Eighty-Day Struggle BetweennChurchill and Hitlernhy John LukacsnNew York: Ticknor and Fields;n224 pp., $19.95nI n his latest book, John Lukacs returnsnto some of the same territory that hencovered in...

Cleaning Upnby Matthew Scullyn’To write a criticism of one’s self would be an embarrassing, even an impossible task.”n—Heinrich HeinenBreaking Barriers: A Memoirnby Carl T. RowannNew York: Little, Brown;n395 pp., $22.95nThis autobiography pretty muchnconfirms the impression left by annoccasional reading of Carl Rowan’s columnsnover the years: a decent enoughnfellow, earnest but smug, amiable atntimes but given...

The City Beatnby Bill KauffmannRed Lovenby David EvaniernNew York: Scribner’s;n340 pp., $19.95nR ed Love is “third generation Leninist”nporno star Suzie Sizzle’snyet-unmade dream project, the lovenstory of her aunt and uncle, the Rosenberg-likenspies Dolly and Solly Rubell.nUntil Suzie’s industry develops a revolutionarynconsciousness, we’ll have tonsettle for David Evanier’s novel of wit,nfine malice, and the same title.nBut...

“Babies are born every minute,” shenassures Solly. “And now they will benfree.”nBill Kauffman is author of the novelnEvery Man a King. He lives innBatavia, New York.nOne-Fifth Pinknby Chilton Williamson, Jr.nFlashman and the Mountainnof Lightnhy George MacDonald FrasernNew York: Alfred A. Knopfn365 pp., $22.00nAnticipating the latest Flashmannnovel is always a delight, and thennthere are the reviews...

together, and when the dustnhad settled, there we were, andnwho else was going to setnthings straight and feed the folknand guard the gate and dig thendrains — oh, aye, and take thenprofit, by all means. . . . WhennI’m done, you may not benmuch clearer on how the mapnof the world came to benone-fifth pink,...

back into the men who contemplate it,nbecause they have the capacity fornidealism. But in Buckley’s fiction,nwomen are the abyss. Betrayal is asnnatural as a sigh, and as predictable asntomorrow’s guilt. In the face of suchnsadness, dreams of peace deserve nothingnmore than a funeral shroud.nBrad Linaweaver is a novelist and anbook reviewer for the Atlanta Journalnand...