Book Description
Cotton has touched off wars and revolutions, inspired astonishing inventions, laid waste to entire ecosystems, and enslaved untold millions of people. Alexander the Great carried cotton cloth on his back from India to Europe. Starting from the late eighteenth century, the fiber transformed creaky rural England into the greatest industrial power on earth. Today, cotton is, if anything, more preeminent than ever and at the center of raging global controversies. Now Stephen Yafa delves deep into the past to tell the amazing story of this humble, infinitely adaptable fiber that has—again and again—reinvented our world.
Domesticated simultaneously in Peru and Pakistan some 5,500 years ago, later a prime motive for the colonization of the New World, as Yafa shows, cotton's most profound impact came after the Industrial Revolution. By the mid-nineteenth century, the vast plantations of the antebellum South, the grim mill towns of New England, and the soot-spewing factories of the English Midlands were knit together in a global system of exploitation and enslavement—all of it based on cotton. When Marx and Engels composed The Communist Manifesto, they chose cotton manufacturing as the prime symbol of capitalism run amok. Beautifully researched and written, Big Cotton traces the cultural, economic, and social history of the “world's friendliest” fiber from the kingdoms of Mesopotamia to the Gap.
Customer Reviews:
The Lowell plan.......2007-10-02
Basing a book on a commodity is not a unique plan, but in this instance it is a fruitful way of looking at social, political, and economic history. My review necessarily simplifies some of the issues presented. My interest in the subject is caused in part by having visited Lowell and having become astonished at the vast size of the National Park Service installation there. In reading the book I learned that Paul Tsongas, a boyhood friend of the author, was instrumental in having the National Park Service turn Lowell into a living museum. (The author grew up in Lowell, a city famous for Jack Kerouac, its mills, and the Lowell system of employer-employee relations.)
Cotton has versatility. Down sides to the cotton story abound. Child laborers were used in Manchester, England. Cotton crops and irrigation resulted in the diversion of the waters of the Aral Sea. India traded cotton cloth with China and Indonesia at the time of Alexander the Great. In the seventeenth century cotton replaced wool in England and silk in France. The governments attempted bans.
In the eighteenth century Richard Arkwright created the factory system. English people desired the fabrics called chintz and calico. Cotton manufacturing provided a source of immense wealth. Arkwright spun his cotton thread establishing an industrial dynasty near the Derwent River. Afterwards Watts's steam engine and Cartwright's power loom resulted in cotton manufacturing in Manchester. In America Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin. Slater, a former employee of Arkwright, built a cotton yarn factory in Rhode Island. By 1809 there were eighty-seven operations in New England and New York. Slater limited himself to cotton yarn. Francis Cabot Lowell used his photographic memory to become a sort of industrial spy in Manchester, England. The mills in Lowell, Massachusetts, automated using the Jacquard system.
Lowell introduced corporate paternalism since farmers could not spare their sons but sent daughters to work at the mill. Anthony Trollope believed that Lowell was a commercial utopia. The harmonious view of the enterprise lasted about twenty years. Later the inevitable friction between workers and management took place. At any rate, Lowell never was the ideal community observers believed it was. The good press was a product of a publication, THE LOWELL OFFERING, written by the female workers. The Lowell mill was less life-draining, less polluted than comparable English factories.
Another concern of conscience was that cotton and slavery were connected strongly. The owners, the Boston Associates, were dubbed the Lords of the Loom. Mill towns included Saco, Lynn, Chicopee, Taunton, Dover, Fall River. Daniel Webster, taking a moderate stance and defending monied interests, was shunned by his good friends Ralph Waldo Emerson and John Greenleaf Whittier. Irish immigrants, more malleable than the daughters of the farmers, formed a great portion of the workforce of the mills by 1860. Northern mill owners and English textile lords misjudged the length of the war. After the war and the immense losses of the South, the price of cotton fell. The share-cropping era commenced.
The development of ring spinning and the bobbin changer reduced the need for skilled operators. This enabled owners to build mills closer to the raw materials, a case of disruptive technology. Factory villages emerged in North and South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama. Most complexes were financed by Northern investors. The author contends that cotton democratized greed. In childhood Andrew Carnegie was a bobbin boy.
The Cone brothers of Baltimore convinced the Southern mills to upgrade the quality of their product. In the West Levi Strauss sold blue jeans, denim. Adding rivets strengthened the work garments. Levi's became a brand pioneer. Sanford Cluett developed a process to preshrink cotton fabrics in 1933. In 1970 denim resurrected the American cotton apparel industry. The Gap and Banana Republic raised the public appeal of cotton pants, blue jeans and khakis.
Research has produced transgenic cotton seed. We are all in the dark about the future of biotechnology. In America two hundred thousand textile workers have lost their jobs since 1997. Cotton, subsidized in the U.S., has been used by both liberal and conservative journals to illustrate the cruel arrogance of power. The National Park Service facility at Lowell is described in this splendid book's Afterward. A glossary, notes, bibliography, and index follow.
