bookpagedev

Business & Finance

Women’s work is never done

Review by bookpagedev

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation’s attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it’s possible to go far without losing your femininity.

Today, women make up nearly half of the working population, and they continue to make strides with their innovative thinking and inclusive management styles. The Census Bureau’s 1997 Survey of Women-Owned Business Enterprises showed that women-owned businesses are growing at a record pace. The number of women-owned firms grew two-and-a-half times faster than all U.S. businesses and now comprise one-quarter of the nation’s businesses. They continue to diversify into industries like construction and transportation, both long considered the male domain.

It’s impossible to ignore the role of women in business, and publishers are taking note. This month we highlight six career-building books that will help women of every age and rank find fulfillment in their work.

A page-turning splash of a book is Mary Foley’s Bodacious: An AOL Insider Cracks the Code to Outrageous Success for Women with Martha Finney. Funny and smart, Foley says the business Good Girl image has got to go. In short, women, be bodacious! What’s bodacious? It’s a way of being courageous, creative, larger than life, and self-respecting. Working her way up at AOL from an $8-an-hour customer service job to one of the top female executives, Foley lives the philosophy of bodaciousness. Self-confidence and self-esteem are priority one for Foley, and she wants to help other women recognize self-worth through career. When women carry bodacious power, Foley argues, everyone at work benefits from their creativity and perspective. If Foley can go to work one day without her pants and still impress clients, I think we all have a trick or two to learn from her.

Research on women’s workplace issues shows that women have failed to support and improve each other’s workplace performance. Pat Heim and Susan Murphy, corporate consultants on gender issues, address this failure in their new book, In the Company of Women: Turning Workplace Conflict Into Powerful Alliances with Susan K. Golant. Eye-opening statistics as well as personal stories illuminate the destructive tendencies of women faced with the success or failure of another woman’s career. With a great deal of tact and concern, the authors seek to outline a new role for women and their relationships within the business setting. Especially effective are chapters on promotion, handling conflicts with style and effective female leadership. Today, one-third of all business school graduates are women. Learning more about the unique perspective and potential of women at work is men’s work as well. This book is a good place for all managers to start. Sometimes women aren’t just destructive of other women’s careers, they destroy their own. Same Game, Different Rules: How to Get Ahead Without Being a Bully Broad, Ice Queen or Ms. Understood by Jean Hollands explores the changes any woman can make in her own management and interaction style to forge ahead in her career. Hollands has made a career of showing high-powered executives how bad behavior at the office costs companies a lot of money. She follows up her work by showing women how bad office behavior can stop their earning potential dead in its tracks. Hollands notes that many women misunderstand the notion of aggressiveness in the workplace, aiming its power at co-workers rather than at its logical source, the work! She also notes how the timid among us can effectively put an end to the Bully Broad management style many women utilize. Powerful and punchy, Same Game, Different Rules gives women the go-ahead to change an unproductive management style and reap the rewards of great relationships at work.

Not every book on women in business focuses on relationships. A handy little book for women in the workplace is the aptly named PowerTools for Women in Business by Aliza Sherman. Sherman is a founder of several Web sites for women and Webgrrls International, a networking group for Internet-career women. Based on her experience with co-workers, Sherman created a list she calls PowerTools, life tools she thinks every woman should pack in her career toolbox. From lists of books to read to short checklists and exercises, Sherman makes sure women’s tools are tuned and honed. An example: She says Tackle Technology is a premium tool, like a saw or hammer. She offers the names of good books on Web building and makes technology sound like a standard item in any girl’s toolbox. This practical book would be a great gift for any young woman getting ready to face the working world.

While PowerTools helps women with the basic tools, The Innovative Woman: Creative Ways to Reach Your Potential in Business and Beyond by Norma Carr-Ruffino is the kind of book that adds a few exotic tools. Carr-Ruffino is a management professor who knows that the next level of achievement for women will be developing their innate creativity and learning how to communicate this creativity to co-workers and management. She maps a game plan for women to follow that includes making connections to creativity and leadership development through well-developed and explained exercises. Carr-Ruffino says these exercises help women develop skills for their current careers, but you never know where a little artistic creativity and innovation will take you. Just as women have always worked, they have always struggled with the delicate balance of work, family and personal goals. Successful Woman’s Guide to Working Smart: 10 Strengths That Matter Most by Caitlin Williams helps women take stock of the strengths they have developed both in and out of the workplace, putting those skills in the most effective work-life form. Beginning with a self-assessment survey, Williams guides women through Ten Strengths, the principles she believes are most important to developing a healthy work-life balance. Then she creates guidelines for integrating the strengths into everyday work and home life. Williams says she wrote Working Smart to support a woman’s quest for meaningful work and a healthy life balance. She achieves her goal beautifully.

Sharon Secor is a business writer based in Minnesota.

 

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation's attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it's possible to go…

Business & Finance

Women’s work is never done

Review by bookpagedev

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation’s attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it’s possible to go far without losing your femininity.

