Food for thought

EAT FAT – Richard Klein.  Picador, MacMillan Publishers Limited 1996,  pp 247 (illus)

This review was written on March 19th 2015

This book by the author is in praise of fat, both the noun and the adjective.  The noun refers to fat in our food and the adjective to overweight or obesity. Klein deplores the negative attitudes in Western Society to obesity and attributes the alleged sense of guilt and poor self esteem of fat people to the public’s distain of and discrimination against them. He exaggerates the degree of public disapproval of the obese in stating that fat phobia is widespread.  He also exaggerates the devotion of western society to thinness since Twiggy and the anorexic look has become chic and he ignores the fact that the great majority of people do not wish to be cadaverously thin but rather wish to achieve a normal or near normal weight as defined by western nutritionists.

He pleads with us to love fat people and to perceive beauty in the obese.  He believes this change in public attitudes can be achieved by a mantra or the simple process of verbal rhythm, although it is not clear what he means by this process. He admits that such a change will be brought about with great difficulty because of public attitudes. The text is full of contradictions and selected references to other authors, some of whom are quite as iconoclastic and just as capable of bizarre views as himself.

Politicians who are fat are more forceful and more likely to succeed, and he mentions Kohl, Churchill, Taft and the French Louis the fourteenth. He forgets de Gaulle, Adenaure and even our own Dev who have made their mark despite lacking evidence of overweight.

Fat women have a stronger libido and enjoy sex more than their slimmer sisters, although sadly I cannot confirm this contention because of lack of personal experience. Elsewhere he states that they are slower to get started than the more excited thin but once they get going they are more difficult to stop. On the other hand he contends that being fat makes it easier for women to opt out of sexual activity with men while providing a stronger source of erotic activity among their own sex.

He writes, in referring to the food expert MFK Fisher, about the beastlike satisfaction of the belly as profoundly human, because deeply animal; the impulse must at times let us, whether male or female, to be attracted by a bloated beast.

Fat women are more masculine and men more feminine, so that the stereotype of the fat woman will often be more capable of repairing the washing machine or replacing your spark plug. He acknowledges that a high fat intake may predispose to coronary disease, diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol disturbances, and yet he manages to confuse the reader by quoting research which allegedly shows that beef and high fat chocolate improve ones blood cholesterol.  And anyhow he believes that quality of life is more important than longevity, implying that gorging yourself is a positive factor in achieving happiness.

He muses about the increasing prevalence of obesity in America and the West.  He considers it a mystery and postulates some ill defined cultural or biological change in Western Society.  I, on the other hand, attribute the American trend to bad eating habits which are a feature of affluence, increasing leisure with its associated boredom and addiction to popcorn and TV, and reduced physical exercise and physical work.  He does not postulate the possibility of increasing sex among females despite their alleged sexual propensity to prefer their own sex. Despite his perception of increasing obesity in America, he states that Americans were “exceedingly fat” at the end of the nineteenth century, and gives as an example Diamond Jim Barry who weighed in at forty stone.

I wonder if Mr Klein has his tongue in his cheek.  Or does his urge to write have a more mundane basis such as the hard cash he and his publishers derive from their contributions to the welfare of humanity? Anyhow, even if my criticism of his views are not always valid, his book is certain to attract some readers even if they find much of his ideas contradictory and his views lacking in scientific basis. Does his book sell like hot cakes to the 40% of American women and the 25% of American men who are categorised as fat and who apparently are badly in need of a push to their self esteem. It would be interesting to know if his book becomes a best seller.

His book Cigarettes are Sublime followed more recently and is available on Kindle but I could not find his ‘’classical’’ work on obesity in the same source. It would be interesting to know how rather bizarre publications such as EAT FAT appeal to and attract the casual reader and the ordinary public. Cigarettes are Sublime was apparently published in 2012. It comes at 658,771 in Kindle sales rank but I could not find EAT FAT on Kindle.

If Trees Could Talk

If Trees Could Talk – Wicklow trees and woodlands over four centuries. by Michael Carey. Coford, 2009. pp 295. Illustrated.

This review was written on June 18th 2012

This book was presented to me by the Irish Tree Society on the occasion of my 90^th Birthday. It is a hardback, beautifully illustrated with photos, maps and designs, and it provides a valuable account over the last four centuries of the silvicultural history of Wicklow, our must heavily wooded county in Ireland. Surely no city in these islands has such a close neighbour so rich in mountain, forest, lake, sea and sky, and with so many historical associations and so accessible to its citizens. And yet despite its closeness to Dublin with its population of more than one and a half million, it remains largely unspoilt.

