Specter of the Past (Star Wars)

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Timothy Zahn is the master of the Star Wars novel. His trilogy (Heir to the Empire, Dark Force Rising, and The Last Command) did almost as much as the movie trilogy's re-release to create new interest in Luke, Leia, and Han Solo. Specter of the Past is the first of a new series, The Hand of Thrawn. Princess Leia is trying desperately to hold the loose coalition of interests known as the New Republic together long enough to see the evil Empire finally vanquished. But in a stunning setback, Han Solo and Luke Skywalker discover that the pirate ships raiding New Republic transports are staffed with clones under the command of someone who claims to be Grand Admiral Thrawn, the Empire's most powerful warlord, believed dead for 10 years. Thrawn's plan for destroying the fragile New Republic seems well on the way to completion--unless Han, Leia, and Luke can stop it.

Book Description

From Hugo Award-winning author Timothy Zahn, whose unprecedented bestselling trilogy continued the saga of George Lucas's blockbuster films and became a landmark in the history of science fiction publishing, comes a dramatic new chapter in the greatest science fiction epic ever told.  Now Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, and Han Solo must battle to safeguard the fledgling New Republic from a dead Imperial warlord--and from itself.

Once the unquestioned master of countless solar systems, the Empire is tottering on the brink of total collapse.  Once commanding an invincible armada of Star Destroyers, its fleet has been reduced to a skeleton force.  Day by day, neutral systems are rushing to join the New Republic coalition.  But with the end of the war in sight, the New Republic has fallen victim to its own success.  An unwieldy alliance of races and traditions, the confederation now finds itself riven by age-old animosities.

Princess Leia struggles against all odds to hold the New Republic together.  But she has powerful enemies.  An ambitious Moff Disra leads a conspiracy to divide the uneasy coalition with an ingenious plot to blame the Bothans for a heinous crime that could lead to genocide and civil war.  At the same time, Luke Skywalker, along with Lando Calrissian and Talon Karrde, pursues a mysterious group of pirate ships whose crews consist of clones.  And then comes the most startling news of all: Grand Admiral Thrawn--believed to be dead for ten years--is reported alive.  The most cunning and ruthless warlord in Imperial history has seemingly returned to lead the Empire to triumph.

As Han and Leia try to prevent the unraveling of the New Republic in the face of this fearful and inexplicable threat from the past, Luke sets out to track down the rogue pirate ships.  To do so, he will team up with Mara Jade, with whom he will share his growing mastery of the Force and the ever-present threat of the dark side.  All the while, lurking in the shadows is the enigmatic Major Tierce, a disciple of Emperor Palpatine, sharing his long-dead master's lust for power, schooled in the devious stratagems of Thrawn himself, and armed with his own dark plans for the New Republic and the Empire.

Specter of the Past marks the triumphant return of Timothy Zahn to the celebrated Star Wars(r) universe in a novel that brings together all the trademark action, suspense, startling revelations, and brilliant spectacle worthy of the name Star Wars.

Timothy Zahn is one of science fiction's most popular voices, known for his ability to tell very human stories against a well-researched background of future science and technology.  He won the Hugo Award for his novella Cascade Point and is the author of sixteen science fiction novels, including the bestselling Star Wars trilogy Heir to the Empire, Dark Force Rising, and The Last Command, the novels Conquerors' Pride, Conquerors' Heritage, and Conquerors' Legacy, and three collections of short fiction.  Timothy Zahn lives in Oregon.

(r), TM & (c) 1997 Lucasfilm Ltd.  All rights reserved.  Used under authorization.

Customer Reviews:

The Blah of Thrawn.......2007-05-22

I put the book down about half-way through it because I just couldn't get into it anywhere near as much as the Thrawn Trilogy. I realize that this book is probably just a lot of setting-up for the 2nd book, but I decided that I'd rather read other books instead of be bored on the way. It probably would have been better if Zahn had stuck with his original idea of one book instead of making it a duology.

Instead of this book, I highly recommend the following 5-star novels:

Cloak of Deception (Star Wars)
Shadow Hunter (Star Wars: Darth Maul)
Labyrinth of Evil (Star Wars, Episode III Prequel Novel)
Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader (Star Wars)
Shadows of the Empire (Star Wars)

Zahn's triumph.......2006-06-13

I really, really enjoyed Tim Zahn's retur to the Star Wars universe, especially since this actually makes political sense. Though I enjoyed the Thrawn trilogy, Thrawn himself was rather annoying, as I am sure that he was to Luke, Leia et al, since he was so good at making their lives miserable. But he was just so omniscient that he was a tad over the top, a Fu Manchu from the Galaxy far, far away. This time, he is just being imitated, with humorous results. Mara Jade is back, too, and nobody does Mara like Zahn does. I don't think the other authors that touch on her really understand her, at all, least of all B. Hambly. Highly recommended.

A worthy "follow-up" to the Thrawn trilogy.......2005-08-19

I really liked this book. Zahn did a great job leading you along. You couldn't wait to start the second book in the duology A Vision of the Future.Luckily since I didn't get to read it till well after they had both been published I didn't have to wait. This is one of the better Star Wars books out there.

boring.......2005-05-18

the irritating writing style continues...unfortunately this time there is no attempt at a storyline and no interesting characters. we don't really need to be informed every time someone has to 'connect to the force', or runs through jedi meditation techniques, etc. it has to be implied at some point really.

Zahn is still the king!!!.......2005-01-26

If you think the Thrawn Trilogy was the best thing ever written in the expanded Star Wars Universe and if you think Andersen's Jedi Academy is the worst then you'll greatly appreciate the addition of the Hand Of Thrawn series. Zahn truelly makes the universe worth expanding again.

