Steve Goddard's History Wire

Book Alert / Benedict XVI: The Man Who Was Ratzinger

Benedict XVI: The Man Who Was Ratzinger,

by Michael S. Rose. Spence Publishing Co. '05. ISBN # 1-890626-63-5. 160 pages with a brief chronology of Benedict XVI; a list of works published while he was Joseph Ratzinger; and end notes.

                                                       BY REV. GORDON S. BATES

In full disclosure, a review written by a liberal Protestant clergyman of a conservative Roman Catholic writer’s biography of the new Pope should be read with several grains of salt. That being said, I have to think that only the most uncritical reader of Michael Rose’s early assessment of Joseph Ratzinger (Benedict XVI since April 19, 2005) would hold it up as an unbiased account of his prior life as priest, Bishop and Cardinal and his future prospects as the spiritual leader of the world’s Roman Catholics. As a book only a few steps from hagiography, it will be valued as an informative and well-written paean of praise of Ratzinger’s role as the foremost conservative in the Church, whose continuity with John Paul II "will likely come by way of translating the guiding lines of the Wojtyla pontificate into institutional realities."

The only criticism of Ratzinger: the appointment of Fr. William J. Levada of San Francisco to succeed him, after 23 years, at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, whom Rose feels may not be conservative enough. The nine chapters are devoted, first, to indicating the many topics on which the new Pope will probably maintain the essentials of the orthodox or traditional faith: e.g. continuing John Paul II’s restrictions on liberal tendencies; tightening the reins on suspect Catholic theologians and universities; affirming the centrality of the ancient Eucharist against those who would dabble with contemporary liturgies; upholding the nuclear family, marriage and morality; and fighting the battle against the prevailing secular cultures of death and homosexuality.

But, second, Rose boldly anticipates and hopes that Benedict, "the one man left in the Church who is capable of surprising the world," will "reform the reformers," meaning his most recent predecessors in the Papacy going back to John XXIII. Based on Ratzinger’s writings, Rose predicts a heightened use of the Latin Mass; appointments to the posts of Bishop and Cardinal of those known to be heterosexuals and opponents of homosexuality; and the consistent correction of any hints given by previous Popes that the Roman Catholic church accepts or is open to religious pluralism or theological relativism of any sort. Here is a book for the conservative faithful and most likely, a perceptive glimpse into the coming decades for outsiders.

Editor's Note: Rev. Gordon S. Bates is History Wire's regular reviewer of books on religious topics.

How Does a British Academic Fare in America? Ask Bernard Lewis, as He Blows Out His 90 Birthday Candles

The Weekly Standard:

"It is often said that the United States isn't easy on its scholars and public intellectuals--that they are not accorded the prestige and respect that they are given in the Old World. This complaint, usually made by left-wingers struggling against the tide in the United States, isn't totally without merit. A good literary scholar or classicist in the United States perhaps doesn't quite have the same social cachet as would a similarly accomplished scholar at Oxford or the Sorbonne. But when scholars do make it in the United States--and there certainly seem to be vastly more European scholars hoping to make it in America than Americans trying to snag a sinecure in Europe--there is simply no comparison in the eminence, influence, and renown that they can achieve. Since arriving in the United States in 1974, the British historian of the Middle East Bernard Lewis has become one of America's--and thus the world's--most famous academics.

"For those of us seriously interested in the Middle East--and since 9/11 that has become a rather large crowd--Lewis, who will celebrate his 90th birthday on May 31, has attained a stature in the field and with the general reading public unrivaled by any historian, living or dead, of the Middle East and Islam. His range of writings--from the pre-Islamic period, through Islam's classical and medieval ages and its premodern "gunpowder" empires, to today's Muslim nation-states--is simply unparalleled by any other scholar."

25 Years Out -- AIDS Eradication Efforts a Mixed Bag

Reuters:

"Twenty-five years after AIDS was first recognized, the world is in better shape than ever to put an end to the disease but is falling short on many fronts, the United Nations said on Tuesday. 'Despite some notable achievements, the response to the AIDS epidemic to date has been nowhere near adequate,' reported UNAIDS, the U.N. agency that coordinates the global campaign against the devastating disease.

"In the years since U.S. doctors first described it in June 1981, AIDS and the HIV virus that causes it have "spread relentlessly from a few widely scattered hot spots to virtually every country in the world, infecting 65 million people and killing 25 million," UNAIDS said in its 10th annual progress report."

