Amazon.com
A great memoirist can burnish even an ordinary childhood into something bright--see, for instance, Annie Dillard's An American Childhood. So what about a really good writer with access to a dramatic and little-documented story? This is the case with Catfish and Mandala, Vietnamese American Andrew X. Pham's captivating first book, which delves fearlessly into questions of home, family, and identity. The son of Vietnamese parents who suffered terribly during the Vietnam War and brought their family to America when he was 10, Pham, on the cusp of his 30s, defied his parents' conservative hopes for him and his engineering career by becoming a poorly paid freelance writer. After the suicide of his sister, he set off on an even riskier path to travel some of the world on his bicycle. In the grueling, enlightening year that followed, he pedaled through Mexico, the American West Coast, Japan, and finally his far-off first land, Vietnam.
The story, with some of a mandala's repeated symbolic motifs, works on several levels at once. It is an exploration into the meaning of home, a descriptive travelogue, and an intimate look at the Vietnamese immigrant experience. There are beautifully illuminated flashbacks to the experience of fleeing Vietnam and to an earlier, more innocent childhood. While Pham's stern father, a survivor of Vietcong death camps, regrets that Pham has not been a respectful Vietnamese son, he also reveals that he wishes he himself had been more "American" for his kids, that he had "taken [them] camping." Catfish and Mandala is a book of double-edged truths, and it would make a fascinating study even in less able hands. In those of the adventurous, unsentimental Pham, it is an irresistible story. --Maria Dolan
Book Description
A Vietnamese Bicycle Days by a stunning new voice in American letters.
Andrew X. Pham dreamed of becoming a writer. Born in Vietnam and raised in California, he held technical jobs at United Airlines-and always carried a letter of resignation in his briefcase. His father had been a POW of the Vietcong; his family came to America as "boat people." His sister committed suicide, prompting Andrew to quit his job. He sold all of his possessions and embarked on a year-long bicycle journey that took him through the Mexican desert, where he was treated as a bueno hermano, a "good brother"; around a thousand-mile loop from Narita to Kyoto in Japan; and, after five months and 2,357 miles, to Saigon, where he finds "nothing familiar in the bombed-out darkness." In Mexico he's treated kindly as a Vietnamito, though he shouts, "I'm American, Vietnamese American!" In Vietnam, he's taken for Japanese or Korean by his countrymen, except, of course, by his relatives, who doubt that as a Vietnamese he has the stamina to complete his journey ("Only Westerners can do it"); and in the United States he's considered anything but American. A vibrant, picaresque memoir written with narrative flair and a wonderful, eye-opening sense of adventure, Catfish and Mandala is an unforgettable search for cultural identity.
Customer Reviews:
a random and beautiful encounter.......2007-07-09
i was travelling alone in Lhasa, Tibet and found this book in Makye Ame restaurant. i started reading and couldn't put it down. it gave me true enjoyable solitude on my lonely journey. loved it. i spent the last two days reading it in that restaurant. ordered a copy from Amazon last week and i can't wait to finish it.
my heartfelt thanks to Mr Pham!
. . arriving at the place where you started. . .and knowing it for the first time.......2007-07-09
`I am a mover of betweens' writes Andrew X.Pham. . . `I slip among classifications, like water in cupped palms.' And in his award winning Catfish and Mandala he takes his readers into those `betweens' with him Viet-kieu, `foreign' Vietnamese, Pham sets out from San Francisco on his rickety 18 speed bicycle riding the Pacific Rim, first up the coast to Seattle, then through Japan, and finally arriving in Ho Chi Minh City from where he begins his odyssey through Vietnam, seeking to understand his relationship to the country of his birth, and the people, and his culture.
The ride he takes us on becomes, for the reader, as spiritual as it is physical. We feel every bump in the road, we push up the hills, we are cold, wet, hungry, ambivalent at times, and we suffer from chronic dysentery. Pham meets people who reject him, who taunt him, and those who, often after initial distrust, befriend him for part of the journey. While he is `pedaling and pushing' alone to Hanoi and back , on a journey everyone advises him is too dangerous, the narrative ebbs and flows through his childhood, through the escape on the boat, through the struggles of his family.
Pham moves comfortably from the specific, the particular, like his recollections of Scarface, Bugsy, Redeye, or Bagman and Mechanic, or the roasting ears of corn dripping with pork fat and scallions, to the philosophic - and then the poetic. It is little surprise he has been linked to writers like Thoreau, Kerouac, Steinback.. . I might add William Carlos Williams,T.S.Eliot or Carl Sandburg. He speaks at once of Vietnam and of his uncertain place there and of the US- and in so doing speaks to all of us who now count among the millions who have left homelands and no longer fully understand what home is, and who `move between.'
By the end of Pham's journey we begin to understand what that is, and value it.
moving.......2007-06-09
This story of a family's escape from Vietnam is a captivating memoir. The author combines his family history with richly detailed descriptions of the landscape of Vietnam. Very well-written and moving.
Great book!.......2007-04-30
Born in Vietnam and came to America at the age of 2--this book is such a great read. It's quite a feeling to see so many of my own thoughts and conflicts regarding my heritage written out this way. Highly recommended.
From another Vietnamese's perspective.......2007-02-23
Overall, this book is well written and has its good moments. As a Vietnamese who came to America at the same time frame and age as the writer, I can't help but to dislike the writer as I read the book.
First of all, I think the writer has a condescending view toward Vietnam and the people. He tries too hard to describe the negatives while not trying to even understand the reason for the state of the country and the people. I feel that the writer sensationalizes, even bordeline fictionalize, his story to appease to the readers. In the book, the author tried to describe the character Kim as a victim of the society, yet, he goes on to use her and skip town so he wouldn't have to face her. He paints such a negative picture of everyone that he met on the road. I wonder why he even took this trip. This author is the reason why Vietnamese Americans are so dislike in Vietnam. The author came back to the country without any knowledge nor understanding, and sadly, all he can do is whined.
I'm two years older than the author and came to United States when I was nine. What the author faced is not unlike any other Vietnamese refugees' story. I wonder about some facts and timeline in the author's recollection of his childhood. Base on the events that were stated, the author must have a photographic memory at such a young age. Some of his memories were a bit far fetched. One has to wonder if the memories were really his or a collection of someone else's memories.
As far as the difficulties in a new country, GET OVER IT!!! Every Vietnamese had to endure the similar situations. My father was a high ranking government official and he too had to work as a janitor. My mother who was a teacher, had to work on a assembly line making seat belts. I grew up in Fresno picking oranges and tomatoes. My wife escaped Vietnam by herself at the age of 16. We all survived and thrived on our experiences. There were many, many more Vietnamese who endured much worse fate than Mr. Pham. I find the author's self-indulgent story annoying by the end of the book.