Today, women make up nearly half of the working population, and they continue to make strides with their innovative thinking and inclusive management styles. The Census Bureau’s 1997 Survey of Women-Owned Business Enterprises showed that women-owned businesses are growing at a record pace. The number of women-owned firms grew two-and-a-half times faster than all U.S. businesses and now comprise one-quarter of the nation’s businesses. They continue to diversify into industries like construction and transportation, both long considered the male domain.

It’s impossible to ignore the role of women in business, and publishers are taking note. This month we highlight six career-building books that will help women of every age and rank find fulfillment in their work.

A page-turning splash of a book is Mary Foley’s Bodacious: An AOL Insider Cracks the Code to Outrageous Success for Women with Martha Finney. Funny and smart, Foley says the business Good Girl image has got to go. In short, women, be bodacious! What’s bodacious? It’s a way of being courageous, creative, larger than life, and self-respecting. Working her way up at AOL from an $8-an-hour customer service job to one of the top female executives, Foley lives the philosophy of bodaciousness. Self-confidence and self-esteem are priority one for Foley, and she wants to help other women recognize self-worth through career. When women carry bodacious power, Foley argues, everyone at work benefits from their creativity and perspective. If Foley can go to work one day without her pants and still impress clients, I think we all have a trick or two to learn from her.

Research on women’s workplace issues shows that women have failed to support and improve each other’s workplace performance. Pat Heim and Susan Murphy, corporate consultants on gender issues, address this failure in their new book, In the Company of Women: Turning Workplace Conflict Into Powerful Alliances with Susan K. Golant. Eye-opening statistics as well as personal stories illuminate the destructive tendencies of women faced with the success or failure of another woman’s career. With a great deal of tact and concern, the authors seek to outline a new role for women and their relationships within the business setting. Especially effective are chapters on promotion, handling conflicts with style and effective female leadership. Today, one-third of all business school graduates are women. Learning more about the unique perspective and potential of women at work is men’s work as well. This book is a good place for all managers to start. Sometimes women aren’t just destructive of other women’s careers, they destroy their own. Same Game, Different Rules: How to Get Ahead Without Being a Bully Broad, Ice Queen or Ms. Understood by Jean Hollands explores the changes any woman can make in her own management and interaction style to forge ahead in her career. Hollands has made a career of showing high-powered executives how bad behavior at the office costs companies a lot of money. She follows up her work by showing women how bad office behavior can stop their earning potential dead in its tracks. Hollands notes that many women misunderstand the notion of aggressiveness in the workplace, aiming its power at co-workers rather than at its logical source, the work! She also notes how the timid among us can effectively put an end to the Bully Broad management style many women utilize. Powerful and punchy, Same Game, Different Rules gives women the go-ahead to change an unproductive management style and reap the rewards of great relationships at work.

Not every book on women in business focuses on relationships. A handy little book for women in the workplace is the aptly named PowerTools for Women in Business by Aliza Sherman. Sherman is a founder of several Web sites for women and Webgrrls International, a networking group for Internet-career women. Based on her experience with co-workers, Sherman created a list she calls PowerTools, life tools she thinks every woman should pack in her career toolbox. From lists of books to read to short checklists and exercises, Sherman makes sure women’s tools are tuned and honed. An example: She says Tackle Technology is a premium tool, like a saw or hammer. She offers the names of good books on Web building and makes technology sound like a standard item in any girl’s toolbox. This practical book would be a great gift for any young woman getting ready to face the working world.

While PowerTools helps women with the basic tools, The Innovative Woman: Creative Ways to Reach Your Potential in Business and Beyond by Norma Carr-Ruffino is the kind of book that adds a few exotic tools. Carr-Ruffino is a management professor who knows that the next level of achievement for women will be developing their innate creativity and learning how to communicate this creativity to co-workers and management. She maps a game plan for women to follow that includes making connections to creativity and leadership development through well-developed and explained exercises. Carr-Ruffino says these exercises help women develop skills for their current careers, but you never know where a little artistic creativity and innovation will take you. Just as women have always worked, they have always struggled with the delicate balance of work, family and personal goals. Successful Woman’s Guide to Working Smart: 10 Strengths That Matter Most by Caitlin Williams helps women take stock of the strengths they have developed both in and out of the workplace, putting those skills in the most effective work-life form. Beginning with a self-assessment survey, Williams guides women through Ten Strengths, the principles she believes are most important to developing a healthy work-life balance. Then she creates guidelines for integrating the strengths into everyday work and home life. Williams says she wrote Working Smart to support a woman’s quest for meaningful work and a healthy life balance. She achieves her goal beautifully.

Sharon Secor is a business writer based in Minnesota.

 

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation's attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it's possible to…

Business & Finance

Women’s work is never done

Review by bookpagedev

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation’s attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it’s possible to go far without losing your femininity.

Today, women make up nearly half of the working population, and they continue to make strides with their innovative thinking and inclusive management styles. The Census Bureau’s 1997 Survey of Women-Owned Business Enterprises showed that women-owned businesses are growing at a record pace. The number of women-owned firms grew two-and-a-half times faster than all U.S. businesses and now comprise one-quarter of the nation’s businesses. They continue to diversify into industries like construction and transportation, both long considered the male domain.

