Raising Cain: How to Help Your Children Achieve a Happy Sibling Relationship

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Deserves ten stars.......2006-05-31

If you just look at the contributors and authors of this book you will know how good it is. Those who rate this work with one star are same people who do this with every other book that exposes anti-serb propaganda. It is now more than obvious that they are doing this proffesionaly, as a full time job.Neither they have read this book neither they really know what is inside the covers. Their only task is to downgrade any work that could open your eyes regarding ex-Yugo affairs. Do not listen to them and don't let them influence you- this book is a rare gem, and after you read it you will know why.

Left revisionism at its worst!.......2005-07-07

Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it!

The people of Serbia know what happened in Bosnia and Kosovo. They know that genocide occurred and that the Muslims of Bosnia and Kosovo were the primary victims. I wonder why Mr. Hammond fails to explain why Serbia refuses to extradite Karadzic and Mladic? Why are they refusing to admit the truth about the gruesome massacre in Srebrenica? Is the whole world conspiring against the Serbian people and more important is there a covert Western campaign to dehumanize the Serbian people? Since Mr. Hammond refuses to condemn the Serbian atrocities, the present reviewer will attempt to bring clarity as to why Serbia keeps providing shelter for notorious war criminals, such as Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic.

Even though he has been accused of committing egregious atrocities in Bosnia, Mladic is still hiding in Serbia under the protection of the Serbian authorities. Considered a national hero in Serbia, Mladic commands great respect and admiration. How does one explain the non-compliance of the Serbian authorities to accommodate the international community?

According to some estimates, more than 50% of the Serbian population still believes that there was no massacre in Srebrenica. The figure is probably much higher among the Bosnian Serb population. I recently watched a debate on Serbian TV about Mladic's role in the Srebrenica massacre. The central question of the debate was whether or not the massacre in Srebrenica had actually taken place. One participant remarked that there had been no massacre in Srebrenica and that Mladic has always been a Serbian hero. When asked why she believed in Mladic's innocence and why she held him in such high regard, she replied that Mladic had been killing "bloody Turks" in Srebrenica. She seemed completely oblivious to the fact that more than six hundred years have passed since the Turkish presence in the Balkans. In order to understand the root causes of the Serbian nationalism we will have to return to year 1389. It was in this year that the infamous battle between the Turks and the Serbs took place in Kosovo, the outcome of which had come to play a pivotal role in the rise of the Serbian nationalism. Considered God by many Serbs, Prince Lazar's death probably still constitutes the most significant event in the Serbian history. Islam has ever since been viewed as Serbia's primary enemy in spite of the fact that more than six centuries have passed since Lazar's death.

This enormous hatred of the Turks was easily transferred onto the Muslims of Bosnia and Kosovo, even though their only common denominator was Islam. In point of fact, many Serbs still make no distinction between the Turks and the Bosnian or Kosovo's Muslims. In contemporary Serbian literature, Muslims are frequently portrayed as backward, uncivilized and belligerent savages, for corroboration see for example books by Vuk Draskovic and Njegos. Paradoxically, despite their grossly distorted let alone parochial views of Islam, Draskovic and Njegos have many readers in Serbia. What better way to mislead the public than to have "experts" like the notorious Serbian ultra-nationalist Draskovic spread vicious anti-Islamic propaganda? Once these so called experts had managed to create a sense of "victimization" in the Serbian people, justifying a war to defend the Serbian people from the "Islamic threat" and the "Albanian nationalism" was easy. Of course, there were no such threats, if anything, the situation was reversed. The Albanians in Kosovo had been suffering from the Serbian repression for years. The Muslims of Bosnia were and still are the most secularized Muslims in the world so all talk of the Islamic fundamentalism in Bosnia has always been nonsensical and completely groundless. For a thorough analysis of Islam in Bosnia see Noel Malcolm's Bosnia a Short History. Thus, it is clear that the Serbian nationalism has always been fuelled by myths (see Michael Sells's brilliantly researched The Bridge Betrayed for a comprehensive analysis of the root causes of the Serbian nationalism).

