Rating: Summary: Great Historis perspective with humor intertwined Review: Tony's book really pricked my interest in the Civil War again. It is a very easy read with excellent historic facts. Tony presents a refreshing perspective on the South in which I live and love.
Rating: Summary: Great Journey! Review: For those that like or dislike the Civil War this book is well worth your time. A very interesting way to see the long term effects of the Civil War. Facts and figures are great and Michael Beck does a great job on the voices...
Rating: Summary: A good audio tape for the road! Review: Actor Michael Beck performs Confederates in the Attic - he doesn't just read it! Imitating the voices of Tony Horwitz's unforgettable characters, Beck makes the book come alive on tape. Horwitz went on a search for the American Civil War, and his adventures are enjoyable and thought-provoking. The first part of the story takes us along on a reenactment where accuracy is more important than comfort. This part is funny, but the second part of the story is more disturbing, for Horwitz decides to investigate a racially-motivated tragedy and runs into some frightening characters who live in fear and hatred. I was glad when he left that episode, even though his journalism is enlightening. Humor returns as he joins a reenactor for a Civil Wargasm, a whirlwind tour of battlefields and other historic sites - or what is left of them. Development has destroyed much of the past, and Horwitz explores the contrasting attitudes of whether we should celebrate the past or try to forget it. A woman who keeps a small museum open explains that she wants young people to learn how terrible war can be. Recommended for history buffs, travelers, and anyone who is interested in the American South, Confederates in the Attic is a 6-hour audio book that goes by very quickly.
Rating: Summary: Explains to the Yankee diaspora our empathy with the War Review: It often takes an outsider to sweep through the south and paint an accurate picture of its citizens. V.S. Naipal did that in "A Turn in the South". Tony Horwitz does that with his book. We southerners are tired of being branded anachronistic racists when we honor our confederate battle flag and our ancestors who fought in the war. (My ancestors fought for the confederacy and the American revolution too.) Mr. Horwitz takes the most difficult task of explaining to the bewildered people of, say, San Francisco why southerners still honor the civil war dead. He does this as a non-partisan by stander whose own ancestors were post-Civil-war Jewish immigrants to the North. One notable chapter is the section on Shelby Foote. Poor Mr. Foote's early career as a novelist and his life-long literary scholarship has been overshadowed by his fame as a civil war scholar and commentator on the Ken Burns PBS Civil War series. I recommend his novel Shiloh as well as his correspondence with Walker Percy. Add Faulkner, Flannery O'Conner, and now Tony Horwitz and you might possible fathom our unique culture down south. Bye yall.
Rating: Summary: Intelligent, Smartly Written, Humorous Anthropological Study Review: Horwitz' commentary on his travels and observations of interesting people and institutionalized mythology of southern US with regard to War Between the States is both a lesson in aspects of deep south culture and empirical study of attitudes regarding wounds that won't heal. In light of such ongoing, centuries old flashpoints in Europe, Asia, and Africa, Horwitz' novel highlights the similarities between cultural antagonisms here and there and helps us to understand the inconceivable lack of tolerance for different ideas that lead to such inhumanity as that in Bosnia, Iraq, Ireland, etc. A really valuable analogy for understanding our homes, our country, our world. His ability to portray his subjects as human, therefore imperfect, with at once both a serious and humorous side, and make his reader both shudder and snicker, is a tribute to his talent as a writer. I only wish the book were longer.
Rating: Summary: An entertaining, yet thought-provoking book Review: As a Yankee who has travelled throughout the South over the past 25 years, I found the book to reaffirm many of my experiences with Southerners and their attitudes toward Yankees: unless one was born and bred in the South, he/she will forever be an outsider. While this book was primarily a contemporary look at today's South, I also enjoyed the background information the author provided about many of the characters, events, and places in the Civil War. The experiences and attitudes of the reenactors were also fun!
Rating: Summary: No one will EVER understand the South; this comes close Review: To understand why this is a MUST read, see the comments from Atlanta (Sept. 11, 1999) and Charlotte (June 4, 1999). The Georgian still doesn't understand that Sherman wasn't there last week; it was over 130 years ago! The North Carolinian still thinks it wasn't about race. Thinking that is like thinking World War II wasn't about "lebensraum." Suppose--as Virginia debated doing until its aristocracy its collective foot down--slavery had been gradually and peacefully abolished. Does anyone seriously believe the Civil War (I mean the REAL one: from 1861-1865) would have happened? I confess to having had no interest, until recently, in the Civil War. Despite my southern roots, I was brought up to actually believe in the words, "all men are created equal," and I was horrified by the notion that one race would think it perfectly acceptable to enslave another race. I simply didn't care to know whether there were "Confederates in my attic." And then something amazing happened: I got interested in genealogy, and I discovered that three of my gg-uncles from Alabama fought for ... the UNION! In June 1863, one of those died for the U.S.A. at Camp Glendale, MS. Within 2 weeks, his first cousin from Georgia died for the C.S.A. at Vicksburg. And why? More importantly, aside from the curious sadness of that event, do their deaths have ANYTHING to do with modern life? I say they form interesting tidbits of information in my genealogy program, and THAT'S IT! Tony Horwitz has come as close as anyone I know to showing the irrationality of some people--almost, though not entirely--in the South, driven by events that have utterly nothing to do with modern life. This is no slam against re-enactors, any more than it would be against actors in a play. While visiting Antietam recently, I met a young re-enactor who was interested only in history; by no means was he any kind of fanatic. He did it because he loved showing others about the PAST. And as the sun went down on a gorgeous Sunday afternoon, so quiet and peaceful, he took down his tent beside the "Burnside Bridge," put it in the trunk of his car, and headed for the freeway and a Big Mac. I've lived in a former Confederate state (although Texas is NOT, and never had been, the South) all my life. But I've never felt any shame or guilt or anger or anything else over "losing" the Civil War. It's something to read about, and that's all. Modern life is about treating EVERYONE with dignity and respect, love and compassion. For all their Bible-thumping, southerners have never understood that if their late, great ancestors had really practiced what they preached and had really believed in the principal credo of the Declaration of Independence, there would have been no Civil War, and no farms in Georgia would have been burned. Horwitz's ultimate message is right: it's time to get over it.
Rating: Summary: Witty and Thought Provoking Review: Horwitz has written a very readable and entertaining book. Some passages are laugh out loud funny and many are witty or wry. His observations about the memory of the Civil War in the South are very illuminating to those of us Yankees who have a less than personal attachment to "the lost cause" (or "glorious and victorious cause" to those of us above the Mason-Dixon line). A quick read that informs and entertains.
Rating: Summary: Outstanding! A humorous & socio-LOGICAL look at the war. Review: This is one of the best books I've ever read! My hat's off to Mr Horowitz! He blends common sense with humor and answers a nagging question: Why can't people (in the south) just move on and stop thinking of the Civil War as an event that happened yesterday? With plenty of relatives on both "sides",it's easier understand a few of the "nuts", and bigots just a little better! They're certainly easier to tolerate! Horowitz is histerically funny!
Rating: Summary: The South Shall "Farb" Again Review: Midway through this book I bought a copy for my brother, a neo-Virginian. I suspect there may be a civil wargasm in our future. Any serious (and not so serious) student of Southern sociology will love this treatment of the lost cause that wouldn't go away. The best parts were the ones which Tony put himself in. By abstaining from the role of sterile detached observer, Horwitz teaches us that none of us are innocent of, or unaffected by the cancers of racism and uncritical thinking.
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