It’s impossible to ignore the role of women in business, and publishers are taking note. This month we highlight six career-building books that will help women of every age and rank find fulfillment in their work.

A page-turning splash of a book is Mary Foley’s Bodacious: An AOL Insider Cracks the Code to Outrageous Success for Women with Martha Finney. Funny and smart, Foley says the business Good Girl image has got to go. In short, women, be bodacious! What’s bodacious? It’s a way of being courageous, creative, larger than life, and self-respecting. Working her way up at AOL from an $8-an-hour customer service job to one of the top female executives, Foley lives the philosophy of bodaciousness. Self-confidence and self-esteem are priority one for Foley, and she wants to help other women recognize self-worth through career. When women carry bodacious power, Foley argues, everyone at work benefits from their creativity and perspective. If Foley can go to work one day without her pants and still impress clients, I think we all have a trick or two to learn from her.

Research on women’s workplace issues shows that women have failed to support and improve each other’s workplace performance. Pat Heim and Susan Murphy, corporate consultants on gender issues, address this failure in their new book, In the Company of Women: Turning Workplace Conflict Into Powerful Alliances with Susan K. Golant. Eye-opening statistics as well as personal stories illuminate the destructive tendencies of women faced with the success or failure of another woman’s career. With a great deal of tact and concern, the authors seek to outline a new role for women and their relationships within the business setting. Especially effective are chapters on promotion, handling conflicts with style and effective female leadership. Today, one-third of all business school graduates are women. Learning more about the unique perspective and potential of women at work is men’s work as well. This book is a good place for all managers to start. Sometimes women aren’t just destructive of other women’s careers, they destroy their own. Same Game, Different Rules: How to Get Ahead Without Being a Bully Broad, Ice Queen or Ms. Understood by Jean Hollands explores the changes any woman can make in her own management and interaction style to forge ahead in her career. Hollands has made a career of showing high-powered executives how bad behavior at the office costs companies a lot of money. She follows up her work by showing women how bad office behavior can stop their earning potential dead in its tracks. Hollands notes that many women misunderstand the notion of aggressiveness in the workplace, aiming its power at co-workers rather than at its logical source, the work! She also notes how the timid among us can effectively put an end to the Bully Broad management style many women utilize. Powerful and punchy, Same Game, Different Rules gives women the go-ahead to change an unproductive management style and reap the rewards of great relationships at work.

Not every book on women in business focuses on relationships. A handy little book for women in the workplace is the aptly named PowerTools for Women in Business by Aliza Sherman. Sherman is a founder of several Web sites for women and Webgrrls International, a networking group for Internet-career women. Based on her experience with co-workers, Sherman created a list she calls PowerTools, life tools she thinks every woman should pack in her career toolbox. From lists of books to read to short checklists and exercises, Sherman makes sure women’s tools are tuned and honed. An example: She says Tackle Technology is a premium tool, like a saw or hammer. She offers the names of good books on Web building and makes technology sound like a standard item in any girl’s toolbox. This practical book would be a great gift for any young woman getting ready to face the working world.

While PowerTools helps women with the basic tools, The Innovative Woman: Creative Ways to Reach Your Potential in Business and Beyond by Norma Carr-Ruffino is the kind of book that adds a few exotic tools. Carr-Ruffino is a management professor who knows that the next level of achievement for women will be developing their innate creativity and learning how to communicate this creativity to co-workers and management. She maps a game plan for women to follow that includes making connections to creativity and leadership development through well-developed and explained exercises. Carr-Ruffino says these exercises help women develop skills for their current careers, but you never know where a little artistic creativity and innovation will take you. Just as women have always worked, they have always struggled with the delicate balance of work, family and personal goals. Successful Woman’s Guide to Working Smart: 10 Strengths That Matter Most by Caitlin Williams helps women take stock of the strengths they have developed both in and out of the workplace, putting those skills in the most effective work-life form. Beginning with a self-assessment survey, Williams guides women through Ten Strengths, the principles she believes are most important to developing a healthy work-life balance. Then she creates guidelines for integrating the strengths into everyday work and home life. Williams says she wrote Working Smart to support a woman’s quest for meaningful work and a healthy life balance. She achieves her goal beautifully.

Sharon Secor is a business writer based in Minnesota.

 

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation's attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it's possible to…

Business & Finance

Women’s work is never done

Review by bookpagedev

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation’s attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it’s possible to go far without losing your femininity.

Today, women make up nearly half of the working population, and they continue to make strides with their innovative thinking and inclusive management styles. The Census Bureau’s 1997 Survey of Women-Owned Business Enterprises showed that women-owned businesses are growing at a record pace. The number of women-owned firms grew two-and-a-half times faster than all U.S. businesses and now comprise one-quarter of the nation’s businesses. They continue to diversify into industries like construction and transportation, both long considered the male domain.