Thus, the principal reason Serbia refuses to turn over Ratko Mladic to the War Tribunal in The Hague is the ancient Serbian dream of a "Greater Serbia". Many Serbs believe that Mladic was fighting for a creation of the "Greater Serbia" and for that reason they tend to deny or at best downplay his atrocities. I think that this also explains the Serbian unwillingness to admit the truth about the Srebrenica massacre. Acknowledging the truth about Mladic's role in Srebrenica massacre would have severe repercussions for Serbia. First, the Serbian people would finally realize that their government had been deceiving them all the time about the war in Bosnia and Kosovo. More important, they would learn that the Serbs were not the victims as their government had been telling them from the very beginning of the war in Bosnia and the subsequent Serbian aggression in Kosovo.

Hammond's central thesis is that the NATO's intervention in Kosovo only exacerbated the conflict. What Hammond however fails to explain is what was the alternative to a military intervention. To keep negotiating with Milosevic until his troops exterminate all Albanians? For three years the Western diplomats had been trying to negotiate an end to the war in Bosnia but to no avail. Approximately 300,000 people had to die because the international community refused to intervene in Bosnia. Had the NATO intervened immediately many innocent lives would have been saved. This is irrefutable!

Sometimes when there is no peaceful resolution in sight we must fight fire with fire! When someone is defenseless and powerless
(as the people of Bosnia and Kosovo were) then we are all obliged to put an end to their suffering, be it by diplomacy or by force.

Another aspect clearly neglected by Hammond, Diana Johnstone, Christian Parenti and other left revisionists is the incontrovertible fact that the Serbs were heavily armed while the Muslims of Bosnia and Kosovo lacked sophisticated weaponry. Had the international community lifted the arms embargo then they would not have needed to intervene.

Hammond's book thus provides an inaccurate and flawed analysis of the war in Kosovo. Based on the assumption that the NATO's intervention merely escalated the atrocities, this book offers a grossly distorted view of the war in Kosovo.

Finally a book that shows the true face of the Wetsern Media.......2004-02-16

I have been waiting for such a book for a long time. First of all let me tell the reader of this review to ignore those morons that gave this book a low grade and call the author boring, reading "entertaining" and "short" history is what made the Kosovo war so appealing to the public in the first place.
Book is very well written, not boring to a person interested in the subject, and tells in great detail what and how the western media did during the Kosovo crisis. It tells about the bias that western media had against the Serbs, people who fought bravely against Nazis in WW2, and how the war was manufactured, and many other GREAT FACTS about the "civilised west" that we will not see on FOXNEWS or read in New York Times.
Also the book NEVER says that Serbs did not commit atrocities (whoever says this clearly did not read the book), but it remindes the casual reader that Serbs were not the only ones who did violent things, a major ommission in the western media.
I would recommend this book to any student that needs an excellent source on the subject and to anyone else who thought that the coverage of the balkan conflicts were not objective.

Revisionist minimisation of anti-Albanian atrocities.......2002-03-10

This is NOT simply a set of articles criticising NATO's 1999 assault on Serbia. Rather, its contributors appear horrified with the very thought of human empathy for the oppressed Albanian people of Kosovo on the part of Western observers. They count corpses, deny atrocities and minimise suffering to the point where it appears almost as though life for the Albanians in Milosevic's Kosovo was actually pretty rosy. There is a great deal of insincerity here. Thus Mick Hume professes concern at comparisons between Milosevic and Hitler: they involve minimising the unique horror of the Holocaust, he says. This is a bit rich coming from someone who spent much of the 1990s equating the Croats and Germans of today with the Nazis. Diana Johnstone views the Serbs almost as a kind of 'chosen people' whom she imbues with mystical powers of resistence to her imaginary Western imperialist conspiracies. After reading this book, I do not believe that even if Milosevic really had exterminated six million people in gas chambers the reaction of these authors would have been any different. Whatever next ? Perhaps a sequel claiming that the Taliban were great feminists and that their atrocities against women were the invention of the Western media...

