For the Record

Just for the record nothing interesting in this weeks new releases. Hopefully have a review up tomorrow.

Still Alive

Yes I'm still alive. Realize I haven't been posting anything for quite a while. I have no good excuses so I'll just say that I'm going to try to do better. Though having a review opportunity I'm excited about certainly helps. Tomorrow a "what's new" post will go up and hopefully I'll have some reviews shortly.

First World War Memory and the Next Few Years

I was all prepared to write several thousand words about the closest thing to a historical debate we have had in Canada for a very long time.  Mainly the blog post put forward by a current NDP, member of parliament suggesting that the First World War was something that Canada should not have been involved in and only Communists had stood up against it.  On rereading the original article I realized that the post in question was from 2007 which does blow up my thesis that this is the beginning of a historical debate that should encompass the next few years, filled as it is with the centennial of the various military actions.

I also found the original piece rather odd. After all, the war support in French speaking Canada was never as high as it was in English Canada. This is true of both world wars. I am not exactly sure why the Communists specifically are being put forward here. As for Vimy Ridge, I have actually most seen it described as the coming together of English Canada, specifically separate from French Canada.

That being said, I do think the next few years will be very interesting. I can only see more debates like this popping up. I only hope that Canadian media, both in book publishing as well as TV and perhaps even film are able to produce suitable material. I have already heard stories out of the UK about jockeying for position as far as the publishing schedule goes.  I am worried that since the Canadian industry is so much smaller and we have comparatively fewer experts that there won’t be much. Also our anemic film and TV industry, trapped as it is by reproducing American reality TV shows and occasional quirky comedies, may not have the chops to produce our own Saving Private Ryan.  It is, perhaps, an unfortunate bell weather that the recent Canadian film to deal with the First World War Passchendaele seems to have been more as an excuse for Paul Gross an aging leading man to bed a nurse during an artillery barrage. I will be optimistic and try on this blog to point out things as they happen going forward.

For the record I was also gratified to see  Thomas Mulcair of as well as the veterans affairs critic strongly condemn the statements.  Stupid and insulting as they were.

The utility of one star reviews

While writing up the last review I took the time to look at the other reviews I could find online. I noticed something that I have noticed other times when dealing with books that have controversial topics. Often the one star reviews are more useful to me than the five star reviews for the simple reason that if one star reviews are able to use actual facts to show their arguments are correct, that gives the book less credibility, while if the one star reviews simply involve ad hominem attacks without giving reasons then that strengthens the book. For example, many years ago I worked up a reading list on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by reading one star reviews. If the one star reviews said that the author was either an anti Semite or part of the Zionist conspiracy without providing examples of how they were wrong, it was likely that the book was much closer to the truth than the negative reviewer wished to admit. I naturally found that out with the previous book on the Tamil Tigers.