It’s impossible to ignore the role of women in business, and publishers are taking note. This month we highlight six career-building books that will help women of every age and rank find fulfillment in their work.

A page-turning splash of a book is Mary Foley’s Bodacious: An AOL Insider Cracks the Code to Outrageous Success for Women with Martha Finney. Funny and smart, Foley says the business Good Girl image has got to go. In short, women, be bodacious! What’s bodacious? It’s a way of being courageous, creative, larger than life, and self-respecting. Working her way up at AOL from an $8-an-hour customer service job to one of the top female executives, Foley lives the philosophy of bodaciousness. Self-confidence and self-esteem are priority one for Foley, and she wants to help other women recognize self-worth through career. When women carry bodacious power, Foley argues, everyone at work benefits from their creativity and perspective. If Foley can go to work one day without her pants and still impress clients, I think we all have a trick or two to learn from her.

Research on women’s workplace issues shows that women have failed to support and improve each other’s workplace performance. Pat Heim and Susan Murphy, corporate consultants on gender issues, address this failure in their new book, In the Company of Women: Turning Workplace Conflict Into Powerful Alliances with Susan K. Golant. Eye-opening statistics as well as personal stories illuminate the destructive tendencies of women faced with the success or failure of another woman’s career. With a great deal of tact and concern, the authors seek to outline a new role for women and their relationships within the business setting. Especially effective are chapters on promotion, handling conflicts with style and effective female leadership. Today, one-third of all business school graduates are women. Learning more about the unique perspective and potential of women at work is men’s work as well. This book is a good place for all managers to start. Sometimes women aren’t just destructive of other women’s careers, they destroy their own. Same Game, Different Rules: How to Get Ahead Without Being a Bully Broad, Ice Queen or Ms. Understood by Jean Hollands explores the changes any woman can make in her own management and interaction style to forge ahead in her career. Hollands has made a career of showing high-powered executives how bad behavior at the office costs companies a lot of money. She follows up her work by showing women how bad office behavior can stop their earning potential dead in its tracks. Hollands notes that many women misunderstand the notion of aggressiveness in the workplace, aiming its power at co-workers rather than at its logical source, the work! She also notes how the timid among us can effectively put an end to the Bully Broad management style many women utilize. Powerful and punchy, Same Game, Different Rules gives women the go-ahead to change an unproductive management style and reap the rewards of great relationships at work.

Not every book on women in business focuses on relationships. A handy little book for women in the workplace is the aptly named PowerTools for Women in Business by Aliza Sherman. Sherman is a founder of several Web sites for women and Webgrrls International, a networking group for Internet-career women. Based on her experience with co-workers, Sherman created a list she calls PowerTools, life tools she thinks every woman should pack in her career toolbox. From lists of books to read to short checklists and exercises, Sherman makes sure women’s tools are tuned and honed. An example: She says Tackle Technology is a premium tool, like a saw or hammer. She offers the names of good books on Web building and makes technology sound like a standard item in any girl’s toolbox. This practical book would be a great gift for any young woman getting ready to face the working world.

While PowerTools helps women with the basic tools, The Innovative Woman: Creative Ways to Reach Your Potential in Business and Beyond by Norma Carr-Ruffino is the kind of book that adds a few exotic tools. Carr-Ruffino is a management professor who knows that the next level of achievement for women will be developing their innate creativity and learning how to communicate this creativity to co-workers and management. She maps a game plan for women to follow that includes making connections to creativity and leadership development through well-developed and explained exercises. Carr-Ruffino says these exercises help women develop skills for their current careers, but you never know where a little artistic creativity and innovation will take you. Just as women have always worked, they have always struggled with the delicate balance of work, family and personal goals. Successful Woman’s Guide to Working Smart: 10 Strengths That Matter Most by Caitlin Williams helps women take stock of the strengths they have developed both in and out of the workplace, putting those skills in the most effective work-life form. Beginning with a self-assessment survey, Williams guides women through Ten Strengths, the principles she believes are most important to developing a healthy work-life balance. Then she creates guidelines for integrating the strengths into everyday work and home life. Williams says she wrote Working Smart to support a woman’s quest for meaningful work and a healthy life balance. She achieves her goal beautifully.

Sharon Secor is a business writer based in Minnesota.

 

With the death of Katharine Graham in July, the nation's attention was once again focused on a strong, successful woman in business. The powerful woman who ran the Washington Post taught many up-and-comers an important lesson on rising through the ranks: it's possible to go…