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psychology of conservatism & fundamentalism

The Authoritarian Specter
Robert Altemeyer
Manufacturer: Harvard University Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0674053052

Book Description

The bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, the emergence of militias and skinheads, the rise of the religious right, the attacks on Planned Parenthood clinics, the backlash against equal rights movements, the increase in poverty...these, according to Bob Altemeyer, are all versions of one story--the authoritarian personality in action. But aren't authoritarians Nazi types, kooks, the Klan? These are just the extreme examples, he argues. The Authoritarian Specter shows that many ordinary people today are psychologically disposed to embrace antidemocratic, fascist policies.

The book presents the latest results from a prize-winning research program on the authoritarian personality--a victory for the scientific method in the struggle to understand the worst aspects of ourselves. It connects for the first time the many ways authoritarianism undermines democracy. Many of our biggest problems, seemingly unrelated, have authoritarian roots. The scientific studies demonstrating this are extensive and thorough; their powerful findings are presented in a conversational, clear manner that engages readers from all backgrounds.

This is an important, timely work. It explains a growing movement to submit to a "man on horseback," to attack those who are different, to march in lockstep. Altemeyer reveals that these sentiments are strongly held even by many American lawmakers. These discoveries deserve careful attention in a presidential election year.

Customer Reviews:

psychology of conservatism & fundamentalism.......2000-02-08

Altemeyer is regarded by social psychologists as the world's leading authority on the psychology of political conservatism and the psychology of religious fundamentalism. He has also done the most-extensive studies in the psychology of bigotry. Altemeyer has submitted his fascinating personality-questionnaire to over 50,000 individuals, including young and old, various academic specializations, Republicans, Democrats, Christians, Jews, Moslems, religious reformists, religious fundamentalists, atheists, agnostics, professional politicians, U.S., Canada, the former Soviet Union--many categories of people. He has applied the sophisticated mathematical technique of factorial analysis to the results, so as to identify how a wide range of personality variables naturally cluster together or separate--are actually the same or different from one another. He has found that political conservatism, religious fundamentalism, and all kinds of bigotry--against Jews, gays, Blacks, women, the poor, and many other minority or other weak groups--cluster together as actually a single personality-trait, which he has thus called "Right-Wing Authoritarianism." He was amazed to find, when he submitted his questionnaires to members of the communist party in the former Soviet Union, that they too scored very high on his "RWA" scale--that the U.S.S.R.'s communists were true conservatives. However, communists in capitalist countries, interestingly, scored low on "RWA" or conservatism.

This book is a more-updated version of Altemeyer's ENEMIES OF FREEDOM, which won the Behavioral Science Prize from the American Association for the Advancement of Science. However, it is not by any means a revised edition--it is a new work. Both books are phenomenally well-written, in a style that is both clear and engaging, and organized well. Both would probably have become national, if not international, bestsellers if only they had been promoted reasonably well, which neither was.

It is rare that the virtues of scientific professionalism and popular-appeal attractiveness are combined together. This book, like ENEMIES OF FREEDOM, is such a work. Anyone who wants to understand religious fundamentalism, political conservatism, or bigotry, cannot do better than to start with either of these two masterpieces by Altemeyer.

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A few extra comments...

Addressing Some Basic Misconceptions About Derrida's Work

Deconstructing Deconstructionism

hidden in the depths of words, nothing comes

An Amazing Work

Specters of Marx: The State of the Debt, The Work of Mourning & the New International (Routledge Classics)
Jacques Derrida
Manufacturer: Routledge
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ASIN: 0415389577

Book Description

Written in the aftermath of the fall of the Berlin Wall and within the context of a critique of a "new world order" that proclaims the death of Marx and Marxism, Jacques Derrida undertakes a reading of Marx's "spectropoetics" -- his obsession with ghosts, specters and spirits. Derrida argues that there is more than one spirit of Marx and that it is the responsibility of his heirs -- we are all heirs of Marx -- to sift through the possible legacies, the possible spirits, reaffirming one and not the other. He leads beyond the deafening disavowal of Marx today, a disavowal he sees as an attempt to exorcise Marx's ghost.
Specters of Marx represents renowned philosopher Jacques Derrida's first major work on Marx and his definitive entry into social and political philosophy.

Customer Reviews:

A few extra comments..........2007-07-09

The pro-Derrida and anti-Derrida standpoints are well represented in these reviews; however, there is a more important point that has not been made. I read this work much like Nietzsche's Zarathustra, meaning that its significance remains to be seen--for now to come. Now, take that as "post-structuralist obscurantism" all you want. I will shoot back just as Derrida did a hundred times: You have not read enough and you clearly do not understand his project.

With that being said, this is not even really a work on Marxism, historical materialism, or even "social" movements, per se. I read this work as affirming the undying desire for emancipation and uncovering the limits of the Marxist/leftist movements and how they are treated within academia. Marx is used as one example among many possible, just as he uses Fukuyama. I would also disagree with the previous reviewer and say that the more I read it, the more elucidating, exciting, and emancipatory this text became. This text is about infinite responsibility, inheritance, and creating "a new opening of event-ness."

I'll close with a quote from Jean Birmbaum who writes, "It is here that we find again the theme of transmission, of legacy, the 'politics of memory, of inheritance, and of generations' that is sought in Derrida's Specters of Marx, on the horizon of an obligation to justice and an endless responsibility before 'the ghosts of those who are not yet born or who are already dead.'"

