A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

On November 23, 1997, the 300 member stations of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) aired The Reluctant Revolutionaries, the first episode of Liberty! The American Revolution, a six-part miniseries about the American Revolutionary War (1775-1781) and the birth of the United States of America. Written by Ronald Blumer ( The U.S. Constitution, Benjamin Franklin ) and co-directed by Ellen Hovde and Muffie Meyer ( Benjamin Franklin ), Liberty! is an earnest if a somewhat superficial attempt to explore America's War of Independence, its root causes. and its long-lasting impact on American, British, and world history. Featuring an all-star cast of Hollywood and Broadway stars (some of whom were just starting out) and a team of American and British historians, including Pauline Maier, Ron Hoffman, Gordon S. Wood, Richard Norton Smith, John Keegan, Jeremy Black, and Nicholas A.M. Rodger, the miniseries portrays the tumultuous 25-year period between 1763 and 1788 through a mix of li...

The Second World War was the largest, bloodiest conflict in history. It was fought on three of the seven continents and involved every major power of the time. Some of the combatant nations (most notably France and Italy) changed sides at least once between 1939 and 1945, and by the time Japan surrendered on Sept. 2, 1945 over 50 million men, women, and children were dead, millions more were wounded and/or uprooted, homeless, and bewildered by the war's effects. Indeed, those of us now living in the early 21st century are still living with the aftermath of World War II; many of the crises we now face can be traced to decisions made during or shortly after the war. John Keegan's The Second World War is a one-volume general history of the 1939-45 conflict, and it should be read more as an introductory text rather than a comprehensive "this-is-the-book-that-explains-the-whole-darned-thing" opus. It's too short (595 pages, not counting the bibliography or i...