Flawed fabric.......2007-03-03
This book is an adequate introduction to the long and convoluted history of cotton, but not, I hope, the finest piece of scholarship on the subject.
Big Cotton provides fascinating tidbits about the cotton plant and the fabric made from it. Although Yafa's "cotton-centric" approach to history is sometimes simplistic, it still makes for interesting reading. However, the writing tends to be clumsy and confusing, and the textile puns are overused. Also, for my tastes, Yafa's political and regional biases intrude into his subject far too often.
"...fanning that trigger.".......2006-10-21
"Gunsligers, snake-eyed varmints, low-down horse rustlers, and lily-livered scumsuckers bit the dust when John Wayne pulled out his six-shooter and started fanning the trigger." (p. 213) Trigger???
That sentence should give you an idea of just how jarring, flip and accurate this author is.
Three crops are the foundation of modern Europe's (and America's) economic and imperial hedgemony over the rest of the world: spices, sugar and cotton. Cotton is, simply, the genesis of the industrial revolution and the resurrection of American slavery. As such, the subject is incredibly important. Mr. Yafa isn't up to the task.
Yes, he's trying to write a popular history rather than a scholarly treatise. But his focus is virtually completely on America. As such is scope is simply too limited.
He mentions aniline as the foundation for synthetic indigo dye in passing in a long, rambling aside about blue jeans. Aniline and the coal-tar it's derived from are the cornerstones of modern chemistry, the chemical industry and the modern (early 20th century) German economy. Eh. No biggie.
If the guy could write, I'd probably be more forgiving of the book's shortcomings. It is a big subject.
Despite the importance of cotton, there aren't very many books extant about its history. Yafa doesn't have the sweep the subject deserves, but you will learn a few things, at least some of the outline of the story.
A lack of coherence.......2006-07-17
"Big Cotton" and US agricultural subsidies are big news in the world of trade. Yafa teases a promise to enlighten on this situation, but fails to deliver.
Yafa knows there is a big and tangled picture here to illustrate, but is unable to work out the world view and settles instead for a series of scenes in cotton's long history. The start of the industrial revolution in England, the rise of Lowell, MA, the beginning of Levi Straus & Co are written as grand chapters containing some amusing anecdotes, but sitting in isolation.
In the final chapters, pesticides and genetically-modified cotton appear, largely wrapped in a diatribe on the evils of both rather than any real analysis. Yafa has left out how the South changed from a resion of sharecroppers pre-WW II to industrial farming by the mid-50's.
Most disappointing are the final chapters on the current world trade. There is a complex story to be told here of US politics and farming as well as farming in Africa. Yafa misses most of this. The devil is in the details of most of this story. With few if any numbers and no detail of costs or pricing Yafa cannot capture this story. It does not lend itself to a journalistic approach, although Yafa's refernces to stories in the Wall Street Journal suggest that the WSJ writers may have written a better piece on the subject than "Big Cotton".
Meanwhile, Yafa purports to tell a tale worldwide in scope, yet his "Big Cotton" is really a US story. After 300 pages of almost exclusively US tales we are told that China is the biggest current producer. Where did the Chinese industry come from? Or Pakistan's or India's?
If you are looking for the story of cotton, keep looking - this is not the book.
Cotton's Compendium.......2005-12-11
This is the complete story of cotton's global, economic impact from the first recordings of reported history up to and including our current era.. Big Cotton is the most complete history of this cloth yet written.
It is the an economic story highlighting how cotton cultivation and production have profoundly shaped the past 5,500 years of human history. From India to Europe to the United States, this plant has defined the economic and social institutions that endure today, from agricultural economies to the industrial revolution, from slavery and the Underground Railroad to wage slavery, from the American Civil War and the most marvelous technological accomplishments to environmental and social disasters of truly epic, global proportions.
Driven by greed, fomenting social and economic misery while providing the cheapest and most durable of human clothing and fashion worldwide, Stephen Yafa's remarkably excellent story is the most well written book I have ever read.
Average customer rating:
- "The day I killed my brother's girlfriend started with me hand picking leaves off our front lawn."
- Short but, excellent.
- Wrecked review
- Anna Gets Well
- An emotionally charged story of responsibility
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Wrecked (Richard Jackson Books (Atheneum Hardcover))
E. R. Frank
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Book Description
Dear anyone who cared about Cameron,
I was the driver of the "other" car.
The police and my mother and father and plenty of people are saying that I didn't kill her. But I know I did. That's what her parents must believe. And my brother, Jack. He always sees what's true. I want to tell him how sorry I am about the accident. I want to say a lot of things to him and to everybody. Like how Cameron was smart and beautiful and kind in a way that isn't all that common in high school. Like how much Jack loved her and how sometimes I can hear him crying through the wall at night. I want to say how bad everything can get.
In one split second.
Upside down and shattered.
Just like that.
Wrecked.
