volvement gave rise to the government’snrefusing to tell the truth, fornwhich there could be only one solution:n”We’ve got to quit lying to ourselvesnall the time.” Amen.nPlain talk, as plain as a Tennesseenfarmer’s butternut tunic. Robert PennnWarren — “Red,” to his friends,namong whose number the reader isninstantly enrolled — is at home in thesenpages, alive with...

Critics at Worknby William H. NoltenNeoconservative Criticism:nNorman Podhoretz, KennethnS. Lynn and Joseph Epsteinnby Mark Royden WinchellnBoston: Twayne Publishers;n175 pp., $22.9SnJust what is “neoconservative criticism”?nWhat gives it any particularnessence or distinguishes it from othernbrands being bartered in bookstores andnnewsstands throughout the Republic?nThe wiseacre might answer that it is thenkind of criticism practiced by neoconservatives,nand thus leave...

beled paleoliberals. Incidentally, if nonone seems to know quite what to makenof “liberal” when used as an adjective,neveryone seems pleased with the “democratic”nlabel — despite the fact thatn”democracy” has little if any concretenmeaning these days, having becomenalmost pure abstraction; even more abstractnthan the word “freedom,” whichnat least retains a residue of concretenmeaning.nOf far more interest,...

OPINIONSnThe Isolationist Enigmanby Chilton Williamson, Jr.n’We assert that no nation can long endure half republic and half empire.”n— Democratic National Platform, 1900nThe Colonel: The Life and Warsnof Henry Stimson, 1867-1950nby Godfrey HodgsonnNew York: Alfred A. Knopf;n402 pp., $24.95nAccording to Godfrey Hodgson,nHenry L. Stimson—secretary ofnwar for William Howard Taft, secretarynof state for Herbert Hoover, and, again,nsecretary...

The DemocraticnCrusadenby Paul GottfriednThe Hollow Men: Politics andnCorruption in Higher Educationnby Charles ]. SykesnWashington: Regnery Gateway;n356 pp., $19.95nIn The Hollow Men Charles J. Sykesnresumes the brief against Americannhigher education that he began in hisnwidely publicized Profscam, publishednin 1988. Sykes argues in both booksnthat our best universities, most conspicuouslynin their humanities faculties,nhave betrayed their true educationalnmission:...

sault from the radical left. The “essence”nof that curriculum can bentraced to the Great Books program,nwhich was organized at Columbia andnChicago earlier in the century andnwhich furnishes access to an “ongoing,noften raucous and contentious debate.”nThis debate, which is supposednto emerge from reading thinkers whon(Sykes never tells us) were, in mostncases, unmistakably nondemocratic, allowsnstudents nevertheless to...

missing from the work of Robert Frostnand Ezra Pound. The three writers arenplayed off of one another in an instructivenfashion. Frost is for Montgomerynthe great equivocator; and Pound anstrange variety of liberal Utopian — atnleast until he discovered that knowledgenwas not enough, that the Renaissancenwas flawed at its core, had investedntoo much of human hope...

ers into patrons and keeping blacksnwhere they have always been — dependentnon the largesse of whites.” Allnparties, black and white, Steele suggests,nmust stop regarding blacks asnvictims deserving of special treatmentnand privileges, and begin instead tonthink of blacks as human beings — asnAmerican citizens whose constitutionalnrights guarantee them fair and equalntreatment, nothing more, nothing less.nWhite administrators...

bate about the connection betweenneconomics and morality.nFather Schall’s collection of previouslynpublished essays is significant forntwo reasons. First, Father Schall, anpolitical scientist at Georgetown University,ndefends the free market bynretrieving from the Catholic tradition anrespect for the rights to property andnenterprise (a tradition superbly tracednin Alejandro Chafuen’s enormouslynimportant little book Christians fornFreedom: Late-Scholastic Economics,n1986). Second, this series...