The eastern part of the county along the seacoast is flat, the centre is mountainous along its entire length and the western side drifts slowly down from the uplands to the central plain of Ireland in Kildare and Carlow. There are only two crossings east/west suitable for motor traffic in the entire county because of its mountainous spine; and these are hardly motorways. Heavy traffic north/south is confined to the motorway on the eastern side and the main road to Carlow and Wexford on the western side. Do these physical and georaphical features partly account for the relative remoteness of much of the county?

Mount Usher

The central mountainous part is heavily treed as is evident if one travels by train from Arklow in the south to Wicklow town further north. The train follows the Avonmore River along its course into the hills at Rathdrum and for a distance of about three miles is enveloped in forest. Later, as the train leaves Wicklow town it travels north to Greystones and Dublin along the shoreline of the Irish Sea for a distance of five miles or more.  I recently took the train to Arklow for the first time in some years and as I travelled, first along the seashore and then through dense forest, I was reminded of the excitement which was part of train travel during my boyhood.

A curious tree in Powerscourt Estate

The silvicultural history of the county is reflected in the changing political and social history of its citizens over the centuries. Many of our great estates were established there during the various turbulent land changes and plantations over the centuries and perhaps the greatest changes in land ownership has occurred during the last century or so as the great estates have slowly but inexorably given away to the decline of the numbers and influence of the landed gentry, a decline which was inevitable after the many land acts of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

The book is divided into three main sections. The first section is headed The Woodland Resource. The history of the resource in terms of trees and the extent of woodlands is based on aspects of archaeology, pollen analysis, documentary records, ecological surveys, place names and iconography. It is based on various surveys conducted over the centuries, including the Ordnance Survey of 1835-40 and the first census in Ireland in 1841.

The second section deals with tree planting in the county over the

Granddaughter Rosie runs through a tree in Kilmacurragh

 centuries. We learn of the great estates which evolved during the plantations which were a feature of our turbulent history during previous centuries. These included the great Fitzwilliam estate, the Rosanna estate in Ashford, the Downshire estate, Charleville, Kilmacurragh, Kilruddery, Powerscourt, La Touche in Bellevue and Mount Usher.

Charleville

The third section deals with the woodland industries which were associated with forestry and which were important in relation to house and ship building, the provision of fuel, and pipe and barrel production, leather tanning and iron and charcoal smelting. Because of its particular importance and its extent, the Fitzwilliam estate receives particular attention from the author in terms of the industries associated with its management and its extensive plantations. We are still left with about 60 hectares of old oak as part of the Coolattin forest and now cared for by Coillte. It was a remnant rescued from the developers of the extensive mature oak forest which was felled by them about twenty years ago. These remaining old oaks survived thanks to local pressure as well as the influence of the Irish Tree Society and Charlie Haughey who was Taoiseach at the time of the dissolution of the estate 

Avondale

Michael Carey refers to Avondale, the home of Charles Stewart Parnell and his forbears, and of its importance as the headquarters of Irish forestry in terms of silvicultural education, research and reputation. It is here and in its connecting establishments that the professional aspects of the forestry industry in Ireland are based and it is in Avondale that the public are welcomed to enjoy its wide variety of trees and to learn of the workings of the tree industry and its importance to the welfare of our country.

Granddaughter Molly and friend in the Garden of Ireland

If for no other reason, the illustrations alone would justify having the book in one’s library. The pictures of remarkable trees are outstanding, as are the maps. The many photos of scenery, houses and other artefacts complete a full and attractive account, historical, political, social as well as silvicultural, which justifies the sobriquet of Wicklow as the so called Garden of Ireland.

THE RESURRECTION OF IRELAND: THE SINN FEIN PARTY

THE RESURRECTION OF IRELAND: THE SINN FEIN PARTY, 1916-1922. Michael Laffan, 1999

This book review was published by RM in the Irish Times in January 2000

    

This book traces the history of the Sinn Fein party from its origin in 1902 to the present day, not from 1916-1922.

There is still an extraordinary interest in the Irish revolution if one is to judge by the continued proliferation of its literature, but many people have a skewed knowledge of its history, thanks to the unbalanced contemporary emphasis on certain aspects and personalities.  This book provides important and comprehensive insights into the political background of the times. I found it informative and eminently readable. It provides an extensive bibliography, is based on considerable research using both primary and secondary sources, and, while Sinn Fein remains the principal theme, the author does not neglect the relationship between the political movement, the military and other aspects of the times.

Newspaper article after the 1916 rising.

The author is particularly concerned with the movement’s early phase from 1902 to 1917 and with its dominant role in the political evolution of Irish freedom from 1917 to 1922.  His accounts of post-Treaty Sinn Fein are informative and are not without interest and relevance in relation to recent developments in the North.  This period is dealt with more briefly but will no doubt receive more attention from future historians.