Addressing Some Basic Misconceptions About Derrida's Work.......2007-01-17

Reading this book will help dispel (or at least nuance) two criticisms that are often addressed to Jacques Derrida's work. The first is that the brand of philosophy that he promotes under the name of deconstruction is irretrievably obscure and that it constitutes a refutation of the notion of objective truth as well as an attack on the Western canon of literary works. The second is that Derrida cultivates a radical posture that is detached from the realities of the day and unashamedly leftist, as the reference to an outmoded Marx would suggest.

Let us first address the accusation of obscurity. Nobody expects philosophy to be easy, and readers who have no experience of reading theoretical texts may have difficulties with this one. I must confess that there are times when I could not follow the author's line of reasoning, and I may have skipped a few paragraphs here and there, but on the whole I did not find this book unduly abstruse or recondite--and I consider myself an average reader, with only a distant background in modern philosophy. I will leave to the reader to judge for himself whether the puns and neologisms that are introduced in the book (hauntology, spectropolitics) or taken up from previous works (differance) are just pedantic wordplays or if on the contrary they do add value and enrich meaning. But at least one should give them a chance to speak for themselves, and place them in their own discursive context.

People often identify deconstruction with an attack on past scholarly traditions or a dismantling of literary texts--in other words, a rejection of the works of "dead white males". This is certainly not the case with Jacques Derrida. He is a scholar moulded in the classical tradition and whose commerce with the canon of Western philosophy and classic literature is steeped with respect and familiarity.

His reference to Shakespeare throughout this essay about Marx's legacy easily proves this point. Bringing together these two authors is not totally out of place: Marx evokes the Bard more than once in his work, in particular in The German Ideology. More to the point, the playwright and the revolutionary share a common interest for ghosts, allowing Derrida to explore this theme by finding echoes between Hamlet and the Communist Manifesto. In both cases everything begins with a ghost, from expecting an apparition. "A specter is haunting Europe: the specter of Communism": thus begins Marx's Manifesto. According to Derrida, this metaphor is not fortuitous: "Marx, writes Derrida, lived more than others in the frequentation of specters... He loved the figure of the ghost, he detested it, he called it to witness his contestation, he was haunted by it, harassed, besieged, obsessed by it."

Shakespeare, for one, knew how to handle ghosts. He understood that it took a scholar to bring a spirit to the stage and to extract knowledge from a ghost. "Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio," admonishes Marcellus in the first scene of Shakespeare's play. This is the sentence by which Derrida choses to close his essay, having recalled that "they are always there, specters, even if they do not exist, even if they are no longer, even if they are not yet. They give us to rethink the 'there' as soon as we open our mouths, even at a colloquium and especially when one speaks there in a foreign language."

Both the book's explicit and incipit deal with the issue of translation, a subject that Derrida revisits time and again in his work. As he notes, the epigraph from Hamlet that opens this essay, "the time is out of joint," has been rendered in various ways by French translators, referring to a time or a world that is all at once disjointed, disadjusted, disharmonic, discorded or dishonored and unjust. "This is the stroke of genius, the insignia trait of spirit, the signature of the thing 'Shakespeare': to authorize each one of the translations, to make them possible and intelligible without ever being reductible to them." According to Derrida, translation is not something that is added to a text afterwards and from the outside. A text bears within itself its own translation, it is open to layers upon layers of interpretation and its limits, where it starts and where it ends, cannot therefore be determined unequivocally.

Likewise, Derrida uses the polyphony of the word spirit, which can also mean "specter" (as do the words "Geist" in German or "esprit" in French) to construct a phenomenology of the ghost, what he calls an "hauntology" or a reflection on how the spirit makes its apparition as a phenomenon. Among other words that are drawn in for their multiplicity of meanings are the French noun "le revenant" (the one who comes back, the ghost), the German expression "es spukt" (it spooks, there are specters around) or the English verb "to conjure" (to beseech, to conspire, to raise a spirit). As Derrida demonstrates, this constellation of meaning around the word "spirit" finds echoes in the authors that Marx criticizes (Hegel, Max Stirner), the ones who criticizes Marx (Valery, Blanchot) or, surprisingly, those who don't (Freud, who also had his ghosts).

What about the accusation of radicalism and aloofness? Derrida certainly gives ammunition to those conservatives critics who consider deconstruction as being equivalent to Marxism. As he acknowledges, "deconstruction would have been impossible and unthinkable in a pre-Marxist space." For him, Marx is to be ranked among the great classics of modern thinking, perhaps alongside Nietzsche and Freud: "Upon rereading the Manifesto and a few other great works of Marx, I said to myself that I know of few texts in the philosophical tradition, perhaps none, whose lessons seemed more urgent today... It will always be a fault not to read and reread and discuss Marx. We no longer have any excuse, only alibis, for turning away from this responsibility."

Upon closer scrutiny, however, Derrida takes some distances with the Marxist dogma, pointing out that Marx himself resented being called a Marxist. He doesn't fully subscribe to "the concept of social class by means of which Marx so often determined the forces that are fighting for control of the hegemony." As he points out, Communist regimes drew the political consequences of Marx "at the cost of millions and millions of supplementary ghosts who will keep on protesting in us." He could have gone further along that line. But even though he shies away from addressing the issue squarely, Derrida reminds us that the specter of communism indeed turned half of Europe into a world of wraith, of chimeras and hallucinations. The communist specter made all reality ghostly. Marx's obsession with ghosts turned out to be prophetic, and Derrida's book allows us to reread him from that angle.