Best book yet on NATO's illegal assault on Yugoslavia.......2001-08-05

This is the best book yet on the NATO aggression of March-June 1999. It also studies the media coverage of the war. The first part consists of four essays on the background to the war, David Chandler's essay, Western intervention and the disintegration of Yugoslavia, 1989-1999, being outstanding. The second and third parts comprise fourteen essays on media coverage around the world, including a brilliant essay on CNN's role as NATO's mouthpiece. Unfortunately, however, there is no essay studying the huge popular opposition to the war in Europe and America.

This was NATO's first war, and it attacked a sovereign country with no UN authorisation. It showed itself as an alliance with no legal or geographic limits, in which the USA and Germany quarrelled like rats in a sack. To trigger the war, the US government demanded that NATO forces occupy the whole country. As a US official said, "We intentionally set the bar too high for the Serbs to comply. They need some bombing, and that's what they are going to get."

It was also the EU's war. From 1990, the EC intervened in Yugoslavia's internal affairs, aiding those seeking to secede. Its recognition of Yugoslavia's seceding republics breached international law, precipitating war. The EU's social democratic governments embrace capital, `the market' and big business: their enemy is nationalism, politics, demonised as the source of all evil.

Germany, the USA, Austria and Albania armed the Kosovo Liberation Army. In early 1998, the KLA's first major attack provoked a Serb crackdown. NATO claimed that the Serbs killed 100,000 people. Later the International Criminal Tribunal of The Hague counted 2,500 dead. The NATO bombing killed 2,600 people. Who should be tried for war crimes?

After the war, the US Congress voted $100 million to `independent' forces in former Yugoslavia, seeking its further disintegration. NATO was supposed to disarm the KLA and to protect Serbs and Roma Gypsies in Kosovo. But it has allowed the KLA to kill more than 200 Serbs and to expel 240,000 Serbs and 90,000 Roma.

Book Description

There are some seven million gypsies in Europe, an often mythologized people in the past. But now they represent a new political force, both in eastern Europe and as a new westward migration begins.The Historical Dictionary of the Gypsies (Romanies) provides a wealth of definite, factual information about this people, and their unique culture.

Customer Reviews:

Great reference book!.......2002-09-02

This book is a must for anyone doing historical research on the Roma people. Yes, it is a little pricey, but well worth it. This book should only be used as a starting point, though. Look to it's very complete bibliography (well worth the price of the book alone) for more detailed information.

Historical Dictionary of the Gypsies (Romanies) (Historical Dictionaries of Peoples and Cultures)

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Historical Dictionary of the Gypsies (Romanies) (Historical Dictionaries of Peoples and Cultures)
Donald Kenrick
Manufacturer: The Scarecrow Press, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0810854686

Book Description

This landmark work in computational linguistics is of great importance both theoretically and practically because it shows that much of English grammar can be learned by a simple program.

The Acquisition of Syntactic Knowledge investigates the central questions of human and machine cognition: How do people learn language? How can we get a machine to learn language? It first presents an explicit computational model of language acquisition which can actually learn rules of English syntax given a sequence of grammatical, but otherwise unprepared, sentences.

It shows that natural languages are designed to be easily learned and easily processed-an exciting breakthrough from the point of view of artificial intelligence and the design of expert systems because it shows how extensive knowledge might be acquired automatically, without outside intervention. Computationally, the book demonstrates how constraints that may be reasonably assumed to aid sentence processing also aid language acquisition.

Chapters in the book's second part apply computational methods to the general problem of developmental growth, particularly the thorny problem of the interaction between innate genetic endowment and environmental input, with the intent of uncovering the constraints on the acquisition of syntactic knowledge.

A number of "mini-theories" of learning are incorporated in this study of syntax with results that should appeal to a wide range of scholarly interests. These include how lexical categories, phonological rule systems, and phrase structure rules are learned; the role of semantic-syntactic interaction in language acquisition; how a "parameter setting" model may be formalized as a learning procedure; how multiple constraints (from syntax, thematic knowledge, or phrase structure) interact to aid acquisition; how transformational-type rules may be learned; and, the role of lexical ambiguity in language acquisition.

Robert Berwick is an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT. The Acquisition of Syntactic Knowledge is sixteenth in the Artificial Intelligence Series, edited by Patrick Winston and Michael Brady.