    

The story of Sinn Fein is complex.  It meant different things to different people and at different times.  Although established in 1902 by and closely associated with Arthur Griffith and his few supporters, the Sinn Fein movement soon became an amalgam of individuals, parties and splinter groups representing all shades of nationalist opinion from the moderate devolutionist to the most extreme separatist. To some it was simply a symbol of the nationalist movement.  To its opponents the title had a pejorative connotation.

    

The first Dail - 1919 (Dad is 3rd from left, 2nd row behind seated members)

In the spring of 1917 various groups combined to form a single nationalist party, a decision confirmed in October 1917 by the appointment of the Sinn Fein executive, with Eamon de Valera as its president.  From then to 1919, Sinn Fein prospered and played the dominant role in furthering the cause of separatism by its sweeping successes in the 1918 general election.  After the setting up of the first Dail and its cabinet, its influence began to wane and its importance was further diminished by the military when the War of Independence commenced at the end of 1919.

The author refers to the disdain the soldiers had for politicians as the military profile was enhanced among separatists during the War of Independence and as the members of Sinn Fein receded into the background and often into prison. De Valera’s absence in America from April 1918 to Christmas 1919, with his remote involvement in the political ambience of the time and his reluctance to share his views with others  diminished the influence of the  politicians.  While a certain conflict was perceived to exist between the military and the politicians, in fact many of the military leaders were also members of the Dail and of the cabinet, and any significant conflict was illusory, at least until the Treaty was ratified.

Sinn Fein election poster 1918

The adoption of proportional representation in the second and subsequent Dail elections, replacing the straight non-transferable system of the first Dail, revealed the more realistic and less sweeping support for Sinn Fein among the electorate than was initially apparent.  The members of the first and second Dala were largely chosen because of their prominence in Sinn Fein and the army.  By passing the Treaty by a narrow majority, they did not reflect the views of the electorate, the great majority of whom were in favour of the Treaty’s acceptance. 

Some excellent contemporary cartoons are included nor is humour neglected when we read the quotes of some of the more passionate patriots who appeared to confound matters of divinity with those of politics.   This is the first standard work on Sinn Fein.  It is essential reading for those who wish to understand the genesis of the freedom which Ireland achieved early in this century.

Disraeli

Disraeli. R.W.Davis. Hutchinson & Co. 1976. 

This review was written on October 20th 2011

I borrowed this relatively short biography from the RDS Library hoping to learn more about the Tory Party’s persistent resistance to Gladstone and his long-term attempts to achieve Home Rule for Ireland from the late 19^th century to the beginning of the Great War in 1914. Disraeli was Gladstone's greatest opponent in the earliest days on the Home Rule issue. He was a great favourite of Queen Victoria just as she disapproved of Gladstone and his commitment to Home Rule and his less than enthusiastic support of the Empire. I recall as a child during my summer holidays in the Gaelteacht in Dingle the seomra, the tidy and carefully kept small room in the more prosperous houses of the area with their many mementoes, trinkets, china and gifts sent from their emigrant brethren who had emigrated to the States and the British colonies. Invariably they included pictures or prints of Gladstone and Pope Pius XII. Even in the more impoverished cottages these pictures could be found. The native Irish in these parts of the West had a great reverence for these two men. 

J.W.Plumb, who wrote the introduction to the book, finished the review:

--- Davis has written a biography of great insight. He does not spare Disraeli – the financial chicanery, the subterfuges or the opportunism. Survival was all to Disraeli.  He survived and triumphed and the story of how he did it is fascinating reading.

Disraeli

The Disraeli story only covers Gladstone’s earlier years. Disraeli  was born in 1804 and died at the age of 76 in 1880. His time as prime minister at the head of the conservatives was relatively short. One short period for a year or two, and later about 7 years shortly before his death. There is little in the biography about Home Rule but there is clear evidence otherwise that Disraeli was very opposed to Irish nationalism and was very anti-Catholic.  He proclaimed himself a great supporter of the Established Church and was in general against all other persuasions, including Dissenters and High Church supporters. He was born a Jew (his father was Issac D'israeli) but changed with his siblings to the Protestant faith. He did not conceal his Jewish origin nor did he refer to it unnecessarily and he was an exponent of greater tolerance of the Jews in Britain.

A Punch Cartoon: Disraeli and Gladstone

He was ambitious since youth and well educated, largely through his own studies and through access to his father’s great library. His father was a writer and an academic and was very wealthy. According to Disraeli his antecedents were Italian and of great distinction but there is little evidence to support this assertion.  Disraeli as a young man was foppish in his habits and dress; he was egotistical, ambitious and erratic, and was involved in some dubious and serious financial problems due to poor judgement about investment. He had an early interest in becoming a member of parliament and was to say to his audience in later years ‘I love power. I love to live in the eyes of the country'.