Deconstructing Deconstructionism.......2006-01-22

Cluttered phraseology, erratic prepositions, dizzying suppositions and a tendency towards compulsive terminologicalism seem to be the hallmark of Derrida's work. The deconstructionist tact in Specters of Marx has resulted in a collection of nearly incomprehensible thoughts, taking the shape of misguided, a-structural and often unintelligible sentences. The book does not seem to have a beginning, middle or end, nor does it seem to carry themes from what chapter to the next (except for the repeated allusions to spirits, ghosts, specters, haunts, spuks, etc.). With all of that being said, I know that this is Derrida's point, to deconstruct language from its privileged space that it inhabits, to disassemble text brick by brick and to break apart the philosophical mortar until there is no foundation left to build upon. However, this raises a few flags for me. From where does Derrida derive the authority, or the power to give voice to the deconstructive effort? Doesn't the process of de-privileging a text require authority from which to speak from? Does Derrida's elite position as a pol-literati allow him some privileged vantage to see things more clearly than others? Granting him that he might hold this position (for the purposes of argument) wouldn't it behoove him to make his writings more accessible, to the masses and academia alike? Considering my relative nascence to Derrida's nonlinearity, and to his verbosity, maybe I am missing the point (in fact I truly believe that I am missing the point). I will admit however, that the excessive neologisms, the confused waywardness, and the aberrant writing of Derrida may be artistic, and sometimes charming. I have found the reading of Derrida useful in that it helps me understand that writing or other texts may best be understood if they are removed from their privileged pedestal, that writing is just a representation of reality, a simulacra of simulacra which may have no meaning by itself. But at the same time, I found Specters of Marx frustrating to read. There were several times in this book where I read a sentence, or a paragraph, or a several pages and had absolutely no idea what it is I just read. If you enjoy postmodern deconstructivist literature then this book is for you; if you prefer to read something that makes some sense, I suggest you stay away!

hidden in the depths of words, nothing comes.......2004-09-25

If you come to "Spectres" expecting find some new insight, some vision to see into Marx, and the canonical texts, as "The German Ideology",Derrida cannot help you or the cause of illumination.Your eyes have grown old and weary trying to find where this light may reside,the epistemic. In fact only history itself and the correlations of whatever exists are there waiting for that, to interpret,to re-absorb to find/locate a new context, a new air to breath, or do we need to purchase that as well, as we now do with water;or as in South America today the turn to the Left away from the hardened corruption hardened with the New York Banks. But now the time from the bottom upwards can see itslef, time again will give it content; and Derrida will not be there,he cannot be there for his help, his aid is filled with contengencies, and reservations in these regards you come away from this work wondering where and what does it strike?, what resonance does it proclaim?; for long ago he(Derrida) found activism to be an end to itself,for itself although Derrida's voice for the dispossessed has seldom lent itself to the cause of Palestine.Why erect barriers?He has forgotten the face of prejudice? Yes or No?He speaks about his childhood and the prejudice he suffered, but then extend this in time, to aid the living,or do we simply forget? where Derrida can you have done this? So conceptual borders and barriers and vocal mantras are erected all the same over time, over place he didn't have although we seldom see this time in concrete form.
These were tail-end Lectures on the demise of an Ideology again the late Fifties also proclaimed an end to ideology,it is an uncomfortable word now with the demise and threat of Soviet Communism, Fukayama's neat little ode to ideology now forgotten itself. The purpose of Derrida is to create, to create concepts,fusions, fidelities, and areas where he can escape that is the line of productive value, and his language does have its illuminations and points of curiosity. It is not a place to build however,to foster ties with, it is a though secluded,yet not altogether hostile; nor does Derrida's work set a continuation that would let you see some other place certainly not within the dirty vagaries and betrayed ambience of politics.Although following ancient thought all is politics, wherever it may interface with the human spirit.We then see on this "Spectres" what is not here. We have known something is rotten in Denamrk to fill in this void with Hamlet, and what "spectre" still roams the earth is all bound to human hunger, human greed, to erecting Walls yet again, to predestine another series of hypocrisies, where again Derrida's voice fails to look. He may look but he keeps his words, his textures inside. Being outward has more definition and committment, and Derrida's work betrays him, for we only need to look at his words. In the end we are given structures, neatly persuasive, to avoid facing the lives of those dispossessed, those who cannot now breath the air freely, nor have the aid of medical service, or not knowing where I will be tommorrow with friends,in friendship with whom? Friendship is proximity, so proximity to the "spectre" cannot be found here in words.

An Amazing Work.......2001-08-12

Derrida is definately "not a good Marxist." He is not trapped in the decaying dialectic model, but works his way around, examines the processes, and allows the readers to arrive at their own conclusions. This book is not about Marx, but rather about the specters, their attendant ideological implications, and historicity. If you are looking for a political Derrida, you will not find him here.

