I checked - it'd been a full decade plus since I'd read a last Jutland book - but, after my several of posts on the battle - the discovery of a new book that seems what I need to read - and referring to an unread book that' I'd had for several years - well, it was a good weekend, Jutlandbookwise.
It was this review - unearthed while trolling for images of German battlecruisers - that really boiled me to bother about - yes, yet another tome on the fucking subject. Seems the last decade has actually unearthed @ least four works of varying degrees of importance on the subject. I've three under my belt. And then there is that fourth - The Rules of the Game.
I've written on this last week, but I really ran dry the Jutland material in the mid 1980's. It's when I discovered it in my life, and even though that rigorous scouring of all available and non available sources that I wa staught in Grad school wasn't in my house @ the time - but I was so rabid on the subject I bled the undergrad world dry of Jutland material back then.
So - the world moves on, fleet actions slip under thousand plane raids in my personal importance, and a decade has passed. But I was academic enough to realise that from 86-96 or so several things of importance came out. In 1986 - why didn't I read it then? - was when John Campbell's Jutland: An Analysis of the Fighting came out. This was the book that is basically a dry recitation of the battle damage inflicted during the battle. There are mini chapters -2 to 3 pages - which narrate the battle - and then 30 pages detailing the shells and the damage done. From this book I delelo[ed a fascination with the reflective abillities of heavy armour - and also discovered that this book is a fucking drag and a chore to read. Seriously - "this shell richocheted off of this deck and then hit ... " Oi. However, it had to be read.
V. E. Tarrant's Jutland: The German Perspective: A New View of the Great Battle. 31 May 1916 was released in 1995 - I got it in that bookstore near the Alimedia Theatre in Oakland - one Cali weekd I saw the book there, and then returning to the Bay Area a few months later (I was always like that - rememebr Vito and Rocky??) I returned and bought it. This book was important because it allowed non German readers to read a lot of revelent shit that hadn't been translated yet. or ever. And guess what- boring as hell. I used to have a bias against German translated into English. But then again, when I developed that idea, it was when I was in my Marx period. W/ Marx, it was so dense - and I just HAD to understand - so I would read and reread and re reread shitloads of MArx - and then read companion books to explain it all to me so I could understand. Again - I had to read it (and it's of course really kool these days to be able to engage in discussions of Paris Manuscpipts 1844, On the Jewish Question, An Introduction to the Critique of Political Phiolsophy, etc etc etc and to actually be able to discuss them - well, if the texts are in front of me ... except for On the Jewish Question - a great title). But THIS BOOK - shite, it was a drag to read - like Marx. Again, the thickness of German was blamed - like Marx - but these days I dunno. I barely remember the book.
And it's funny. This lastw eek I got both dowen fromthe shelves - and they both looked greedily readable. Like Iw ant to marry each book. But I know I domnot want to marry either of those books. There's someone new.
And it's Andrew Gordon's The Rules of the Game: Jutland and British Naval Command from 1996. From the reviews, it's important and will teach me new things- or will al least slice my attention to things I've never pondered before (IS my hope). It's supposed tobe reading candy - canna put it doen once you sortie w/ it. And, it's something I'm pursuing- no chicago public Library has it, cheap online bookstore diddna have it - but I am getting it.
So cheap am I that it's hard to buy new things. So cheap. Esppecially since as I age and become less of a collector - I relaise that I do not have to own every book i read (Something about a library @ my house and ... I dunno). But to combat this cheapness, i told my sisters to give me Borders cards for xmas-bday whatever. I have $40 worth, and finally I am going to use them. I have to order it online, and it'll take 4-8 weeks to get off backorder - but order it I am. About $25 paperback w/ shipping included after a 25% discount online coupon is used. So I'm getting it.
So, 1986, 1995, and 1996. Oh, last book - the candy i read over the weekend - Is Jutland: Death in the Grey Wastes (2003). I'd gotten this book cheap a few years ago 2d lhand - and Immedialtely shelved it. When I started to write on Jutland last week, I got it down to look, feel, smell, touch it - and before long, iwas devouring it. The weekend. Compulsive. Ittaught me new things. It fired me for more reading on Jutland. And - it's a simple oral history. No chapters on why Jellicoe was right, or Beatty was right, or whatever - just the sailors (And,f rom time to time, Jellicoe and Scheer etc) telling their story. The book is outstanding.