Overall, I think the author tries a bit too hard writing about himself and forget the real victims, his motherland and the Vietnamese people. As much as the author wants to convey of his noble character, I find his views lack of empathy and understanding for Vietnam. I happen to be very proud of my roots and appreciate all that Vietnam has to offered, even with all of its imperfections. Sadly, Mr. Pham reflects many Vietnamese Americans that have turned their back on their roots. I'm proud that I was born in Vietnam and will be proud of my heritage everyday.
Book Description
"The first full-length and scholarly account of why we got into Vietnam in the first place, why we fought as barbarously as the Japanese in Manchuria or the Germans in Poland, and why we deserved to lose it -- indeed why we did have to lose it if we were to find any kind of ultimate peace." -- Henry Steele Commager, Amherst College
"A provocative and informative book written in the easy style of a seasoned teacher. One must wonder what might have been had Backfire been written two decades earlier." -- Paul Bucha, Medal of Honor, Vietnam
"This remarkable book provides a way of looking at the Vietnam War that is both intellectually complex and extremely moving." -- Susan Sontag
In a probing look at the myths of American culture that led us into the Vietnam quagmire, Loren Baritz exposes our national illusions: the conviction of our moral supremacy, our assumption that Americans are more idealistic than other people, and our faith in a technology that supposedly makes us invincible. He also reveals how Vietnam changed American culture today, from the successes and failures of the Washington bureaucracy to the destruction of the traditional military code of honor.
"Baritz reminds us of how confident we were in America's invincibility during those pre-Vietnam War days. He looks closely into 'the invention of South Vietnam' during the Kennedy years, and he examines the body counting war at home--the bureaucratic and psychological effort to convince ourselves that we were winning, and would surely win. Backfire reveals brilliantly why the lessons of Vietnam are so difficult to learn," -- Martin J. Sherwin, History Book Club
Customer Reviews:
Backfire.......2006-01-21
John Sweet
Book review #3
Baritz, Loren. Back Fire: A History of How American Culture Led Us into Vietnam and Made Us Fight the Way We Did. Baltimore: The John's Hopkins University Press, 1985.
Loren Baritz takes a look at the Vietnam War in a way that lets us understand why we decided to fight and why we fought the way we did. Unlike most surveys of the war that focus on the logistical elements and command decisions which explain what the war was Baritz explains why it was. "To understand our present role in the world" Baritz explains, "we must understand the Vietnam debacle." (p.9) Indeed, if we are to learn anything from our mistakes, and virtually everyone now agrees that Vietnam was a mistake, it is essential to know why something happened and not just what happened. To explain why Vietnam happened the way it did Baritz proposes that there is "an inherent connection between war and culture [that is] present in all nations." In our case, Vietnam was fought the way it was because our culture left us no other way to fight it.
Baritz divides the book up into three parts. The first part, Tinder, explains why America decided to fight in Vietnam and the myths that forced us to make war half way around the globe with a people that we did not understand. The second part, Fire, explains how we fell into an ever deeper war in Vietnam and how our means of fighting determined how we fought and why we were unable to effectively combat a vastly inferior military force. The third part, Backfire, is the most telling part of the book for it presents an explanation of how our culture forced us to fight the way we did, why we ultimately lost, and why we are still making the same mistakes today.
In Tinder, Baritz convinces us that Americans firmly believe that we are the best. We are a "chosen people" inhabiting a "city on a hill" doing "Gods work" bringing a "Great Society to Asia." Such blatant solipsism is part of our entrenched American dogma. So ingrained is this self righteousness that we truly can not comprehend someone who does not wish to be like us. One GI put it simply "The Vietnamese are so stupid that they can't understand a great people were trying to help a weak people." So it was, as Baritz explains, that Gods Country went to Vietnam to save them.
Our almost total ignorance of the Vietnamese culture is now legendary but at the time it did not seem important. Our sense of righteousness and invincibility was so complete that we never even considered the possibility that we were the real enemy to the South Vietnamese. One of the greatest blunders of the Vietnam War was the refusal to see the indigenous forces of the South as the main target. Instead, we assumed that the North was behind our failures to win the hearts and minds of the "backwards" South Vietnamese. Baritz is careful to explain that all nations have myths about their own greatness, but it is when these myths of inherent superiority are combined with power that terrible things happen. As was the case for us in Vietnam. Indeed, Baritz's book is now routinely quoted to expose the similarities between Vietnam and Iraq in an attempt to put the brakes on what is turning out to be a similar debacle.
Our moral superiority has often been derived by our technical superiority according to Baritz. Our obsession with the power of technology is absolute. It has been, and is today, the firm belief of most Americans that technology is the answer for most problems. This dependency on technological solutions, according to Baritz, blinded us to the proper response in Vietnam which was counterinsurgency. To truly win the hearts and minds of the South Vietnamese, intelligence and human interaction, practiced on a national scale might have handed the US a victory. But such a strategy offered no stage to display our superior technology. Even when our use of technology was obviously not working the Army responded in a typically American way. "When something failed to work we did more of it."(p.233) While such insanity is self-evident today, at the time it was perversely logical to the American generals who were so caught up in their own myths that to do otherwise would be tantamount to admitting the entire American way of life was wrong. After reading Backfire the belief in American military strategy as an extension of what is essential about America is not such a slippery slope. Baritz is very convincing connecting American culture to the way we fight. We are a technological nation and, more than anyone, dream of winning wars by the push of a button. "Shock and Awe," "smart bombs," and "stealth" are all extensions of our desire to separate us from harm and have the wonders of American ingenuity save the day. In Vietnam, as well as in the war on terror, where there is no front line intelligence gained from good foot soldiers and not bigger and better missiles are the deciding factors in achieving victory.
If all of this is so clear now why do we continue to make the same mistakes? In the third part, Backfire, Baritz explains that we have no choice. We fight the way we do because our culture defines who we are and how we fight. As long as our culture remains the same we will continue to be more efficient in our fighting but no more effective. This is because we are prisoners of our faith in technology. In order to maintain a high tech society the functioning of government, business, and the military must reside in a bureaucracy. As Baritz explains "when the technological mind is turned to the problem of organizing human activity, the result is bureaucracy." (p.48)
Baritz demonetization of the effects of bureaucracy on the military is total. With clarity and logic he explains how the fighting of such a technological war necessitated the bureaucisation of the military and its tragic consequences. The most damning of the outcomes is the development of careerism within the officer corps. The shift of officers from "leaders to managers" created such hazards as a drop in morale, insubordination, lack of responsibility, lack of experience, and unimaginative tactics. When officers are working to "get ahead" the job takes precedence over the mission and the mission suffers as it did in Vietnam.