Biography

Daniel Boone, unplugged

Review by bookpagedev

For many of us of a certain age, the enduring image of Daniel Boone is coonskin-capped actor Fess Parker on the eponymous television series from the 1960s. Robert Morgan shatters that iconic image right from the get-go in Boone, his impressive new biography of the American legend. Forget the coonskin cap, he writes in the very first sentence, he never wore one. That’s just the first of many myths that Morgan a novelist (Gap Creek), poet and Cornell professor dispels in his meticulously researched and elegantly told book. Boone, as Morgan celebrates him, was many things, some of them contradictory. He was resourceful and intelligent; a visionary, to be sure, and a marksman without rival. A loving husband and father of 10, he spent a significant chunk of time away from the family he cherished and was frequently in debt. He was a gregarious, social man who preferred to be alone in the woods. Raised a Quaker though he nonetheless killed a few Indians in his time he later became a Freemason (and Morgan lays claim to being the first biographer to explore this particular philosophical bent, with its ideals of liberty and brotherhood, when evaluating the woodsman’s life.) As one might expect of a biography written by a novelist and poet, Boone places its fabled subject within the context of the late-18th/early-19th century Romanticism that spurred Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman in the United States, as well as their European counterparts ( General Boone appears in Byron’s Don Juan). James Fenimore Cooper was just one writer of the age who placed characters modeled on Boone at the center of novels, thus fueling the myth. Within decades of his death, Morgan writes, his image and his character would be portrayed and transformed in a hundred different ways and under different names to become a quintessence of America’s ideal of itself, its origins and aspirations, its destiny. But Morgan seeks to demythologize Boone, bringing him down to human scale, and he sets to this task with an exacting attention to detail. Those details take readers to the heart of day-to-day life in America both before and after the Revolutionary War (in which Boone himself played a role). Life on the frontier was hard, of course, and could be perilous at the best of times. Morgan is adept at recounting such harrowing events as the brutal torture and killing of a scouting party that included Boone’s eldest son, James, by an angry group of Cherokees, Delawares and Shawnees. He is very good, too, at conveying the optimism of seemingly endless possibilities that inspired the pioneers. Boone epitomized this spirit, clearing the path, both literally and figuratively, for the settlement of the West, and Morgan counts road maker among the man’s many achievements. The irony that is never far beneath the surface of this biography’s narrative, though, is that Boone’s almost religious fervor for taming the virgin wilderness ultimately helped hasten the destruction of the thing he loved most in the world.

Separating fact from fable, we meet a Daniel Boone who was indeed a leader, though not always comfortable in that role. His marriage to the uncomplaining Rebecca Bryan (whom Morgan portrays as the consummate great woman behind the great man), endured long absences, but indeed seems to have been the great romance it has often been painted as. Despite his inherent integrity and leadership qualities, Boone was different from most of the men of his age, Morgan says. His innate character as woodsman and hunter, a white Indian as it were, made him perhaps ill-suited for some of the political and business situations that would prove his undoing in later life.

Written with admiration and great care, Boone is a book for those who like their biography told with leisurely erudition, readers interested in taking the countless side trips that fill out the story and place it within a larger context. The narrative teems with fascinating asides: We learn, for instance, that Indian Summer is so named because it was the season when Native Americans were most likely to be on the warpath. Oh, and if you’re wondering, Boone’s real hat of choice was beaver felt. Robert Weibezahl is author of the novel The Wicked and the Dead.

For many of us of a certain age, the enduring image of Daniel Boone is coonskin-capped actor Fess Parker on the eponymous television series from the 1960s. Robert Morgan shatters that iconic image right from the get-go in Boone, his impressive new biography of the…
Biography

Review

Review by bookpagedev

A Streetcar Named Desire opened on Broadway in 1947, signifying a brave new era for the arts. Along with pushing at the period’s sexual boundaries, Tennessee Williams’ provocative work showcased an electrifying 24-year-old newcomer. As the brutal Stanley Kowalski, Marlon Brando altered the very perception of the craft of acting.

To this day, Brando remains an audacious original. Marlon Brando, a new addition to the Penguin Lives series, adeptly explores the contradictions of his sometimes dazzling, often confounding career. Written by Patricia Bosworth biographer of Brando’s chief 1950s rival, Montgomery Clift the book examines the forces that shaped his career and the personal demons that were its undoing.

The son of a salesman and an alcoholic, would-be actress, Brando grew up in the Midwest. But it was New York that beckoned, following his expulsion from high school (for his elaborate pranks). He worked as an elevator operator, night factory watchman, cook and enrolled in acting courses. It was under the tutelage of Stella Adler, master of method acting, that he was able to channel his rage against his father into his performances. Ever in conflict with his father, Brando adored his mother. And he cherished the frail, bespectacled Wally Cox a friend since boyhood. (Cox became famous in his own right as a comic character actor.) Hard to believe, but at the height of his glory in Streetcar, Brando shared a filthy apartment with Cox and a pet raccoon named Russell.

But then, Brando always flaunted convention. Following his move to 1950s Hollywood, he made no secret of his many affairs (he preferred exotic women) or of his disdain for the politics of moviemaking. Still, it was the screen that enshrined his performance as Kowalski. He went on to strike an indelible pose in a black leather jacket and a biker cap in The Wild One and to win an Oscar for On the Waterfront. But eventually, he cashed in and began making movies strictly for the money. The resulting performances were almost always fascinating; the movies weren’t.

