The Back Room > The Diner
What are you currently reading?
Bogey:
--- Quote from: SonicMan on April 08, 2007, 05:38:26 PM ---Just returned from a trip to Richmond, VA - great place for Civil War history (as you likely already know) - the famous 'ruins' of the Tredegar Iron Works is now the 'Visitor's Center' for the Richmond battlefields (includes both the '62 & '64 campaigns in the area); there is also a new 'commercial' exhibit museum that is quite good. Also, just finished Gary Gallagher's superb lecture series (on DVD) from the Teaching Company - outstanding. Dave :D
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Gary Gallagher's course looks outstanding Dave....did you have to pay the $129 for the dvds? Have you read the Foote material that BWV was discussing? It is absolutely the best overview of the American Civil War I have ever read. Even blew away Bruce Catton's overviews IMHO. The opening of Foote's third volume may in fact be the best nonfiction writing I have ever come across.
karlhenning:
I am in a very low-key re-reading of Crime & Punishment. Although, on one hand, I am finding it brilliantly written, and I could simply stay up all night and finish it off . . . I am allowing it to breathe, and I do savor it.
bwv 1080:
--- Quote from: Bill on April 08, 2007, 05:26:52 PM ---[/b]
Which part are you re-reading?
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Focusing on the major campaigns, skipping the minor ones and Northern politics (I just read Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals)
bwv 1080:
Also just began Cormac McCarthy's The Road, which I was suprised to see was on Oprah's book club. Probably the first book in the club where cannibalism is prevalent :)
SonicMan46:
--- Quote from: Bill on April 08, 2007, 06:06:47 PM ---Gary Gallagher's course looks outstanding Dave....did you have to pay the $129 for the dvds? Have you read the Foote material that BWV was discussing? It is absolutely the best overview of the American Civil War I have ever read. Even blew away Bruce Catton's overviews IMHO. The opening of Foote's third volume may in fact be the best nonfiction writing I have ever come across.
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Bill - good morn to you; yes, I read the Foote volumes many years ago (no longer have them, but probably should buy them again for a re-read; he was just an outstanding 'story teller' - love him on the Ken Burn's series on the Civil War, which would be my recommendation for a 'video' set to those just getting into this period of American History).
The Foote series may be somewhat 'daunting' for those wanting an introduction to the American Civil War; although innumerable books exist on this subject (and numerous sub-topic), my 'one-volume' recommendation would be Battle Cry of Freedom by James M. McPherson (published in 1988) - winner of the Pulitzer Prize and now an inexpensive paperback.
Concerning the Gary Gallagher DVD set, I did pay the $129 (which is their sale price for the 8 DVDs - 24 hrs of lectures in total, so takes a while); I did have a CD set in the past but sent it to my father; the DVDs are much more engrossing - Gallagher is superb in this material and the addition of photos & battle maps as visuals is more enjoyable. Dave :)
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