Category: Book Review

The genre is the academic novel. That category might make one think of Tom Sharpe, David Lodge, Malcom Bradbury, Mary McCarthy, Kingsley Amis, C. P. Snow, or the ineffable Willa Cather. But John Williams is in a class nearly by himself in Stoner (1965).
Williams’s prose is windowpane clear. The emotions of his principle character Stoner are deep but nearly silent and all the more elemental. Stoner is surrounded by people who do not understand him, and lives his life entirely in their company.

http://www.amazon.com/Stoner-York-Review-Books-Classics/dp/1590171993/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1339811528&sr=8-1&keywords=stoner
What is incomprehensible and mysterious about Stoner is that he loves the worlds that words make in books. In the English Department at the University of Missouri between 1920 and 1960, where he passes his days, this love is neither well-known nor highly regarded. That he lives only to read, to write, and to talk about literature makes him an academic failure in the company of career-makers who care nothing for words and ideas.
The accounts of Stoner’s several transformations from boy to student to scholar are marvellous. The best of these transformations is perhaps the last when his hand brushes a book and its pages quiver with life. That is the moment he dies forgotten, unlamented, and unmissed.
I did find the plot mechanical. Edith, the wife, and Lomax, the Head of Department, were ciphers there to bedevil Stoner, but who were otherwise empty of meaning. Nor did I find it creditable that the dean, Finch, would be so staunch. But each of these three characters provides a mirror for Stoner’s reaction and that is enough.
I said that Williams is in a class nearly by himself. Together with him I would assign Willa Cather, The Professor’s House (1925), a seat. She, too, captures something of the wonder and awe of learning that the other scribes listed at the outset are too jaded to realize and probably incapable of portraying.
My thanks to Trevor Cook for mentioning this book.

Alexis de Tocqueville’s Discovery of America by Leo Damrosch (2010)
A superb book this one. It brings out much from Tocqueville’s notebooks and letters, which is then related to Democracy in America, volumes I and II. The comparison is always informative, as we see Tocqueville refining the ore, and at times arresting to see the conclusions he wrestles from the raw material. He laboured to suppress snap judgements when he saw something different and even offensive to his sensibilities. Not common that restraint.
Impressive research underlies the book, as the author compares Tocqueville’ experiences with that of other European travellers in the United States at the time. This cross section of European travel writers is quite striking. He was not alone in making the trip, but he alone made a lasting work from it.
Following Tocqueville’s trail also makes the reader aware for what he missed. Tocqueville missed meeting Abraham Lincoln by a few miles. Tocqueville made nothing of the differences between Canada and the United States. He only saw in Canada the ghost of its French past. Though Tocqueville was travelling at a time when Associationism was a current in American intellectual life he seems never to have encountered any of its advocates or adherents. That is strange since Associationism, though now a relic in the museum of dead ideas, was a cut-down version of Frenchman Charles Fourier’s theories of humanity. It peaked about ten years after Tocqueville’s visit but its seeds were there at the time of the visit. Nor did Tocqueville encounter any of the other utopian colonies like Nashoba in Tennessee, though he passed close by. It was ended at the time of his trip, but only just, and no one seems to have mentioned it to him. It was a Southern experiment in interracial living.
The long chapter on the three races was abridged from student editions of the Democracy in America for many years. But that chapter is powerful on every point. Slavery is pernicious, degrading both parties. Tocqueville talked to red men, but never to black as far as I can tell.
Harvey Mansfield, Jr. Tocqueville: A very brief introduction (2010) is a concise account of Tocqueville’s whole life and work. It is quite remarkable in condensing so much into so few very well chosen words. It is highly recommended. I cannot say the same for The Ideal of Alexis de Tocqueville (2000) by Manning Clark. Sheldon Wolin’s rambling Tocqueville between two worlds (2001) glitters now and again, but mostly it rambles.
To return to Damrosch’s Alexis de Tocqueville’s Discovery of America, it is superb on the paradoxes that Tocqueville embodied. Genius is sometimes defined as the ability simultaneously to hold contradictory ideas. By that definition Tocqueville was certainly a genius. He was democrat and anti-democrat at once. He was a liberal and a conservative. He admired energy and daring and valued calm order. Would that there were more geniuses less inclined to simple labels with even simpler conclusions.
http://www.amazon.com/Tocquevilles-Discovery-America-Leo-Damrosch/dp/B0058M75UI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334627754&sr=8-1

Lawrence Scaff, Max Weber in America. Princeton University Press, 2011
http://www.amazon.com/Max-Weber-America-Lawrence-Scaff/dp/0691147795/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334464504&sr=8-1
Max Weber and his wife Marianne spent four months travelling in the United States in 1904.
The visited New York City, Boston, Niagara Falls, Buffalo, Chicago, Evanston, St. Louis, Muskogee, Fort Gibson, New Orleans, Tuskegee, Knoxville, Asheville, Greensboro, Mount Airy, Richmond, Washington D. C., Philadelphia, Baltimore, Providence, and more.
They went to libraries, high schools, universities, factories, alms houses, work houses, settlements, German communities, stock exchanges, land auctions, abattoirs, stockyards, union meetings, committee meetings, receptions, breakfasts, chambers of commerce, and so on, and on. Both Max and Marianne gave talks and lectures and listened to many more. He solicited contributions for a German sociology journal.
When a scheduling conflict gave him the choice of attending a Presidential reception and meeting Teddy Roosevelt or going to the Indian Territory to meet red Indians and see the remains of the frontier, it was an easy choice. Off he went to Muskogee.
The presidential election campaign was on during his visit and he read much about TR. He may have seen TR in Germany, which Roosevelt visited more than once. TR spoke a passable German. When applying the concept of charisma to politics, TR was an example Weber used.
Max took a particular interest in race relations and formed a lifelong friendship with W. E. B. du Bois. That is why he made a point touring the South.
The book is heavy going. The tour is only about a quarter of the book. The remainder includes the background of the conference in St. Louis that was the initiating factor in making the trip. German influence on American intellectual life at the time. The impact of the trip on Weber’s ideas, and the translation and publication of Weber’s works into English.

The man – George C. Marshall – emerges from all the deeds, but the deeds are numbing in number and variety.

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