"Islamic Inscriptions" by Sheila Blair

Islamic Inscriptions
by Sheila S. Blair

http://www.amazon.com/Islamic-Inscriptions-Sheila-Blair/dp/0814713289/ref=sr_1_1/002-7363174-5144854?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187740474&sr=8-1

Ugh, ok, this was knowledge I needed to pick up and it really is a truly valuable reference book on the topic, but...ugh...it was a textbook in every sense of the word. Islamic Inscriptions is the main reference work (at least that I could find and it was well-reviewed by specialists) on the topic of...Islamic Inscriptions. Blair covers monumental inscriptions, wood, textiles, glass, and other portable objects.

It's probably worth a couple notes on what the book is and is not. It is not a detailed review of lots of examples of the various genres of Islamic inscriptions, but is really more of an introduction to the entire field. As such, rather than lots and lots of illustrations and detailed discussion of actual texts used in inscriptions and detailed discussions of stylistic developments with images - rather than all of that, it is more of an overview of everything that has and hasn't been done in the field. That does involve a decent number of images and lots of mention of different examples of specific inscriptions, but the book spends more time telling you about other sources where you can find the images, texts, and translations than it does actually showing them to you.

What you get as a result is a sense of where the field is, you get a decent overview of the structure of how inscriptions work with a decent smattering of examples, you get a good geographic overview of the differences between regions and across time and materials, and you get a good bibliography. But do you get a huge catalog of lots of examples with transcriptions and texts? No.

In all fairness, the sheer volume of examples she points to in other sources shows you the book probably could have run 1000 pages if she had included them all, if that would even have been possible (I doubt it actually given the likely copyright restrictions and rarity of many of the objects and hence likely paucity of available images). Still, it does feel like the book was more of an introduction and overview than a comprehensive study to fill one with a sense of understanding the field. Perhaps that's good, sometimes it may be too easy to think we know it all after reading a book rather than having just been introduced. This book at least gives you an honest level of knowledge.

For me, I'm looking for artistic inspiration backed by technical and historical understanding, so I value the knowledge I gained, but I'm going to have to keep looking now using this as a starting point, not an end point.

"Shake Hands With The Devil" by Roméo Dallaire

Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda
by Lt. Gen. Roméo Dallaire

http://www.amazon.com/Shake-Hands-Devil-Failure-Humanity/dp/0786715103/ref=pd_bbs_2/002-7363174-5144854?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187222660&sr=8-2


I was 18 and in college when the Rwandan genocide occurred. Like most people who saw it unfolding on TV I was shocked and horrified, probably more so than most of my friends and family as I was always very interested in world affairs and couldn't get the image out of my head of reporters measuring the scale of the genocide by counting the bodies per hour floating down the river across the Rwandan border. But, like most folks, I chalked it up as some tragic event in an inexplicably complex corner of Africa and mostly forgot about it as I went on with my life.

Fast forward to 2006. Sometime last year I'm channel surfing and see something on the satellite guide called "Shake Hands with the Devil" on the Documentary Channel and saw it was something about Rwanda. Curious, I started watching, and before long not only was I pulled back into remembering the savagery of the genocide, but I found myself sucked into the personality of the man whom the documentary was about - the head of the small UN mission in Rwanda at the time, General Roméo Dallaire.

I've actually never seen that entire documentary, just large chunks of it. It actually was about his return to the country 10 years after the genocide and followed him as he visited old friends and places where events had occurred, with lots of space for flashbacks and commentary from others. The visual imagery was disturbing and moving, I actually just ordered the DVD so I can watch the whole thing (you can order it here - http://www.newsreel.org/nav/title.asp?tc=CN0175&s), but when I heard Dallaire had written a book, I wanted to read that too.

The book is in some ways a mini-autobiography, followed by a detailed account of Dallaire's year in Rwanda. There are numerous instances of descriptions of the more gruesome events he witnessed, but it is not a catalog of attrocities. It is events as he experienced them, and clearly going through something so harrowing while simultaneously struggling day in and day out to do something - anything - to save people and stop the killing, he became numb for a while to much of what was occurring (though he paid for it dearly with post-traumatic stress disorder, alcoholism, and nightmarish flashbacks for years since).

Not insensitive though, not by a long shot. Dallaire strikes me as a fundamentally humble, decent, hard-working, and dedicated man. And utterly and completely color-blind, a through-and-through believer in the common humanity of us all. He grew up living between the French and English-speaking worlds of Canada and often found himself trying to be the conciliator or else someone castigated by both sides for failing to march to one extremist drum or the other. But he stuck it out and clearly his dedication to hard work combined with his genuine affection and caring for others is what turned him into an admired and respected leader in the Canadian military and ultimately as head of UNAMIR (the UN mission in Rwanda). He wouldn't and doesn't say that himself in his book, he is more apt to focus on his failings and point out where he is responsible for mistakes, but it shines through. With 100 generals like him running UN operations (if backed up by proper troops, political will, and logistics), an amazing amount of good and conflict resolution could clearly be accomplished in the world.

