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, not...
That sounds perfect! I have only read a couple of Vidal's histories but have wanted to read them all in order at some point. They aren't great novels, but they make for fascinating reading. I think he is truly brilliant.
ReplyDeleteNICE photo.
ReplyDeleteSometime in the last year the area around the sign and the sign itself have been taken into the public domain and turned in to a park. A rare example of Los Angeles caring about its heritage; usually it just gets trashed. The sign is a bit trashy, too, from my occasional glimpses the most interesting one is over the sculpture garden at the LA County Museum of Art. It seems balanced by the big red stabile in the garden.
ReplyDeleteavrds, I hope you read those historical novels, in order is nice but not necessary. They are a great way to learn history, similar to the Flashman novels in that respect, and nothing like Philippa Gregory's take on the Tudors.
There a few books like that, where I really want to read them all. Vidal's are certainly on that list. I have never read Flashman, but might at some point try the one in the American West -- I think there is one like that...?
ReplyDeleteHarry Flashman is in America a few times, finding himself in an Apache war troop, defending the end of a famous fort in your corner of the world that got burned to the ground (my baf I can't remember the name), as an accidental participant at the Battle of the Little Big Horn in two different books in the west. He also is a slaveholder, a part of the underground railway, at the theater when Lincoln dies (he refers to this, but it isn't played out in the story), and with John Brown at Harpers Ferry. I hope you can forgive him his Raj-ish attitudes toward various races, sexes, and classes. He always gives the individual his due and where appropriate, admiration.
ReplyDeleteYes there are a few but there is the one titled"Flashman and the Indians"Speaking of there are two Indian books featured in the August HBC one just on Wounded Knee and the other on the Sioux.
ReplyDeleteBo, give Harry his due. It's "Flashman and the Redskins."
ReplyDeleteCarol,you are correct.I can't stare at my Flashman titles in the bedroom because they reside in the dining room bookcases now.
ReplyDeleteI think it was Flashman and the Redskins that first caught my attention. Probably an old NY Times discussion -- between Bo and Carol, no doubt!
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of the Hollywood sign just recently private development of luxury homes nearby on the same hillside was headed off by private donations to buy the land from the developer.After a month of nice thick coastal fog in LA with Temps a good ten degrees below normal we went up twenty to 94 today and for the next several days with the valley around 104.Uggh.
ReplyDelete