For the ordinary student of history it is not possible to understand the confused state of the political parties during the earlier years of the 19^th century. While there was evidence of the origins of the Whigs ( later the Liberals and Labour parties)  and the Tory or conservative party, it was apparently only by the late 19^th century that the present day more compact Liberal, Labour and Tory parties came to pass. It was equally difficult, at least in this biography, to understand the policies of the different major and splinter groups who were involved in such aspects of the political scene as free trade, Protectionism, Reform, the dominance of the Anglican Church, the Empire, foreign policy and Ireland.  Rather than expect to learn about the politics in Britain during Disraeli's lifetime, it is best said that the book, at least for the casual reader without a great knowledge of the period, is most interesting as a personal account of Disraeli as a man and a political figure.

He was first elected to parliament in 1837 and soon came to be admired as a great and stirring orator by some, and not afraid to flail his opponents with his tongue, thus adding to more than a few enemies.  He was opportunistic in his policies - he could change his views conveniently when the situation demanded it. As regards Ireland, he was sympathetic with the Irish in his earlier years but he eventually strongly opposed such issues as the financial support of Maynooth and other financial endowments for Catholics in Ireland. However, when he needed the support of the 50 odd Irish MPs his attitude to Ireland could be a little more benign.

His greatest domestic contribution to the electorate was his success in alleviating the distress of the poor and the workers who were ground down by the burgeoning industries which were a feature of the mid-19^th century. Despite the traditions of the conservatives in parliament, it was clear that Disraeli and his political colleagues and supporters did much to alleviate the underprivileged through appropriate reform of the working and social conditions of the poor. As somebody said ‘political expediency was always his touchstone’ but surely this can be said of many politicians. Another commentator said ‘He was not sympathetic to the downtrodden’.

Disraeli had another important career as a novelist. His plots were based on the political and social life of his time and his characters were frequently based on well known politicians, prominent members of the public, other acquaintances and members of his family. It is apparently clear from his characters who were those he admired and those who were his enemies. He was clearly a gifted novelist and could turn to writing a successful novel when he was not too preoccupied by his political affairs. He had a number of ‘best sellers’ to his credit.

His personal life was happy after he met and married Mary Ann who was 13 years older than he and who was devoted to Disraeli. She may well have deserved the sobriquet which was famously expressed by somebody who said she was more like a mistress than a wife. Her death some years before him was his great loss but he must have got some comfort from his last ten year association with Queen Victoria who was devoted to him and who had been attracted by his fulsome and sympathetic relationship with her. He did much to alleviate her distress following the early death of Prince Albert.

There is an extensive bibliography in the book on Disraeli and his time. When this book was published in 1976 the most recommended source for scholars was the six volume The Life of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield by W.E.Monypenny and G.E.Buckle published in 1910-1920.

Home

At Home in the World – Sound and Symmetries of Belonging. Spring Journal Books, New Orleans. 2010. 

This review was written on December 16th 2010

John Hill is a practising Jungian psychotherapist who lives in Zurich. He is a close friend of my brother-in-law Mark Hederman since they were at school together in Glenstal and his family were close to my wife, Louise, Mark and the Hederman family in earlier years. He was trained in philosophy in Dublin University and the Catholic University of America.  

The title provides the full sense of what Hill wishes to convey in the wider sense of home and homelessness but those of us who are not familiar with Jungian psychology will find problems of interpretation and of insights in the earlier chapters.  One professional colleague writes on the back cover of the book as follows

The work offers a profound philosophical and psychological exploration of the multi-dimensional significance of home and the interwoven themes of homelessness and homesickness in contemporary global culture. Home is a particular dwelling place, as a cultural or national identity, as a safe temenos (a sacred enclosure or precinct, according my Random House dictionary- RM) in therapy, and as a metaphor for the individuation process are (sic)  analysed expertly from multi-disciplinary perspectives and, more poignantly, through the sharing of diverse narratives that bear witness to lives lived and endured from memories of homes lost and regained.

Gaia: Primordial Goddess of the earth or Mother Earth

The theme is home in every sense from the individual family to the planet’s role as Gaia, the home of humanity. (He does not use the word Gaia as popularised by James Lovelock in describing our planet home - RM.) The author touches on his own somewhat dysfunctional family, his many changes of home and home’s circumstances during his training and after his thirty years of professional life in Switzerland where he married, had a family, divorced and worked as a deeply committed Jungian psychotherapist.   A meaningful and comprehensive review of John Hill’s text would require me to reread the chapters dealing with the more arcane language of his profession. In his final chapter he returns to Jung and his dreams. He writes

One of Jung’s dreams, evocative of the vertical axis of home, suggests that the human psyche harbors (sic) to embrace the entirety of evolution. The dream inspired him to envisage the human personality as a many storied house, which is still in the process of being built. The top floor would symbolise the conscious personality, but as one descends, one discovers other stories containing relics of a historical consciousness. Already Jung’s description of his 1912 dream makes this kind of experience.