The combination of bureaucracy and technology in Vietnam led to the eventual, extreme conclusion in strategy, that of having no strategy; the body count. When killing becomes and end unto itself the morality of war breaks down quickly. War becomes cold and passionless. Baritz correctly finds fault with such thinking claiming that "passion is an appropriate response to war." Without passion and debate the bureaucratic ship will be on autopilot. Incidences such as My Lai are the tragic results.
Did we learn from Vietnam? Baritz claims that "one antidote for folly is experience" and the experiences of Vietnam should have cast our invincibility myth into the ashcan as well as our reliance on technology as a panacea. Yet, it seems that the lessons of history are nothing in comparison to the American Myth that we are a city on a hill. Ronald Reagan against the Soviets, Clinton against the third world and the Bush Doctrine of preventive strikes and the forced spread of democracy all have repeated some of the mistakes that we made in Vietnam.
Baritz concludes that "our power, complacency, rigidity, and ignorance have kept us from incorporating our Vietnam experience into the way we think about ourselves and the world." (p.349) To fight a different, more humane, more effective war, will require more than a change in the military structure but a change in American cultural thinking. Looking at the current global policy of the United States, this does seem likely to happen any time soon and so we will continue to fight the way we do: with a national myth that shows us that we are good, with technology that makes us strong, and a bureaucracy that gives us standard operating procedures. Unfortunately, it has proven not to be a winning combination.
Too bad it didn't get read by our leaders.......2004-11-10
I can't add to the description of the book, except to say that it's too bad more people haven't read it. Especially our leadership. It's horrendously important to recognize the failures that we're repeating in Iraq.
Hard book to put down.......2004-01-27
This is a remarkable book that I found very hard to put down. If you are interested in discovering why we went to war, and how we lost it, Backfire if for you. The author avoids the usual mantra of both the left and the right and gives us what may be the most comprehensive analysis of this war written to date. Although I will take issue with some of the authors assumptions, this book should be must reading for the politicians and military who wage war, and for parents who send their children to fight wars.
It is difficult to find fault with the author's contentions that we fought the wrong war. Our enemy fought a political and psychological war, a war against American culture; whereas we fought a conventional war and were trapped by our own cultural assumptions of American invincibility. It is the author premise that American foreign policy was, and is, driven by our cultural myth of America as the City on a Hill. Baritz observes that as Americans we see ourselves as the new Israel, God's chosen people. The author contends that because of this myth the American people see themselves as a moral example to the world, Baritz wrote: It means that we are a Chosen People, each of whom, because of Gods favor and presence, can smite one hundred of our heathen enemies hip and thigh. . . . We believe that the people of the world really want to be like us, regardless of what they or their political leaders say. So Baritz takes the Ugly American approach to our foreign policy.
In a sense, he is right. Our belief in our own invincibility, and that the Vietnamese people wanted to be like us and welcome us drove the war. It was inconceivable to us that they would not share our values, applaud our intentions or embrace our presence. It led us to trust in our guns and to our failure to state our national objectives for this war.
Here are a few of the remarkable insights the author gives us:
There was a tendency for American war planners and policy makers to think the job was done when their plans and policies were approved, leaving no one to monitor whether or not what they decided was effective. He points out that we supported a regime that had little popular support and our conventional military tactics made the problem worse because bombing, artillery, napalm and Agent Orange would wound and kill the very people whose support we needed. After Tet, the Viet Cong insurgency was defeated and the Phoenix program of the assassination of Viet Cong leaders had decimated the leadership of the Viet Cong. By 1970 General Giap had concluded the only way the North could win the war was through regular war, the very kind of big-unit engagement American Generals had hoped for. But by this time, the political war at home was lost. Yes, the press was partially to blame for our defeat. The constant stream of defeatism by the Press, especially during and after the Tet offensive cannot be underestimated in turning American opinion against the war.
Baritz takes issue with the claim that the war could have been won if the military had been allowed to fight it differently. Not because we could not win, but because the American culture at the time precluded such a victory. Vietnam was not perceived as a threat to American, there was no anger in the American public to support such a war. In the end, the North Vietnamese understood American culture, they believed they could win if they did not lose. All they had to do was to outlast American patience. The Americans war leaders believed that they would lose if they did not win. The failure to achieve quick and decisive victory doomed the American war effort.
Has the America changed? Are we now willing to do what we were incapable of doing in the 1960's? that is to wage an effective war? Or has the American public, like that of ancient Rome as the barbarians gathered on their frontiers, grown tired of defending its freedom? Only time will tell.
Excellent critque of US imperialism.......2001-08-05
NATO's assault on Yugoslavia is remarkably similar to the USA's war of aggression against Vietnam. Loren Baritz's excellent book Backfire: a history of how American culture led us into Vietnam and made us fight the way we did, (Morrow, 1985) presents the US Government's pattern of thought, in some detail. The McGeorge Bundy report of February 1965 "concluded by informing the president that if he kept his focus on what the NLF was doing in the South as the cause of our bombing in the north, the world's criticism of the bombing could be dealt with. If the American players would continually emphasize the atrocities of the guerrillas, `the international pressures for negotiation should be quite manageable.' America must not get sucked into negotiations for peace except for what amounted to an unconditional surrender of the guerrillas." "While he (President Johnson) was destroying the country with bombing, defoliation and napalm, he could without cynicism speak of peace and progress. He believed that the destruction was unfortunately necessary before the construction could occur. That was Ho Chi Minh's fault." "During the debate about whether the United States should send its bombers to help the French at Dien Bien Phu, the Chief of Staff of the army, General Matthew B. Ridgway, recalled that in Korea, where he had been in command, `We had learned that air and naval power alone cannot win a war ... It was incredible to me that we had forgotten that bitter lesson so soon - that we were on the verge of making that same tragic error.' The lesson we had learned in World War II was forgotten before it was relearned in Korea, and was forgotten again in Vietnam. Old myths apparently neither die nor fade away. Before America withdrew from Vietnam, we dropped four times more bombs on Vietnam than all the bombs we dropped all over the world during World War II. It did not work, as the CIA regularly said it would not." "LBJ had received the advice to start the air war to prevent the ground war." But a failed air war provoked pressure for a ground war. "The decision to send in the marines was based on the assumption that they would serve only `security', not combat, objectives. The war planners did not have to admit to themselves that they were in an Asian ground war. The President did not inform the American public about the decision to send the marines when he had the opportunity to do so. America soon learned what was happening, and Secretary Rusk explained, if that is the right word, that the marines were ordered to avoid combat, only to return enemy fire." Paul Warnke, the appropriately-named Pentagon hack, said, "There is no question of the fact that we can keep on winning the war forever. We always win and we always will, and it won't ever make any difference. Our wins won't make a clear dent because there is no way in which we can bring about political progress in South Vietnam. ... The more of an American occupation you engage in the longer you're going to stay." "Guerrillas do not need to win; they simply must avoid losing. Conventional forces must win. Guerrillas can wait for the expense of foreign expeditionary forces to wear down the enemy's economy, and for the accumulating casualties to enrage the home front. Guerrillas are at home to start with. They never need to fight set battles unless they choose to. Because they can wait, time is on their side and is therefore a test of the enemy's patience and will in a distant land." "General Westmoreland's `strategy' was to fight a `war of attrition', to kill as many guerrillas and North Vietnamese troops as possible. Then they would quit. Then we would win. The killing became the objective. General Westmoreland did not know what else to do: `What alternative was there to a war of attrition?'" But, as a standard military textbook said, "Attrition is not a strategy."