The Specter of Genocide: Mass Murder in Historical Perspective

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Good book about genocide, bad book about individual genocides

The Specter of Genocide: Mass Murder in Historical Perspective

Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521527503

Book Description

Focusing on the twentieth century, this collection of essays by leading international experts offers an up-to-date, comprehensive history and analysis of multiple cases of genocide and genocidal acts. The book contains studies of the Armenian genocide; the victims of Stalinist terror; the Holocaust; and Imperial Japan. Contributors explore colonialism and address the fate of the indigenous peoples in Africa, North America, and Australia. In addition, extensive coverage of the post-1945 period includes the atrocities in the former Yugoslavia, Bali, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Rwanda, East Timor, and Guatemala. Robert Gellately is Professor and Strassler Family Chair for the Study of Holocaust History at Clark University, where he teaches a variety of courses in modern German history, modern European history and the history of the Holocaust with a concentration on the study of Nazi Germany and the Gestapo. In Backing Hitler (Oxford, 2001), Gellately uses new evidence to demolish long-held beliefs about what ordinary Germans knew of the concentration camps. His internationally acclaimed book, The Gestapo and German Society (Oxford, 1990) challenges conventional concepts of the Gestapo and daily life in Nazi Germany. He has won numerous fellowships, and awards, most recently from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Germany. Ben Kiernan is A. Whitney Griswold Professor of History and Director of the Genocide Studies Program at Yale University and Convenor of the Yale East Timor Project. Kiernan is the author of The Pol Pot Regime (Yale, 1996), How Pol Pot Came to Power (Verso Books, 1985) and three other works and over a hundred scholarly articles on Southeast Asia and the history of genocide. Choice called him "the most knowledgeable observer of Cambodia anywhere in the Western world." Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge "indicted" and then "sentenced" him as an "arch war criminal." Kiernan is a member of the Editorial Boards of Human Rights Review, the Journal of Human Rights, and the Journal of Genocide Research. He is currently writing a global history of genocide since 1500.

Customer Reviews:

Good book about genocide, bad book about individual genocides.......2006-01-14

If you are interested in the study of genocide and theories of how a genocidal regime may rationalize its policies, then this book is a good choice for you. It's chock full of scholarly articles on theories concerning these matters, as well as how genocide should be defined, and other such intellectual material. If you're more interested in learning the details of individual genocides: how they were carried out, in-depth histories and case studies, then this is book will provide nothing for you to sink your teeth into. The articles within it frequently reference statistics from actual genocides and compare various aspects of different genocidal regimes, but never make any attempt to go beneath the surface. You'll learn nothing new from this book about any genocide that you couldn't have learned from just doing a Google search. Even the articles that are about specific events, like the killings in Guatemala, are mostly just full of heady social theory with statistics and facts concerning Guatemala as a backdrop. They never go into the specifics of how the killings were carried out, or specific incidents, or anything that might breathe just a little bit of life and humanity into the stuffy academic monologue. You may want to read this book if you're preparing to write a research paper on genocide, but it's definitely not something most people would read for pleasure.

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Snippy worl of Mr Roberts
A Modern Master
Stunning!!

Snippy World Of Michael Roberts, The
Manolo Blahnik , John Galliano , Andre Leon Talley , and Michael Roberts
Manufacturer: Steidl/Edition 7L
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 3865211518
Release Date: 2005-08-15

Book Description

Description: "Michael Roberts is the Jean Cocteau of the fashion world," wrote the celebrated New Yorker editor Tina Brown in 1997, welcoming her new fashion editor to the most prestigious magazine in the world. Having already served for many years as a style editor (The London Sunday Times, Vanity Fair) and having produced numerous illustrations, photographs, paintings, and columns of fashion criticism for various media, Roberts had already had his name coupled with Cocteau's, but his striking visual style is collected here for the first time. From evocative pen-and-ink sketches to acrylic paintings to intensely witty New Yorker covers created from cut paper, these works capture the fads, foibles, and fashionability of our times. Anna Wintour, editor-in-chief of American Vogue, in her introduction to "this beautiful book" calls them "fiendishly accurate satire." And the shoe guru Manolo Blahnik writes, "His drawings grasp fashion moments like a photo could never do." That a major part of the book was created through the painstaking method of paper collage especially appeals to the internationally famed fashion designer John Galliano. He writes, "I have avidly collected his work, along with doing my own collages, for years, and I am honored to be a part of this book." --Grace Coddington

Customer Reviews:

Snippy worl of Mr Roberts.......2007-05-25

unfortunately we did not get the book up today. Please check!!

Best regards Ursual Geuen Mueller

A Modern Master.......2007-01-11

A Modern Master

I had no idea who Michael Roberts was when I came across this book, which idly adorned a naked shelf in the now historic Coliseum Bookstore. As I flipped through the book again and again and again I was awestruck by the sheer number of spectacular plates in one volume. I'd frame them all but wouldn't dare dissect this clothbound collector's dream. Mr. Roberts' artistic prowess is an inspiration--his bold colors, defined shapes that are chiseled as well as a body-builder's pecks, and imagery so striking it burns a place in your memory. Note the Pompeian mosaics--just mind-blowing.

I was so moved by his artistry that I purchased 2 of his earlier works, The Jungle ABC and Mumbo Jumbo, The Creepy ABC. How wonderful to discover the talent, wit and verse contained in these treasures for new readers--what a fun way to learn!

Thank you Michael Roberts for these treasures, I anxiously await your future masterpieces.

Stunning!!.......2007-01-09

A beautiful book beautifully produced, laid out and printed. If you are looking at this review you know who Michael is and what you're buying, so all I can say is that you won't be disapointed, just hit your "buy now with one click!" button.

Specters of the Atlantic: Finance Capital, Slavery, and the Philosophy of History

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Specters of the Atlantic: Finance Capital, Slavery, and the Philosophy of History
Ian Baucom
Manufacturer: Duke University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0822335964

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In September 1781, the captain of the British slave ship Zong ordered 133 slaves thrown overboard, enabling the ship’s owners to file an insurance claim for their lost âcargo.â Accounts of this horrific event quickly became a staple of abolitionist discourse on both sides of the Atlantic. Ian Baucom revisits, in unprecedented detail, the Zong atrocity, the ensuing court cases, reactions to the event and trials, and the business and social dealings of the Liverpool merchants who owned the ship. Drawing on the work of an astonishing array of literary and social theorists, including Walter Benjamin, Giovanni Arrighi, Jacques Derrida, and many others, he argues that the tragedy is central not only to the trans-Atlantic slave trade and the political and cultural archives of the black Atlantic but also to the history of modern capital and ethics. To apprehend the Zong tragedy, Baucom suggests, is not to come to terms with an isolated atrocity but to encounter a logic of violence key to the unfolding history of Atlantic modernity.

