The Athenaeum

"The Butcher's Cleaver" Now for Sale

Please visit the web site for my novel "The Butcher's Cleaver."  It is now for sale on-line at Barnes & Noble, Amazon and iUniverse.com pl

www.rosemontbooks.com

For sale at these links:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/104-0278800-4247125?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=The+Butcher%27s+cleaver&x=11&y=11

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/results.asp?WRD=The+Butcher%27s+Cleaver&z=y

http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?isbn=0-595-47476-4

A review of the book has recently been published in the Defense Intelligence Agency newspaper:

Download DIAReview.pdf

"This a remarkable and a very unusual book, with those qualities being inseparable. In particular, there is its pervasive, perambulating, almost dreamlike air -- both in narration and description. That is, everything that its central character, Confederate agent Claude Devereux, takes note of (but not only Claude) is presented to us as though it were preserved in amber -- estimates of men and situations but also the then-existing "look" of things, natural and man-made. Of course, to capture or evoke the "then-existing" as it was then felt is the great yet elusive goal of historical fiction. In addition, a feel for, or a need to evoke, the "then-existing" implies a no less powerful sense that much of what existed then is lost. It is here, without ever becoming too explicit, that "The Butcher's Cleaver" is so poetic. Again, this is present in the most seemingly ordinary descriptive passages (as time seems to slow down a bit to allow Claude to notice the look of a street, a piece of architecture, etc.). After a while one begins to feel that that all this verbal and visual "touching" amounts to a continuous farewell on Claude's part, and not only because he almost certainly knows that his cause and way of life are doomed but also because we know (as he anticipates) what acts Claude himself will bring to pass after the span of the novel itself is completed. The perambulating, near dreamlike quality of the book comes to a climax in the scene where Claude and his brother Patrick observe Pickett's charge at Gettysburg. Again, one would think that in the face of such a famous scene of "action" that the tempo of the writing would have to accelerate, but instead, if anything, it slows down a bit more, to convey what probably does occur in the minds of trained men who are observing combat but also to convey, in this case, their awed, horrified reluctance to take in what they cannot avoid seeing. Patrick, BTW, is a beautifully modeled character; his role in the double game the Devereux brothers are playing is at times almost heartbreaking. "  Lawrence Kart

THE TREATY OF AL-HUDAYBIYA - F.B. Ali

           Abstract

The accepted version of this treaty, and the events surrounding it, forms a perplexing chapter in the history of Islam, since it fits neither context nor character. Later historians, including modern ones, have adopted without examination or question the account that they have received from their predecessors. Surprisingly, so have Muslims, even though this alleged version casts the founder of their faith in a poor light. Instead, they have chosen to come up with all sorts of excuses and explanations to overcome these implications.

This paper examines the historical basis for this received narrative and shows that it is so flimsy as to render it quite unbelievable. This examination also adduces strong grounds for accepting an alternative version of these events, which has a sound evidentiary basis and conforms fully to the historical context. This much more likely version is also detailed in the paper.

This investigation also highlights the dangers of unquestioningly accepting all hadith as true merely because of the religious sanctity attached to them.

---

[1] This paper was originally published in The Muslim World in January 1981 (Volume LXXI, No.1, 47) under the title Al-Hudaybiya : An Alternative Version. It was also reprinted in Uri Rubin, ed., The Life of Muhammad (Aldershot, UK and Brookfield, USA: Ashgate Publishing, 1998). It is reproduced here in essentially the same form with some editorial amendments (designed to improve readability, and sharpen the points made).

Download Al-Hudaybiya

“The Spirits of the people are very good. The loss of Charlstown affects them no more than a Drop in the Bucket...”

Dearest Friend

Sunday June 18 1775

The Day; perhaps the decisive Day is come on which the fate of America depends. my bursting Heart must find vent at my pen. I have just heard that our dear Friend Dr. Warren is no more but fell gloriously fighting for his Country-saying better to die honourably in the field than ignominiously hang upon the Gallows. great is our Loss. He has distinguished himself in every engagement, by his courage and fortitude, by animating the Soldiers & leading them on by his own example -- a particular account of these dreadful, but I hope Glorious Days will be transmitted you, no doubt in the exactest manner.

The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong -- but the God of Israel is he that giveth strength & power unto his people. Trust in him at all times ye people pour out your hearts before him. God is a refuge for us. --Charlstown is laid in ashes. The Battle began upon our intrenchments upon Bunkers Hill, a Saturday morning about 3 oclock & has not ceased yet & tis now 3 o'clock Sabbeth afternoon.