By the early 1970s he was considered unemployable. Then came an astounding one-two punch: The Godfather and The Last Tango in Paris. The latter, about a doomed three-day sexual relationship, was an art house sensation. The Godfather brought Brando his second Oscar. In one of the most memorable nights in Academy Award history, he sent an American Indian named Sasheen Littlefeather to reject the honor.

A skilled writer with a fluid delivery, the insightful Boswell delivers numerous memorable scenes (such as Brando in a physical tussle with Cox’s widow over possession of his ashes). She doesn’t delve into the tragedies involving his son Christian and daughter Cheyenne, and she all but sidesteps certain personal details, such as Brando’s homosexual liaisons. But if the book is not definitive on a personal level, it is a satisfying, exceedingly colorful biography of a career.

Biographer-TV producer Pat H. Broeske has a menagerie of animals that includes an orange cat named Stanley for Stanley Kowalski.

 

A Streetcar Named Desire opened on Broadway in 1947, signifying a brave new era for the arts. Along with pushing at the period's sexual boundaries, Tennessee Williams' provocative work showcased an electrifying 24-year-old newcomer. As the brutal Stanley Kowalski, Marlon Brando altered the very perception…

History

A year in the life of America

Review by bookpagedev

In this breakneck review of one year of the early 20th century, author Jim Rasenberger reverses the old dictum about journalism being the first draft of history. For him, it’s the last word. Rasenberger, a contributor to the New York Times, looked at every page of that paper’s 1908 run and made forays into newspapers from the provinces. The result, America 1908, is a work with all the breadth and heft of, well a daily newspaper. Then as now, journalism was incapable of understanding the significance of day-to-day happenings and how important (or soon-forgot) they might be.

Of the events mentioned in the book’s subtitle ( The Dawn of Flight, the Race to the Pole, the Invention of the Model T, and the Making of a Modern Nation ) only the first was reported firsthand by journalists. The strange and mysterious story of Adm. Peary and Dr. Cook and the drive to the North Pole, Henry Ford’s Model T, the dark years of racial apartheid Rasenberger must take from sources written long after the events of 1908. Factual depth and interpretive range never get in the way of good stories. Nor should they. The author set out to chronicle quixotic and fabulous adventures, and he does. In May, there’s the appearance on the streets of Chicago of one Bertha Carlisle, wearing a tight-fitting, hip-hugging sheath dress. Late summer witnessed the famous episode of Fred Merkle, who failed to tag second base in a decisive game between the Cubs and the Giants, costing his New York club the world championship. We have a three-page account of one of President Theodore Roosevelt’s point-to-point hikes through Rock Creek Park, over under, through obstacles, but never around them. Two pages follow on the return of the Great White Fleet, Roosevelt’s declaration to the world of American naval superiority. The best part of the book is devoted to the Wright brothers, their invention of the airplane, and their intrepid proof to the world of the capability of what they called their machine. Here, the book soars. We are in the cockpit as the modest mechanics from Dayton, Ohio, tip the gossamer wings, climb, dip, turn and set humankind free of gravity.

In this breakneck review of one year of the early 20th century, author Jim Rasenberger reverses the old dictum about journalism being the first draft of history. For him, it's the last word. Rasenberger, a contributor to the New York Times, looked at every page…
Nonfiction

Review

Review by bookpagedev

For most of us, serving on a jury is one of the few occasions in which our opinion has a life-altering impact. Taking on this civic duty is such an unaccustomed ascent to power and responsibility that we are almost as certain to be affected by it as the person we are judging (albeit seldom as drastically). In A Trial by Jury, from his vantage point as jury foreman, Burnett chronicles the trial and judgment of Monte Milcray for stabbing Randolph Cuffee to death. Is Milcray guilty of murder, as the prosecution argues, or did he act in self-defense, as he contends? This is what the jury must decide.

The trial takes place in a New York City courtroom in early 2000 and is complicated by the fact that Milcray and Cuffee, a transvestite, were apparently having sex when the killing occurred. Aside from the tawdriness that gives rise to it, the trial is run-of-the-mill. There are no celebrities involved, no dazzling police work, no cunning legal sallies. The arguments and summations are completed in less than two weeks, and the verdict is delivered on the fourth day of deliberation. An academic he now teaches history at Princeton Burnett is less interested in the drama of the final judgment than in the psychological dynamics that lead up to it. He reveals at the start what the verdict will be, the better to focus the reader’s attention on how the jury members process evidence, interact with each other in close confinement and ultimately reach a unanimous decision. Although he quickly discovers that his stereotypes of the other jurors are all wrong, Burnett does demonstrate that each of them sees the defendant through the scarred prism of his or her own experience.

Sensing their own power, the jurors at first discuss whether it might not be preferable to administer real justice instead of adhering strictly to the law. But one member undercuts this naive ideal with the observation that nobody has asked me to play God. I’ve been asked to apply the law. Justice belongs to God; men only have the law. Burnett notes that his training has inclined him toward dealing with cosmic questions that have only provisional answers. As a juror, however, he must render an absolute answer and one he can live with. His description of how he and the others come to terms with this awful burden makes this an absorbing story.