Ancient Texts andnModern Readersnby E: Christian KopffnThe Text of the New Testament:nAn Introduction to thenCritical Editions and to thenTheory and Practice ofnModern Textual Criticismnby Kurt and Barbara AlandnTranslated by Errol F. RhodesnSecond Edition,nRevised and EnlargednGrand Rapids: William B.nEerdmans; 368 pp., $32.50nBn4inegin at the beginning,” was thenKing’s suggestion to Alice. “Gonon to the end. Then stop.”...

the grasp of the average intelligence —nthat richness will have little effect onnChristianity in America.nE. Christian Kopff is the editor of ancritical edition of Euripides’ Bacchae.nA Private Sensibilitynby R.S. GwynnnLife Sentence: Selected Poemsnby Nina CassiannEdited by William Jay SmithnNew York: W.W. Norton;n130 pp., $17.95nAgenerous spread of four poemsnthat appeared in the New Yorkerneady in 1990...

Passion in Privatenby Car] C. CurtisnA Bottle in the Smokenby A.N. WilsonnNew York: Viking; 320 pp., $18.95nOver the last ten years, A.N. Wilsonnhas been compared to thengreat 20th-century English satirists:nWaugh, Amis, and Barbara Pym. Nownthat he is in the process of writing antrilogy, it was inevitable that some criticnwould add to these the name of...

interesting of them at the Black Bottle:nDay Muckley, the alcoholic failed novelist;nRikko and Fenella, Julian’s landlordnand landlady; Cyril, the proprietornof the pub, who looks like T.S. Eliotnbut has one of the filthiest mouths innLondon. The meaning of it all is thensum of the events and characters. Possiblynthe best way to depict Wilson’sndark vision of the...

of the American Dream. So — here wenare. To study bad taste is to look in thennational mirror. These authors avertedntheir eyes from the big picture, andnblinked at the most revelatory implicationsnof bad taste.nBut one good thing about their BadnTaste is that, though they omittednOprah Winfrey, Kitty Dukakis, andnPhil Donohue, the dust jacket doesnfeature a...

Carl Schmitt: Politics and Theorynby Paul Edward GottfriednWestport, Connecticut: GreenwoodnPress; 168 pp., $39.95nAgainst Democracy and Equality:nThe European New Rightnby Tomislav SunicnNew York: Peter Lang;n196 pp., $39.95nWhat does it mean to be “rightwing”?nSince the term and itsncompanion “left-wing” first appeared innthe wake of the French Revolution tondescribe, respectively, those who opposednand those who supported thenrevolutionary agenda...

Our Constitution: Alive or Dead?nThe Conservative Constitutionnhy Russell KirknWashington, D.C.: RegnerynGateway; 241 pp., $22.95nConsensus on the benign motivesnof our Founding Fathers and thennature of the Constitution that hadnpersisted through the 19th century begannto crack at the beginning of then20th under assaults from the Progressives.nIt has disintegrated at an acceleratingnrate since, so that today we, as...

The Lure of BlacknGoldnby Gregory McNameenThe Prizenby Daniel YerginnNew York:nSimon & Schuster;n877 pp., $24.95nJanuary 14, 1991. As I write, morenthan half a million American andnAllied soldiers are massed on the northeasternnfrontier of Saudi Arabia, arrayednagainst the million soldiers of SaddamnHussein. At issue is the sovereignty ofnKuwait, a feudal monarchy that happensnto enjoy the highest per-capitanincome...

quences. Worldwide energy use triplednbetween 1949 and 1973, the year ofnthe first OPEC embargo, but at thensame time absolute demand increasedn550 percent, mostly in the UnitednStates, Europe, and Japan. In the lastnnation oil consumption increased 137ntimes over, from thirty thousand to 4.4nmillion barrels daily. Small wonder thatnJapan urged military intervention innthe Persian Gulf from the...

firmly committed to the Council’snteachings.nFor the great irony is that whatnprevents Molnar from noticing thesenencouraging trends is the same relentlesslynpolitical outlook he (rightly)nblames for most of the post-Councilnaberrations. Unfortunately, that outlooknalso skews his view of the Councilnitself Since, in his view, “civil society”nis “impermeable to conversion” becausenof its very structure, the result ofnthe Church’s “strategy”...

to the supernatural, every part of lifenmust — and does — seem a game, anclosed entity defined strictly by its ownnself-referentiality. Modern “philosophy”nassures us that such an entity isnsimply “reality,” and contemporaryn”criticism,” which is deconstruction,nseconds the conclusion.n”What we have lost,” Walter Sullivannconcludes, “—let me repeat it —nis a sense of the sacred in literature andnlife.”nChilton...