Bilingual Selection of Syntactic Knowledge: Extending the Principles and Parameters Approach

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Bilingual Selection of Syntactic Knowledge: Extending the Principles and Parameters Approach
Teresa Satterfield
Manufacturer: Springer
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0792386493

Book Description

Bilingual Selection of Syntactic Knowledge motivates a more formal approach in theoretical linguistics by investigating the parameters of syntactic variation and simultaneous acquisition of multiple languages. Taking the behavior of the Null Subject Parameter (NSP) across languages as an illustration, the book raises important questions concerning the adequacy of standard parameter-setting models in the face of compelling evidence from both mono- and bilingual child speech data.
Teresa Satterfield argues convincingly that so-called `universal' premises guiding well-known parametric approaches greatly complicate attempts to construct an economical bilingual analysis. Further, she demonstrates the compatibility of more recent formulations in linguistic theory (i.e. the Minimalist Program) and studies on language learnability (Clark, 1992, 1993; Kapur, 1994) which present the view that while initially convincing, standard parameter models are potentially costly and less than effective in terms of monolinguals as well.
Using Clark's application of the Genetic Algorithm as a point of departure, Bilingual Selection of Syntactic Knowledge describes a number of computational simulations. These simulations not only demonstrate the robustness of the GA-as-language-learner, they offer a more detailed account of the parameter-setting task confronting the bilingual child while also making more precise predictions regarding the process of syntactic knowledge.

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The Acquisition of Syntactic Knowledge
Robert C. Berwick
Manufacturer: The MIT Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OQCJJU

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A solid and dependable author of nascent southern literature...

Somehow Form A Good Book

A bit of a come down for Earley

Somehow Form a Family (Stories That Are Mostly True)

Really good book!

Somehow Form a Family: Stories That Are Mostly True
Tony Earley
Manufacturer: Algonquin Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Here We Are in Paradise: Stories

The Tender Land: A Family Love Story

Last Train to Nibroc

Unarmed and Dangerous: New and Selected Poems (Johns Hopkins: Poetry and Fiction)

The Last Life: A Novel

ASIN: 1565123603

Book Description

This is the book that in hardcover won unanimous praise from reviewers, who called it "beautiful and transcendent" (The Boston Globe), a book that "measures the arc of a culture's mortality in small, personal increments" (Star Tribune, Minneapolis), is written "in a poker-faced style that always seems on the verge of exploding into manic laughter or howls of pain" (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution).

They're right. Tony Earley is a writer so good at his craft that you don't read his words so much as inhale them. His first book of nonfiction is one of those unexpected classics, like Ann Lamott's Traveling Mercies, in which a great writer rips open his/her heart and takes the reader inside for a no-holds-barred tour.

In a prose style that is deceptively simple, Earley confronts the big things-God, death, civilization, family, his own clinical depression-with wit and grace, without looking away or smirking.

Customer Reviews:

A solid and dependable author of nascent southern literature..........2007-07-31

At least that's what I tell myself when I sit down to drink up the words and prose that Tony Earley puts on paper when he's writing and not teaching over at Vanderbilt University! (I'm just playing, of course.) Earley's works, two short collections of short stories and the stupendously written "Jim the Boy" evoke a deft blend of early Ernest Hemingway with the Southern traditions and common sense of Flannery O'Connor and Carson McCullers, among others. This collection "Somehow Form a Family: Stores That Are Mostly True" is merely another solid example of his work ethos and ability to spin a good yarn. I've read it several times and it becomes more enjoyable, as familiar and comfortable as a worn pair of shoes, each and every time. You should treat yourself to the experience, too.

Somehow Form A Good Book.......2006-11-03

Tony Earley's third book consists of ten previously published pieces that in his introduction he says he hesitates to call essays but rather stories "mostly true because memory, like imagination, is largely a function of individual perception." So there you have it. At least, unlike the plethora of recently published writers who either don't seem to understand the difference between fiction and nonfiction or choose to ignore it, Mr. Earley acknowledges the difficulty of keeping the two completely separate. The "pieces" cover a variety of topics and for the most part have little in common with each other except the fine writing of the author.