Powerful and provocative analysis of the U.S. role in Vietna.......2000-05-13
The subtitle of "Backfire" - "A History of How American Culture Led Us into Vietnam and Made Us Fight the Way We did" - sums up the contents well. But it fails to suggest the great evil and ignorance which Baritz's scholarly analysis reveals. Example: G.I.s spent a full year in Vietnam; officers were rotated in and out every six months. Reason: Officers needed to "punch their tickets" (i.e. serve in Vietnam) if they wanted to rise up the ladder of promotion. So military policy was formulated based on that priority, not on the obvious fact that just as officers were becoming really experienced combat leaders, they were sent home and replaced by inexperienced officers. The resulting cost of American lives amounts to a war crime on the part of senior military leaders who put the policy into effect, a war crime against their own men! Another example: U.S. soldiers derided Vietnamese men as "fags" because they saw them holding hands. They were ignorant of Vietnamese culture in which such conduct has nothing to do with sexual preference. Thus, "why fight for a bunch of fags" became a prevalent attitude. Baritz's book is different than almost any other on Vietnam - and more thoughtful and thought-provoking.
Book Description
A dramatic memoir that tells the story of a young boys life in South Vietnam and his escape to America ten years later. Kien Nguyen watched the last U.S. Army helicopter leave without him. Kien was more at risk than most because of his odd blond hair and his light eyes. He was the most unwanted. Told with stark and poetic brilliance, this is a story of survival and hope.
Customer Reviews:
Hard to put down............2007-10-11
This story was fantastic...It was hard to stop reading. Both my husband and I read the book while on vacation and really enjoyed.
Kien Nguyen does a wonderful job telling his life. I would love a sequel...to know the how his life was after arriving in the U.S.
Gone With The Wind for the Vietnam Conflict.......2007-07-16
Book Review by John J. Fitzgerald
The Unwanted: A Memoir
Kien Nguyen
New York and Boston: Little Brown, 2001
This is a compelling read. It held my attention and I finished it in two readings. Perhaps, because I am a Vietnam veteran, the book's theme held my attention. What happens to the people that we leave behind after an American invasion is repulsed and eventually comes to an end? Many of those who worked with and for the Americans will be viewed as collaborators. French women who dated German soldiers in Paris during WW2 were regarded as trash. What happens to the children of these women and their "foreign affairs", after the invader departs or flees? There have been a lot of these American invasions over the last century or so, and the story told here probably echoes in other lands. In a few years, we will probably get a similar tale based on Iraq.
Kien Nguyen seems to have written an honest tale. Parts of it do not ring true. Not all of the Communist officials are corrupt. Some of the corrupt officials in his tale are actually placed on trial by other Communist officials. He seems to have a very puritanical view of sexual relations and some of his sex scenes are quite sadistic. He does not treat a loving, young, girl friend very well. In fact the "hero," our narrator, is quite self-centered and depicts himself as the innocent victim of all of the activity swirling around him. He seems to dislike, if not hate, his mentally challenged sister. There are some scenes of torture that strain credibility, unless you buy the notion that the Vietnamese people are generally cruel. He has a scene where his cousins kick a dog to death. This strikes me as strange when they could have killed and cooked the animal. Captured "boat people" are first rescued and then "tortured" for no clear reason.
Escape from Hell, Vietnam, is the main goal of the story. The United States is described as the Heavenly City where all truth, goodness and beauty are thought to reside. It is also "air conditioned." The story is heavily shaped by ideology. Americans are good and Vietnamese are not good, for the most part.
The theme of the "Wizard of Oz" is part of this story. If Dorothy can just get to the Emerald City everything will be all right. Kien is our Vietnamese Dorothy.
He can't be happy, or even half happy, living in Vietnam. His real home is America! Dorothy would have settled for Kansas!
I read this book as the product of a South Vietnamese, Republic of Vietnam, "take" on the events of the Vietnam War. The narrator's family members were collaborationists and were quite well off and during their reign of power they treated their countrymen as simply their servants and their inferiors. The one strong character in the tale is the grand-father, and in the best Confucian tradition he is always wise and judicious. He was an officer in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) and it was one of the most corrupt armies the world has ever seen. But he was a hero. (The narrator does not dwell on that fact of life.)
At times, I found myself thinking of Scarlet O'Hara in "Gone With The Wind." Fighting to maintain her ante-bellum lifestyle in a post Civil War Georgia, Scarlet feels no responsibility for slavery. She struggles to hold on to a world that no longer exists. Kien's mother is a lot like Scarlet and so is Kien. Narcissistic and egotistical, they have no sense of obligation to society and act surprised that the society that they reject, rejects them.
Aristocrats after the French Revolution of 1789 acted the same way. They hated the new regime and dreamed of the golden days of the "Ancien Regime."
At times the book seems a bit surreal. But then, the world of Kien is not quite real. He is a half-breed, part Caucasian-American and part Vietnamese. His identity is not anchored in either culture. Some of his narration reveals this when he prays to Buddha and then to God. His words contain some American slang and you have to wonder where he learned it. Was it from his mother?
The book seems to contain a measure of truth. The treatment of the children born of American fathers and Vietnamese women was not kind or humane. Children of colored Americans and Vietnamese women are treated the worst of all. Women get the worse treatment of all. Vietnam is a very sexist society.