Tis expected they will come out over the Neck to night, & a dreadful Battle must ensue Almighty God cover the heads of our Country men, & be a shield to our Dear Friends. how [many ha]ve fallen we know not-the constant roar of the cannon is so [distre]ssing that we can not Eat Drink or Sleep -- may we be supported and sustaind in the dreadful conflict. I shall tarry here till tis thou[ght] unsafe by my Friends, & then I have secured myself a retreat at your Brothers who has kindly offerd me part of his house. I cannot compose myself to write any further at present -- I will add more as I hear further--

Tuesday afternoon --

I have been so much agitated that I have not been able to write since Sabbeth day. When I say that ten thousand reports are passing vague & uncertain as the wind I believe I speak the Truth. I am not able to give you any authentick account of last Saturday, but you will not be destitute of intelligence -- Coll: Palmer has just sent me word that he has an opportunity of conveyance. incorrect as this scrawl will be, it shall go -- I wrote you last Saturday morning. in the afternoon I received your kind favar of the 2 june and that you sent me by Captn. Beals at the same time, --I ardently pray that you may be supported thro the arduous task you have before you. I wish I could contradict the report of the Doctors Death, but it is a lamentable Truth, -- and the tears of multitudes pay tribute to his memory -- Those favorite lines [of] Collin continually sound [in my Ears.]

How sleep the Brave who sink to rest, 
By all their Countrys wishes blest? 
When Spring with dew'ey fingers cold 
Returns to deck their Hallowed mould
She their shall Dress a sweeter Sod 
Than fancys feet has ever trod
By fairy hands their knell is rung
By forms unseen their Dirge is sung 
Their Honour comes a pilgrim grey
To bless the turf that wraps their Clay
And freedom shall a while repair
To dwell a weeping Hermit there --

I rejoice in the prospect of the plenty you inform me of, but cannot say we have the same agreable view here. The Drought is very severe, and things look but poorly.

Mr Rice & Thaxter unkle Quincy Col Quincy Mr Wibert all desire to be rememberd, so do all our family. Nabby will write by the next conveyance --

I must close, as the Deacon w[aits.] I have not pretended to be perticuliar with regard to what I have heard, because I know you will collect better intelligence -- The Spirits of the people are very good. The loss of Charlstown affects them no more than a Drop in the Bucket, --I am

Most sincerely yours


Portia

(original letter- Abigail Adams to John Adams and text of same courtesy of  The Massachusetts Historical Society)

"Don't Fire Until You See The Whites Of Their Eyes"- Don Troiani

Death of General Warren at Bunker Hill- John Trumbull

Hoping that all Athenaeum readers/commenters have a grand, lovely Fourth of July weekend shared with family & friends.

-Maureen Lang

Judge Leon's decision in the Al-Janko habeas corpus case

I was so fortunate as to be asked to give my opinion to the court in this matter.  Judge Richard Leon of the DC District Court and the good people of the Oregon Federal Public  Defenders office have returned honor to American justice in the case of Abd al-Rahim al-Janko who has been wrongly imprisoned and abused by the Taliban and then the US Government for eight long years.  pl

Download 6.22.09 Janko Habeas Opinion

"The Sky Is Filled With Breathtaking Pictures" APOD- June 16, 1995/2009

Happy 14th Anniversary to APOD.  Below is the 1st image displayed on NASA's wonderful astronomy site:

 

6/16/95- "The sky is filled with breathtaking pictures, many of which are available on the World Wide Web. Each day we feature a different picture of some part of our fascinating universe, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer."

And here is the anniversary photo from APOD's current incarnation:

6/16/09- "On the occasion of our 14th anniversary, the APOD editors thank all of our contributors and mirror site operators whose volunteer efforts help bring the wonders of astronomy to millions of people around the world."

-Maureen Lang 

"This Story Shall The Good Man Teach His Son" -Memorial Day 2009

 

 

(Enter the KING)

WESTMORELAND. O that we now had here 
    But one ten thousand of those men in England 
    That do no work to-day! 
  
