At the movies last week, we saw the preview [I know, they call them trailers these days, but 'pre' 'view' as something you see before seeing the actual film and something you see before the feature movie, still seems to make more sense than something you drag behind, like a trailer] for Charlie Wilson's War, starring Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts.
I want to make a plug here for George Crile's book. It's a very engrossing giant of a book that tells the nonfiction stories of Congressional intrigue, setting up the US arming of the Muhajedeen resistance to the Soviets in Afghanistan, and wheeling and dealing with the powers that be in Pakistan. This book goes into great detail, but reads like a good adventure spy novel. There's no better way I know of to till in some of those blanks about how we got where we are today in Afghanistan and Pakistan. I know that the movie, no matter how good it is, just can't go into the details that book does. If kids studied history by reading books like this, it would be the favorite subject of more than few people like Ropi.
So, before the movie publicity causes all the library copies to be checked out, go get your copy and start reading Charlie Wilson's War.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
3 comments:
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There was a president called Wilson around the WW I, wasn't he? He made the Wilson Points or something like that (I don't know its English name) but it was refused. He was afraid of an other Great War because the countries who lost the war were severely punished. The point I don't see Hungary got the greatest punishment despite none of The World Wars were our mistake, especially the 2nd one where Hitler forced us to fight. (In the first one we must have joined because Austria did and we were 1 country). So now we know Wilson was right.
ReplyDeleteps: thanks for mentioning me
ReplyDeleteWilson's 14 Points. Point X was:
ReplyDeleteX. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity to autonomous development.
Here
you can see them all.
Ropi, I think you might really enjoy a series of novels by Upton Sinclair about a young man, actually he is about your age in the first novel. His name is Lanny Budd. He's an American whose father is an arms dealer and his mother lives in Paris. They take place before, during, and after WW I. He takes part in the negotiations for the Treaty of Versailles which did NOT accept Wilson's Fourteen Points. The first book of the series is called World's End. I'm not sure if you can find it in Budapest. Is there an American library there connected with the US Embassy? See if they have a copy. I doubt it because Sinclair was a socialist and it is an anti-war book. Not something our current administration would want to share. But let me know, maybe we can find a copy for you somewhere. I remember enjoying reading the books in this series and learning history at the same time.
And of course I had to mention you here. It fit perfectly.