The Course of Human Events The 2003 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities eBook David McCullough
Download As PDF : The Course of Human Events The 2003 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities eBook David McCullough 
In this short speech, the master historian tracks the founding fathers’ and his own fascination with all things historical.
The Course of Human Events The 2003 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities eBook David McCullough
McCullough, as usual, hits it out of the park. It is in our Kindle library as well as on a shelf among our ever growing McCullough "print" collection. Joseph Ellis' "The Quartet: Orchestrating the Second American Revolution. 1783-1789" is also a valued recent addition. Whoever it was who thought history is "dry" has another "think" coming. We NEED to "know our history or be doomed to repeat our mistakes".Product details
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The Course of Human Events The 2003 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities eBook David McCullough Reviews
I was very disappointed to have paid $8+ (June 2011) for the "book" with this title. This is NOT a book, rather the text of a nice lecture by David McCullough that is a very short read. This is not at all very clear in the description of the "book" on the website. I see the paperback version is now less than $4.- perhaps has now tried to adjust the price to the actual content. However, I think that buyers ought to clearly understand what they are buying. One will note that no book summary with the actual number of papers is provided.
My bottom line is that I like David McCullough as a historian. I understand that this lecture is likely to be mostly history light. Hear McCullough’s voice a few times and you can always hear his voice in his writing. I wished that this had been several lectures instead of one and I wish it could have had more depth. I recommend this single lecture mostly to his fans and as a very easy way to decide if you might become one. Mine is the copy so not expensive but the lecture is on line for less.
I was eager to get David McCullough’s The Course of Human Events The 2003 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities. I have always enjoyed his books. Also his TV documentaries. In my eagerness I misses the fact that this is a 30 page lecture. About an hour worth of reading. The reason for the lecture was to thank an audience who had just awarded him with the opportunity to present the 2003 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities. According to their website the lectures represent the “highest honor the federal government confers for distinguished intellectual achievement in the humanities.” In other words he is not likely to indulge himself in much in the way of negativity or intellectually challenging material. A time honored approach to this kind of award lecture is a mix of personal reflection and odd historical facts.
This is what the lecture contains. His thoughts on his career as a historian a few factoids that never exactly made it into one of his books. That he was first drawn to history by the story of a mouse and Benjamin Franking, Amos and Me, touched my memories. I remember this as a Disney animation as well as a Disney book. A fond recollection.
Some of his factoids left me wondering. For example he mentions speeches by Americans that were drawn from classical courses. This as proof that they had been avid readers. In the case of the famous Nathan Hale line, "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country." Tracing the line to Cato is fair enough, but why no mention of the fact that historians cannot be certain that these were his final words?
My point is not to be nit picky, but the lecture could have had more depth had it reminded listeners of the uncertainties attendant to the profession of historian.
In May of 2003, David McCullough wrote and presented The Course of Human Events in The 2003 Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities, in Washington, DC, forty years after he began writing his first book.
This is the fourth book I’ve read by McCullough, the first one of his that I read was The Wright Brothers, and I was amazed at his ability to make history come alive. Last year, shortly before Christmas, I read his In the Dark Streets Shineth A 1941 Christmas Eve Story, which was educational, entertaining and also lovely. This past 4th of July, I happened to see his The American Spirit Who We Are and What We Stand For, which was inspiring. This short book offered, in addition to some fascinating details about our history as a country, a certain amount of comfort.
In this speech he speaks of many aspects of how this work - his writing, speaking - has led to so much more, for him, than he could have anticipated so many years ago.
”The reward of the work has always been the work itself, and more so the longer I’ve been at it. And I’ve kept the most interesting company imaginable with people long gone. Some I’ve come to know better than many I know in real life, since in real life we don’t get to read other people’s mail.”
He quotes many others, but this was my favourite
”It was then, in 1942, that the classical scholar Edith Hamilton issued an expanded edition of her book, The Greek Way, in which, in the preface, she wrote the following”
“I have felt while writing these new chapters a fresh realization of the refuge and strength the past can be to us in the troubled present….Religion is the great stronghold for the untroubled vision of the eternal, but there are others too. We have many silent sanctuaries in which we can find breathing space to free ourselves from the personal, to rise above our harassed and perplexed minds and catch sight of values that are stable, which no selfish and timorous preoccupations can make waver, because they are the hard-won permanent possessions of humanity….
“When the world is storm-driven and the bad that happens and the worse that threatens are so urgent as to shut out everything else from view, then we need to know all the strong fortresses of the spirit which men have built through the ages.”
Recommended
McCullough, as usual, hits it out of the park. It is in our library as well as on a shelf among our ever growing McCullough "print" collection. Joseph Ellis' "The Quartet Orchestrating the Second American Revolution. 1783-1789" is also a valued recent addition. Whoever it was who thought history is "dry" has another "think" coming. We NEED to "know our history or be doomed to repeat our mistakes".
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