Edward Morris writes from Nashville.

 

For most of us, serving on a jury is one of the few occasions in which our opinion has a life-altering impact. Taking on this civic duty is such an unaccustomed ascent to power and responsibility that we are almost as certain to be affected…

Nature

One last great work from Cousteau

Review by bookpagedev

If there is a heaven, I’ll be surprised. If I wind up there, even more so. But if, at the pearly gates, I see Jacques Cousteau, seated just to the right of Saint Peter, helping that apostle mete out justice, I won’t be taken aback. Cousteau’s book, The Human, the Orchid, and the Octopus, newly available in an English translation, spans a magnificent life of thought and adventure. Readers who are familiar with Cousteau only through his work as an undersea television star will learn that he was also an important inventor of scuba gear an outspoken conservationist and a World War II fighting veteran. His book shepherds readers through a number of problems that occupied Cousteau for much of his life, and a note of warning ties the various chapters together. Whether writing about the importance of pure science, deploring the destruction of coral reefs, or predicting the near immortality of future humans, Cousteau calls for caution, responsibility, action suffused with thought.

In a book filled with gems, it can be hard to isolate one to talk about, but the chapter titled Catch as Catch Can, which explores the problem of unsustainable fishing practices, is arguably the most important. When rich nations feed fish to livestock and bolster gourmet restaurants with exotic catches, he notes, they’re taking food away from poorer countries where fish isn’t just a menu option it’s often the only available protein. Although politicians hesitate to confront the fishing industry, Cousteau comes right out and says that most fishing professionals are in it for a quick buck at the expense of the industry’s future. Just in case you’re thinking a 10-year-old book must be out of date, let me tell you that, in addition to being an inventor, fighter and conservationist, Cousteau was also a prophet. His predictions that terrorism and genetics would preoccupy the 21st century were eerily right on the money. The Human, the Orchid, and the Octopus will top must-read lists for people who want to understand the 20th century from the viewpoint of one of its greatest titans.

If there is a heaven, I'll be surprised. If I wind up there, even more so. But if, at the pearly gates, I see Jacques Cousteau, seated just to the right of Saint Peter, helping that apostle mete out justice, I won't be taken…
History

Ellis considers the creative aspects of American statecraft

Review by bookpagedev

During the 28-year period between the start of the War for Independence in 1775 and the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, decisions were made, or avoided, that established the foundation for much that was to follow, for good or ill, in American history. Virtually every one of the major decisions came after vigorous, and often bitter, discussions. In his glorious American Creation: Triumphs and Tragedies at the Founding of the Republic, Joseph Ellis argues that the success of the founders was partially attributable to their ideological and even temperamental diversity. Unlike revolutions in other parts of the world, in America there was never a one-man despot. The American founding was, and still is, a group portrait, Ellis writes.

American Creation focuses on six significant moments with several recurrent themes. First, that John Adams was basically right that the founders were pragmatists, for the most part making it up as they went along. Second, that Washington was correct when he claimed that space was a priceless asset; Ellis believes the most original political contributions made by the founders were offered in response to that unique condition. Third, that controlling the pace of political and social change was critically important. The founders opted for evolutionary rather than a revolutionary approach, Ellis writes. [T]he calculated decision to make the American Revolution happen in slow motion was a creative act of statesmanship that allowed the United States to avoid the bloody and chaotic fate of subsequent revolutionary movements in France, Russia, and China, he argues. However, he adds, thinking that the issue of slavery would die a natural death, proved a massive miscalculation. Ellis believes that the period between 1786 to 1788 is possibly the most creative moment in all of American political history. The climax occurred at the Virginia Ratifying Convention in the summer of 1788 where James Madison and Patrick Henry engaged in what Ellis says is most likely the most consequential debate in American history. In a nutshell, Madison maintained the notion that government was not about providing answers, but rather about providing a framework in which the salient questions could continue to be debated. The Constitution, in which federal and state authority contend for supremacy, becomes like history itself, an argument without end. Ellis notes that George Washington felt that a truly just Indian policy was one of his highest priorities, that failure on this score would damage his reputation and stain the nation.’ But even Washington, with the strong assistance of Henry Knox, his secretary of war, who was fully prepared to play the role of conscience of the American Revolution, could not prevail. One of the major reasons was Creek Nation leader Alexander McGillivray, who defied all the stereotypes and of whom Ellis says it is difficult to imagine a more capable and shrewd leader. Despite failure, Ellis points to the exceptional quality of leadership on both sides. Ellis’ books on early American history are national treasures. In his latest, his meticulous scholarship and superb narrative skills educate and entertain in the best sense. He is always keenly aware of both the events as they occurred as well as their place in the broader course of history. Roger Bishop is a retired Nashville bookseller and a frequent contributor to BookPage.