Out in Paperback / Women and the Press -- The Struggle for Equality

Women and the Press -- The Struggle for Equality by Patricia Bradley, Northwestern UPress, ISBN #0-8101-2313-4.

Those who enjoyed Nan Robertson's 1992 memoir, Girls in the Balcony -- Women, Men and The New York Times, can broaden their view in this history of women in the profession of journalism. When this reviewer broke in as a cub reporter in 1961, the only women at The Hartford Times were to be found in the "Society Department," which covered weddings and fluff pieces about food and fashion. Their journey forward is an inspiring, if frustrating, tale. This volume, written by a communications professor at Temple University, asks "Is there a role, a responsibility, for advocacy, even subversion, in a newsroom setting?"

Book Alert / The Sky's The Limit

The Sky's the Limit -- Passion and Property in Manhattan by Steven Gaines. $26.95, 273 pages, ISBN #0-316-60851-3. Index, no bibliography or source notes. Grouping of b&w glossy images.

Regular readers of History Wire know that we're not afraid to review a book that's not of recent issue. With the number of new works published each year now reaching into six figures, it's easy to miss a worthy volume, only to discover and devour it years later. We so enjoyed Steven Gaines's bestselling Philistines at the Hedgerow, about riches and class conflict on Long Island, that we were delighted to learn that in The Sky's the Limit, published in 2005, he's struck again, this time unmasking the world of buying, selling and brokering eight-figure residential real estate in Manhattan.

The author concentrates largely on upper Fifth Avenue and its dramatic tension with the environs of Central Park West. The protagonists are buyers and sellers, many of whom you're already aware of because of the exploits that earned them enough to be playing this game. Gaines profiles a covey of real estate brokers, describing how they came up through the ranks to earn sometimes multimillion dollar salaries -- or more appropriately, commissions. A six per cent commission on a $15 million condo or cooperative can keep you in satin sheets for a good while.

The reader can enjoy this book on many levels. Gaines is not primarily a historian but, as a latter-day Stephen Birmingham, ably sketches the historical backdrop of today's Manhattan real estate scene, explaining how such iconic buildings as the Ansonia and the San Remo came to be. The book contains much hilarity, which is brought on not by Gaines's desire to tell a knee-slapper but simply as an outgrowth of the the unnerving pressure on people to be the best (read richest).

A sample: Apple Computer Steven Jobs decided to completely refurbish the north tower of the San Remo at 145 Central Park West, which unit he bought from a member of the Rothschild banking family. Only renowned architect I.M. Pei would do as a designer even though Pei had never renovated an apartment:

"The results are striking but not very pretty -- a  study in grim, gray granite, with granite floors imported from Europe, and twelve-foot-tall nickel and bronze doors that weigh eight hundred pounds each but are so precisely balanced that they can be opened and shut with a fingertip. In the master bedroom, at the very top of the tower, there are six pivoting, single-pane windows that cost $80,000 each to fabricate. by the time the apartment was finished, Jobs had lost interest and he never moved in. It was uninhabited for a decade (Ed.'s note: think of the carrying costs!). In 2002 Jobs quietly put it on the market for $26.5 million, but with no takers interested in living in a granite quarry, he eventually dropped the price to $18 million, and sold it to Bono, the Irish rock star, who moved from the El Dorado down the street."

Some of Gaines's asides are hilarious, such as the broker who keeps a jar of Grey Poupon mustard in her Bentley to be ready for the inevitable question posed at traffic lights. But he is equally adept at limning the history of New York City housing policy, to show how tenements morphed into cooperatives and, ultimately, into condominiums, providing abundant and engaging detail on each.

French Reign of Terror: Revisionism Deconstructed

The New Yorker -- Adam Gopnik:

"Revisionism in history knows no boundaries. Just in the past few years, we have been told that that comet may have glanced right off the dinosaurs, prodding a few toward flight and feathers; that the German blitzkrieg barely meandered across Europe; and that Genghis Khan was actually a sharing and caring and ecumenical leader, Bill Moyers with a mustache and colorful folk costume.