Customer Reviews:
"The day I killed my brother's girlfriend started with me hand picking leaves off our front lawn.".......2006-06-05
Sixteen-year-old Anna was driving her (drunk) best friend home from a party when she collided head-on with her brother's girlfriend's car. Now a beautiful high school senior is dead, Anna nearly lost an eye and suffers from PTSD with crippling nightmares, her best friend Ellen is in a wheelchair, and the family is at odds with one another. Wrecked opens with the car accident and its aftermath, but, as a whole, the book is an exploration of the fabric of an entire family.
Anna's friends and family have widely disparate reactions to the wreck. What is the right way to respond, anyway? Anna can find websites about how to deal with a dying family member, how to be a friend to someone who is grieving, and how to cope if you have suicidal thoughts, but there is no website to address the peculiar situation of how to cope with unintentionally killing one of your peers.
The narration of Wrecked is told in a genuine teenaged voice, full of questions, full of frustration with parents, and desperately seeking direction. In a strange way, the entire crisis brings Anna's family closer, to a more complete understanding of one another.
This book is highly recommended for teens and family members of all ages. It is especially important for anyone dealing with a family crisis or the accidental death of a family friend. Fans of this book should seek out Mary Beth Miller's Aimee and John Green's Looking for Alaska.
Short but, excellent........2006-04-22
This book cannot be put down. I read this book in 5 hours, I am in [...]honors so this book was easy for me, I absolutely adored this book. I love how it went into flashbacks of times with her and Jack. Excellent book, purchase!
Wrecked review .......2006-01-12
The Book Wrecked by E.R. Frank, and published by Atheneum/Richard Jackson Books September 27, 2005. There are 256 pages in this book. This book is fiction. This book is about a young girl who accidentally kills her brother's girlfriend in a car accident. She deals with the ups and downs of having the girl's death on her shoulders, which is very hard for her to cope with.
This book is mainly about dealing with life and death. I think that the author is trying to allow young adults to take a look through a teens eyes and let them see how it would be if they drink and drive. The young girl's name is Anna she goes to a party with her best friend Ellen. When they arrive at the party peer pressure pushes Anna do what she normally does not do, that is drink. She stops after a while and sobers up a little bit but Ellen is definitely wasted. On the way home is what changed Anna's life forever. All she can remember is the accident, and waking up in the hospital. She keeps repeating things she heard like screaming, and Ellen's voice. Now Cameron her brother's girlfriend is dead and no one is blaming her but she feels that it is all her fault. From what I have read so far in the book I believe that it is a very good book. It makes me feel kind of like I am in the story. It is so descriptive that I feel like if I close my eyes I can see what is going on.
After reading the part of the book I have completed the book has really left a lasting impression it has made me think about what I would do if I were put in that situation. It kind of makes me sad, I want everyone that is interested in reading this book to know that it is the type of story that once you have picked it up to start to read it you can not put it down.
Anna Gets Well.......2005-12-31
I loved this book. The voice of the narrator Anna, is sincere, and although she has endured living with a troubled father and survived a terrible car crash, her voice is never whiny or filled with self-pity.
Even though everyone tells Anna that the crash was not her fault, years of emotional abuse from her father and guilt over her brother's grief over the loss of his girlfriend in the crash takes its toll on her and she begins to have severe panic attacks and is unable to face driving a car. The author of Wrecked is a psychotherapist and the sessions between Anna and her shrink are realistically portrayed.
I also enjoyed the scenes between Anna and her friends at school and away in Florida. Anna's friendship with her friend Ellen is put to the test when Ellen continues to abuse alcohol. There are no easy answers which is what makes this such an excellent read for young adults and adults alike. It shows that there are no bad guys, just people like us who have a hard time navigating through life. A satisfying ending brought the book full circle. I'd read other books by this author.
An emotionally charged story of responsibility.......2005-12-15
Speaking of tension, E.R. Frank's Wrecked is one of the most moving stories you could find on the aftermath of an auto accident. An auto crash involving three teens kills one, leaves a passenger disabled, and is viewed from the driver's perspective in Wrecked. For Anna has killed her brother's girlfriend in the accident and has to handle not only the death but the rift with her brother and her passenger friend, who was drunk at the time. An emotionally charged story of responsibility.
Amazon.com
In The Wrecked, Blessed Body of Shelton Lafleur, a revered artist looks back on the adventures and sufferings of his childhood with compassion, wisdom, and humor. As an 8-year-old, Shelton Lafleur runs away from his foster home in the New Orleans Garden District. While trying to find refuge in a towering oak tree in one of the city's parks, he falls. The catastrophic accident leaves both legs crippled, determining the course of his life. After years in a grim orphanage, Shelton runs away again in search of his roots. A street artist named Minou befriends him, and ultimately becomes his mentor and inspiration.
Book Description
John Gregory Brown's award-winning debut novel, Decorations in a Ruined Cemetery was hailed as "the stuff of which classics are made" (Los Angeles Times). With his second novel, The Wrecked, Blessed Body of Shelton Lafleur, John Gregory Brown reaffirms his standing as one of the most gifted and inventive new writers to emerge from the South.
