Welcome to this month's reading group selection. David Von Drehle mentions The Melting Pot , a play by Israel Zangwill, that premiered on Broadway in 1908. At that time theater was accessible to a broad section of the public, not the exclusive domain it has become over the decades. Zangwill carried a hopeful message that America was a place where old hatreds and prejudices were pointless, and that in this new country immigrants would find a more open society. I suppose the reference was more an ironic one for Von Drehle, as he notes the racial and ethnic hatreds were on display everywhere, and at best Zangwill's play helped persons forget for a moment how deep these divides ran. Nevertheless, "the melting pot" made its way into the American lexicon, even if New York could best be describing as a boiling cauldron in the early twentieth century. Triangle: The Fire That Changed America takes a broad view of events that led up the notorious fire, noting the gro
Some more on TR:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/25/books/review/Steel-t.html
A total meander -- I finally watched the Lady with the Dog the other night on youtube. It was lovely.
ReplyDeleteIgor has lots of interesting Russian films and other media posted at his site:
http://www.youtube.com/user/IgorRusland
Glad you enjoyed it, av. You should check out the short of Ward no. 6.
ReplyDeleteThanks -- that's a story I don't know (but then I don't know many of Chekhov's stories). I'll check it out. Igor also has a 1960s War and Peace available. Nice to have these there.
ReplyDeleteI originally planned to study Russian history so this is a nice return to my roots.
This day in history seems apropos to the new immigration laws in Arizona.
ReplyDeleteNot sure what films and how many but TCM is running an ad that Tues and Thurs nights? in May will be Native American themed.One in the ad though is One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest which seems a bit of a reach but TCM does have a good collection of films.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the heads up, Bo. LOTS of good films this month.
ReplyDeleteYou can check out their schedule for the month at http://www.tcm.com -- it's under "Hollywood and Race" [!] on Tues/Thurs nights.
The Squawman is a classic. And they are showing Black Robe which is really good. If you've never seen it, I highly recommend it. And Smoke Signals, too! I've never watched Dancing with Wolves, but may even try that at this late date.
Is Blackrobe the flick from the 80's that takes place in Canada?If that's the one it was very good.The times are 8pm eastern time tues and thurs nights through May.
ReplyDeleteYes, that's it. I saw it as part of a class on Native American history so it's well regarded as well.
ReplyDeleteI like the scene with the old guys asking if there will be sex in heaven and when the priest says no, they want nothing to do with the place!
Black Robe is good. The Canadian version of The Mission.
ReplyDeleteThe anniversary of the Haymarket Riot, in 1886, brought to mind the reading we did of Death in the Haymarket in the old NYT Am History forum. Seems with all this fighting over immigation we may soon see new riots in regard to the Arizona immigration bill. Seems Americans will never understand that immigration is good for the country, not bad.
ReplyDeleteI'm certainly not anti-immigrant (in fact I was out supporting the Hispanics in DC when I was there last)
ReplyDeleteBUT.... In the big picture, immigration is supported because it means cheap labor and, in the case of high-tech workers, which is another big group of immigrants these days, that the country doesn't have to invest in education and training.
So it really does work to keep labor in its place and all Americans sort of on the edge that their jobs can be next. In that regard, I can understand the edginess of those in Arizona.
And I agree, we may see more of that before the economy picks up enough to reabsorb all these people.
I see that Stage Coach is on tonight. I don't think I've ever seen that one. Another classic.
ReplyDeleteI forgot it was Tues but I see there are 4 films tonight so hope they do that each tues and thurs.I miised the name of the guest host right now but he's a professor and an Indian and picked the films to be shown.Chetenne Autumn up right now.
ReplyDeleteEither way, av, the industries and companies will go to where labor is cheapest. This is a highly mobile corporate world these days.
ReplyDeleteYes, this is a tough world for workers to be sure. But the workers the Arizona people are up in arms about (literally, alas) are those whose jobs are most likely done on site -- construction, hotel and restaurants, landscaping, maintenance, etc.
ReplyDeleteThe mantra is that they are doing jobs Americans don't want to do. The truth is more likely that they are doing jobs Americans don't want to pay for.
Congrats!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Rick. I'm very excited. They offered me fiction or history and I opted to go with history. I'm glad I did after looking at last year's winners and finalists, since they seem to be right down my alley. AND I get to pick my own books! Who could ask for more! Yippee!
ReplyDeleteHad second thoughts about posting that so publicly so deleted that first post. The judges are not secret, but they aren't posted either. But wanted my fellow history readers to know!
ReplyDeleteGood for you Diane!.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Bo! Funny how exciting this is to me. I guess it's the idea of all those books.
ReplyDeleteRobert always said we read the award winners. Now we can test that premise.
I hope you let us know which books you read.
ReplyDeleteI hope everyone lets me know what to read. I"m sure it will be all the books mentioned here. Now I can just order them. Be interesting to see what the other two panelists suggest.
ReplyDeleteSorry for having gone AWOL but had some other irons in the fire which I tended to and now plan to get back in full swing in Am History. Glad to see Trippler, Rick and others have kept Emerson going. Feel bad for not having been a more active part of the discussion.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteDon't beat yourself up. I haven't been an active participant either.
ReplyDeleteToday's Day in History references Reinhard Heydrich, who I just happen to be reading about in Saul Friedlander's "Nazi Germany and The Jews 1933-1945." Last year Harper issued an abridged/combined edition of "The Years of Persecution" and "The Years of Extermination."
ReplyDeleteFriedlander makes an observation on page 146 that struck me as applicable today:
"In most general terms the crisis of Jewry in the Western world was the direct outcome and expression of the crisis of liberal society as such and the rise of antidemocratic forces throughout the West."
Today there are any number of manifestations of "the crisis of liberal society and the rise of antidemocratic forces."
Militant Islam comes to mind. So does the likes of Rand Paul, favorite of Tea Partiers, who doesn't seem to think the federal government should have intervened in the cause of civil rights.
These are interesting times to be sure. I just received a copy of this book, which also looks fascinating:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.amazon.com/Soul-France-Culture-Wars-Dreyfus/dp/0307266311/
Interesting? Or distressing?
ReplyDeleteAs in the curse, may you live in interesting times.
ReplyDeleteCareful when you quote: Discussing this morning a news article about the murderer of 3 women in their 70s & 80s in 1988 who just had his death penalty case argued at the state Supreme Court, leading my boss to comment about the death penalty process being a "farce" upon which I quoted the line about history repeating itself, first as tragedy, second as farce. I came up empty when boss asked the source of the quote, so went back in my office, googled it and found it was a Marx quote--not something like to endear me to him. When I did 'fess up, I asked if he could pretend it was Groucho instead of Karl. He muttered something under his breath, including a word that sounded like "credentials" (I can't think of any other word that sounds like that) but I think I'm useful enough to escape retribution.
ReplyDeleteSo you're widely read. Your boss should happy about that. Just don't start quoting Lenin. That stuff about rope and capitalists is bound to get you in hot.
ReplyDeleteHa, Rick! For that matter, I think I will try to avoid all that camel-through-the-eye-of-a-needle stuff, too.
ReplyDeleteFor the record:
ReplyDeleteYou really can see Devil's Tower (or the tip of it) from the interstate -- which is how Brinkley says he saw it in his book on TR (I was sure that was impossible).
I watched and watched for it, convincing my daughter that I was going to crash the car in the process, but sure enough it came into view on a couple occasions in the distance.
Now I guess I can say I, too, have seen Devil's Tower.