KING. What's he that wishes so? 
    My cousin Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin; 
    If we are mark'd to die, we are enow 
    To do our country loss; and if to live, 
    The fewer men, the greater share of honour. 
    God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more. 
    By Jove, I am not covetous for gold, 
    Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost; 
    It yearns me not if men my garments wear; 
    Such outward things dwell not in my desires. 
    But if it be a sin to covet honour, 
    I am the most offending soul alive. 
    No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England. 
    God's peace! I would not lose so great an honour 
    As one man more methinks would share from me 
    For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more! 
    Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host, 
    That he which hath no stomach to this fight, 
    Let him depart; his passport shall be made, 
    And crowns for convoy put into his purse; 
    We would not die in that man's company 
    That fears his fellowship to die with us. 
    This day is call'd the feast of Crispian. 
    He that outlives this day, and comes safe home, 
    Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd, 
    And rouse him at the name of Crispian. 
    He that shall live this day, and see old age, 
    Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours, 
    And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian.' 
    Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars, 
    And say 'These wounds I had on Crispian's day.' 
    Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot, 
    But he'll remember, with advantages, 
    What feats he did that day. Then shall our names, 
    Familiar in his mouth as household words- 
    Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter, 
    Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester- 
    Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red. 
    This story shall the good man teach his son; 
    And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by, 
    From this day to the ending of the world, 
    But we in it shall be remembered- 
    We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; 
    For he to-day that sheds his blood with me 
    Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile, 
    This day shall gentle his condition; 
    And gentlemen in England now-a-bed 
    Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here, 
    And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks 
    That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

Henry V | Act IV, Scene 3


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAvmLDkAgAM





-Maureen Lang

"THEY HAVE KILLED PAPA DEAD!" A Review by W. Patrick Lang

 

"Anthony Pitch's "THEY HAVE KILLED PAPA DEAD!": The Road to Ford's Theatre, Lincoln's Murder, and the Rage for Vengeance is the only new major work to focus on the assassination and its aftermath."

I am sometimes described as a "student of the Lincoln assasination."  I suppose that is true although I only developed an interest in the subject after reading Bill Tidwell's two fine books on the subject some twenty years ago.   Further reading led me to the question of the Dahlgren Papers, their authenticity, or the lack of it, and the possible chain of opinion changes in Richmond that may have led to a decision to capture or kill Lincoln.  The long defended "Booth as lone rogue in charge of a band of nuts" theory is so discredited that it is hardly worth discussing.  The great irony in that theory of the killing has always been that Southerners are its principal defenders.  Why would they not be?  The possibility that the secet services of the Confederacy killed Lincoln either wittingly or in an unauthorized action by Booth (their agent) is still resisted with fire and brimstone by what I call the "SCV crowd."  Heaven forbid that their ancestors might have tried to "take out" what they saw as the enemy head of state and commander in chief of the armies and navies over-running their homes.  Heaven forbid!  Now we have this interesting book, named for the agonized exclamation of one of His children.  God bless them.  They would need his blessing in years to come. 

Pitch, evidently English by birth and Northern by the grace of residence and taste, went to enormous trouble in researching the book.  Nine years, he says?  Nine years in the bowels of the National Archives and countless libraries.  God bless him too.  The book is a marvelous resource for someone like me.  Pitch has dug up a mass of detailed first person narrative and quoted newspaper stories, columns, proceedings and other primary or nearly primary source material that makes the protagonists in this national "passion play" stand up and walk around.  The author makes you see the sky as it must have looked the week after Lee's surrender of his army.  He makes you smell the horses on Pennsylvania Avenue.  Pitch brings to life all the seedy hotels and bars of 1865 in Washington.  He fills in the details in one's imagination of what it was like to rent a horse for a day, what the stableman said to you in letting you ride off on his horse, what the country people of southern Maryland were like, how they spoke and thought.  It is striking that so many of Booth's team were Catholic Marylanders.  Two had been in the major seminary at Baltimore before the war and left to join the Confederate Army.  They were back in civilian life two years later after taking the "Oath of Allegiance" to please the ever-gullible US Government. 

The book is marred for me by Pitch's inability to see any sort of higher motivation in anyone on the Southern side of the American Iliad.   In his view, they are all wretches and madmen pursuing a hopless dream of disunion in this best of all possible countries.  Powell, the man from Mosby's Rangers sent in to Washington to join Booth's team and give it "spine" is portrayed as a coarse lout, savage in nature and uncomprehending of the gravity of the meaning of his actions.  In fact Payne/Powell left his Florida home at seventeen to soldier.  He was captured wounded in Pickett's Charge at Gettyburg and when sufficiently recovered escaped to Virginis where he joined Mosby's command.  Pitch says that he was a deserter from the Confederate Army.  In fact, he was still on the muster role of Mosby's regiment the day that he was executed in Washington.  He pleaded for Mrs. Surratt's life even on the gallows.

