1776

1776 – by David McCullough

I found myself going against the grain with this one.  Reading Amazon reviews, I discovered that most loved this book. I really did not. I think it’s because of my expectations. When one sees or says “1776”, images appear in one’s mind of the American Revolution, the birth of our country, the Declaration of Independence, and all the names associated with these events.

True, the entire story of the American Revolution didn’t occur only over one year.  So one could cautiously state that one shouldn’t expect the whole story in these pages.  I’ll concede that.  So what actually did happen in this pivotal year?  Well, the actual signing of the Declaration of Independence, and lots of skirmishes with England.  The former gets almost no mention in this book (sadly). Instead, it’s filled with the latter.  So part of my problem is, I don’t really enjoy reading books (or chapters within books) that deal exclusively with meticulous detail of what happens within battles in a war.  Any battle in any war. It’s just too much for me.

So this is what we have here. There were three main battles during the Revolutionary War in 1776, and McCullough goes into plenty of detail.  I simply lost interest. In fact, this is one of those books that I had to make myself pick up, and force myself to read, say, at least 10 pages per day so I could finally finish the thing.

If I tried to scrape some sort of theme or continuity out of this thing, I guess you could say that the author does a good job of showing us the evolution of George Washington as a general.  If I’m not mistaken, he’s part of every battle in this book, and seems to turn the tide by the year’s end in favor of the Continental army.

Now that I think of it, McCullough’s books are a bit of a mixed bag for me. I’ve loved his books where he focuses on people (John Adams, Harry Truman), but am not that engrossed when he writes about actual events.  I’m probably in the minority here, however.  Again, Amazon reviews show that most really liked this book. So please don’t take my word for it.

Great Expectations

Great Expectations – Charles Dickens

We’ve all heard of Charles Dickens. But how many of us have read his works?  Or, how many of us have read his works because we had to as opposed to wanted to (i.e. High School). My only exposure to his books is the too-often told tale “A Christmas Carol”.  Even with that one, I don’t think I ever actually read the book.  I’ve just seen countless plays and movie versions around the tale.  Fortunately, classics are easy and cheap to come by on the Kindle, and I was fortunate to discover this one – which many claim is his best work.

Published in 1861, this story tells the tale of “orphan” Pip. I put “orphan” in parenthesis, because he’s raised by his older sister and her husband. Somehow – that makes the term “orphan” more bearable to me. Anyway, one day young Pip (I’m guessing he’s about 10, but am not sure) is out in the marshes in the evening time and is accosted by an escaped convict. The convict demands food and a file. The scared Pip obliges, and our story is set in motion. On a completely different note, soon Pip is sent into town by his family to work for an elderly widow, Miss Haversham. His main task is to entertain her young adopted daughter Estella. Estella is a bit older than Pip, and is very stand off-ish. Of course, Pip falls in love with her.

There’s much more to this story. So much more. It would be unfair to state that what I’ve mentioned is the main theme of the book. This book has so many characters and so many plot lines, that it’s quite impressive that Dicken’s style doesn’t allow one to become lost. What our real story here is that as young Pip becomes more exposed to culture, he tends to want to leave his humble origins behind for good. Especially when he is told from a lawyer one day, that he has “inherited” a rather large windfall. Of course, he is expected to use this windfall to move to the big city and become more educated (hence the title of the book). I should mention that, around this time in the narrative,  Pip is now much older. 20 perhaps? I’m not sure. Dickens never really tells us. However, he never really needs to. That’s what makes this book so captivating.

Dickens does such a masterful job of not having to spell anything out for the reader, yet his subtle suggestions throughout the story give the reader just enough to not feel lost. This is why this author is considered a classic.  Would modern readers enjoy a tale written over a century and-a-half ago?  In some cases, yes. However, I really can’t see many high school students reveling in glee if assigned this by their English teacher. Of course, that’s sadly true about most assigned books to young people. Sad really.

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It’s nice to take a break from modern story-telling once in a while.  And as I’ve already mentioned – mightily cheap in an e-book format.