Wish me luck!
It's a good read and has held up well over the years. I first read it back in the 70's when I was much younger. Made quite an impression then. Still have my military book club edition of it.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Spoilers What Book Are You Reading?
- Thread starter Huntn
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
It's a good read and has held up well over the years. I first read it back in the 70's when I was much younger. Made quite an impression then. Still have my military book club edition of it.
Ah! That's an interesting anecdote which will force me to read Chekhov's Ward No 6!
I remember reading that Lenin was a voracious reader and used to write on the margin of virtually any page he read.
Well, this anecdote forcibly struck me, because, at the time I read it, - I had read several biographies of Lenin before then - but none that had featured that particular story - until that most recent biography, published in the late 80s.
And, as it happened, I had also recently read "Ward No 6" (a 'long' short story - and remember, Chekhov was a doctor), - in a Russian (English language) published edition - a beautiful multi volume edition - with meticulous production values - in hard back - of his short stories, sold to me by a book store which was closing down. Anyway, the story is gripping, terrifying and brilliant - quite unlike anything else Chekhov ever wrote, and - to my surprise - my reaction on reading it was similar to Lenin's.
Lenin wrote (I think, to his sister) that he went "ooooooof" and couldn't stop thinking about it; this is a story that compels you to stop, draw breath, think, pause, pace and yes - go "ooooof".
Last edited:
Wish me luck!
If you're interested in this sort of subject - there's two books that really impressed me and I'd recommend...
A famous US general once said when asked about winning battles (Patton?) "Get there the fastest with the mostest". Its a really interesting and thought provoking book and an ideal tome to go alongside anything about the politics and warfare. (And yes we should have hung Speer)
Also - this one is also really impressive.
A story of two airforces - one was modern, ruthlessly efficient and throughly prepared for the battle to come which fought another that just knew their confidence, élan and chivalry would win out in the end...
If you're interested in this sort of subject - there's two books that really impressed me and I'd recommend...
A famous US general once said when asked about winning battles (Patton?) "Get there the fastest with the mostest". Its a really interesting and thought provoking book and an ideal tome to go alongside anything about the politics and warfare. (And yes we should have hung Speer)
Also - this one is also really impressive.
A story of two airforces - one was modern, ruthlessly efficient and throughly prepared for the battle to come which fought another that just knew their confidence, élan and chivalry would win out in the end...
On the topic of Albert Speer, I cannot recommend Gitta Sereny's biography "Albert Speer: His Battle With The Truth" highly enough; this is a superbly written and meticulously researched work, subtle, nuanced, intelligent, fair-minded, morally informed and yet one that interrogates and strips away its subject. A brilliant work.
Last edited:
Yes, read it. I agree - a superb work.
How she managed to pull such nuance out of him without wanting to beat him with her tape recorder at the end of every session I'll never know.
How she managed to pull such nuance out of him without wanting to beat him with her tape recorder at the end of every session I'll never know.
Thanks for the recommendation. Just ordered.
Actually, she was very fair - the early chapters were spellbinding, and deeply sad, in a way, because - as was the case with Michael Corleone, - it becomes clear that all Speer had ever wanted to do was teach mathematics.
And life - his father, his father's snobbery and insistence on Speer studying architecture (the family profession) and clear preference for other siblings - and subsequent circumstances - made that impossible. Then, the Faustian pact he made with fame and fortune and ambition meant that there was never going to be a return to "normalcy" after Spandau, let alone, after Hitler, and the power and professional recognition and satisfaction he had enjoyed in those years.
So, yes, it is too easy to want to bash him with the tape-recorder - but - having shown his background and upbringing with painful empathy - she then, utterly destroyed him, - meticulously, politely, and irrevocably - she stripped away his defences and those internal Chinese walls he had built so successfully for himself.
In the end, he was revealed for what he was; this is one of the very best books I have ever read about that era, - an absolutely superb - and beautifully written - work - and it is all the more powerful for having been a fair-minded and meticulous interrogation and examination; that makes the conclusions it draws all the more compelling.
Last edited:
since i totally forgot the TV series is about to start in 2017, i had to push my shamefully high pile of yet-to-read-books aside and started Neil Gaiman - American Gods. The idea is great and so far (35%) the book pulls off a good "roadtrip movie" kind of vibe.
On books read recently:
Terry Pratchett - Dark side of the Sun: i was a little confused at first because the humor isn't as big part of the novel as in his other books, and yet the far out sci fi is way out there. Once i realized the year in the front actually meant the re-release of the book and this was actually part of Terry's earlier work it made more sense.
Stanislaw Lem - Tales of Pirx the Pilot: not the philosophical Lem of "Golem XIV","Fiasco" or the more comical Lem of "Star diaries","the futurological congress", but more along hard sci-fi. And in it's german translation despite having 4 translators for it's 10 short stories absolutley cohesive with no language seams to be found. Books like this aren't written anymore.
Some day in the future i will run out of Lem-books-i-haven't-read-yet and it will be a sad day.
On books read recently:
Terry Pratchett - Dark side of the Sun: i was a little confused at first because the humor isn't as big part of the novel as in his other books, and yet the far out sci fi is way out there. Once i realized the year in the front actually meant the re-release of the book and this was actually part of Terry's earlier work it made more sense.
Stanislaw Lem - Tales of Pirx the Pilot: not the philosophical Lem of "Golem XIV","Fiasco" or the more comical Lem of "Star diaries","the futurological congress", but more along hard sci-fi. And in it's german translation despite having 4 translators for it's 10 short stories absolutley cohesive with no language seams to be found. Books like this aren't written anymore.