The fact that the Vietnamese government allows Kien and his family to leave is not explained. It happens "out of the blue." (There is not much history in this memoir. During the period of the memoir, the big issue in the USA was where are our MIA's and our POW's? Sylvester Stallone was making his fantasy films about the war. The U.S. kept an embargo in place against Vietnam until the 1990's. The Vietnamese never received any of the promised compensation that Nixon/Kissinger promised in their peace treaty of 1973.) Nor is there any serious mention of the damage done to the country and the people of Vietnam by the American war effort. After the American Revolution, those who sided with the British, the "Tories" were regarded as traitors and many of them fled from the states back to England. They were not wanted by their neighbors. These were some of the original "boat people" of American history.
This book might do some harm. It contributes to the notion that the Americans (who invaded Vietnam) were the ones who suffered the most from the Vietnam War. It seems to support the Ronald Reagan claim that the war was a "Noble Cause." In American history, if you believe that the Confederate South's fight against the Union Army was a "Noble Cause," you will probably never get to a clear understanding of the American Civil War. There are some people who do not want us to come to a clear understanding of either the American Civil War or the War in Vietnam. They prefer that we endorse myth over history.
This memoir/book reads too much like a novel to be a significant contribution to history. I predict that it will soon be a Hollywood movie. Right up there with, "Gone With The Wind." It will make the same kind of lasting "contribution" to our understanding of the American past.
-----
See below for an idea of what Ronald Reagan considered the history of the Vietnam War to be.
Source: http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1982/21882b.htm
Public Papers of Ronald Reagan
February 1982
The President's News Conference
February 18, 1982
- - - - - -opening statement- - - - - -
And now, Jim [Jim Gerstenzang, Associated Press], I can't think of anything else to say, so you can ask the first question.
El Salvador
Q. Thank you.
Mr. President, the Secretary of State has said that the United States will do whatever is necessary to head off a guerrilla victory in El Salvador and that the mood of the American people should not necessarily determine our course there. Do you agree with those statements, and under what conditions would you send combat troops to El Salvador?
The President. Well, once again, Jim, we get into an area -- there are all kinds of options -- economic, political, security, and so forth -- that can be used in situations of this kind. And as I've said so often, I just don't believe that you discuss those options or what you may or may not do in advance of doing any of those things -- except that I will say, lest there be some misunderstanding, there are no plans to send American combat troops into action anyplace in the world.
Q. If I could follow that up. Can you just envision any circumstances under which we would be sending U.S. combat troops to El Salvador?
The President. Well, maybe if they dropped a bomb on the White House, I might get mad.
- - - - - - other questions - - - - -
Lou [Lou Cannon, Washington Post]?
Nicaragua
Q. Mr. President, have you approved of covert activity to destabilize the present Government of Nicaragua?
The President. Well, no, we're supporting them. Oh, wait a minute, wait a minute. I'm sorry. I was thinking El Salvador, because of the previous -- when you said that. Nicaragua. Here again, this is something upon which the national security interest -- I will not comment.
But let me say something about all of Central America right now, and questions on that subject. Next week I will be addressing the Organization of American States on that entire subject, and therefore, I'll save any answers to any questions on that subject.
Q. If I could follow up, do you approve or reject -- or do you care to state what your policy is as far as having American covert operations to destabilize any existing government without specific reference to Nicaragua?
The President. No, again I'm going to say this is like discussing the options. No comment on this.
Yes, George [George Skelton, Los Angeles Times].
El Salvador
Q. Mr. President, although you have no plans to send combat troops to El Salvador, plans can be developed quickly. I'd like to hear some expression of your commitment, if there is one, not to use American combat forces in El Salvador. And, again, just how far will your administration go to keep the Duarte government from falling?
The President. Well, George, your question again gets to that thing that I have always said I think has been wrong in the past, when our government has done it -- and I will not do it -- and that is to put down specific do's and don't's [sic] with regard to some situation that deals with not only security matters but even such things as trying to influence a situation such as the one in Poland. I think that to do so is just giving away things that reduce your leverage.
- - - - - - - - other questions - - - - - -
Now, Lesley [Lesley Stahl, CBS News], you were -- --
U.S. Foreign Covert Operations
Q. Thank you, Mr. President. I'm sorry, but I'd like to go back to Latin America and El Salvador for a minute.
In the 1960's the CIA came up with a secret plan to get us involved in Vietnam in a surreptitious, covert manner. Is it possible that you can tell us that there is no secret plan now devised by the CIA or any other agency in government to surreptitiously involve Americans in similar activities in Latin America? And can you also assure the American people that we will not go in there secretly without you and this Government giving us some pre-warning?
The President. Well, Lesley, you know there's a law by which things of this kind have to be cleared with congressional committees before anything is done.
But again, if I may point to something -- I'm not in total agreement with the premise about Vietnam. If I recall correctly, when France gave up Indochina as a colony, the leading nations of the world met in Geneva with regard to helping those colonies become independent nations. And since North and South Vietnam had been, previous to colonization, two separate countries, provisions were made that these two countries could, by a vote of all their people together, decide whether they wanted to be one country or not.
And there wasn't anything surreptitious about it, that when Ho Chi Minh refused to participate in such an election -- and there was provision that people of both countries could cross the border and live in the other country if they wanted to. And when they began leaving by the thousands and thousands from North Vietnam to live in South Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh closed the border and again violated that part of the agreement.
And openly, our country sent military advisers there to help a country which had been a colony have such things as a national security force, an army, you might say, or a military to defend itself. And they were doing this, if I recall correctly, also in civilian clothes, no weapons, until they began being blown up where they lived and walking down the street by people riding by on bicycles and throwing pipe-bombs at them. And then they were permitted to carry sidearms or wear uniforms.
But it was totally a program until John F. Kennedy -- when these attacks and forays became so great that John F. Kennedy authorized the sending in of a division of Marines. And that was the first move toward combat troops in Vietnam.
So, I don't think there's any parallel there between covert activities or anything -- --
Q. Will you tell me that there will not be secret plan that you will not tell the American people about?
The President. I can't answer your question for the same reason that I couldn't answer George's. I just can't answer on that.
There's a lady in the very back row.
- - - - - - - other questions - - - - -
And so it goes!
Excellent! Very Well Written.......2007-06-25
I could not put this book down. It was that good! Every chapter was so vivid and intense.
evocative.......2007-06-09
This book is a distressing and fascinating story and also one of courage. In clear language devoid of bitterness the author tells of the years following the Vietnam War. Both insightful and inspiring.
A wanted reading.......2007-04-04
It's amazing that one person can go through such repeated tragedies in one lifetime. I hope Kien writes a follow up book to document his new life in the United States.
Customer Reviews:
Vietnam on Film.......2004-06-11
These film essays look at documentary filmmaking and news reporting on the Vietnam War. I read this book as part of a film class at in college. This book is best for a person interested in the representation of war, especially this particularily divisive war will be moved by reading this book.