And the author goes on to explain:

It was as though we had to describe and explain a building whose upper storey was erected in the nineteenth century, the ground floor dates back to the sixteenth century, and careful examination of the masonry reveals that it was reconstructed from a tower built in the eleventh century. In the cellar we come upon Roman foundations and under the cellar a choked up cave with Neolithic tools ---- that would be the picture of our psychic structure.  We live on the upper storey and are only aware that the lower storey is a little old-fashioned. As to what lies beneath the earth’s surface, of that we remain totally unconscious.

I leave the more arcane aspects of Hill’s chapters on the conscious and unconscious and I deal more with his chapters which include his protean description of the home in its many forms. Home can be related to the closely-knit family, it can refer to a community or nation and is thus related to our commitment to nationality; it can refer to various structures in society, the professions, and political movements, or to humanity as a whole as in the Gaia concept. In the individual, home may change as one ages, as one’s family’s circumstances change and as one adopts a career and changes location. No doubt one’s original childhood and early home will remain a powerful part of one’s consciousness but in to-day’s climate the rapid increase in immigration worldwide raises huge problems contributing to the trauma of homelessness, a factor dealt with in detail in chapter 10 and 11, At home in a Global Society and Traversing Cultural Boundaries. Hill dissects in detail the many problems the immigrants face and the many problems faced by their host nation

Hill states that homelessness appears with many faces: overpopulation, intolerance, poverty, civil strife, the concentration of wealth among the few. He mentions the speed of information, and the ease of transportation which has unleashed world migrations of unparalleled dimensions. He proposes some of the solutions which may be employed to overcome the immigrants’ language, cultural and emotional needs, not to mention loss of possessions and separation from home and nation. Hill states that much can be learned from the psychotherapist’s and social worker’s engagement with immigrant populations and clearly the author is deeply concerned with our current situation.

Although, even with such professional inputs, the lot of the immigrant nowadays cannot easily be solved. Hill talks about the methodology of coping with increasing immigration but the possible solutions which he puts forward surely ignores the cause of this world trend, that is, a burgeoning human population which fails to realise the limitations of Nature on which we depend for our existence and which must add to or, more likely, accelerate the fundamental cause of our woes. And a rise in the oceans of one metre will increase the current high rate of immigration by a hundred fold. The author’s two chapters described so comprehensively about world immigration must add further warning to us of the threat to humanity.

Chapter 12 Ireland Contemplating a Nation from a Place of Exile provides an interesting insight into Irish nationalism, and particularly into our recent revolutionary period and the Northern situation. It is relevant because of the author’s birth in Ireland and of his Irish family. His views on nationalism as the font of revolutionary violence and of alienation of Irish society are very close to my own.

He states that Nationalist movements in Ireland have long sought to legitimise their ideals and objections by referring to the ancestral myths of Celtic heroism, to wit, to Cúchulainn and Mother Ireland in her many guises. The heroism of Cúchulainn and our betrayal and neglect of Mother Ireland came as a stimulus to the revolutionaries.   It should be stated that only certain nationalist movements have shared these as driving myths. They have been largely confined to the military ambitions of those who led 1916 and its aftermath, the War of Independence and the long history of the IRA in all parts of the Island of Ireland. The earlier foundation of the Celtic myths can be found among the poets and academics of the 18^th, 19^th and early 20^th centuries and it was they who perhaps inadvertently influenced the Fenians, the IBB, the Irish Volunteers and later the IRA. Hill writes about the ‘dark shadows’ cast by these Irish myths, shadows which owe their appearance to the failure of a comprehensive Irish national identity.  Other national movements such as Home Rule and Griffith’s Sinn Féin could hardly be said to have been too concerned by Irish myths.

His chapter on Ireland may also be relevant to the different levels of psychic consciousness.  Ireland is one of the few countries which have a mythical history and ours is based on the five successive invasions of the island, two of which preceded the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Firbolgs and the final invasion of the Celts. These components of the Irish historical myth may in the author’s opinion symbolise the levels of psychic consciousness, ‘’--- a psychic inheritance embedded in the land’’. The historical myths of our country must surely be evoked in every Irishman who has long ago emigrated if he hears the haunting notes of the Lark in the Clear Air or the Cuileann, or the voice of John McCormack singing I Dreamt I dwelt in Marble Halls.