It is New Orleans during the Depression, and Shelton Lafleur is eight years old, a black boy mysteriously adopted by a wealthy young white woman confined to her bed. One day he tumbles from the top branches of a live oak tree, crippling himself: for life. But sweet deliverance arrives in the form of a wily man named Minou, who takes Shelton into his lively family and under his worldly tutelage. Not only does Minou teach . Shelton the means of survival in a South deeply divided by race, but he holds the secret: of Shelton's birth and ultimately the source of Shelton's redemption.
Customer Reviews:
You'll never forget sShelton Lafleur.......2007-05-21
This is my favorite of the three books I've read by Mr Brown. Shelton Lafleur comes to life on the pages of this book and you will never forget him. I have read the book three times and get something new each time. This is a must read for everyone.
Takes a while to get into, but you'll think about it later.......2005-04-15
This was one of those books I picked up in the library because it just happened to be there and it had an unusual title. It took me a while to get into it. At first I thought I wouldn't finish it, but the next thing I knew, I couldn't put it down. Shelton LaFleur's young life is tragic. He is a black child being reared by a white mother, who is ill. The circumstances of his birth and how he became part of this woman's family is heart-rending and misguided (let alone illegal). At age eight, he wanders away from home one night, gets lost, climbs a tree for a better view, and falls. He ends up being taken to a home for orphaned boys, where he not only has to deal with his permanent injuries, but physical and psychological abuse, as well. His life becomes a torment. Eventually a family takes him in, but what a family it turns out to be.
In spite of the painful circumstances of his childhood, and maybe because of them, LaFleur grows up to be a successful painter. Though some of his work is enigmatic and dark, he finds an audience as he matures. The story is written from the vantage point of the old man he's become.
It's been eight months since I read this book, and I still think about it. That's a book worth reading!
Carolyn Rowe Hill
A Gift from the Author.......2003-12-31
I finished reading this for about the fourth time a few months ago. For Christmas, I bought a box of these -- 50 -- to give to friends. I am very, very popular this year. The editorial reviews on this book just scratch the surface. It is an absolutely compelling story, the characters actually live alongside you, the writing is music and the message is profound. It's as "worthwhile" as Thomas Wolfe, and as engaging as a great beach read. The only down side to this book is that it makes a lot of other stuff seem disappointing by comparison.
Loved this book.......2000-06-18
I completely disagree with the previous reviewer and with Kirkus. Maybe some of the plot is implausible, but that isn't really important. This author has touched deeply into things about human nature. And I loved the irony of the ending.
artsy, original, and thoroughly tiring........1998-05-19
Certainly "artsy," certainly original, and certainly tiring is John Brown's second and most recent novel, The Wrecked, Blessed Body of Shelton Gerard Lafleur. At points in the story, it seems that Brown achieves something great. At other points, I wished I never picked the book up. The novel's complex plot circles around a handful of eye-catchingly interesting issues including racism, life as a seriously handicapped child, mentorship, and others. Suspiciously reminiscent of the Forrest Gump screenplay, Shelton Lafleur (abr.) also contains a nice dose of casual, meaningful, and insightful philosophy in the form of Shelton's occasional reflections on life. The story is told from the retrospect of Shelton Gerard Lafleur, who is narrating the story as a moribund and decrepit old man. He tells the story of his most unusual childhood in New Orleans during the Depression -- the story of his mysterious adoption by an affluent and aged white woman, his life-crippling fall from a backyard oak, and his experiences with the eccentric and impoverished black mentor who adopted him for a second time. Despite the poignant issues involved, Brown fails to create anything close to a moving novel. The Wrecked, Blessed Body of Shelton Gerard Lafleur is instead victim to long spells of rambling and trifling.
Customer Reviews:
Power of a 'Non-Fiction Novel'.......2006-12-21
In discussing personal events, some a half-century old, it's damn difficult to believe that anyone has the 20/20 recall displayed by John Gilmore in 'Laid Bare'. But once you suspend disbelief, you can walk into this book with the swagger of a Chandleresque detective, sipping an afternoon whiskey in a smoky dive in downtown LA, listening to a failed 1950s Hollywood actor tell you all about the famous people he's known. "Sure pal," you say, "go on, tell me more about this Jim Dean character. Sounds like trouble."
This is a book about deformed celebrity (James Dean, Jane Fonda, Marilyn Monroe, etc.) and failed celebrity (John Gilmore). You aren't required to recognize half of these long-ago stars to get the jaded, forlorn vibe of the piece. Gilmore walks with a lot of ghosts and lives with a deadening irony: if he's (in)famous (and published) it's through describing first-hand, often graphic encounters with film stars. Yet, he constantly moans about his failure to launch successful film and publishing projects. He's not content with his notoriety -- yet is painfully aware that without it he'd be sweeping floors.