I reread most of the articles and found myself liking them better the second time. I attribute that to Mr. Earley's attempt at honesty and his expertise with words and finally my seeing myself and members of my family in many of his pieces. (He also in his introduction hopes that his readers recognize themselves here.) How many writers would admit to something so politically incorrect as trying to kill a sick cat to put it out of its misery? ["Shooting The Cat"] His language is impeccable. On an autumn morning in North Carolina, a window was "intricately jeweled with frost." Dan Ledbetter (Earley's grandfather) at 6'4" was "so skinny that he seemed to have been constructed from spare parts." And the above-mentioned cat, in healthier days "had come to Granny's house in the usual way: it showed up on the back steps freshly weaned and mewed solicitiously, as if seeking work." I recognize the author's blue Carolina mountains, the Tennessee sighting of which always takes my breath away. Also, in the title piece, Mr. Earley remembers the bad reception of his family's Admiral television built in the 1950's and understood that his family was poor because they owned a black and white set too heavy for Hoss on "Bonanza" (my dad's favorite TV program) to pick up by himself. Mr. Earley also includes a thoughtful chapter on the uniqueness of words he heard in his childhood and is saddened that in only a generation these "colorful" expressions will die. ["The Quare Gene"] In a moving passage he remembers visiting his maternal greatgrandfather "well into his nineties" and being asked by the family patriarch, "Who are you?" The youngster replied, "I'm Reba's boy. Clara Mae's grandson." (At family reunions in East Tennessee, although I'm fairly sure my past is longer than my future, I am always referred to simply as "Frank's boy" and will remain forever nameless.)

In "A Worn Path," Mr. Earley traces his religious upbringing as a child at Rock Springs Baptist Church, his later flirtation with the Episcopal Church because he "loved the smell of incense as much as. . . the smell of beer," his attempts at atheism and finally his peace, (sort of) believing that he is watched over by a loving God and that "as we walk through the world, even along the dangerous paths we have chosen for ourselves, God worries about where we put our feet."

Regardless of who you are, where you are from, whether or not you believe in God or think you should kill sick cats, you will marvel at Mr. Earley's beautifully burnished prose. We can all be thankful that in spite of the fact that as a youngster, he seems to have watched television day in and day out, he still grew up to be a fine writer.

A bit of a come down for Earley.......2006-05-28

I've read Earley's other two books--both of which were truly excellent--and I had high expectations for this effort, but was somewhat disappointed.

The trademark gentleness that marks Early's other work isn't as deftly handled here. Some of the stories don't really amount to much. Because the book is largely autobiographical I get the sense the material constrained the writer in ways fiction wouldn't.

Actually, to my mind the best writing in the book is the introduction where Early explains the "Mostly True" aspect of the title, wherein he muses about the clarity of memory and the ways in which it changes over time.

This isn't a bad little book. It just pales in comparisons to both Tony's other book of short stories or his Jim the Boy novel. Try one of those if you liked this one--you're in for a treat if you do.

Somehow Form a Family (Stories That Are Mostly True).......2005-09-10

This book rekindled a flame in me to write some of my memoirs for our children and grandchildren. Written with heart and humor. Evokes many childhood memories.

Really good book!.......2003-10-12

Tony Earley is a really great writer and this is a outstanding book! I first encountered Tony Earley in the pages of The Oxford American and his essay, "A Worn Path", which is included in this book. He is a wonderful writer and reading his essays brought back countless memories of my own life. I can't say enough about this book!

Somehow Form a Family: Stories That Are Mostly True

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Somehow Form a Family: Stories That Are Mostly True
Tony Earley
Manufacturer: ALGONQUIN BOOKS
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000OKPRFO

Customer Reviews:

Informative and lovely.......2003-10-29

If you like reading about various history regiments or organizations, and especially ethnic formations like Irish troops, you will enjoy this book. It is well written, seems to be well researched, and is very attractively presented with lots of photos, illustrations, maps, and so forth. Quality publishing job as well.