Baucom contends that the massacre and the trials that followed it bring to light an Atlantic cycle of capital accumulation based on speculative finance, an economic cycle that has not yet run its course. The extraordinarily abstract nature of today’s finance capital is the late-eighteenth-century system intensified. Yet, as Baucom highlights, since the late 1700s, this rapacious speculative culture has had detractors. He traces the emergence and development of a counter-discourse he calls melancholy realism through abolitionist and human-rights texts, British romantic poetry, Scottish moral philosophy, and the work of late-twentieth-century literary theorists. In revealing how the Zong tragedy resonates within contemporary financial systems and human-rights discourses, Baucom puts forth a deeply compelling, utterly original theory of history: one that insists that an eighteenth-century atrocity is not past but present within the future we now inhabit.

Specters of Mother India: The Global Restructuring of an Empire (Radical Perspectives)

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Specters of Mother India: The Global Restructuring of an Empire (Radical Perspectives)
Mrinalini Sinha , and Mrinalini Sinha
Manufacturer: Duke University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0822337959

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Specters of Mother India tells the complex story of one episode that became the tipping point for an important historical transformation. The event at the center of the book is the massive international controversy that followed the 1927 publication of Mother India, an exposé written by the American journalist Katherine Mayo. Mother India provided graphic details of a variety of social ills in India, especially those related to the status of women and to the particular plight of the country’s child wives. According to Mayo, the roots of the social problems she chronicled lay in an irredeemable Hindu culture that rendered India unfit for political self-government. Mother India was reprinted many times in the United States, Great Britain, and India; it was translated into more than a dozen languages; and it was reviewed in virtually every major publication on five continents.

Sinha provides a rich historical narrative of the controversy surrounding Mother India, from the book’s publication through the passage in India of the Child Marriage Restraint Act in the closing months of 1929. She traces the unexpected trajectory of the controversy as critics acknowledged many of the book’s facts only to overturn its central premise. Where Mayo located blame for India’s social backwardness within the beliefs and practices of Hinduism, the critics laid it at the feet of the colonial state, which they charged with impeding necessary social reforms. As Sinha shows, the controversy became a catalyst for some far-reaching changes, including a reconfiguration of the relationship between the political and social spheres in colonial India and the coalescence of a collective identity for women.

The Specter of Relativism: Truth, Dialogue, and Phronesis in Philosophical Hermeneutics (SPEP)

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The Specter of Relativism: Truth, Dialogue, and Phronesis in Philosophical Hermeneutics (SPEP)

Manufacturer: Northwestern University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0810112574

The Specter of Democracy: What Marx and Marxists Haven't Understood and Why

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The poverty of political science

The Specter of Democracy: What Marx and Marxists Haven't Understood and Why
Dick Howard
Manufacturer: Columbia University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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In this rethinking of Marxism and its blind spots, Dick Howard argues that the collapse of European communism in 1989 should not be identified with a victory for capitalism and makes possible a wholesale reevaluation of democratic politics in the U.S. and abroad. The author turns to the American and French Revolutions to uncover what was truly "revolutionary" about those events, arguing that two distinct styles of democratic life emerged, the implications of which were misinterpreted in light of the rise of communism.

Howard uses a critical rereading of Marx as a theorist of democracy to offer his audience a new way to think about this political ideal. He argues that it is democracy, rather than Marxism, that is radical and revolutionary, and that Marx could have seen this but did not. In Part I, Howard explores the attraction Marxism held for intellectuals, particularly French intellectuals, and he demonstrates how the critique of totalitarianism from a Marxist viewpoint allowed these intellectuals to see the radical nature of democracy. Part II examines two hundred years of democratic political life -- comparing America's experience as a democracy to that of France. Part III offers a rethinking of Marx's contribution to democratic politics. Howard concludes that Marx was attempting a "philosophy by other means," and that paradoxically, just because he was such an astute philosopher, Marx was unable to see the radical political implications of his own analyses. The philosophically justified "revolution" turns out to be the basis of an anti-politics whose end was foreshadowed by the fall of European communism in 1989.

Customer Reviews:

The poverty of political science.......2006-09-25

Dick Howard (he seems to use the forms Dick and Richard equally) has written "The Specter of Democracy" as a series of essay-like philosophical conceptions of the relation between Marx and modern day democracy. Of itself, this is an interesting idea and his clearly intelligent discussion of matters on the intersection between philosophy and political science shows considerable talent for using the difficult concepts of these fields. Unfortunately though, Howard's theses are largely untenable as he fails to appreciate the thouroughness of Marx' commitment to opposing bourgeois civil society.

Howard himself describes his goal in the book, which is also the point of the title, as trying to demonstrate that modern democracy, not communism, is really the 'specter haunting Europe'. Democracy, he says, is really the 'solution to the riddle of history', because it allows the full development of the autonomous nature of the political which is the real overcoming of alienation.