So, on balance, I judge this book to be a marvelous resource, wonderfully documented but a work that would have benefited from a modicum of neutrality toward the events and people of that far off time.  pl

Irish Langs

My father'sfamily came to America from County Meath just before The Famine, Oldcastle actually.  I have been told that the family persists in that part of the country.  In looking in the on-line Irish telecom phone book, I notice that there are a few Langs listed thereabout.  In particular I see that there is a Frederick Lang living in a village outside of Kells.  That was my grandfather's name.  Would anyone care to suggest a method for gtting e-mail addresses for any of these people?

I realize that I am opening the door to mischief in the form of twelve year old boys with a developed sense of gamesmanship.  Conmen and scamsters are everywhere.  I am not easily deceived.  pl

“A Reason For Every Detail”: The Gamble House, Pasadena CA

The whole construction was carefully thought out, and there was a reason for every detail. The idea was to eliminate everything unnecessary to make the whole as direct and simple as possible, but always with the beautiful in mind as the final goal.

-Charles Greene

Touring the Gamble House in Pasadena, I kept mulling over this mission statement from one half of the architectural team that designed the place. The magnetic drawing power of this Greene & Greene building & its surrounding gardens, begun as David Berry Gamble’s winter home & ending as housing for lucky USC graduate design students, can be felt immediately on entering its circular brick driveway.  A magnificent “bungalow,” the zenith of Arts & Crafts design execution, the Gamble House sits on a slight hill framed by the vegetation of SoCal, that odd mixture of palm trees, pine trees, eucalyptus, & scrub oak.

The regular Gamble House tours are enough of a dazzle, but the “Behind the Velvet Ropes” tour I recently experienced was even better.  Wearing cotton gloves, twelve of us explored every inglenook & cranny of the house.  Walking off the beaten path in the Gamble home is magical.  From the top of the house, a huge open room perched on high like a crown that was meant originally to be a billiard room (but for the religious non-billiard playing Gamble family turned into an airy retreat overlooking a deep arroyo), to the basement root cellar/larder beneath the kitchen stairs, to David Gamble’s tiny private study in between with its Stickley furniture and vaulted brick fireplace, the deliberate, organic flow built into each space was mood altering.  Even standing outside on one of the many sleeping porches, busy traffic noises and the sounds of docents & tourists receded far into the background.  So much smooth wood, woods of all kinds used in the construction of each wall, floor, ceiling, staircase, each piece of custom designed furniture.  Teak, bird’s eye maple, cedar, redwood, humble pine blending seamlessly with exquisite detailing- inlays of abalone shell, silver, ebony, semiprecious stone chips, buttons of mahogany covering every nail.  The house seems so modern in its design, it was startling for all of us to open Mrs. Gamble’s walk-in closet & find clothing from 1908- could someone who wore button-hooked high tops and a veiled leghorn hat with cherries on the brim have possibly commissioned such a place?  And in the gilded first decade of the 20th century?

But one can surmise from their choice of architects alone that the Gambles were unique, individualistic. The family also had made a conscious choice NOT to buy property & build their house on the already populated “Millionaires Row” in Pasadena (that area often viewed in the background of the Rose Parade, the traditional mansions at the posh residential end of Orange Grove Blvd.), but preferred instead a tract of land overlooking the rugged arroyo a few miles away.  Many others followed them to that part of Pasadena later, & an outcropping of Greene & Greene designed homes soon surrounded the Gamble House.  The walking tour of those homes was tempting, but would have to wait for another day.  I had spent three hours putting my hands on priceless Arts & Crafts history, & the cotton gloves had to be turned in.

Those readers who can make their way into Pasadena at some point to tour the Gamble House are in for a rare treat, an afternoon of architectural wonderment in the serene surroundings of this National Historic Landmark.  For those who do their touring on the web, the Gamble House has a comprehensive site www.gamblehouse.org that includes history of the house & the extensive conservation/restoration done to it over the years, many stills, & a very good virtual tour.  Below are a few pics my husband & I recently took of the exterior of the house.  The interior photos are from the USC Greene & Greene Virtual Archives, as no camera use is permitted inside.

-Maureen Lang       

 

                                              

Sam Lanin Presents...

We Big Band aficionados while shooting the bull in person or online many times amuse ourselves by tracing the roots & influences of our favorites orchestras back through the early 1940s, back even further into the era of the Great Depression, citing every source from Bennie Moten of Kansas City fame to Gershwin musicals to New Orleans dance & roadhouse jazz as possible bloodlines for the amalgamated sounds of the 40s dance band era. But just a little further back in time is one of the biggest (mostly forgotten) influences of all.  What were Glenn Miller, Jimmy & Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman et al. doing musically during the 1920s? 