OPINIONSnRedefining Americanby Lawrence Austern”/ began by feeling that I was a Norwegian, then changed into a Scandinavian,nand have now arrived at being a generaUzed Germanic.”n— Henrik IbsennEthnic Identity: ThenTransformation of White Americanby Richard D. AlbanNew Haven and London: YalenUniversity Press; 374 pp., $35.00nOniinver the generations,” wrotenMilton M. Gordon in hisn1964 study of the assimilation of...

On the Law of Nationsnby Daniel Patrick MoynihannCambridge and London: HarvardnUniversity Press; 224 pp., $22.50nO n the Law of Nations is a powerfulnbrief in favor of what thenUnited States Supreme Court in 1900ndeclared to be “the customs and usagesnof the civilized world.” (In PaquetenHabana, the highest court declaredninternational law to be “part of ournlaw” and...

The End of Historynby Chilton Williamson, Jr.nThe Technological Bluffnhy Jacques EllulnGrand Rapids: William B.nEerdmans; 418 pp., $24.95nIt seems to me that the staff and allnthe contributing editors to Chronicles,nworking together for a year innparadisiacal California on a lavish grantnfrom the MacArthur Foundation,ncould not possibly produce as pessimisticna work as The Technological Bluffnby the French cultural...

Wills^ Waynby James B. GravesnUnder God: Religion andnAmerican Politicsnby Garry WillsnNew York City: Simon and Schuster;n445 pp., $24.95nGarry Wills is, of course, the talentednapostate conservative whoseninterpretative political reporting avoidsnthe usual journalistic cliches. No onenwill disagree that Wills penetratesnevents more deeply than do, say, theneditorial writers for the New YorknTimes, any more than he will deny...

Bring Me the Headnof John D.nby Philip N. MarcusnThe Politics of Knowledge: ThenCarnegie Corporation,nPhilanthropy, and Public Policynby Ellen Condliffe LagemannnMiddletown: Wesleyan UniversitynPress; 347 pp., $35.00nCharity Begins at Home:nGenerosity and Self-interestnAmong the Philanthropic Elitenby Teresa OdendahlnNew York: Basic Books;n299 pp., $22.95nSn Add to Favorites

haunts Odendahl’s book. She has writtenna gloss on H.D. Lloyd’s WealthnAgainst Commonwealth: her CharitynBegins at Home is feminist deconstructionnas muckraking. The public’s ripofFnby “tax subsidies” are the rebatesnof today. The private charters shendeplores are secure, except for criminalnand other forms of “self-dealing.” Andnshe calls for an end to “dynastic”nmonies, a view common during then1930’s but...

Wild Thingn’ by Gregory McNameenIron Johnnby Robert BlynReading, Massachusetts:nAddison Wesley;n268 pp., $18.95nAnew kind of animal stalks the landnthese days. If you listen closely,nyou can hear its strange call: chestthumpingnroars alternating with keeningnwails and abundant sniffles. And if younlook carefully, you’ll doubtless soon spotnone, for they clone faster than jackrabbits.nThis new critter is now allnaround us,...

costa County, somewhat south of Missaukee,nand less fertile: the county ofnStadtfeld himself and of this reviewer.nAlthough in these United Statesnnobody calls himself a peasant, actuallynthe Jagers and their neighbors were anpeasantry, living very close indeed tonthe soil, wasting nothing, close-knit innfamily, hardworking, pious. The narrownessnof their life only half a centurynago — indeed, right up...

OPINIONSnPoets and the Art of Interior DesignnMarianne Moore: A Literary Lifenby Charles MolesworthnNew York: Atheneum;n472 pp., $29.95nAmerican Poetry: Wildnessnand Domesticitynby Robert BlynNew York: Harper & Row,n341 pp., $22.50nMissing Measures: Modern Poetrynand the Revolt Against Meternby Timothy SteelenFayetteville: University of ArkansasnPress; 264 pp., $22.95nThe Function of the Poetnby Fred ChappellnSalem, VA: Roanoke CollegenThe sculptress Malvina Hoffmannfound...

Poems and McPoemsnby Fred Chappelln”Even one verse alone sometimes makes a perfect poem.n— Ben JonsonnOld and New Poemsnby Donald HallnNew York: Ticknor and Fields;n244 pp., $24.95nIt was Donald Hall who gave us thatnuseful and precise critical termn”McPoem” to describe the garden varietyncontemporary poem in flabby freenverse whose dismal ambitions are set tona spavined music. Hall...