This is an increasingly common argument used by political scientists and philosophers (as well as many anti-Marxist intellectuals in general) to reject the criticisms aimed at bourgeois civil society by Marx & Engels, the Frankfurter Schule, and the apparent challenges of (preventing) totalitarianism. In this view, Marx' undertaking was in reality an idealist philosophy primarily aimed at, in Hegelian tradition, showing ways for mankind to overcome alienation: with the difference between Hegel and Marx being that the latter used a critique of political economy as his philosophical weapon and a theory of revolution as his replacement of the Hegelian Geist.

This reading is however impossible to maintain. Extremely careful reading of Marx' early works, often cited in support to show alienation as the root of all evil with Marx, shows that in fact the political economy was always conceived by Marx to be the primary cause of the alienation of modern man. Even excellent scholars such as Allen Wood have misunderstood this though, so it cannot be held against Howard too much. Much more damaging is the extremely idealist (and very superficial) reading of both "Das Kapital" and the "Grundrisse" that Howard applies. Stating that Marx merely wanted to demonstrate the misconceptions that capitalists have about capitalism as a summary of the content of "Das Kapital" entirely misses the actual content of the critique, which is strongly materialist and historical in nature and far too deeply reliant on the particularities of capitalist production to allow for such a purely Hegelian reading. Marx did not intend to show that capitalists failed to understand capitalism as "political", as Howard thinks - that is precisely an idealist view of civil society itself which historical materialist critiques are an attack on! The political is itself a mirror of social relations between men engaged in production for their own survival, and it is THAT which has analytical priority at all times in Marxist thinking.

Strangely enough the lion's share of Howard's book is spent on discussing totalitarianism and its critiques, only tangentially related to Marx by way of the Frankfurter Schule and the liberation of the political. Howard is clearly enamored of the approach of Lefort and Castoriadis in their later period, which interprets totalitarianism as a democratization that undermines itself by its radicalness (again we notice Hegelian idealist tendencies in this book's analysis!). Lefort's analysis, shared by Howard, finally posits totalitarianism as an attempt to combine radical democratization with an infusion of meaning to history, which must lead to the totalitarian domination of this particular meaning (robbed of its real content, as seen in Stalinism). Howard then argues that it is precisely the indeterminacy of modern democracy that allows itself to be saved from this - the less meaning given, the more people can give, he seems to say. Interesting parallels to Rorty could be made, but Howard does not engage him much, preferring to use the obvious subject of the French Revolution vs. the American one as demonstration.

This review may seem at this point a little disjointed, but this is because the book itself is rather disjointed. There is but a very thin connection between on the one hand the idealist reading of Marx as overcomer of alienation by releasing the political, and on the other hand the critique of totalitarianism and the critiques of those critiques (we are dealing with philosophers here...). What really dooms the book, despite the clear intelligence and erudition of the author, is the way in which a really faulty and overly convenient reading of Marx is used to support a notion of the political common only to liberal pragmatists, namely the political as the (peaceful) battlefield of conflicting meanings. Not only does Marxism not permit such a view of things, meaning one can either involve Marx or pragmatism but not both, but it is also very much a pity that the focus on Marx prevents Howard from actually defending this notion of the political itself. Because of this, the reader is left with a lot of interesting smaller ideas but two faulty cores: an undefended but controversial concept of the political as fair 'vessel' for subjective determinations, and Marxism as an economic Hegelianism. I'll give it three stars because of the effort undertaken by the author, but 2.5 would be more appropriate.

The Specter of Communism: The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1917-1953 (A Critical Issue)

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Blame america , excuse the murdering monsters
As Good As It Gets
Readable and insightful survey of the genesis of the Cold War
Good survey of US bias against communism
The Specter in America

The Specter of Communism: The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1917-1953 (A Critical Issue)
Melvyn P. Leffler
Manufacturer: Hill and Wang
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0809015749

Book Description

The Hill and Wang Critical Issues Series: concise, affordable works on pivotal topics in American history, society, and politics.

The Specter of Communism is a concise history of the origins of the Cold War and the evolution of U.S.-Soviet relations, from the Bolshevik revolution to the death of Stalin. Using not only American documents but also those from newly opened archives in Russia, China, and Eastern Europe, Leffler shows how the ideological animosity that existed from Lenin's seizure of power onward turned into dangerous confrontation. By focusing on American political culture and American anxieties about the Soviet political and economic threat, Leffler suggests new ways of understanding the global struggle staged by the two great powers of the postwar era.

Customer Reviews:

Blame america , excuse the murdering monsters.......2007-04-02

This book is basically an apology for Russian communism. One that proclaims the message: "communism isn't all that bad". "Stalin was a prudent, cautious and reasonable man and the Americans were the knee-jerk irrational reactionists" The book also seems to convey the message that "America made it seem worse than it was and hyped it up".

I mean, why should any country have reservations about the spread of communism? Communism, a form of government that is the privileged few, the Nomenclatura, who rule with absolute power over the lower party members and the general population, the proletariat. Let's not forget, commumism produced leaders such as Lenin, Stalin and Pol Pot. Sure, it's intentions may be good.....but human nature won't let it work. Power is its end.....not its mean, though that's what the original bolshevik revolutionaries proclaimed.

Basically, it's a 'blame america first' type of book. I for one am not going to be swayed just because of this author's talented writing skills, his commumist-friendly opinions and artful ways of persuasion using history. Nope. I blame communism and Stalin ( who murdered millions of his own......MILLIONs )

The 'amoral' U.S.A........never murdered millions of its citizens on the whim of their President. It never negated the existence of people on a list. A list who was cavalierly reviewed by the president, Stalin, and checkmarked with a pen as he decided whose life to end and existence from the records of history to erase. Many others were sent to Gulags never to be heard from again. It was the communist bastion of the USSR and ITS President, Stalin who did this.

