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Truman (平装)
by David McCullough
| Category:
Biography, American history, American presidency |
| Market price: ¥ 228.00
MSL price:
¥ 218.00
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Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
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MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
Hailed by critics as a true masterpiece, David McCullough's sweeping biography of Truman provides a deeply moving look at an extraordinary, singular American and has captured the heart of the nation. |
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AllReviews |
1 2   | Total 2 pages 14 items |
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Walter Isaacson (Time) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
McCullough's marvelous feel for history is based on an appreciation of colorful tales and an insight into personalities. In this compelling saga of America's greatest common-man president, McCullough adds luster to an old-fashioned historical approach... the sweeping narrative, filled with telling details and an appreciation of the role individuals play in, shaping the world.
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The Economist (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
Remarkable... you may open it at any point and instantly become fascinated, so easy, lucid, and energetic is the narrative and so absorbing the sequence of events.
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Alan Brinkley (The New York Times) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
A warm, affectionate and thoroughly captivating biography... the most thorough account of Truman's life yet to appear.
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Robert Dallek (Los Angeles Times Book Review) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
McCullough is a master storyteller whose considerable narrative skills have been put to exquisite use in re-creating the life and times of America's 33rd president. |
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Jonathan Yardley (The Washington Post) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
Meticulously detailed, elegantly written, tightly constructed, rich in revealing anecdotes and penetrating insights. It is, as its subject demands, biography on the grand scale. |
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Gaddis Smith (Yale Review) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
McCullough has done the hard work necessary for good history and has added zest and imagination... the Truman story meets a deep need to reaffirm personal values and to dream that the country can somehow "go home"... to leaders who speak for themselves, who are in touch with the people, and who campaign on the issues. |
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Andrew Alexander (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
I must say as a fan of history and American politics I have enjoyed all of McCullough's books that I've read to date and "Truman" is easily one of his masterpieces. However, I think McCullough fails to inform his reader of some important details while portraying the life of Harry S. Truman. For example, McCullough portrays Truman as a heroic visionary acting courageously to prevent the spread of communism into South Korea but fails to mention that the "democracy" Truman was protecting was a military dictatorship. Other than that, this book is a great read about a great man and admittedly McCullough's "oversights" are innocuous to the finished product.
Almost immediately when reading this book you get the sense that from an early age Truman was too big for his surroundings growing up at the turn of the cenutry in Jackson County, Missouri - and clearly he was.
Without-a-doubt, Truman was the "American dream" realized. Only in America could a young man, the son of a political savy farmer with what seemed to be perpetual financial problems, grow up to be one of the greatest statesmen of the 20th century.
McCullough takes the reader through all the life-shaping events of Truman's life without a loss of enthusiasm be it Truman's time spent as a artillery captain on the Western Front in World War I, to his days as a county Judge in western Missori, his associations with the Pendergast political machine, to his subsequent election and rise to prominence as a U.S. Senator, the political maneuvering that put him on the ticket as VP with FDR, to the agony of the decision to drop the atomic bombs, the shaping of post World War II America, Truman's astonishing victory in the 1948 campaign, the Berling airlift, the Korean War, and ultimately Truman's return to private life.
This is a great book and a great read. Not only is it a remarkable biography, but it is also a great study of an important era in American history and the man who shaped American policy towards communism, for better or worse, that lasted up until the end of the Cold War.
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DelParto (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
David McCullough has a knack of showing much respect for his subject. His well-researched historical biography of President Harry S. Truman, TRUMAN, is by far the most packed and detailed assessment of the former president that one will encounter. McCullough's writing and interest in history shows the human aspect of Truman from the time he was born, 1884, up to his death in 1972, and those who will want to read this book will see a side of Truman that has been overlooked or overshadowed by the events that he experienced during his administration, such as the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the controversial debacle with General Douglas MacArthur. On the other hand, he also spearheaded Civil Rights legislation for African Americans in the military, helped create the United Nations and NATO, and worked to unify foreign nations in Europe.
All of the information in this book derived from an enormous body of records that derived from the Harry S. Truman Library, which was meticulously written and kept by Truman through his lifetime. McCullough includes his intimate thoughts that he wrote in letters to his wife Bess as well as conversations that show how Truman confided with his dear friend Secretary of State Dean Acheson, and the intense personality of a president who was known for his most famous quote, "If you can't stand the heat, you better get out of the kitchen." No doubt, Truman was his own historian, and from reading this biography, he had a love for history as well as literature. Indeed, he was a man of arts and letters, and always referenced Abraham Lincoln and U.S. Grant, Mark Twain and Willa Cather. However, he as well as Abraham Lincoln and George Washington were among the respective presidents that did not attend college.
The most interesting part of the book is the discussion of Truman's rise to the presidency. And the most sincere and somewhat sad part of the book is the concluding chapters when Truman is back home in Independence, Missouri where he did not want to be amongst the spotlight of Washington. McCullough describes Truman's long journey home.
Nevertheless, one can see how one Missouri farmboy persevered. He fought in World War I, served as a US Senator, and became US president. His story is one that does not happen too often. McCullough succeeds in portraying Harry S. Truman as truthful as possible.