Hill states that Yeats was one to rekindle the revolutionary spirit with his ‘a Terrible Beauty is Born’. There were of course other literary and political influences which led to 1916 and its 90 year aftermath, such as the centenary celebrations of ’98, the sleeping dog of the Fenians and the IRB, the Celtic Twilight.  Our myths were to lead to the divisive political and military consequences which have lasted to this day. Pearse, initially a moderate supporting home rule as late as 1912, became obsessed with Mother Ireland and Cúchulainn. These were to lead to his blood sacrifice four years later, no doubt influenced by Tom Clarke, who started his career in the late 19^th century bombing the English population, and Seán MacDermott who devoted his life to organising a resurgent IRB and, with Tom Clarke, was long committed to a military uprising.  (MacDermott was to meet my mother in 1915 and intended to marry her – RM.) These revolutionaries were ably encouraged by the Irish Americans led by the old warrior, John Devoy of Clan na nGael. In 1916 there were few who supported the rebellion but the British played into the hands of the separatists by executing the leaders - and so our home of nationalism became dysfunctional and scarred by conflicting ideologies.

Common Sense

Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Penguin Books (1982). First published in 1776. 

This review was written on August 12th 2005

I read this book at the end of July 2005. It was Paine’s classic The Rights of Man which I had read a few years ago that inspired me to start writing reviews of books. I am not sure that I intended at the time to review every book during future reading but it so happens that since I read the Rights of Man I continued to do so. The total number of books I have reviewed since has reached 45.

Common Sense is a short polemical work of 64 pages. The original text of Common Sense was limited to 36 pages but a later edition added another 28 pages where Paine underlined America’s splendid natural resources which presaged a very great future for the American people. The Penguin edition starts with a 14-page introduction by Isaac Krammick which gives the background of the American Revolution of 1776. In that year Paine was in America, in Philadelphia. His publication urging the thirteen American states to break with Britain had a profound effect at a time when the majority of the Americans were not in favour of breaking with Britain despite the serious conflict which had already developed with the Mother Country. (Paine maintained that the British claim to motherhood was quite unjust because so many Europeans from other countries had emigrated by this time to America).

His publication had an extraordinary impact and became an out and out best seller, reaching 100,000 copies initially. Eventually 500,000 copies were published during the first year, between legitimate and pirated ones. Apparently, King George III had made a speech attacking the American colony which was first reported in America on the day of Paine’s manifesto. In the added pages of his publication he refers to the unfortunate effect the King’s speech had on relations with America. It helped to popularise the extreme sentiments expressed in Paine’s manifesto.

According to the editor, Isaac Krammick, Paine’s Common Sense had a catalytic effect on American thought and was the single most important influence leading to the independence of the American nation. After independence many Americans remained loyal to Britain and were opposed to leaving the British Empire. Those who stayed in the States remained a small and rather isolated minority and removed from the thrust of power and patriotism. Others moved to Canada or went back to Britain.

The second part of the introduction to the Penguin issue is entitled From Staymaker to Revolutionary: the Life and Career of Tom Paine. It is a 36 page biography of Paine who had just arrived in America at the time of hostilities there. His short essay made a powerful case against all forms of conciliation with the British. Although he had not been much more than a year in America when he wrote his diatribe against the British government and the King, he spoke as if he were an American urging his fellow men to immediate separation. He became a great hero to his hosts and his reputation extended to his later time in France where he was an enthusiastic supporter of the French Revolution. He had visited England a few times, it appeared, during these exciting times and was lucky not to have been imprisoned or lost his head.

He urged the Americans to build a navy. He claimed that, compared to England, they possessed such rich natural resources that it would be impossible for Britain to maintain its hegemony in the western Atlantic. The addendum to his pamphlet providing the statistics of the British navy contains details of their number and type of warships but claims that most were out of commission and that the navy was far too overstretched because of Britain’s far-flung dominions. The poor state of the British navy was another of his criticisms of the British King and the British government.

The final few pages of the book deal with his reply to the Quakers. Writing formally as a religious society, the Quakers claimed that it was unlawful and against the law of God that Americans should dispossess the king and oppose the British government. Paine’s answer to their statement showed a cold logic which contradicted their argument and which rightly opposed the intrusion of a religious group in matters of politics. American independence was eventually confirmed by the Treaty of Paris five years later,

It was clear that no ordered system of government existed in America at the time of the Revolution. The influence of the British government had largely waned as the revolutionary forces were gathering strength. There was no local government to control personal behaviour and even when the American state was well established there remained a tradition that government should interfere as little as possible with personal freedom, a tradition which still exists, as in the possession of guns. When the United States was established, it was in a milieu of personal freedom, in the absence of a well structured law and order system, and the gradual waning of the original pioneering spirit of sacrifice and high-minded morality. The lack of personal responsibility has contributed to the form of democracy which has evolved in America, a form of democracy which may be changing the ethos of Europe and the rest of the world. Whether democracy has the seeds of its own destruction is a moot point but what is the alternative? A benign dictator is virtually a contradiction in terms, if only because absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Paine was a fierce critic of monarchic government and aristocratic privilege as it existed up to the end of the 18^th century. He deplored the exclusion of the ordinary people from political influence. He could see the virtues of popular power in the Netherlands and Switzerland in his own time and, as is so evident in the second part of his Rights of Man. He advocated many important social changes in society which foreshadowed the social benefits which are available to every citizen in western democracies to-day. His was a powerful influence in bringing about government by the people for the people.