In this way, Gilmore himself becomes a kind of Zelig-like character, always in the background, molding to the events, surviving the headliners, interpreting their actions.
Is it all fact? Probably not even Gilmore knows. Perhaps Capote was on to something with the power of the non-fiction which says (to a point) - "It might not have happened exactly this way, but it should have."
If Gimore wasn't actually been present at these events, then this would devolve to fanzine/tabloid fodder. But the fact that he was - to some degree - an observor/participant, takes it from yellow journalism into the realm of confession.
And confessions make great movies. So maybe the irony will, one day, come full circle for John Gilmore.
GILMORE STILL THE KING OF L.A. NOIR .......2006-07-31
LAID BARE tells the hard-knocks, riveted facts of a life lived in Hollywood, always on the sets, the parties and wild times. It is with equal delight that I express that while James Ellory was breaking into high school girls homes and stealing their panties, and while he was sleeping in park bushes from binges (all according to Ellory), John Gilmore was hanging with James Dean and movie stars, a teenage Sunset Strip and Beverly Hills club-hopper with people Ellory could never have possible known who would have now found him an incredulous and obnoxious boor. As describned in LAID BARE, Gilmore was struggleing to make it as a legitimate stage actor in New York, and trying to break into Hollywood movies while Ellory was burglaring homes on panty raids instead of chasing the real thing as Gilmore was doing. Gilmore's writings were being published while Elroy was still on in the bushes, or so it would appear. Gilmore's book on the Black Dahlia was optioned six years for a movie by Edward Pressman who didn't option Ellroy's book. Ellroy has lucked out with a mediocre movie with Brian DiPalma while Gilmore has withdrawn his own property for a special venture on the person he knew as Elizabeth Short, the Black Dahlia. Ellroy has apparently pulled his head from the bushes and sees he is not as important as he wanted to be; he is not the hard-core L.A. noir writer of Gilmore's stature. A reviewer says that Ellroy has publicly said "Gilmore is full of crap". Ellroy is a hack writer of juvenile mentality and Gilmore is a superb artist. Perhaps Ellory hates more that Gilmore doesn't acknowledge Ellroy and has no time for such "buck-grabbers," as Gilmore said during a reading at Skylight books in Los Angeles, mentioning Ellroy, Steve Hodel and Donald Wolfe. Ellory thrives on public attention while Gilmore doesn't. Ellory writes commercially to entertain and Gilmore, a genius, writes to enlighten. Ellroy has used almost every celebrity name to bolster his pulp fictions (naturally the real people he fabricates about are dead). Gilmore actually knew these people. As in LAID BARE, He writes about them honestly and with daring aplomb, pathos, sensitivity and pain. Such is the saga of James Ellroy bad-mouthing Gilmore. LAID BARE is a brilliant read, a deep, searching probe into the nature of celebrity and the price of the hunger for fame. A book that will live for generations!
A Hollywood Trip...........2006-07-20
While reading John Gilmore's "Laid Bare - A Memoir of Wrecked Lives and the Hollywood Death Trip," I was amazed at the number of notorious celebrities the author had tilted booze, dropped acid and eventually slept with. From Janis Joplin and Jean Seberg to James Dean and Sal Mineo, Gilmore was witness to a side of fame few could only dream of. Now, if it was only true.
This is not to say Gilmore's extremely well-written musings are a load of baloney, as his chapters devoted to Joplin, Jim Morrison and even the sad story of Barbara Payton are insightful and poetic. The details provided are so original that much of this has to be based on fact. Gilmore, born and raised in Hollywood and the son of a former bit player at MGM and an LAPD cop, was a part-time actor, screenplay writer and director who seemed to never catch a break. City hopping between Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and Paris during the 1950s and 60s, Gilmore's quest for movie stardom failed to materialize. To his credit, he had several agents and did quite a bit of television work with guest roles on such programs as "The Naked City," "Bonanza" and "The Barbara Stanwyck Show." Publicity shots of Gilmore from this period show a youthful heart-breaker with a strong resemblance to Tony Curtis. He tried to direct a surfing epic in Hawaii, but financing fell through. He was to co-star in a European film with Seberg, but Italian investors pulled out. And while he was Dennis Hopper's roommate, he wrote a screenplay that was eerily similar to what would become "Easy Rider," though he received no credit for it. And the list goes on.
One of many controversial passages in Gilmore's book is devoted to his friendship with James Dean. After Dean's shocking death at the moment of super stardom, quite a few people claimed deep friendships with the legendary star. Gilmore has not only tried on this jacket, but he says their camaraderie began in New York and continued through Los Angeles where they would ride motorcycles together along coastal highways. These dream-like road trips would inspire his screenplay that would eventually be stolen by Hopper and mined into "Easy Rider" gold.