Book Description

In January 1994, the Zapatistas seized towns in Chiapas, Mexico, calling for broad democratic changes. The writings of Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos, who emerged as the group's eloquent spokesman, are collected here. This edition features new pieces and new commentary by the editor.

Customer Reviews:

Essential Reading.......2007-01-19

Since reading this book (actually, before I was even halfway finished) I had decided I needed to buy copies for family and friends as gifts and recommend it to pretty much everyone. Marcos is an amazing writer, and the story of the Zapatistas is extremely relevant and intriguing for anyone interested in modern society, politics, Latin America, social movements, civil wars, literature and poetry, what "integrity" means in such troubled times, and so much more. No matter your interest, you will not be dissapointed by this purchase.

Another handsome collection of writings from El Sup.......2006-04-22

Without a doubt, Subcomandante Marcos is one of the most important present day writers and activists in the Americas. "Our Word is Our Weapon" is a huge collection of his essays and short stories about the Zapatista rebellion in Chiapas.As such, I highly recommend it for peace and justice activists engaged in Latin American solidarity work, the anti-corporate globalization movement and indigenous struggles. Moreover, it is an interesting study of grassroots participatory democracy in action. Read it and be inspired!

The man is a myth.......2005-12-02

Subcomandante Marcos is not just a man, he is a myth in his own lifetime. The cult of personality that surrounds him is completely deserved. His poetic voice is so sharp and poignant you can not help but feel sympathetic for his Zapatistan cause.

The highlight of the book is the last third which features primarily his writing. The stories and poetry he shares are accessible to almost anyone. He is the antithesis of stuffy. His anecdotes and points are so simple yet so perplexing you wonder how he does it.

A movement of Now........2002-11-24

Too often those of us who seek social justice for people who have been traditionally oppressed tend to just reminisce on the past.

However, this book proves that there is a great social movement that ordinary people CAN , RIGHT NOW make a diffrence about

The history of Mexico, like the history of Latin America, is a history of pain, struggle, and exploitation.

Marcos shows us a movement that seeks to right some of the wrong, and leads a movement of the oldest of the old, the oppressed of the oppressed: Indigenous campesinos (farmers) of Southern Mexico. Where pictures of Jesus Christ stand right there alongside of.....Che Guevara.

A people that have been traditionally been treated like dirt, for lack of a better word, now taking an inspirational and highly moving stand and demand an end to exploitation and a better way of life.

Through their charismatic and briliant leader, Marcos, he tells us the story of the people known as Zapatistas and their struggle for dignity.

The dignity of a people no longer willing to tolerate centuries of injustice.

What human being cannot be moved by such extroadinary courage?

A must to read!.......2002-11-01

How can anyone read el subcommandante and not be moved? How can anyone just look at the plight of these people in Mexico and not feel rage at the injustice?

Other Worlds Science Stories September 1951: The Witness; Down in the Misty Mountains; A Word from Our Sponsors; America's Secret Weapon; My Struggle

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Other Worlds Science Stories September 1951: The Witness; Down in the Misty Mountains; A Word from Our Sponsors; America's Secret Weapon; My Struggle
Eric Frank; Gibson, Joe; Brown, Fredric; Ley, Willy; Bloch, Robert Russell
Manufacturer: Clark Publishing Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000KOV0NM

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Our Word Is Our Weapon
Subcomandante Marcos
Manufacturer: Serpent's Tail
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Our Word Is Our Weapon: Selected Writings : An article from: The Ecologist

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Our Word Is Our Weapon: Selected Writings : An article from: The Ecologist
Paul Kingsnorth
Manufacturer: Ecosystems Limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

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Our Word Is Our Weapon
*
Manufacturer: Serpents Tail
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000K1YHSA

Book Description

Glen Canyon, now Lake Powell, is rediscovered through wonderful color images by Eliott Porter.

Customer Reviews:

Death of a Canyon.......2007-06-10

This not a book about photography and should not be purchased just for the "pictures". It is literally a memorial to the death of Glen Canyon. It is a reminder of our obligation to stay informed.