Sleepless in Heaven!.......2000-02-24
This book was amazing! It was very insightful and deep. I learned more about this era from this book than i ever did in high school!
Amazon.com
In Tangled Memories, Marita Sturken attempts to explain how events take on cultural meaning through what she calls "technologies of memory," primarily monuments, texts, icons and images. She argues memory has as much to do with fantasy and invention as with truth and that it attains a narrative form separate from history and possessed of its own political significance. Although it focuses primarily on the Vietnam War and the AIDS epidemic, her book also takes in the Kennedy assassination, the Challenger explosion, the beating of Rodney King, and the Gulf War. Sturken's conclusions are often belabored: that the American Vietnam memorial fails to capture the horrors brought upon the Vietnamese people is a rather unoriginal and obvious insight she blames on the "underlying nationalism of the Washington Mall." Does the AIDS quilt she documents likewise obscure the worldwide ravages of the disease when spread upon the Mall? The theoretical discussion of memory and representation often bogs down in the political positions the author assumes rather than defends. One of the pities of such difficult exposition is that a relatively superb chapter on the Gulf War is "forgotten,"a mere 22 pages of her 358-page book.
Book Description
Analyzing the ways U.S. culture has been formed and transformed in the 80s and 90s by its response to the Vietnam War and the AIDS epidemic, Marita Sturken argues that each has disrupted our conventional notions of community, nation, consensus, and "American culture." She examines the relationship of camera images to the production of cultural memory, the mixing of fantasy and reenactment in memory, the role of trauma and survivors in creating cultural comfort, and how discourses of healing can smooth over the tensions of political events.
Sturken's discussion encompasses a brilliant comparison of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the AIDS Quilt; her profound reading of the Memorial as a national wailing wall--one whose emphasis on the veterans and war dead has allowed the discourse of heroes, sacrifice, and honor to resurface at the same time that it is an implicit condemnation of war--is particularly compelling. The book also includes discussions of the Kennedy assassination, the Persian Gulf War, the Challenger explosion, and the Rodney King beating. While debunking the image of the United States as a culture of amnesia, Sturken also shows how remembering itself is a form of forgetting, and how exclusion is a vital part of memory formation.
Book Description
A tale of the unmaking of the first American movie filmed in Vietnam in 1957, the scandalous and disasterous undertaking is finally exposed. Surviving cast and crew members explain a contorted drama behind the scenes as Audie Murphy goes to Vietnam, foreshadowing the war-to-come. It depicts Hollywood at its worst!
Customer Reviews:
Special Book!.......2002-02-05
What I like most about this book is that it takes a few months from 1957 on a film location and tells how it feels to be there. The movie was not great, and it was forgotten soon enough. Yet, the atmosphere of film making and the camaraderie of the crew and cast is just a wonderful experience. Yes, they had some terrible times, with ego clashing and scandals covered up, but it is such a nostalgic little story, reading like a novel. All the people in the story, Audie Murphy and Michael Redgrave, mostly are fascinating, and how nice to have a special look at them. I truly enjoyed this armchair escape to another time and another place. Thanks!
Special Book!.......2002-02-05
What I like most about this book is that it takes a few months from 1957 on a film location and tells how it feels to be there. The movie was not great, and it was forgotten soon enough. Yet, the atmosphere of film making and the camaraderie of the crew and cast is just a wonderful experience. Yes, they had some terrible times, with ego clashing and scandals covered up, but it is such a nostalgic little story, reading like a novel. All the people in the story, Audie Murphy and Michael Redgrave, mostly are fascinating, and how nice to have a special look at them. I truly enjoyed this armchair escape to another time and another place. Thanks!
REAL INSIGHTS INTO AUDIE MURPHY!.......2001-05-09
This book has info about Audie that is not anywhere else. The author interviewed people close to Audie who never have talked about him before for publication. The movie The Quiet American was a special project for him, according to his best friend Willard Willingham. He soon hated doing it because Vietnam, even in 1957, was not a pleasant place before the war. This book reads like a novel but is all true. If you really want insights into Audie Murphy, you must read this book. Despite all that happened, he knew what he had to do. He was not just an actor. He was a hero--and in the Quiet American, he played the part to perfection. There is another remake of the movie now filmed, but nothing can top the original.
A Thoughtful Damn.......2000-04-22
This really is a marvelous book--full of all the details and asides that you don't get to read elsewhere. I found it amusing as well as informative. The author, Dr. Russo, clearly knows his subject--and shares his knowledge in a very entertaining way.
Behind the Scenes.......1999-11-17
I have read a few movie making books, but this book is a revelation about how many things can go wrong during production, how stuff like the flu, misplaced permits, even inoculations, could cause a movie to flop. Russo makes us feel how all these actors and crew worked so hard--knowing it was getting worse every day and the movie itself would not be what they wanted. I just loved this book to find out about Vanessa Redgrave's father and what Saigon was like before American soldiers changed it forever.
Book Description
In a remote Inupiat Eskimo village in 1971, the friendship and love between a young female shaman, a traditional hunter and a draft-dodging ecologist leads to tragedy.
Customer Reviews:
Intriguing and Intensely Detailed Story of the Far North.......2007-09-30
Lesley Thomas detailed this book so intricately that it seems real. I was most especially fascinated by the character of Kayuqtuq "Gretchen" Ugungoraseok, who is an orphan Native American adopted by the Inupiat, which means real people.
Kayuqtuq is a young woman living in a subsistence culture with roots that extend thousands of years into the past. Her observations of people, including naluagmiu (white man) Leif Trygvesen, are from the perspective of her culture. I was completely fascinated.
Though Kayuqtuq is already a young woman in this story, which is set in 1971, emotionally she is dealing with trauma from her childhood; perhaps she is also dealing with the continuous trauma of harsh life in the Arctic. The result is that Kayuqtuq's story is frequently more like a coming of age story than the story of a person who has already reached adulthood.
Part of Kayuqtuq's coping strategy is to become an angutkoq, or shaman. Regardless of whether Kayuqtuq has shaman powers or is incredibly intelligent, her insights and visions of events are remarkably accurate and frequently prescient. Unfortunately, her visions and insight fail to give her enough clarity to prevent tragedies.
This novel is primarily the story of Kayuqtuq "Gretchen" Ugungoraseok and Leif Trygvesen. The story is partially about the clash of cultures, but also about how Kayuqtuq and Leif react differently to the situations around them because of their cultures. Kayuqtuq and Leif's perspectives allow us to see how Inupiat culture views various situations in comparison to European culture.