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J. Gugelman (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
I recently completed Truman by David McCullough, which checks in at over 900 pages. I have to admit that I couldn't understand how a book about Harry Truman could possibly take up 900 pages. However I found that I, like many others, underestimated Truman in more ways than one.
Harry Truman was certainly not from the mold of highly-educated, affluent, East Coast presidents. Raised in turn of the century Independence, Missouri, Truman was from beginnings that were humble at best. McCullough details his Missouri upbringing and roots in a fair amount of detail. Of particular importance are his relationships with his grandfather, father, and mother. Sharing his father's passion for party politics, the young Truman becomes part of the 'machinery' after a short, yet formative stint in the Army during WWI. Soon thereafter, he begins a long association with the Pendergrast organization of Kansas City that would dog him for the remainder of this political career.
The story follows Truman from the local and state level through his rise to the Senate and Vice-Presidency. The fascinating part of the book begins here. As one would expect, any rise to the Oval Office would create notice. Add to that the overshadowing spectre of WW2. But it is really events that followed that made Truman's Presidency. The decision to use the Bomb and keep it in civilian control. The Marshall Plan. The spread of communism throughout the globe. The formation of Israel. The Korean conflict. Even the first hints of something to come in Vietnam. It could be said that every major American foreign policy event of the 2nd half of the 20th century begain during Truman's tenure. Truman fans will say his leadership prevailed during these years. And his detractors will say it was then that he made so many crucial missteps.
Careful attention is paid to the other major players of the times and their impact on Truman: Roosevelt, Marshall, Eisenhower, Churchill, and Stalin. In addition, the lesser-known characters who were close to Truman are given fair treatment as well: Pendergrast, Bess Truman, and Dean Acheson, among others.
At first glance (and lift) McCullough's work can be a little intimidating. But the pacing of the book is perfect and the structure (short, manageable sections) really frees one to read it quickly and easily. McCullough is clearly a big fan of Truman but does take care to portray the human aspect of Truman, faults and all.
I heartily recommend this book to anyone interested in Presidential history, 20th century US History, or US foreign policy in the last 60 years. I plan to move on to McCullough's other Pulitzer winner, John Adams very soon.
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A reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-22 00:00>
David McCullough's biography on Truman was a Pulitzer Prize winner and it is easy to see why. Harry S. Truman very worthy subject, the research of the subject was exhaustive, and the resultant book fluid, accessible, insightful, engaging, and educational. I found it a fully satisfying book for the subject matter it covered. I can't even imagine the amount of research that went into this book.
Harry Truman was a haberdasher (men's clothing store owner) from the small town of Independence, Missouri, and probably as unlikely a possibility to be president of the United States as one could imagine. He rose through local machine politics to U.S. senator based upon his fine reputation as an artillery captain in WWI, and a few years later, Roosevelt took him on as VP to balance his ticket. Then, near the end of WWII, as we all know, FDR died and Truman became president and was faced with such great and difficult decisions as whether to drop the A-bomb on Japan, how to deal with a willful and highly adventurous General McArthur in the Korean War, how to massively airlift food and other supplies to communist-blockaded Berlin, how to deal with Russia during the Cold War. He even had to survive an assassination attempt on his own life.
How did this plain, seemingly unsophisticated man grow so quickly into the most important job in the world at one of the most troubled and dangerous times in our history? How did such an underdog small-town outsider with only a high school education manage all this? What kind of a man was he close-up? These are questions David McCullough tries to answer for us. McCullough, in fact, succeeds in making us feel we are there in his meetings, his family get-togethers, his poker games, on his walks and drives. We also go along with Truman and wife Bess as they try to take anonymous vacations after he retired from the presidency - without security, believe it or not. I'll leave it to your imagination how long the trip remained with the former president going unnoticed.
McCullough sketches the Truman experience from the early 1800's when his pioneer forebears moved from the east to Missouri, which was then the gateway to the western territories. He spends a lot of the book, as you might expect, on his presidency, and the surrounding people and circumstances. You get to know Harry Truman personally and also get some insight into Ike (less admirable than we thought), MacArthur (as arrogant as we thought), Joe McCarthy (as scary as we thought), and many other high-profile types in his administration such as the great Dean Acheson and George Marshall. McCullough had access to many of the letters Truman wrote to his family, friends, and associates, and, surprisingly, some of the letters Truman wrote to his self and never mailed, basically to blow off some steam about a particular situation. (You would wonder why he even kept these letters and how they ended up for public viewing.) You had to be impressed with his self-command under great and often unfair criticism, his ability and willingness to make a tough decision, his work ethic to learn the hardest and most difficult job in the world as quickly and thoroughly as possible. To be sure, Truman was a flawed human being (aren't we all?), but that makes him an even greater man for the things he accomplished. Also, He was often able to inspire great effort and loyalty from the people who worked with him, and was able to deal with some very important people outside his administration who were very difficult. In a word, he was quite a leader, and if he hadn't been, things might have turned out a lot worse for all of us. No doubt about it, his presidency took place in some very scary times!
I was surprised how much I liked this book and heartily recommend it.
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1 2 | Total 2 pages 14 items |
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