Statue of Paine in his native Norfolk.

Many years later, after he returned to America to live out his life and long after the country had become independent, the remarkable part he played in the evolution of America’s history had been completely forgotten. He found himself impoverished, lonely and isolated, and only a few neighbours attended his funeral. He remained a forgotten figure for a few generations until his remarkable contribution to liberalism and to social advancement was rekindled by several biographers, the first published in 1892 and three further biographies in the latter half of the 20^th Century. His name is now well known to historians and students of sociology, and there are active Thomas Paine societies and clubs in many parts of the western world. As his remarkable contribution to society was revived, William Cobbett arranged to have his remains removed to England for memorial re-interment. However, the final saga of his life and death ended when his remains were lost in the docks of Liverpool. He was born in 1737 and died in 1809.

Madame Curie and her daughters

Marie Curie and her  Daughters – Shelley Emling. Palgrave Macmillan  2012. 

Written on April 30th 2013

Marie Curie was born in Poland and met her husband Pierre Curie in Paris.  He was a scientist attached to the Sorbonne but he was killed in an accident in 1906 when he was still young.  She had joined him in his scientific work and she continued on as a scientist after his death. 

Marie and Pierre on their wedding day.

They had two daughters who were named Irène and Eve.  Marie Curie was of course famous as, with her husband,  the discoverer of Radium and Polonium in 1898  and was unique in receiving two Nobel prizes for her work on radium and radiation.  She remained a celebrity in France until she became involved with another young scientist who was married.  Her treatment by the French, particularly by the Catholic Church and those of the the right wing, reminded me much of the treatment received by Dreyfus when he was wrongly accused of leaking information to the Germans.  She was under considerable pressure from the public and from a number of her own colleagues to return to Poland because of her disgrace.  She resisted all pressures and she was greatly supported in the United States where she was received always as a celebrity, where she had many close friends and where much money was collected for her work on radiation. It was also surely unique that her daughter Irène won a Nobel Prize later in her life having joined her mother as a scientist.  Her daughter received her Nobel Prize because of her discovery of nuclear fission. Her second daughter Ève was younger and was less interested in science; she became a well-known media person and author. 

Before her disgrace in France, Marie Curie was considered by the French as an inspiration for women, particularly in such an unusual area as science.    Her lover was Paul Langevin and the love affair continued for some years but eventually petered out by the beginning of the Great War in 1914, although they continued to remain close friends afterwards.  The affair was a considerable source of pressure on Marie but nevertheless she succeeded in overcoming all the difficulties created by her critics.

Marie visited America and went to the Standard Chemical Company in Pittsburgh where she spent some time – three hours or more – talking to them about the production of radium.  Since 1960 radium is no longer purified although there remains still a lot in storage.  It is used in atomic bombs amongst other things but there is quite an interesting account in the book of  her visit to the Standard Chemical Company at the end of her stay in America.

Chapter 6 – New and Improved – deals with the dangers of radium and the gradual realisation by some that people were dying from radiation exposure.  The chapter also deals with the adoption in the early 1920’s of attempts to protect people from X-ray radiation and these rules became more widespread and more serious by the mid-twenties.  It was clear that there were many other people who refused to accept that radium and polonium were likely causes of serious illness and death but again there were others who were pretty well convinced by the evidence at the same time.  

Chapter 7 – Another dynamo duo – in December 1924 Frederic Joliot joined Marie Curie in her laboratory as a junior assistant.  He was to become a famous associate of hers as well as marrying her daughter Irène and this chapter dealt mostly with Irène and Frederic and with Irène’s increasing success and her recognition as being an important scientist by the French.  She too received a Nobel Prize.  She had a daughter shortly after they got married – Hélène and later a son, Pierre. Both are esteemed scientists. In this chapter there is a brief description of the month long trip to Brazil where she and her mother gave a number of well attended lectures and were accorded a number of receptions etc.  It was a long trip, taking them two weeks to get to Brazil and two weeks to return. 