Gilmore describes a deeply troubled Dean, who had a fascination with speed and death. He claims they experimented together sexually, but Dean was mainly a heterosexual. This friendship, while giving Gilmore some notoriety, eventually caused Hollywood to brand the author a "rebel and troublemaker," further contributing to his failure to break through studio doors. Perhaps, but it did lead to Gilmore's novel "Live Fast Die Young: the Short Life of James Dean" which has done well on the bestseller lists. Today, residing in attractive senior citizen splendor, Gilmore the rebel seems to have found his niche with nonfiction investigation, penning such memorable works as "Severed: the True Story of the Black Dahlia Murder" and "Manson: The Unholy Trail of Charlie and the Family." In all, he's written around 10 noteworthy novels, some fiction, most not, hovering around the seamy side of LA life.
What is most fascinating about Gilmore's "Laid Bare" is the recreation of a storied Hollywood in transition. The studio system was coming to an end and the fertile era of the furious 1960s and 70s was slowly taking root. It's the kind of meat James Ellroy ("LA Confidential") feeds on regularly, and it's not surprising that Ellroy has gone on record to say Gilmore is full of crap. Truth be told, Gilmore most certainly hovered around a movie scene Ellroy could only dream of.
Anyway, Gilmore's take on the likes of Lenny Bruce, Jane Fonda, William Burroughs and Steve McQueen is not especially positive. He has quite a bit of venom built up for McQueen, who had an affair with his first wife while the trio lived in New York. Hopper is raked over the coals with rare abandon. Jack Nicholson is poked a few times. He even takes Errol Flynn to the cleaners, though the sex-obsessed swashbuckler has always been an easy target.
The irritating hair which one can never easily pluck while perusing this underbelly wreckage, is that the huge majority of celebrities Gilmore crucifies kicked the bucket many years ago. None of these sad souls are alive to dispute Gilmore's shady claims. Conversations which took place 40 and 50 years ago are recited verbatim. One suspects "Laid Bare" is kind of like those dinosaurs in "Jurassic Park." They were created with incomplete DNA, with frog blood filling in the missing gaps. Thus, a monster has been created equal parts beautiful, horrifying and repulsive.
Towards the end of Gilmore's unforgettable work, there's a passage where he seems to be winking at the audience. While describing Carlos, the roommate of a friend, he says "People who told the truth were fools, Carlos said. He believed lying was more creative than telling the truth. He'd just sit around making up stories to get people to think of him as an intelligent and important person. After he got that stuff published, he got some fat checks. He didn't care that anyone thought he was a fake. He was going to keep on lying because a superior man never tells the truth - he tells what he wants to be the truth."
Gilmore's work may indeed be baloney. If so, it's well-written baloney. Burn, Gilmore, burn.
ONE OF THE BEST HOLLYWOOD MEMOIRS EVER PENNED! .......2006-07-07
LAID BARE was given to me by movie director Curtis Harrington who had purchased a stack to pass out to friends. I have done the same: bought a stack and am passing them out. This is Hollywood in the Golden Age, told by one on the inside and half the time on the outside (via the nature of the movie business!). A boldly written, brilliantly penned memoir from around 1950 until about 1970 (and Jim Morrison!), giving us glimpses of the collapse of the major studios. John Gilmore has lived it, worked it from the start (Republic Studios),desired it, sought a special kind of fame and was so steeped in the Hollywood Mystique he seems a walking encyclopedia of the bright and dark side of L.A., and its heartbeat: Hollywood. Gilmore was born and raised in Hollywood, was pals with James Dean, was a bedtime mate of Jean Seberg and a host of other starlets, worked with talents like Barbara Stanwyck, Joan Fontaine, Peter Lorre, was mentored by Ida Lupino and John Hodiak, was acquainted with Marilyn Monroe, Jane Russel, Jayne Mansfield and Mamie Van Doren, and far from least, Brigitte Bardot. Gilmore tells all in this daring, piercing memoir of a highly creative talent wandering through twenty-plus years of Hollywood's cold days and hot nights, yearning to make it big time but finding survival in the drivers seat insterad of drugs, booze and death. I didn't want the book to end and I wish there were more!
I bought his book because he wrote about James Dean.......2005-09-21
However, it was a fascinating book chock full of information about many actors. Once you begin you must read until the last page. Very informative, but dark book dealing with the seamier side of personalities.
Average customer rating:
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The Bay at Nice, Wrecked Eggs
David Hare
Manufacturer: Faber & Faber
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ASIN: 0571146945 |
Average customer rating:
- An interesting viewpoint marred by bias
- Fascists?!? I don't think so...
- A must read for all Irish Americans
- Brilliant
- The "Troubles", as seen by the trouble-makers
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We Wrecked the Place
Jonathan Stevenson
Manufacturer: Free Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 068482745X |
Amazon.com
The Troubles--a collective term for the sectarian violence and near-ritual murder that has plagued Northern Ireland for the last quarter century--can be laid at the door of a small group of terrorists, republican and loyalist, whose influence far exceeds its number. Jonathan Stevenson, an American journalist, interviews more than 30 of these militants, many of whom admit the folly of armed struggle and express a desire for a peace that admits all sides. Whether that peace will come through the on-again, off-again truce now in effect in Northern Ireland remains to be seen, but Stevenson's book provides an important, close-up view of events in that unhappy place.