"So it was inevitable that we would get a revisionist history of the French Reign of Terror—the period from September, 1793, to July, 1794, when the Committee of Public Safety, in Paris, invented the modern thought crime, cut off the heads of its enemies, and created the apparatus of the totalitarian state. Since the time of Burke, through Carlyle’s history of the French Revolution and, above all, Dickens’s 'Tale of Two Cities,' the imagery of the Terror—of the sansculottes knitting as tumbrels rolled—has been lodged deep in our imagination. 'All perished, all , Friends, enemies, of all parties, ages, ranks, Head after head, and never heads enough For those who bade them fall,' Wordsworth wrote, in disillusioned horror, after it was over; and we see the heads falling still.

"Yet our sense of such an iconic moment is bound to be partial—icons are flat. The real question about revisionist history is whether it turns something flat into something three-dimensional or just hangs it on the wall upside down. This revisionist history, now that it has crossed the Atlantic, turns out to be subtler and more interesting than some of the British reviews might have suggested. Written by the academic historian David Andress, the new book is called “The Terror: The Merciless War for Freedom in Revolutionary France” (Farrar, Straus & Giroux; $26), and the subtitle emphatically semaphores the new position."

Chinese Sources Say U.S. Planned to Raid Nuclear Facilities

wwwCHINAVIEW.com:

"A newly-published book said that a U.S. clandestine plan on air raiding China's first nuclear weapon facilities 42 years ago forced Chinese leaders to alter the nation's economic development strategy.  The book on the modern Chinese economy revealed that the country thus had to hide its economic muscles in remote southwestern mountains to avoid the strikes.

"The sudden change of economic development strategy, which governed all the national economic plans from 1966 to 1970, was a fact revealed by an academic book titled The Research Report on China's Ten Five-Year Plans, which was issued by China's top think tank, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) here Tuesday. The book was compiled by prominent economist Liu Guoguang and another handful of elite economists from the CASS.

"The book said, after a careful study of international situations, Chairman Mao Zedong masterminded to change the agreed Third Five-Year Plan (1966-70) from focusing on improving people's livelihood to preparing an all-out war against the "imperialists", particularly the United States.     In bailing Chinese people out of economic hardship resulting from big famines in the late 1950s and early 1960s, the central leadership, steered by Chairman Mao, previously decided to reinvigorate the sluggish national economy in the five years between 1966 and 1970.

Tienanmen Victims' Families Seek Compensation

Reuters:

"Families of victims of the 1989 military crackdown on Tiananmen Square demonstrators have called on the government to reassess the incident and compensate victims, days ahead of the sensitive anniversary of the event. In an open letter released on Monday by the watchdog group Human Rights in China, the 'Tiananmen Mothers' also called for a process of truth and reconciliation over the events of June 3-4, 1989, when troops and tanks suppressed weeks of peaceful protests, killing hundreds.

"'We believe that only by going through a process of determined perseverance can we accumulate results bit by bit,' said the letter from the group headed by Ding Zilin, a retired professor whose teenage son was killed in the crackdown. 'And only though the continuous accumulation of specific results can we achieve a just and proper resolution of the June 4 issue.'"

Croesus Gold Stolen From the Met

Associated Press:

"Two pieces from the treasure of King Croesus that were returned to Turkey from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York after a long legal battle have been stolen and replaced with fakes, the culture and tourism minister said Sunday. Croesus' golden broach in the shape of a sea horse and a coin were switched with replicas at the Usak Museum in western Turkey, said the minister Atilla Koc, confirming a newspaper report on Sunday. 'Unfortunately the incident is true,' Koc said.

"Croesus, the 6th century B.C. king of the Lydians, was the richest man of his time in what is now western Turkey. Ever since, his name has been synonymous with great wealth. The broach was one of 363 artifacts from the so-called 'Lydian Hoard' that was purchased by the Metropolitan Museum in the 1960s. Some 30 years later, the museum acknowledged that it knew the pieces were stolen when it purchased them, and returned them to Turkey."

World War II to Vietnam Vets Interred at New Cemetery

Associated Press:

'About 75 veterans and their families gathered under a pavilion Saturday for the first Memorial Day observance at the nation's newest national cemetery. 'To be able to honor the Georgia veterans who have wanted this for so long _ it's been a great experience to help them,' said Sandra Beckley, director of the Georgia National Cemetery.

"Open since April 24, the $28 million cemetery already has had 179 burials of veterans who fought in conflicts from World War II to Vietnam, and more than 100 funerals have been scheduled through February. Cemetery officials also are planning additional burials from other veterans' deaths this year, Beckley said."