We are reminded in chapter 8 – Returning to America again – of the fact that Marie was born in Poland and was fiercely proud of her country.  It had received its first freedom from the Russians, Germans and Austrians in 1918 and she was determined to set up a radium institute there as well.  This chapter deals with her ambitions and her relations to Poland and with her approach to Missy Maloney to organise a fund raising scheme in America to finance her Polish ambitions.  I haven’t read the chapter in every detail but obviously the Poles in America were amongst the most enthusiastic to support this fund raising campaign.  In order to further the Polish initiative, Marie went to America again where she spent some weeks.  Nevertheless it was clear that the Americans were not quite as enthusiastic as her previous visit.  She received a gift of 50 thousand dollars, which was quite a lot of money at the time and it enabled her to proceed with her plans for Warsaw.  She was in Warsaw at the beginning of the big crash in the stock market in 1928 and she was lucky that the money had been collected and was presented to her the day after the first sign of the crash.  It was presented to her by the President.

The world's first atomic bomb

Chapter 9 – Into the Spotlight – was important because, through the researches by Irène and  Fredric, they discovered  nuclear fission which was to lead eventually to information they had about the instability of the radium atom and about the first step towards harnessing atomic energy and eventually the atomic bomb produced in the US in 1944. 

The next few chapters deal mostly with research work by Frederic and Irène.   This concerned work in relation to radioactivity and the emission of radiation to non- radiant objects.  It was clear that much of the research done by Irène and Frederic and by many other physicists then in Europe, including those who left Germany for America (I suppose because they were Jewish) were active in this area of research. They were well on the road to the discovery of the atomic bomb; although they may not have realised the appalling possibilities of such discoveries.  The Frederic and Irène discovery is described in a later chapter as artificial radio activity.  Marie and Pierre had discovered natural radioactivity; it was perhaps ironic that Irène and her husband discovered artificial radio activity.  It was clear that the work of Irène and Frederic had opened up a new understanding of the nucleus of the atom and thus provided an extension of the research performed by Marie and Pierre. As well as their discovery of natural radioactivity, and the properties of a few elements, the study of the latter two lead to new insights into the atomic structure.  The next generation took this finding further by showing how scientists could duplicate this natural phenomenon artificially.  

Marie Curie with Albert Einstein

Marie died in 1934, almost certainly from aplastic anaemia or something related to her exposure to radium. Irène and Frederic got their Nobel Prize in 1935. In chapter 10 Frederic refers to the possibility of the nuclear bomb at the end of his speech at the time of the receipt of the Nobel Prize.  In chapter 11 Frederic says that he stated, “ neither of us could have imagined the repercussions of their research” – referring to Irène and Frederic and their desire for peace; but they continued their researches into radioactivity and artificial radio activity. 

Coming closer to the end of the book  Frederic and Irène showed increasing interest in the Nazi’s and they were very much opposed to the appeasement by France and the British to the German presence in France and were entirely opposed to Nazism in all forms. They took precautions to conceal the knowledge and information they were privy to during the occupation and whatever they garnered during their researches was not revealed until 1949.  After the war was over and Fredric and Irène had returned to Paris – just after they had dropped the second plutonium bomb on Nagasaki killing 140,000 people – they continued the use of atomic fission despite the bombing of Japan.  They both felt partly to blame for all that had transpired, as did other scientists in the same field of research.  What they had hoped was that fission would lead to a promising new source of power but instead it had lead to massive death and devastation.

After the War, at the request of the French government, Frederic was invited to organise the building of atomic reactors to provide energy for the country and for it to become an important source of energy, particularly as France, depleted as it was by the ravages of war, was able to export  energy to other countries.  Frederic, as High Commissioner of the Ministry of Atomic Energy was placed in charge of all the scientific and technical work in this area.   Irène was also very much involved.  The radioactive isotopes derived from her and Frederic’s discovery of artificial radio activity was one of the important benefits of their research.

A mobile xray truck

The discovery of artificial radioactivity has helped physicians with medical treatments since the 1930s.  Just one important and useful example, radioactive versions of potassium and technetium can allow us to trace where the elements travel and lodge in a patient.  A sensitive detector picks up the radioactivity outside the body and can locate and track the flow of blood and nutrients into certain organs.

The final chapter of the book underlines Irène’s important role in research and also mentions Eve because of her reputation as a media figure, a public speaker, a biographer and a journalist. She was noted as an active humanitarian with her husband during their various world travels. Eve died in 2007 at the age of 102.  Her husband was among other things the head of UNICIF. 

The last page or two of the book makes a plea to have more women in science, in education and equal in every way with men. As I listen nowadays to the radio and television, I wonder if women are outstripping men in the public arena. I am increasingly impressed by so many articulate and confident women commentators we encounter in the media and even in sporting events.