Glen Canyon Dam should never have been built and would never be built today. The American people would never stand for it. Ironically and sadly, it was the loss of Glen Canyon that inspired many to say, "Never again." When the Bureau of Reclamation attempted to follow Glen Canyon Dam with a series of dams down stream in the Grand Canyon, the agency met a solid wall of opposition. In ways, the river still flows free through the Grand Canyon because of the sacrifice that was made with Glen Canyon.

Even former staunch proponents of Glen Canyon Dam lived to regret their support. As late as 1974, Senator Barry Goldwater still felt the dam was an improvement over the untamed river. But by the mid-80s, he felt otherwise. In one interview, in fact, Goldwater lamented that if he could change just one Senate vote he'd cast in 30 years, it would have been his vote to approve construction of Glen Canyon Dam.

Sad.

Historically valuable, photographically bland.......2005-09-30

"The Place No One Knew" is the famous book that comes up anytime someone mentions the submersion of Glen Canyon. It was the Sierra Club's--and the environmental movement in general's--first major statement on the construction of Glen Canyon Dam, the flooding of Glen Canyon, and the filling of Lake Powell.
The book is a companion, or I should say the polar opposite, of "Lake Powell: Jewel of the Colorado," a book by Floyd Dominy, then Commisioner of the dam-building Bureau of Reclamation.
Both books are basically propaganda, though for seperate sides of the same issue; both feature scenic photos of a place, praising text, and pertinent quotes.
Glen Canyon was referred as to "the place no one knew" because its lack of national park status (and protection) was a major factor in its being inundated by the trapped water of the Colorado River. In actuality, a lot of people knew it--just not many with the Sierra Club. In fact, more people rafted through Glen Canyon a year than did through the Grand Canyon. C. Gregory Crampton wrote ten books about Glen Canyon before its demise, and liked to joke that THIS book should have been called "The Place the Sierra Club Didn't Know."
Which would have been more correct.
All that said, this book is a valuable historical document--for its role in the Glen Canyon controversy, and for its role in this century's environmental movement.
But it's not that good of a book. The photos are below average: many have a grainy, low quality-feel to them, and most of them are of very small things, and fail to give the true scope and grandeur of what Glen Canyon was. They are not Eliot Porter's best work, and some of the photos aren't even of Glen Canyon, but of other red rock from other places in Utah. (That's true, believe it or not, and it's well-documented.)
The quotes that accompany the photos are all right, but they're not amazing, they won't make you jump up.
A far, far better book featuring photos of Glen Canyon is Eleanor Inskip's "The Colorado River Through Glen Canyon: Before Lake Powell." Check it out.
And a far, far better collection of Eiliot Porter's is "Eliot Porter's Southwest." It's full of gorgeous black and white images from all over the Interior West.

A visual rhapsody.......2003-06-06

I got a copy of Eliot Porter's Glen Canyon book after reading Edward Abbey's "Desert Solitaire," a chapter of which is devoted to a downriver rafting trip along this stretch of the Colorado River just before the dam was built. While Abbey's descriptions are vivid, I wanted to see with my own eyes what he was describing. And Porter's camera is the closest you can get to doing that today.

His pictures are, of course, not the real thing, but they are about as breathtaking as photography can be. The colors, textures, reflections, and the play of light and shadow are wonderful, and each photograph is distinctly different. His own description of the canyon's display of color and light in the introductory essay "The Living Canyon" give an instructive insight into the eye of the photographer. His awareness of what he is looking at and his ways of choosing to look help the reader to see even more in the 80 photographs that follow.

While some of the photographs capture the monumental scale of the canyon walls and formations, many focus on the myriad surfaces that are revealed to the eye: erosion patterns, lichen, rippling water flow, the dark streaking mineral stains extending from seeps, the rough texture of weathered sandstone in glancing sunlight, smooth river stones, the layered stripes of exposed sediment, the trickling spread of water falling from overhead springs, the hanging tapestry coloration of the walls, whorled and striated rock, dry sand. There are also photographs of plants: moonflower, maidenhair fern, willow, tamarisk, redbud, columbine, cane. Above all, there is the rich array of colors, capturing a great variety of moods and attitudes.