But back to the book. He runs through his life and Canadian military career pre-Rwanda, and then from his copious notes (and those of his dedicated staff) constructs an almost day-by-day account of what happened. What emerges is a story of multiple failures by almost every party involved in the conflict that allowed it to happen and play out as disastrously as it did. No one who screwed up escapes blame, the UN bureaucracy, the US, France, Belgium, NGOs, the pre-war Rwandan government, the rebel RPF force that became the new government, the Bangladeshi military (for pete's sake!), and many others. On the other hand, the men Dallaire commanded and many individuals and some organizations shine through as having remained tiny flickers of light in the darkest days. The Rwandan Red Cross somehow managed to keep operating throughout the conflict despite many of its workers themselves and the patients they were ferrying being massacred. The troops Dallaire commanded including an amazing pair of contingents from Tunisia and Ghana and many individuals from other countries saved thousands of lives, but the men were permanently scarred by the massacres they couldn't stop (sometimes right in front of their eyes) and some they even indirectly helped cause (being sent to a place to rescue someone, being unable to find them because they were hiding in fear of their lives, leaving, then coming back the next day to find the people slaughtered because the Interahamwe militia had seen the UN troops and realized someone was hiding there).

Anyhow, these are just some broad impressions from the book. His conclusions at the end are perhaps the weakest part of the book - well intentioned, but perhaps not the most practically thought out. But I count that as a minor error and it doesn't change the fact that if the politicians would have listened to him more they would and could have done far better for Rwanda and the entire Great Lakes region in the decade of misery that has followed. What comes through is a man who genuinely and deeply cared for the people and country he was trying to save, was blocked and ultimately used as a pawn by conniving forces bigger than him (especially France and the US), but who nonetheless showed great courage and truly showed the spirit of what UN forces are ideally trying to be - studiously neutral, but genuinely out to try to create the conditions for peace and not afraid to wield a stick when necessary. And in an incredibly practical way. This is no flower child speaking, he is a military man, but a military man with a heart, a brain, and an ability to work with people with an incredible intensity that is sorely needed in the world. Read the book, you'll never look at Rwanda, the world community and powers that be in Rwanda, or the UN quite the same. And you'll thank the Lord that there are men like Roméo Dallaire in this world.

"Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling" by Richard Lyman Bushman

Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling
by Richard Lyman Bushman

http://www.amazon.com/o/ASIN/1400077532/ref=s9_asin_image_1/002-7363174-5144854?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=19GFH3A1D6PEW1WSK8A8&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=278240301&pf_rd_i=507846


I'd heard a great deal about this biography of Joseph Smith and was quite curious to check it out. I am Mormon and the author's approach and background appealed to me - a believing Mormon but also a serious scholar of American religion at Columbia University who wasn't afraid to show the reality that honest scholarship and research on Joseph Smith's life revealed.

The results for me were eye-opening in a very positive way. Fair enough, there are criticisms that can be raised of Bushman's approach, some say he took kid gloves to some topics, others say he gives credence to accusations they don't believe. Personally, I think the only really fair criticisms (admittedly speaking as someone here who is not terribly steeped in primary sources from the era beyond the scriptures Joseph Smith produced) are those of which any good scholar who has produced a good work may be accused of: i.e., that as many questions are raised and left hanging as answered, that some minor points can be argued where the brevity necessary in any book required a more certain-sounding statement, etc. In other words, I find this a good, credible book and work of scholarship and would rather focus on what I learned than the minor concerns some folks would like to get all bent out of shape over.

So, what did I learn? Joseph Smith emerges here as a real human being to me for almost the first time. I won't say the first time, part of my faith has always seen some of his human foibles and struggles as an integral part of why I believe. But here, the full reality of Joseph Smith's personality and failings is laid out side-by-side with his accomplishments. A truly three-dimensional individual emerges. The man really did have a bit of a temper and hot-headed personality that sometimes caused him to act in ways that I probably would have had a tough time dealing with. But then in that way, I've had church leaders today that I've had the same struggles with. In both cases for me as a believer, I realize that I need to turn to higher spiritual principles and the guidance of the Holy Ghost to know how to act. I for one am glad to see Joseph Smith's place in the same spectrum of life as I live today rather than in some unrealistic deified sphere. A deified sphere is where I think he's gone to since and where I hope to get to, but there's not much point in pretending that he or anyone else who ever lived on the earth except Jesus was perfect in this life.

Another thing I always find valuable and which this book gives in spades is the breaking of false assumptions. Now, I'm not one to yell fire in a crowded theater and neither is Bushman: the point is not to say "you've all been duped, look at this stuff Joseph Smith did", but rather to say "here's a full account of what Joseph Smith did in life" and then let the reader sort out for themself what it means. So the subjects are handled in my view honestly and tactfully, and often-times with the questions of the meaning of it all and the why's left hanging where no clear answer is obvious. In other words those searching for either the debunking of certain claims about Joseph Smith (i.e., "he didn't really drink wine or marry already married women, right?") or a justification for them to use aren't going to find Bushman straining to force theories or answers where the evidence doesn't provide them. Instead Bushman is simply the honest scholar, laying out the historical record as best as he can and where no further answers are forthcoming he at best lays out a maybe or two or quite often says "I don't know based on the evidence available at present". That is honest, and that allows a reader like myself to come to these topics and explore them as best as possible with my own mind and theories.

Anyhow, a great read, eye-opening, not faith-destroying in any way for me but faith-building as I think I am in agreement with Joseph Smith himself in consider anything that gives me further knowledge faith-building even if it provides new challenges I have to sort through. Indeed, intellectual challenges if handled right are just like weights in the gym, they build strength when part of a broader strength-training program. For those who feel like this book was an expose which tore up their faith (of whom I think I know at least one), I honestly think they have misread the meaning of Joseph Smith's life and Bushman's attempt to give a comprehensive portrayal of it, but then that is far more a matter of an attitude of faith than of scholarship per se. As a work of scholarship quite aside from faith, I think believers and non-believers can learn a great deal from this book. As a believer, one can similarly gain a much greater understanding of the facts and history of Joseph Smith's era and then go on to build a more complete edifice of faith using that knowledge.