The Vessels of His Meaningnby David R. Slavittn’There is nothing so likely to hand down your name as a poem: all othernmonuments are frail and fading.”n— Pliny the YoungernProsody and Purpose in thenEnglish Renaissancenby O.h. HardisonnBaltimore: Johns Hopkins UniversitynPress; 360 pp., $42.S0nTo say that O.B. Hardison, Jr., whondied last August at the age of 61,nwas...

La Floridanby Chilton Williamson, Jr.nAt the Moon’s Innnby Andrew LytlenIntroduced by Douglas E. JonesnTuscaloosa: The University ofnAlabama Press; 400 pp., $18.95nIn an expedition that began in 1538nand endured until 1543, Hernandonde Soto and six hundred men failed tondiscover in what is today Florida and thenLower American South that which theyncraved most to find — gold....

the he Missa est and De Soto’s words:n”You live again as a Christian, Senor.nAmong Christians.” The apposition ofnthe heathen shriving and the Christiannone, the bitter black brew in the conchnshell and the silver chalice containingnChrist’s blood, though implicit, is unmistakable.nIn his novella The Bear, WilliamnFaulkner wrote that the land of thenAmerican South — Andrew Lytle’snland;...

ence); and Updike writes with equalnauthority and authenticity about both.nIf Angstrom’s feats are well-remembered,nUpdike has earned and enjoyednanother kind of fame during the samenyears. Updike went to Harvard andnOxford. The less fortunate Angstromnmissed out on college, but served twonyears in the Army. Updike was sparednhis generation’s military experience,ngaining at least a couple of crucialn^career years...

ryman screamed at him for abandoningnpoor Thomas, and then staggerednout of the hospital.”nThe point is simple: HafiFenden’sndead subject has been killed off, or atnthe very least deprived of emotionalnand creative energy, even before thenleap from the Washington AvenuenBridge. We are clearly more informednabout Berryman’s understanding in thenMariani version.nIn Dream Song, Mariani describesnhow a poet in...

ofiF to find the source of the Nile.n(Burton’s voyage is recounted in thenrecent film The Mountains of thenMoon.) He came close, but battlesnwith the African peoples he encountered—nand roundly despised — and angrowing rivalry with Speke botched hisnmission. Speke sagely named the headwatersnLake Victoria and took singlencredit for this heroic act of discovery.nStill Burton could...

OPINIONSnGreat Exaggerationsnby Chilton Williamson, Jr.n”Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning.”n— Romans 15:4nThe Death of Literaturenby Alvin KernannNew Haven and London: YalenUniversity Press; 230 pp., $22.50nB y the early 1960’s, conditions innAmerica and in Europe had proceedednfar enough that pundits andnintellectuals on both sides of the Atlanticnfelt free to confirm what they...

A Province of the Republicnby J.O. Taten”Literature is an avenue to glory ever open for those ingenious men who arendeprived of honors or of wealth.”n— Isaac D’IsraelinThe Lytle-Tate Letters: ThenCorrespondence of Andrew Lytlenand Allen Tatenedited by Thomas Daniel Young andnElizabeth SarconenJackson: University Press ofnMississippi; 374 pp., $39.50nThe Years of Our Friendship:nRobert Lowell and Allen Tatenby...

O Canadanby Allan CarlsonnThe Trouble With Canada: AnCitizen Speaks Outnby William D. GairdnernToronto: Stoddart PublishingnCompany; 448 pp., $29.95nIf the fuss over Canada’s Meech LakenAccords has you confused, WilliamnGairdner’s The Trouble With Canadanis a fine place to turn to. The book is ansolid personal jeremiad against thenegalitarian evils taking root in Canada,nand the spineless politicians who...

The Thought ofnthe Constitutionnby Michael LindnConfronting the ConstitutionnEdited by Allan BloomnWashington, D.C.: The AmericannEnterprise Institute for Public Policy;n564 pp., $24.95nIn their program “A Decade of Studynof the Constitution,” Robert A.nGoldwin and his collaborators at thenAmerican Enterprise Institute havenconsistently published the most readablenand stimulating discussions of contemporarynconstitutional issues to havenappeared in America. The virtues ofnprevious AEI...