Shading and complicating the cultural differences between Kayuqtuq and Leif is that each is multicultural in their own way. The Inupiat adopted Kayuqtuq, but she is Native American. European and Viking culture strongly influenced Leif's mother and father, but Leif is from the United States. Adding even more complexity is that each is an outsider in their culture. Kayuqtuq is trying to learn to become an angutkoq, which Inupiat elders forbid, and Leif is an environmentalist and against the war in Viet Nam, neither of which made him popular with "The Establishment" in 1971. It was probably inevitable that the two outsiders found kindred spirits in each other and came to love each other. Perhaps the tragedies that followed were just as inevitable.
Lesley Thomas's writing reminds me of the detail that Charles Dickens put into his novels. I like Dickens' writing very much and I am unable to recall any modern author to whom I have been exposed that writes with such intricacy and precision. However, Lesley's writing is so clear and organized that even with the complexity of the story I never got lost or had to re-read a section. This book is such a literary achievement that it has received awards from The National Federation of Press Women, The Alaska Press Women, and The Washington Press Association.
This book is neither a light read, nor is it a book that you will forget any time soon. I will admit that my eyes were moist as I finished Lesley Thomas's story of Kayuqtuq and Leif. Lesley's writing pulled me so deeply into the characters that they seemed real to me. Just as in real life, what happened to them can not be undone, no matter how we might wish otherwise. Even now, several days after finishing this novel, I wish I could undo what happened, but then Lesley's message would have been diluted, and I, and future readers, would have been less affected.
The awards this fictional novel has won are well-deserved. This book is one of the best modern novels I have read. It is truly a great novel. If you enjoy stories about the conflict in cultures, if you have ever liked Dickens, if you want to read about the effect modern culture has had on the Inupiat and the environment of the far north, or if you just want to read an incredibly well written book, get this one.
I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did.
flight of the soul............2007-08-26
I'm happy to recommend this intricate and poetic novel to those looking for more than a quick read or an easy story: looking for something more soulful, something that leaves the heart transformed.
Much has been written about the hundreds of cultures destroyed by Christian missionaries, whether they carry bibles or rifles or deeds or broken treaties. The setting of this drama is a small Alaskan village trying to hold itself together in the aftermath of partial colonization. But Lesley Thomas does not return preaching for preaching. Instead, she draws upon her own life experience to show the reader exactly what life there looks like detail by detail one conversation at a time, all of it set against an Alaskan landscape so searing and mysterious that it too becomes a character.
In this setting two people try to find each other: an Indian woman whose English name is Gretchen, and the biologist she calls the Birdman. Again and again they miss each other, only to be brought back together by a passion deeper than words: a fine demonstration of how much hurt can be inflicted on a budding romance to the extent lovers try to protect themselves from each other. There is a lovely byplay in which Gretchen sneaks into the biologist's camp to read his very personal journal, which he conveniently leaves under his pillow. How badly these two want to talk to each other, and how hard they find it to do so, is a tension behind the subplots playing out between Inupiat villagers, visiting whites, orphaned Gretchen, and a very confused but sensitive scientist suddenly exposed to a wider world than was dreamed of in his philosophy.
A complication: Gretchen is a practicing shaman who does not fully understand what she's doing. Her struggles are consistent with how other cultures understand shamanism (as opposed to New Age workshop "neoshamanism" bent to the agenda of self-improvement), including her spells of dissociation and the terrifying images she encounters. It's gratifying to read an author who has done her homework on this topic, especially at a time when so much Native lore has been appropriated, adulterated, and sold to people who don't know any better.
As a reader who teaches a graduate-level myth class, I appreciated the mythological references, quotes, stories, legends, all lightly touched on without interfering with the pace of events. A good question for the reader to wonder about while reading: What myth are the lovers caught up in, and what are their options for finding each other from within it? (The old Norse saying that starts the Prologue puts it well: "How can anyone know what is possible for those in love?")
Another dimension to this novel is the ecological, particularly as people on the scene (including the biologist) note the climate changes and business decisions that threaten the Alaskans. The ultimate fate of everyone in range--and nowadays we are all in range--is clear: "The animals are sickening and we are told not to eat them, nor nurse our own babies. Soon we must leave our home, retreating from the rising waves. We will join the saddened animals and wander, hoping for mercy from strangers." It would seem to be a law of history and psychology too that those who experience themselves as perpetually angry exiles and outcasts tend to inflict displacement on other creatures unless a way is found to bind up the original wounds and find a sense of homecoming.
Many poignant episodes appear throughout the story. One occurs about two-thirds of the way through when Gretchen, who thinks of herself as ugly, is finally able to experience some of her own inner and outer beauty by trying to retrieve the soul of the man she loves and yet torments.
Mental health professionals in the U.S. have been slow to realize that not all psychological anguish arises from within. What happened to both Gretchen and the Birdman to make them both so guarded and so easily injured has roots in the shadows and pathologies of their cultures. Part of the difficulty of healing and connecting involves their attempts to shoulder what are actually historical-colonial legacies of wounding playing out in personal relationships.
To end these terrible legacies: how to do that? What will it take to make the dominant culture less lethal to itself, to Earth, to people it regards as Other? The myths of many times and this novel offer a hint: the story must be rewritten from within it, starting with many small and large acts of sacrifice carried out in love strong enough to fly like the goose into the heavens.
Two Tin Tallin's Fly Away.......2007-08-22
What a cosmic, karmic, seismic shift the elders in Lesley Thomas' excellent epic, centered in the 1971 Alaskan Arctic, have endured in their lifetimes. This haunting book is a love story, a paean to survivors, an ode to a land and civilization literally melting - disappearing while the Bush/Cheney/Coleman Global Big Oil Band plays on.
Lesley's lovely book is wonderfully written, but yet, at least for this reviewer, sometimes difficult to read. I find myself feeling like Billy Jack in the ice cream store: 'I try. I really try' not to let the [bad guys] get me down and 'then I think of ... this idiotic moment of yours and I Just Go Berserk.'
Please read this book, and pass it on to all your sane friends and relatives and maybe, just maybe, if enough of us on this Group W Bench (listen to Alice's Restaurant again) band together, we can stop the insanity!
... cue Jinx Dawson and Coven o/~ One Tin Soldier Rides Away o/~
/TundraVision, Amazon Reviewer
A beautiful, well-written story.......2007-08-17
I can't pretend and say that I know a whole lot about shamanism and indigenous culture in general because I don't. When I read Lesley Thomas' FLIGHT OF THE GOOSE, I initially thought she was part of the indigenous culture that she writes about in her novel. Lesley really dives into every minute detail about the daily lives of the indigenous people in Alaska and their culture including their language. I was wrong. Judging by the text, the author really did her research on the language, spirituality, and the mundane every day life of the indigenous natives in Alaska. There is even a glossary of Inupiaq in the back of the book that defined certain words that she used in her story. The authenticity of Lesley's novel alone gets major kudos from me.