Customer Reviews:
An interesting viewpoint marred by bias.......2004-12-08
While Stevenson paints a picture of the troubles nicely with interesting facts and vivid personal accounts, he also retains an extremely biased viewpoint within the work. He repeatedly criticizes the Republican viewpoint and officials, calling them trite, cruel, narrow-minded and flawed, while he praises the Unionists for being practical, rational and righteous, as if their side of the argument was the only one with basis in fact.
Fascists?!? I don't think so..........2004-09-01
I have not yet read very much of this book. I ran across it in the library last weekend, read a bit of it, and mentally filed it as one I should get a copy of. I just heard the author on a news program, and that influenced me further to get a copy. I really look forward to finishing it now. One of the previous reviewers really angered me. If the IRA are fascists, what were O'Duffy's blueshirts? And for that matter, what about Paisley's followers??? That is just the sort of ignorant drivel I would expect from a more than likely English individual who is too cowardly to sign his name. Not only that, I seem to remember accusations from various quarters that the IRA were Maoists, or some other kind of communists, in the not too distant past. I have not always approved of the methods used by the IRA- I personally believe that violence can be used much more intelligently and effectively than has frequently been the case. However, those decisions were not mine to make, and I'll be damned if I'll criticise any military commander without stepping into his (or her) shoes, especially after the fact. Judging from the fact that nearly all Englishmen to whom I have been introduced have made derogatory remarks and/or addressed me with racial slurs as soon as they heard my name, the English obviously still hate us as part of their culture. Apropos of that, anyone resident in the six counties who wants to be British should move to England. There are plenty of us exiles around the globe who would be glad to take their place once Ireland is again united.
My family came from Donaghadee, Co. Down. My great-grandmother grew up there, and she used to tell myself and my grandfather (her son) that we would all go back to visit someday "when the British are gone". She died in 1982. My grandfather died four years later. My hair is turning grey, and the flag of the sassenach still flies over my native land, a land I have never even seen. Just to forestall a criticism I have frequently heard from citizens of the Irish Republic, who tell me that they don't care about the north and I don't have the right- they have their Ireland. Those of us in exile (yes, even those of us born in exile...), and those unfortunate enough to still live in the occupied six counties do not.
I am NOT too cowardly to sign my own name; it is:
Liam Stewart Williamson
a.k.a. Dimestore Liam
CWPro2@netscape.net
A must read for all Irish Americans.......2001-01-05
Stevenson does an outstanding job providing a backdrop to the current political and social culture of Ireland for the American reader. He describes Ireland's troubled history siting specific watershed events, rhetoric form all sides as well as the major laws that created the political climate the troubles stemmed from. This book is a quality read for anyone interested in understanding why Ireland is divided, and a must read for all Irish Americans.
Brilliant.......1998-07-24
This book is fantastic. Stevenson's understanding of Irish politics makes this book an invaluable addition to the scholar's bookshelf while keeping it accessible to readers who may be unfamiliar with the intricacies of Irish history.
The "Troubles", as seen by the trouble-makers.......1997-08-01
The heart of Mr Stevenson's book is the personal history, much of it told in their own words, of thirty-one Northern Ireland terrorists and ex-terrorists--fourteen republican, seventeen loyalist. Along the way Mr Stevenson fills in all the necessary details of recent history, and a good deal of more general historical and social matter. Mr Stevenson is an American who lived in Belfast 1993-1996. He has written a very good, very worthy book.
The first thing I want to know about a book on the Irish "Troubles" is: does the author make excuses for terrorism? Nobody who has seen terrorism at close hand can believe that it is a proper method in the pursuit of any goal, nor that unrepentant terrorists are fit people to govern any polity. In this respect Mr Stevenson is clean, his moral sense absolutely sound--an unusual thing among American writers on Ireland. While offering full coverage of the frequent nastiness and illegality of the British state's counter-terrorist actions, and of the cruel viciousness of "loyalist" terrorism, he knows--and shows--Sinn Fein/IRA for what it is: the last (it was also one of the first) of the European fascist parties. No matter who you are--Irish, British, republican, loyalist, Protestant, Catholic--if you disagree with Sinn Fein, they do not disagree politely back (except, of course, on American TV): they break your legs. Then they go and break your mother's legs. That is the reality behind Gerry Adams' unctuous smile. "Ah, but they're only trying to get back their lost land," murmur the apologists. This is like saying that Al Capone was only trying to make a living--an equally true statement. It's a question of METHOD.