Power and Ideologynby Paul GottfriednThe Soviet Union, the CommunistnMovement, and the World:nPrelude to the Cold War,n1917-1941nby Alan J. LevinenNew York, Westport, and London:nPraeger; 203 pp., $37.95nAlan J. Levine explores the relationsnof the Soviet Union with both Asianand the West, from the Bolshevik Revolutionnthrough the Nazi-Soviet Pact.nFrom the title and from the author’snbiographical notes, it is...

Soviets were fighting for democraticnsocialist internationalism during thenSpanish Civil War, when Stalin usednthat conflict as a smokescreen to negotiatenwith the Nazis while finishing offndissident socialists in Spain and’Russia.nLevine’s treatment of Marxism-nLeninism also serves as a bridge towardnunderstanding Stalinism. Levine takesnseriously Stalin’s argument about thenneed to “establish socialism in onencountry” in preparation for its armednspread. He...

but a step removed from the “cosmicnloneliness” of Meursault, the hero ofnAlbert Camus’ The Stranger, a novelnthat haunted Styron, he tells us, evennthough he did not read it until he wasnin his 30’s. I find it interesting thatnwhen he set out to write The Confessionsnof Nat Turner, his best novel itnseems to me, he employed...

Entered From the Sunnby George GarrettnNew York: Doubleday;n368 pp., $19.95nGeorge Garrett is a man ofnletters—a member of a diminishingnbreed that may soon vanish. For wellnover three decades he has regularlynpublished poetry, criticism, and fictionnlong and short; he has also writtennscreenplays and memoirs, and exploredn.still other.modes. This very facility as anwriter of poetry and prose has...

The Wonder of Academenby William H. Nolten’The high-minded man must care more for truth than for what people think.”n—AristotlenUnseasonable Truths: The Life ofnRobert Maynard Hutchinsnhy Worry S. AshmorenBoston and New York: Little, Brownn& Company; 616 pp., $27.00nWhile being interviewed on WilliamnBuckley’s Firing Line,nHarry Ashmore remarked that he hadnallowed the subject of his UnseasonablenTruths: The Life...

AfErmative Scholarshipnby Murray N. Rothbardn”An excellent scholar! One that hath a head Hlled with calves’ brains without any sage in it.”nPreferential Policies: AnnInternational Perspectivenby Thomas SowellnNew York: William Morrow;n221 pp., $17.95nThomas Sowell has become a virtualnone-man publishing industry,nand Preferential Policies is his latestncontribution to the Sowell book-of-theyearnclub. It is not surprising to findnthat this scattered...

Montana on thenMovenby A. Carl Bredahl, Jr.nRide With Me, Mariah Montananby Ivan DoignNew York: Atheneum;n329 pp., $18.95nWith this latest novel, Ivan Doigncompletes his McCaskill trilogy,nbegun in 1984 with English Creek andnfollowed in 1987 with Dancing at thenRascal Fair. Ride With Me, MariahnMontana is good Doig, and thatnmeans readers can expect crisp dialogue,nrapid pace, vital language,...

The Old ReliablenbyJ.O. TatenThe Folks That Live on the Hillnby Kingsley AmisnNew York: Summit Books;n246 pp., $18.95nHere is a sentence that begins withnthe deep predication of HenrynJames, though not with his tone, andnproceeds to a cadenza in the unmistakablenAmis mode: “On current form henwould never be in danger of imaginingnthat her merely being his sister...

Exit Stage Leftnby Gregory McNameenThe Disappearance of the Outsidenby Andrei CodrescunReading, MA: Addison Wesley;n216 pp., $17.95nThe Outside: beyond wall andnwatchtower, on the far lee of thenborder, the place of the Other, the placenof exile. Now that the walls are crumblingnaround the worid, helped along bynthe crowbars of angry patriots; now thatnthe faces of the other...

young; Johann Gutenberg’s first printednbook dates to 1436, and it has beenna mere five hundred years since Erasmusnof Rotterdam leaped fi’om hisncarriage, squatted in a muddy lane, andninspected a scrap of newsprint, sonthrilled was he to encounter the printednword. There may yet be a future fornthe written word; on the other hand,nthe age of the...