Happy birthday to Sarah Vowell, author of The Wordy Shipmates and a favorite here at the Reader!
A favorite quote: "Being a nerd, which is to say going too far and caring too much about a subject, is the best way to make friends I know."
Sarah Vowell
The Partly Cloudy Patriot
Showing posts with label The Partly Cloudy Patriot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Partly Cloudy Patriot. Show all posts
Monday, December 27, 2010
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Just Finished: The Wordy Shipmates
It took me a little longer than I thought it would, but I just finished The Wordy Shipmates, an examination of 17th Century New England by the always charming Sarah Vowell.
Shipmates is a look into an obscure corner of American History: the era of the first white settlers to what would eventually become Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. I learned a lot by reading it - namely, that Thanksgiving wasn't a yearly ritual, it had to be earned; that Pilgrims and Puritans aren't the same thing; that the Pilgrims wanted to separate from the Church of England, while the Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony wanted to reform it from within; and that the Puritans gave us the New World traditions of democratic elections and the "acceptibility" of the slaughter of Native Americans.
Vowell uses her trademark blend of insightful historical inquiry and biting social commentary, with a side of pop culture, throughout.
If I had one complaint about this book, it would be the (seeming) repetitiveness of the New England names: Winthrop, Williams, Cotton, Hutchinson. Maybe it was the strong theological subject matter or maybe it was the fact that I felt so removed historically from the people of 17th century New England; either way the result was the same: I felt that Shipmates wasn't her best work. That honor would go to The Partly Cloudy Patriot for its variety and quality of the essays within. I also liked Assasination Vacation better than Shipmates, probably for its macabre sense of history, and the fact that I had visited a lot of the places she described.
Sarah Vowell is an amazing writer. In fact, the strongest conclusion I had after thinking about it for a while was that she would make an amazing history professor: smart, funny, relatable, good with primary source materials. Unfortunately, I'm well past school and she probably makes more money writing history commercially than she ever could at a university.
Either way, I'm glad I read it, and I'm looking forward to reading her new book Unfamiliar Fishes when it comes out next year.
Favorite Quote: "The United States is often called a Puritan nation. Well, here is one way it emphatically is not: Puritan lives were overwelmingly, fanatically literary...the country that became the U.S. bears a closer family resemblance to the devil-may-care merchants of New Amsterdam than it does to Boston's communitarian English majors."
Shipmates is a look into an obscure corner of American History: the era of the first white settlers to what would eventually become Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. I learned a lot by reading it - namely, that Thanksgiving wasn't a yearly ritual, it had to be earned; that Pilgrims and Puritans aren't the same thing; that the Pilgrims wanted to separate from the Church of England, while the Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony wanted to reform it from within; and that the Puritans gave us the New World traditions of democratic elections and the "acceptibility" of the slaughter of Native Americans.
Vowell uses her trademark blend of insightful historical inquiry and biting social commentary, with a side of pop culture, throughout.
If I had one complaint about this book, it would be the (seeming) repetitiveness of the New England names: Winthrop, Williams, Cotton, Hutchinson. Maybe it was the strong theological subject matter or maybe it was the fact that I felt so removed historically from the people of 17th century New England; either way the result was the same: I felt that Shipmates wasn't her best work. That honor would go to The Partly Cloudy Patriot for its variety and quality of the essays within. I also liked Assasination Vacation better than Shipmates, probably for its macabre sense of history, and the fact that I had visited a lot of the places she described.
Sarah Vowell is an amazing writer. In fact, the strongest conclusion I had after thinking about it for a while was that she would make an amazing history professor: smart, funny, relatable, good with primary source materials. Unfortunately, I'm well past school and she probably makes more money writing history commercially than she ever could at a university.
Either way, I'm glad I read it, and I'm looking forward to reading her new book Unfamiliar Fishes when it comes out next year.
Favorite Quote: "The United States is often called a Puritan nation. Well, here is one way it emphatically is not: Puritan lives were overwelmingly, fanatically literary...the country that became the U.S. bears a closer family resemblance to the devil-may-care merchants of New Amsterdam than it does to Boston's communitarian English majors."
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
A Brief Interruption
I'm thinking about taking the weekend off from reading VALIS. Since it is also the Thanksgiving weekend, I think it would be appropriate to instead read Sarah Vowell's The Wordy Shipmates instead.
Sarah Vowell is an author, actress and all-around renaissance woman. I have also read her books Assasination Vacation and The Partly Cloudy Patriot. She's funny, erudite and easy to read. And considering the fact that The Wordy Shipmates is about the early days of Puritanism in the new world, it may be a perfect fit for the holiday weekend.
I'm also taking Thursday and Friday off from the blog, but will return on Saturday, when I will resume our regularly scheduled programming!
Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!
Sarah Vowell is an author, actress and all-around renaissance woman. I have also read her books Assasination Vacation and The Partly Cloudy Patriot. She's funny, erudite and easy to read. And considering the fact that The Wordy Shipmates is about the early days of Puritanism in the new world, it may be a perfect fit for the holiday weekend.
I'm also taking Thursday and Friday off from the blog, but will return on Saturday, when I will resume our regularly scheduled programming!
Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!
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