Here are the actual trouble-makers of the Troubles. The broad picture Mr Stevenson assembles from his portraits is familiar to anyone who has followed the course of events; but it is told with an admirable objectivity and an appealing undercurrent of optimism--not only optimism for this poor tortured piece of land, but for the possibilities of individual human redemption. In spite of the occasional atrocities of 1996-7, Mr Stevenson believes that the real violence is over, and that the hard men of both sides are struggling to adapt to constitutional methods. I hope he is right
Average customer rating:
- A Dirty Dirty Book
- Great Collection of Personal Essays
- Whacked
- Very Funny!
- Hip, Smart , Funny
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Oedipus Wrecked
Kevin Keck
Manufacturer: Cleis Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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Shortbus (Unrated Edition)
ASIN: 1573442224 |
Book Description
If David Sedaris were straight (or Margaret Cho were a man), they might be Kevin Keck. Keck mines the same rich vein of candid, confessional humor as these popular comics, but Oedipus Wrecked goes further in single-mindedly, hilariously recounting every grim detail of the author's almost absurdly varied sexual history. Keck pulls no punches in describing his endless, obsessive erotic experiments. In essays like "Ass Backwards," "Wet, Hot Presbyterian Summer," and "I Was a Teenage Homosexual," Keck skewers his eccentric mother (whose dildo he swipes), documents his plunge into the "chorus of coming" on a sex party line, and limns a particularly outré encounter with a girl who demands he participate in water sports but won't "have sex" because "that's a sin."
For a driven horndog like Keck, sexual taboos exist to be broken. Still he always pays a price through numbing guilt or fear of discovery — though neither prevents him from embarking on the next quest for love and orgasms. Keck's tableaux of sexual excess are rendered in vivid, unflinching language that marks the emergence of a new voice in contemporary humor that's both cuttingly comic and startlingly revelatory.
Customer Reviews:
A Dirty Dirty Book.......2007-07-15
This is a dirty book... Dirty, dirty dirty book. It might have better be titled 'Ode to Chronic Masturbation'. But underneath all the 'smut' is a well written and funny book of stories people might write in their journals, but would never consider publishing. I read it very quickly. Whole book took about 1hr 1/2 to read, which would make this book one that's better to borrow than buy.
Great Collection of Personal Essays.......2006-07-07
This book was suggested to me by a friend who said she couldn't stop laughing as she read it. I don't laugh easily, but this is definitely the only book to ever make me nearly choke to death as I was reading it.
It's easy, though, to overlook what a great writer Keck is and to think of him as just another memoirist with a series of funny anecdotes (or in his case a series of dirty jokes). These are well-written stories that actually reveal quite a lot about human sexuality and male anxieties. It should probably be required reading for every woman.
Whacked.......2005-11-29
Cute book about the author's misadventures, mostly as a teen, with his body during a long, drawn out adolescence. Though he often gets caught, a la Jason Biggs in AMERICAN PIE, from which Keck's humor seems to derive, he never lets societal scorn stop him from exercising his rights to be sexual any which way he can. Some of these events are more mortifying than others, and some of them more unbelievable. In a dozen teen sex comedies we've seen an incriminating sex tape wind up on TV during our hero's family viewing hour, so when Keck asks us to believe that this happened to him as well, we respond with the skepticism ordinarily saved for those who claim to have known the original girl whose date wound up hanging from a tree, his feet gently brushing the top of his parked car while she waited inside, wondering, where has he gone? But in general Keck is amiable about this, he actually doesn't care whether we believe him or not.
He likes anal sex, with himself, and reading the opening chapter in which he reminisces about inserting the banana, the broom handle, the cucumber and the family's ice cream scooper, my eyes widened, while I thought wow, here's a guy Kevin who's had more up his ass than I have. Though he writes another chapter professing, "I Was A Teenage Homosexual," it's plain to see that his bent is really towards women, and he manages to have sex with four of them within a two year span, which is pretty good, no? Keck, a talented poet, has a deep Southern charm like THE DUKES OF HAZZARD or SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT, and he knows how to spin out a story. Nearly always he ends the tale before you're tired of him. I hope that OEDIPUS WRECKED is only the first of many Sedaris-esque memoirs from him.
Very Funny!.......2005-11-22
I did not expect it to be as funny as it was and also very honest. I loved it.
Hip, Smart , Funny.......2005-11-13
If you enjoy finely crafted prose, need a dose of hilarity, and aren't easily offended, then you'll enjoy this. The stories are based (loosely?) on the author's sexual misadventures. Keck sometimes seems incredulous recounting his own behavior and the responses it elicits in others. Well worth your dime and your time.
Average customer rating:
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Wrecked on the Feejees
William Cary
Manufacturer: Ye Galleon Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 087770435X |
Average customer rating:
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Across the Zodiac (Large Print Edition): The Story of a Wrecked Record
Percy Greg
Manufacturer: BiblioBazaar
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Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 1426440855
Release Date: 2006-10-07 |
Book Description
Once only, in the occasional travelling of thirty years, did I lose any important article of luggage; and that loss occurred, not under the haphazard, devil-take-the-hindmost confusion of English, or the elaborate misrule of Continental journeys, but through the absolute perfection and democratic despotism of the American system.
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