When these future Big Band heavyweights weren’t auditioning to be sidemen in regional bands in order to get some performance experience, hustling pit gigs for musicals & vaudeville (plus the occasional church social or debutante dance), trying to land any steady job playing their instruments to help Ma & Pa support numerous siblings, or dreaming of joining a really successful well known orchestra like Paul Whiteman's (a permanent job that might actually pay the rent) they were...

...working as session musicians for record producer/arranger Sam Lanin.  From Bruce Elder at allmusic.com: 

Not everyone who had a profound effect on the world of music was necessarily a musician, or had to be a particularly good one -- sometimes it was just a matter of recognizing the latter quality in others and enabling them to do what they did best. Sam Lanin was a musician, but it was not in that capacity that he made his greatest contribution to music -- oh, he played drums here and there in some recording sessions, but that was as far he got generating music himself in a way that lasted beyond a particular performance. He was a band director, an organizer of performing and recording groups, who was as active in that field as anyone in music during the 1920s -- his timing was especially significant because the '20s were, for the majority of Americans (except in the farm belt) a time of unimpeded (and, as it turned out, in major part illusory) prosperity, when entertainment was booming... [Lanin’s] reputation beyond the 1920s and early '30s was carried forward by the names of the musicians who passed through his employ. Among the most celebrated of Lanin alumni, in addition to Phil Napoleon, Miff Mole, Red Nichols, and Jules Levy, Jr., were Jimmy Dorsey, Tommy Dorsey, Manny Klein, Jimmy McPartland, Bix Beiderbecke, Eddie Lang, Bunny Berigan, and Nick Lucas.

Glenn Miller & Benny Goodman also played in the recording studio for Lanin during the late 1920s & very early 30s. Lanin had a sure instinct for raw talent, giving these young musicians solo spots on some of his best-selling records: Me And My Shadow- 1927, Gonna Get A Girl-1927, Side By Side- 1927, South Bound-1928, Glorianna-1928, Do Something-1929, Lovable And Sweet-1928, Turn On The Heat- 1929, Hello, Beautiful!-1931. 

Here's a sampling from youtube of the Sam Lanin dance band sound so popular on parlor Victrolas:

Dark Night

Am I Wasting My Time On You

Flag That Train

Tonight's My Night With Baby

I Want Somebody To Cheer Me Up

Hello Beautiful! (some 20s/30s nudes in this one, considered both daring & artistic at the time, I'm sure)

For more great music from Sam Lanin try these re-mastered samples from the CD below put out by Rivermont Records of Lynchburg VA.

- Maureen Lang

"The Least Worse Place" A Review

   "The Least Worse Place" by Karen Greenberg is a study of the first hundred days that the Guantanamo detention facility was in operation.

Karen is Executive Director of the Center on Law and Security at New York University.  She has been deeply involved in a long series of closely focused conferences on torture, civil military relations and the legal and moral aspects of counter-terrorism. 

In this book she describes the initial efforts by career military and civilian officials to create a prison camp that met international standards for such a facility and the process by which the Bush Administration quickly undermined these efforts and created an engine of perpetual confinement and tortured confessions. 

The process of transformation of this facility went forward quickly once Donald Rumsfeld and his collaborators realized that the officers initially in charge intended to obey US and international law with regard to the treatment of captured personnel.  That was unacceptable in the Bush/Cheney Administration and so, new, more pliable men were found for the job of running Guantanamo.  There are always such people in any organization and they always come forward, eager to disgrace themselves and their cloth.  This is the story of the beginnings of that disgrace.

Greenberg hints at the roots of the psychology af such men and the personnel systems that bring them to the fore.  She describes careers built of endless striving for self advancement, of lives of sycophancy at higher and higher levels of government culminating in eagerness to do or say anything that will earn favor with "the man."

Disturbingly, she points to the sad role played by part time soldiers at Guantanamo.  Reserve officers are supposed to bring the values of Main Street America to the Army.  They are supposed to be more attuned to humane values than professional soldiers.  At Guantanamo, reservists rather than the Regulars were often the principal instruments for the willing transmission of illegal and cruel policies demanded by Washington.

The psychology of that phenomenon is fertile ground for another book.  I hope Greenberg writes it.

Pat Lang