Considering these above mentioned historically documented facts regarding the terrors inflicted upon the population by the ruling Red party, not only in the old USSR but other communist regimes (cambodia, Cuba, Vietnam and China for that matter), is it possible that the United States' "fears" or "overreactions" to the spread of communism after WWII were, perhaps, a bit justified? If these communist countries, in the decades following, WWII had turned out to be benevolent, non-tyranical, beneficial to their general populations or 'good' in any sense of the word, then the USA's reactions and maneauverings after the war would have been, as the author puts it, 'an overreaction'. But, because history proved that communism was indeed a monstrous terror upon the peoples of those particular countries, does it not justify our government's sentiments toward communism's spread post WWII? Indeed it does. Thank God for the actions that our government took to jealously protect our way of life.....which, incidentally, is the best way of life on the earth ( why does everyone seek to get into America if it's not the best?)

I side with America and I side AGAINST communism. This goes for any period of history.....from the 1940s until present. Like the WHO songs says......" Won't be fooled again"

As Good As It Gets.......2006-11-26

Melvyn Leffler's "The Specter of Communism" is a superb, short, and nuanced history of the origins of the Cold War. It should be assigned reading in any college course on 20th century American foreign policy.

In Leffler's telling, Stalin felt vulnerable after World War II and wanted to preserve good relations with the U.S. The Soviet dictator insisted, however, on moving his borders westward, installing a puppet regime in Poland, and playing a leading role in the occupation of Germany and Japan. These goals didn't necessarily clash with core U.S. interests and might not have resulted in a Cold War if Europe and East Asia hadn't been on the verge of collapse after 1945. Since World War I, Washington had been haunted by the fear that the resources of Europe and Asia might fall under the control of one hostile power -- either Germany or Russia -- that could then threaten the security and political economy of the U.S. Washington policymakers didn't think that Stalin planned to start a new war, but they panicked when communist parties surged in France, Italy and elsewhere. Assuming that communist governments would link their economies to the USSR's, Washington responded by moving to rebuild the German economy and integrating Germany into a U.S.-led European bloc. Stalin, fearing a revival of German power, clamped down on Eastern Europe and blockaded Berlin. The Cold War was soon going at full steam.

One of the high points of Leffler's book is the discussion of the domestic politics of anti-communism. American conservatives didn't give a hoot about Europe or foreign policy, but they did want to exploit anti-Red feeling to discredit New Dealers and crack down on labor unions and civil rights groups. However, having stirred up a lot of paranoia, conservatives were outflanked when the Truman Administration tapped these same sentiments to win support for expensive plans to rearm the U.S. and rebuild Europe! Thus the Great Bipartisan Compromise of the 1950s and '60s was born: an anti-Soviet foreign policy was married to crude Red Baiting at home.

Leffler writes clearly, understands the policy environment of Washington, and doesn't accept the prevailing (and idiotic) myth that U.S. foreign policy is generally well-informed or motivated by moral considerations. On the contrary, the U.S. policymakers of the late 1940s were more-or-less amoral and sometimes poorly informed about foreign countries. (American foreign policy can be Machiavellian and inept at the same time.) "The Specter of Communism" is history at its best.

Readable and insightful survey of the genesis of the Cold War.......2006-04-27

I was assigned to read this short book for a course on United States foreign policy in the 20th century. Unlike a great many texts on the subject, I found it absolutely enjoyable to read. Things to watch in particular are how Leffler handles the shift of how the United States officially and popularly felt about Communism and the Soviet Union before and after World War II, the formulation of the doctrine of containment, and most especially the interplay between the leadership not only in the United States, but the Soviet Union and Europe as well. This final point, the exploration of the nature of particular leaders and national psyches, is the greatest strength of Leffler's account. FDR, Truman, and Stalin especially come alive in the narrative. Through the course of the narrative, the reader is given a very interesting and now unconventional thesis that to some extent, the Cold War was indeed inevitable in the post-war world as a result of the positions of the United States, the Soviet Union, and the ruin of Europe. Especially pivotal to the coalescence of the Cold War was the United States' declaration of the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe. Leffler says: "The American intent was not to threaten the Soviets or divide Europe, but this was the price the Truman administration was willing to pay in order to revitalize Western Europe and harness the resources of western Germany" (pg 67).

Overall, this is an intelligent and accessible account of the origins of the Cold War that anybody interested in the World Wars, the Soviet Union, Communism, and/or contemporary foreign policy would do well to read.

Good survey of US bias against communism.......2000-07-14

This book is good for what it tried to accomplish. Its a introductory survey of the origins of an American mindset against communism. Leffler points out that communism wasn't a concern of the USA population or politicians until after WWII- when the communist began to rival democratic capitalism. Leffler uses historical documents to support the assertion that the sum of world-wide communism never really came close to rivialing the US in terms of economic or military power. However, the fear that maybe communism could gain equal status one day in the future led the US to undertake decisive actions toward securing Hegemony.

The Specter in America.......2000-04-12

Leffler writes a balanced account of the events leading up to and into the the Cold War. He discusses the impact of geopolictics with regard to the First and Second World Wars and how communism impacted American public policy. He points out that it was not so much fear of the physical power of the Soviet Union but fear of the ideologies of communism within our borders that led the anit-communist anti-Soviet movements in our nation. He follows the growth of Russia into a world power and explains how it eventually became a military threat and a nuclear power. The book is engrossing and well structured. Leffler presents the information in a clear way without unnecessary deviations. It is an excellent look at Cold War origins.

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