Porter was recognized for his photography of birds, and while there are no birds visible in these photographs, his introductory essay makes mention of them, and when looked at with that awareness, many of the pictures also seem to capture a sense of "air space" for flight. Before turning to photography, Porter was a Harvard professor of biochemistry and bacteriology, and it's interesting to see the somewhat dispassionate eye of the scientist in the way he uses the camera. While the story of Glen Canyon may induce sorrow or anger, the photographs are strong for their lack of sentimentality.

The pictures also excite a curiosity about the geology of the river, and the book concludes with a short essay describing how the canyon walls reveal the geological ages that have gone into forming this part of the earth, going back millions of years. The book also includes a catalog of all the plants and animals that inhabited Glen Canyon before its inundation. Altogether, with its quotes from other writers, including Loren Eiseley, Joseph Wood Krutch, Wallace Stegner, and members of John Wesley Powell's expedition in the 19th century, this book is a fitting record of a great lost national treasure.

A heartbreakingly beautiful book.......2002-11-13

These photographs are just about all that is left of Glen Canyon. After the Sierra Club and other environmentalists had lost the battle to prevent the Glen Canyon River Dam from being built, Eliot Porter took this extraordinary series of photographs to memorialize the gorgeous area that has been lost forever. Few people at the time knew much about the Canyon. It was too remote, too difficult to get to. Although it was one of the areas that John Wesley Powell found most beautiful in his first expedition down the Green and Colorado Rivers, no access roads or paths were ever built to make it possible for many people to view the areas firsthand. As a result, very few people knew precisely what we were about to lose.

The tragedy is that these areas are really, truly are gone. Even if the Glen Canyon River Dam were magically removed, many of the areas viewed in these gorgeous photographs have already been silted up. The Green and Colorado Rivers carry extreme quantities of minerals, and when the dam stops the flow to form a reservoir, they tend to drop to the bottom. All dams have a limited life. They don't last for as long as one might imagine. Basically, they create a new landmass behind them over the course of a century or so. Many of the spots photographed in these pictures are now solid earth.

One would hope that such beautiful photographs as these, photos that create tremendous longing for what we have already lost, would make us more concerned to preserve what is left. But with the current presidency even today as I write this review opening the national parks to snowmobiles and with people speculating that there will be new attempts to open arctic areas in Alaska to oil exploration, we can't assume that in the least. These photographs may end up being emblematic of all endangered areas, of the ongoing fragility of all of nature.

Oversized Paperback Rivals Original Sierra Club Hardback.......2000-08-13

I was expecting a reprint similar to the small-sized Ballantine issue of the late 1960s. I was surprised to receive a book almost as large as the original Sierra Club hardback! The color in several of the photographs is even better than in the original (and difficult to find/very expensive) book, thanks in part to the cooperation of the museum which received Porter's works as a bequest.

THE PLACE NO ONE KNEW : Glen Canyon on the Colorado (Abridged)

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THE PLACE NO ONE KNEW : Glen Canyon on the Colorado (Abridged)
Eliot Porter
Manufacturer: Sierra Club / Ballantine
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000RG8D9M

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The Place No One Knew Glen Canyon on the Colorado
Eliot Porter
Manufacturer: Sierra Club
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000GVS9X8

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The Place No One Knew: Glen Canyon on the Colorado
Eliot Porter
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OHE726

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The Place No One Knew: Glen Canyon on the Colorado
Eliot Porter
Manufacturer: Sierra Club
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000NSGRME

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Place No One Knew: Glen Canyon on the Colorado
Eliot Porter
Manufacturer: SIERRA CLUB BOOKS
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000OKCMB6

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The Place No One Knew: Glen Canyon on the Colorado (abridged)
Eliot Porter
Manufacturer: Sierra Club-Ballantine Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000PGH7JQ

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The Place no One Knew: Glen Canyon on the Colorado (abridged)

Manufacturer: A Sierra Club-Ballantine Book
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000HEU81U

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The Place No One Knew: Glen Canyon on the Colorado
Eliot Porter
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000GRAU9S

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Grand Canyon or a mess of mountains?
David Ross Brower
Manufacturer: The Sierra Club
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Water Supply & Land Use | Nature & Ecology | Science | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0007I3HA0

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