During the 28-year period between the start of the War for Independence in 1775 and the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, decisions were made, or avoided, that established the foundation for much that was to follow, for good or ill, in American history. Virtually every one…
History

Pictures of a Bull Moose

Review by bookpagedev

The coffee-table book Historic Photos of Theodore Roosevelt, with text and captions by Stacy A. Cordery, comprises 200 or so images of our 26th president’s 60 exuberant, exhilarating years. TR made significant contributions to a dozen fields of human endeavor, including natural science, exploration, organized sports and police work. Somehow, he also managed to find time to lead the famous charge up San Juan Heights, create the modern U.S. Navy, become a devoted husband and father, and write 35 books.

The photos show young Theodore peering out the window of his grandfather’s house as Lincoln’s funeral cortege moves past; the new president taking command after William McKinley’s assassination, speaking to crowds with distinctive gestures. Another photo shows the president brokering the peace that ended the Russo-Japanese War and won him the Nobel Prize for Peace.

The time for this volume is opportune. As the centennial of the Roosevelt presidency draws to a close, these pictures remind us of the capacity for life of this amazing man. The book is fittingly dedicated to Wallace Finley Dailey, curator of the Theodore Roosevelt Collection at Harvard Library.

The coffee-table book Historic Photos of Theodore Roosevelt, with text and captions by Stacy A. Cordery, comprises 200 or so images of our 26th president's 60 exuberant, exhilarating years. TR made significant contributions to a dozen fields of human endeavor, including natural science, exploration,…
Biography

A first lady in her own way

Review by bookpagedev

The sizeable townhouse where Alice Roosevelt Longworth lived and hosted her political salon for decades still stands square and formidable, just off lively Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C. It seems a fitting stage for Theodore Roosevelt’s daughter, who was nothing if not formidable, and was always happy to be at the center of the action.

Alice was a rare bird for her time and place: a truly free woman with an independent mind, who did and said exactly what she wanted from her teen years as Princess Alice in the White House to her old age as the witty truth-teller of the 1970s. Though Alice lived in the public eye daughter of a president, wife of House Speaker Nicholas Longworth she kept her inner life private. Now, 27 years after her death, biographer Stacy A. Cordery is able to tell us more than we’ve ever known about what went on in Alice’s head, thanks to access to her personal papers provided by the Longworth family. The resulting portrait in Alice shows a woman who came by her independence the hard way, as a defense against abandonment and grief.

Her mother died at her birth. Her father couldn’t bear to be near a baby who reminded him of his dead wife. Her stepmother tried her best, but had a completely different personality. Her husband was a drunk with the sexual morals of a stoat. Her longtime lover couldn’t leave his wife. And her only child died at 31, in a possible suicide. No wonder Alice became tough-minded the only alternative would have been collapse.

Cordery, the author of a Theodore Roosevelt biography, mines diaries and letters for insights into Alice’s rebellious teen years, her marriage, and her love affair with William Borah, the maverick Republican senator from Idaho. Borah’s coded love letters to Alice confirm what has been assumed: He, not her husband, was the father of Alice’s daughter Paulina.

Borah and Alice were also political allies, and both were consistently on the wrong side of history. Alice inherited her father’s brilliant mind, but not his broad-minded compassion. She fought the League of Nations, the New Deal, intervention in World War II. Her vicious attacks on her first cousin Eleanor Roosevelt still make ugly reading. Cordery is able to explain them as the byproduct of Alice’s rage that lightweight cousin Franklin had usurped the position she thought her beloved brother Ted Jr. should have had. Alice calmed down in old age. She raised her orphaned granddaughter and befriended talented younger people of all political persuasions, among them Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy. And she read. Alice was a lifelong autodidact with amazingly eclectic interests. After her political dinner parties at the house off Dupont Circle, Alice would retreat to her bedroom and read through the night poetry, biology, folklore, anything and everything. Cousin Franklin was famously said to have a second-rate mind and a first-rate temperament. Alice was first-rate on both counts.

Anne Bartlett is a journalist in Washington, D.C.

 

The sizeable townhouse where Alice Roosevelt Longworth lived and hosted her political salon for decades still stands square and formidable, just off lively Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C. It seems a fitting stage for Theodore Roosevelt's daughter, who was nothing if not formidable, and…

Lifestyles

Knit wit

Review by bookpagedev

If you’ve hitherto resisted the knitting craze, Knitted Icons may convert you yet. Author Carol Meldrum cleverly amplifies one or two signature characteristics of 25 cultural giants of the 20th century and adds them to a basic doll body. Among her best: Gandhi, the Beatles (early and Sgt. Pepper era), Einstein with hair standing on end, Bob Marley with dreads and cap, Jailhouse Rock Elvis (and later Elvis with sneer and white jumpsuit), Che Guevara with beret and distinctive facial hair, Audrey Hepburn as Holly Golightly (the dress and accessories are stellar) and Madonna in pink conical bra c. 1990. Definitely judge this little book by its perfect Rolling Stone parodying cover.

If you've hitherto resisted the knitting craze, Knitted Icons may convert you yet. Author Carol Meldrum cleverly amplifies one or two signature characteristics of 25 cultural giants of the 20th century and adds them to a basic doll body. Among her best: Gandhi, the Beatles…

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