My Summer Reading List

I have read extensively this summer. I break my books into four categories: German history; America 250; Russian novels; Middle East. Here we go:

German History 

1. Weimar by Katja Hoyer. This is a tale of life in Weimar, the capital of Germany from 1919 to 1931. This small town was transformed into a political center. The tragedy is slowly unveiled, from bright hopes in the mid 1920s to disaster in the wake of the Great Depression leading to the rise of Hitler.
    
2. Germany Memories of a Nation by Neil MacGregor. This was a gift from my colleague Niels Giese who runs Edelman GERMANY. It is a welcome antidote to Weimar. There are wonderful stories of Luther, Goethe, and the Rothschild family. The chapter on Money in Crisis details the descent into hyper-inflation and destruction of savings of the middle class in the 20s.

American History

1. Yankee From Olympus; Oliver Wendell Holmes by Catherine Bowen—This book has been on my shelf for decades. It is the story of the Great Dissenter on the Supreme Court, a Boston Brahmin who went to Harvard, served with distinction in the Civil War, was chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court, then served on the US Supreme Court for thirty years. He stood up for free speech in the post WWI years of anti-immigrant and anti-foreign fever. He also stood up for the working man in opposing a Court decision allowing a 60 hour work week.
    
2. The Zealot and the Emancipator by H.W. Brands—In the two decades prior to the Civil War, two of the pivotal figures were John Brown and Abraham Lincoln. Brands catalogues Brown’s journey from Bleeding Kansas to seizure of a Federal arms depot in Harpers Ferry, VA. Brown refuses to take the easy defense of mental illness or physical incapacity from wounds incurred in the shoot-out. He insists on a full airing of his rationale for the uprising, which is emancipation. After Brown was convicted and hung, Lincoln follows with his famous Cooper Union speech in 1860, in which he asserts that a nation cannot survive half slave and half free, a House Divided cannot stand.
    
3. The Soul of America; The Battle for Our Better Angels by Jon Meacham—The long time journalist Meacham recalls several of the most challenging moments of US history, stating that “Progress is possible. Hope is sustaining. Fears can be overcome….we have endured moments of madness and of injustice, giving the better angels a chance to prevail.” How to process the post WWI period in which women are finally given the right to vote but immigration is choked off as part of a fear campaign against Communism and thousands of Ku Klux Klan marched down Pennsylvania Ave. Among Meacham’s points: Fight Tribalism, Respect Facts and Deploy Reason; Enter the Arena.

Russian Novels

1. Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol—Chichikov is an aspiring landowner. He invents a marvelous ruse, the purchase of dead peasant souls, which have not yet been removed from the official registry in Moscow. He plans to mortgage the peasants to finance his land purchase. He travels from farm to farm asking the owners to buy the deal souls. This is a tale worthy of Dickens as a picture of Russia in the mid 1800s, with its decrepit farmhouses, the dowagers seeking attention, the gossips spreading the word of Chichikov’s hidden millions.
    
2. Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev—The hero of the novel is Bazarov, the Modern Man, a young nihilist who eschews religion and love. He and best friend Arkady are at once intimate and competitive to such an extent that they engage in a duel over alleged flirtation and betrayal. The relationship between fathers and sons is reminiscent of the 1960s in the US, blending unconditional parental affection with utter incomprehension of values.
    
3. Eugene Onegin by Alexander Pushkin—This is a sad story of unrequited love. The hero Onegin is unable to love the young Tatyana, whose heartbreaking letter to her lover is worth frequent reading. “You filled my dreams and sweetest trances as yet unseen and yet so dear, you stirred me with your wondrous glances….When you came in, I seemed to Waken, I turned to flame, I felt all shaken.” He walks away from her only to realize when he sees her at a ball a decade later that he has made a huge mistake; she is now married to a prince. She writes, “Now I beg you go. I love you but I am now another’s wife and I’ll be faithful all my life.”

Middle East

1. Israel on Trial by Roy Altman—I met the author at an event on Sunday. He is a judge on the Federal bench in Florida. His book examines the charges against Israel from a legal standpoint. He moves systematically through the idea of Israel as a colonial project, Israel has prevented the establishment of the Palestinian state, Israel is an apartheid state and Israel has committed genocide in Gaza. The most important part of the book is the historical reality of Jews in Israel for over 3,000 years, with historical recognition on steles in Egypt and Jordan of conquests by pharaohs in 1200 BC and a local ruler in 800 BC against the Jews.

I hope that you find this helpful. Back to vacation now…

Richard Edelman is CEO.