The story of FLIGHT OF THE GOOSE is told from two different perspectives...Gretchen, a young solitary Inuit who is teaching herself to become a shamaness, and Leif, a biologist who is trying to avoid the draft. Their romance certainly plays a big role in Lesley's novel but the author also addresses other issues like war, the environment, and the clashing cultures of the older and younger Inuits without coming off as preachy and sanctimonious.
I am normally not a big fan of romance novels. I find them rather unrealistic and phoney but Lesley Thomas's novel is anything but unrealistic. What I really liked about the book was the authencity of the book. The amount of research that Lesley invested into her book really shines through especially when she describes the uneventful daily lives of Gretchen and her people.
I loved reading FLIGHT OF THE GOOSE. Lesley Thomas has a wonderful gift for storytelling. She has made a new fan out of me who rarely reads fiction nowadays.
Beautiful & Moving Story ...........2007-08-09
I just finished this book five minutes ago and scores of thoughts and images are floating through my mind right now. It is hard for me to figure out what to say in a review that hasn't been said already and how to convey the thoughts I'd like to share. It is an incredible book and one that I would not hesitate to recommend to any book club or anyone else to read.
First off, it's very lyrical. I can actually see the tundra and the sea breaking loose from the ice after a long hard winter. I can actually see the tent in the middle of the marsh. I can see the love shining in a young Indian's eyes, the fear and the impotent rage. I can see how love triumphs over bitterness and the very humanness of being human and scared. It is also a very lush novel ~~ lyrical and lush, my two favorite types of descriptions when it comes to reading. It is not a book to put down at a whim ~~ no, it's a book to savor and re-read over and over simply because of the beauty of language and description.
Secondly, I have always loved reading about different cultures. Perhaps it's because it's so different from my own life (which seems to be very much a white-bread and butter type in comparison to this novel's people). Whatever the reason is, I enjoy reading about it. Thomas does a great job of carrying me across the whole nation into a different world ~~ a world of ice and beauty, fraught with danger and redemption. It is not just a love story, it is about a disappearing way of life that makes your heart sad because once a way of life is gone, there is no way of reclaiming it.
Thirdly, it is one of the most beautiful love stories I have ever read. It's not your typical bosom-heaving type novel ~~ no, it's about a real love story of two star-crossed lovers. It's beautiful and real. A young man lost in the anger of his failed relationship with his father, grieving over the death of his brother, avoiding the Vietnam war finds love with a young girl, who is an orphan and a shamaness, wild at heart and unable to give away her heart. This book shows that love conquers all, even death.
In all honesty, you cannot pick this book up and read it, then forget about it. There are too many rich details in this book that throughout the course of the day, you'll be doing something, then you'll be reminded of something else in the book. This is a book that you will want to read again in a few years. And again. It is one of the most beautiful story you'll ever want to read.
Pick up this book and soar into a world of beauty that you will never forget.
8-9-07
Book Description
The ongoing effort of the United States to account for its missing Vietnam War soldiers is unique. The United States requires the repatriation and positive identification of soldiers’ bodies to remove their names from the list of the missing. This quest for certainty in the form of the material, identified body marks a dramatic change from previous wars, in which circumstantial evidence often sufficed to account for missing casualties. In The Remains of War, Thomas M. Hawley considers why the body of the missing soldier came to assume such significance in the wake of the Vietnam War. Illuminating the relationship between the effort to account for missing troops and the political and cultural forces of the post-Vietnam era, Hawley argues that the body became the repository of the ambiguities and anxieties surrounding the U.S. involvement and defeat in Southeast Asia.
Hawley combines the theoretical insights of Judith Butler, Michel Foucault, and Emmanuel Levinas with detailed research into the history of the movement to recover the remains of soldiers missing in Vietnam. He examines the practices that constitute the Defense Department’s accounting protocol: the archival research, archaeological excavation, and forensic identification of recovered remains. He considers the role of the American public and the families of missing soldiers in demanding the release of pows and encouraging the recovery of the missing; the place of the body of the Vietnam veteran within the war’s legacy; and the ways that memorials link individual bodies to the body politic. Highlighting the contradictions inherent in the recovery effort, Hawley reflects on the ethical implications of the massive endeavor of the American government and many officials in Vietnam to account for the remains of American soldiers.
Book Description
American popular culture changed dramatically during the Vietnam era--from Leave it To Beaver to All in the Family and from Bobby Darin to Bob Dylan. In Crossroads, historian Mitchell K. Hall explores the popular culture that shaped the baby boomers and the transformation that generation wrought in movies, television, sports, and music. As he traces the evolution of American culture, Hall looks at the ways in which these cultural elements not only underwent radical structural changes but also reflected the upheaval and unrest in Vietnam era America.
Books:
- On the Ridge Between Life and Death: A Climbing Life Reexamined
- Panzers I and II and Their Variants: From Reichswehr to Wehrmacht
- People of the Silence: A Novel of the Anasazi (The First North Americans series, Book 8)
- Police Ethics: The Corruption Of Noble Cause
- Private Pilot Manual (JS314500)
- Rethinking the Principles of War
- Royal Navy Aces of World War 2 (Aircraft of the Aces)
- Sea of Thunder: Four Commanders and the Last Great Naval Campaign 1941-1945
- Sharpe's Trafalgar: Richard Sharpe & the Battle of Trafalgar, October 21, 1805 (Richard Sharpe's Adventure Series #4)
- Shenandoah Summer: The 1864 Valley Campaign
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- The GOLD OF EXODUS
- Living Snakes of the World in Color
- El Sueno de la Razon
- History: Fiction or Science
- Hollywood Asian: Philip Ahn and the Politics of Cross-Ethnic Performance
- Planet India: How the Fastest Growing Democracy Is Transforming America and the World
- Island of the Setting Sun: In Search of Ireland's Ancient Astronomers
- Legal U.S. Immigration: Influences on Gender, Age, and Skill Composition
- Don't Flinch!: Devotions for Competitors
- Evaluating The Nonprofit Ceo: A Guide for Chief Executives and Board Members
General
| Asia
| History
| Subjects
| Books
Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and the Civil Rights Struggle of the 1950s and 1960s: A Brief History with Documents (The Bedford Series in History and Culture)
Four Hours in My Lai
The Scopes Trial: A Brief History with Documents (The Bedford Series in History and Culture)
The Vietnam War on Trial: The My Lai Massacre and Court-Martial of Lieutenant Calley (Landmark Law Cases and American Society)
The Vietnam War (2nd Edition) (Seminar Studies in History Series)
