Time for my annual “Spring Cleaning” column, in which I address reader issues and recommend the best books I read during the past 12 months.
My one reader issue is the same as before. I appreciate the volume of reader mail I get, and pride myself on answering every one, good or bad, agree or disagree, in awe of my range of knowledge or in disbelief at the depths of my ignorance. But my mail volume is such that I can only answer each reader once. I cannot, as some readers wish, get into a back-and-forth debate on every column. I suggest that readers looking for a dialogue, including the bloggers who are now posting my columns on their blogs, post their comments about my column on my website, historylessons.net. There I would happily engage in a dialogue.
Recommended reading:
Auschwitz: A New History by Laurence Rees. This is one of the best books I have read on the most famous of the Nazi death camps. The book is full of information about the politics and inner workings of Auschwitz and the other death camps, but Rees mostly tells the story through the eyes of death camp survivors, which is what makes the book so unforgettable.
Thirteen Days in September by Lawrence Wright. Wright, the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Looming Tower, the story of al-Qaeda’s attack on the World Trade Center (which I previously recommended), has written a magnificent account of the Camp David Accords, in which President Jimmy Carter, Israeli leader Menachem Begin and Egyptian leader Anwar Sadat spent 13 days at Camp David, Maryland, negotiating a Middle East peace that earned Sadat and Begin the Nobel Peace Prize. The rivalries, passionate disagreements, angry threats, and the Herculean, and ultimately successful, efforts to keep the talks on track are portrayed in lucid prose and exquisite detail.
The Churchill Factor by Boris Johnson. London’s quirky mayor has written a paean to Winston Churchill that is factual, yet fun to read, in part because Johnson inserts himself into the story in an engaging way. I don’t normally like it when authors intrude upon their subjects, but here it works.
James Madison: A Life Reconsidered by Lynne Cheney. Cheney offers little that is new, but it’s well written and researched, and, hey, it’s about my hero and favorite Founding Father.
Bruce’s History Lessons, Books I and II. Again, a shameless plug. You can purchase both five-year collections of my newspaper columns — years 2001–2006, and 2006–2011 — from the “Buy the Books” link on the home page of my website, or simply Google my name, Bruce G. Kauffmann.
There, the place looks cleaner! I’ll be back next spring.