Some day in the future i will run out of Lem-books-i-haven't-read-yet and it will be a sad day.
Last edited:
You do.
It is a superb work.
It is easy to stress your loathing of the Third Reich - but Gitta Sereny does far better than that.
Actually, Gitta Sereny - who had Underground contacts herself during the second world war, and made no secret of her loyalties - loyalties, which, had they been discovered, would have cost her her life - makes clear how repellant she found that world even when they - the Germans - appeared to be winning, yet, somehow, she managed to write a compelling, clear-eyed, and meticulously fair-minded book. This is a book full of nuance and subtlety, supported by sources and a wonderful understanding of the world of central Europe at that time.
She lets the facts and the evidence and the stunning sources she brings to bear tell their own story, and lets her witnesses - including - indeed, especially - Speer - talk and open up - which they do. In the course of this polite, respectful, but meticulous and relentless interrogation, she seeks to understand them - and - more importantly - make them understand and know - and face - themselves.
This is explosive stuff, for some found it too much.
And earlier book she wrote "Into That Darkness" - is also well worth reading. This included a series of utterly compelling interviews she had held with Franz Stangl - (the commandant of Treblinka) - which ended with him admitting - in shocking and unforgettable circumstances - what he gloomily and glumly conceded was "his guilt"; his death, a day later - it was a genuine cardiac arrest, not suicide - was attributed in part to the fact that he had been compelled to come face to face with himself and his actions.
Last edited:
I thought it was great too. Odin (Woden) was superb. Coincidently the Guardian have today featured some illustrations that are really nice here.
By the way - the book I recommended earlier, The Most Dangerous Enemy - I didn't really make it clear - but the pilots that fought with the confidence and élan and who were certain they'd win out were the Luftwaffe - the ruthless and efficient force was the RAF. A very interesting read and quite conclusive.
Sounds fascinating.
Yes, but the RAF had Hurricanes and Spitfires by 1940, - two superb planes - and much more importantly, they had radar, which was invaluable.
And they also had the advantage of short distances (physically, and in terms of time). In other words, they were at "home" - which meant that they were able to be warned (accurately) of what was facing them - thanks to radar - and where it might be facing them - and could "scramble" to meet it as late as possible, which saved time, fuel, and their own energy levels.
This also meant that if a RAF plane was shot down it could be expected to land on "friendly" territory, - if the pilot survived, he could expect to be airborne again within days, assuming he hadn't been badly injured - and they were partially freed from the tyranny imposed by the calculations of that triangle - speed, fuel, distance - which certainly hampered the Luftwaffe, given the technology available at the time.
I get the feeling like the rise and fall of the third Reich will give me a WW2 fatigue but @Scepticalscribe I'll definitely keep the Albert Speer book on my list...very intrigued!
The book is fascinating because it goes to the heart of a foundation myth that has it roots in that peculiarly British trait of not really wanted to be seen to try too hard, or take things too seriously. Its not a dismissive revisionist history though, if anything, it makes a lot more of the achievement gained but cautions us to think carefully about we achieve such victories either in war or peace. As such I think it goes way beyond just being another WWII book.
Briefly - the authors argument is that prior to 1939, the RAF and Dowding realised that if we were to be attacked it was likely to be with massed bombing from fleets of aircraft. Dowding and the RAF in a very 'un-British' way began to plan very carefully for this from as early as 1930. (Experiments with metal monoplanes and tracking aircraft with radio beams began 10 years before the battle). Nothing was plucky British serendipity, everything was planned. These experiments and ideas were incorporated into what was to become the most advanced fighter defence system the world had ever seen. A lot is made of radar and the tracking rooms but it incorporated factories (for just in time deliveries of planes to operational airfields), the observer corps, air sea rescue, fast refuelling and repair operations, defence in depth through rotation of squadrons etc etc. Against this the Germans confidently flung a colossal but disorganised army of the air that had never really been seriously tested against an advanced opponent and it got put through a meat grinder. Many of the accounts he cites shows how surprised the Germans were at the efficiency and ruthlessness of the RAF system and were at a loss how to respond other that to keep throwing waves of planes and aircrew at it. Basically a first world war airforce (albeit with excellent monoplane aircraft and outstanding individual dogfighting tactics learnt in Spanish Civil War) met an air defence system teleported back from 50 years in the future that had swopped its jets and missiles for archaic prop driven aircraft armed with often inadequate 303 machine guns.
That sounds as though it would be a most interesting book to read.
Don't know whether you ever read any of Derek Robinson's stuff - his WW1 and WW2 books about the RFC and RAF (fiction, but wonderfully realised) are very good.
My copy of Albert Speer, His Battle with Truth by Gitta Sereny just turned up and I'm afraid I may have to return it. It's quite a lengthy book and although that is not a problem in itself, the font size is a little too small for me. So I'll have to either find a copy in hardback or read on my kindle.
Get the hardback, - better production values and easier on the eyes - would be my recommendation.
This is a book you may find yourself reading back - or tracking back to double check a fact or two.
And, yes, it is quite a lengthy book, but - to my mind - is well worth the read.
I've found one here, a first edition. It says this; Does it mean a couple of pages are loose?
"FIRST EDITION with dust jacket a cople of plates loose but owtherwise almost pristine - rare and collectable - will send out 1 st class post"
"Plates" tend to mean photographs. The book had two - perhaps - three sections of photographs, if memory serves.
An excellent and very interesting book by Tony Judt called "Postwar - A History of Europe Since 1945".
I read that a few years ago and I agree, it's excellent.