So - a fire again on warships from world war one. Whn I should be concentrating on all the news tuff on Russia.
well, where ever the wind .... and now, the wiond blows over the North Sea. And no - I do not know anyhting obout Distant Victory, the 2006 book on jutland ... yet.
It was this review - unearthed while trolling for images of German battlecruisers - that really boiled me to bother about - yes, yet another tome on the fucking subject. Seems the last decade has actually unearthed @ least four works of varying degrees of importance on the subject. I've three under my belt. And then there is that fourth - The Rules of the Game.
I've written on this last week, but I really ran dry the Jutland material in the mid 1980's. It's when I discovered it in my life, and even though that rigorous scouring of all available and non available sources that I wa staught in Grad school wasn't in my house @ the time - but I was so rabid on the subject I bled the undergrad world dry of Jutland material back then.
So - the world moves on, fleet actions slip under thousand plane raids in my personal importance, and a decade has passed. But I was academic enough to realise that from 86-96 or so several things of importance came out. In 1986 - why didn't I read it then? - was when John Campbell's Jutland: An Analysis of the Fighting came out. This was the book that is basically a dry recitation of the battle damage inflicted during the battle. There are mini chapters -2 to 3 pages - which narrate the battle - and then 30 pages detailing the shells and the damage done. From this book I delelo[ed a fascination with the reflective abillities of heavy armour - and also discovered that this book is a fucking drag and a chore to read. Seriously - "this shell richocheted off of this deck and then hit ... " Oi. However, it had to be read.
V. E. Tarrant's Jutland: The German Perspective: A New View of the Great Battle. 31 May 1916 was released in 1995 - I got it in that bookstore near the Alimedia Theatre in Oakland - one Cali weekd I saw the book there, and then returning to the Bay Area a few months later (I was always like that - rememebr Vito and Rocky??) I returned and bought it. This book was important because it allowed non German readers to read a lot of revelent shit that hadn't been translated yet. or ever. And guess what- boring as hell. I used to have a bias against German translated into English. But then again, when I developed that idea, it was when I was in my Marx period. W/ Marx, it was so dense - and I just HAD to understand - so I would read and reread and re reread shitloads of MArx - and then read companion books to explain it all to me so I could understand. Again - I had to read it (and it's of course really kool these days to be able to engage in discussions of Paris Manuscpipts 1844, On the Jewish Question, An Introduction to the Critique of Political Phiolsophy, etc etc etc and to actually be able to discuss them - well, if the texts are in front of me ... except for On the Jewish Question - a great title). But THIS BOOK - shite, it was a drag to read - like Marx. Again, the thickness of German was blamed - like Marx - but these days I dunno. I barely remember the book.
And it's funny. This lastw eek I got both dowen fromthe shelves - and they both looked greedily readable. Like Iw ant to marry each book. But I know I domnot want to marry either of those books. There's someone new.
And it's Andrew Gordon's The Rules of the Game: Jutland and British Naval Command from 1996. From the reviews, it's important and will teach me new things- or will al least slice my attention to things I've never pondered before (IS my hope). It's supposed tobe reading candy - canna put it doen once you sortie w/ it. And, it's something I'm pursuing- no chicago public Library has it, cheap online bookstore diddna have it - but I am getting it.
So cheap am I that it's hard to buy new things. So cheap. Esppecially since as I age and become less of a collector - I relaise that I do not have to own every book i read (Something about a library @ my house and ... I dunno). But to combat this cheapness, i told my sisters to give me Borders cards for xmas-bday whatever. I have $40 worth, and finally I am going to use them. I have to order it online, and it'll take 4-8 weeks to get off backorder - but order it I am. About $25 paperback w/ shipping included after a 25% discount online coupon is used. So I'm getting it.
So, 1986, 1995, and 1996. Oh, last book - the candy i read over the weekend - Is Jutland: Death in the Grey Wastes (2003). I'd gotten this book cheap a few years ago 2d lhand - and Immedialtely shelved it. When I started to write on Jutland last week, I got it down to look, feel, smell, touch it - and before long, iwas devouring it. The weekend. Compulsive. Ittaught me new things. It fired me for more reading on Jutland. And - it's a simple oral history. No chapters on why Jellicoe was right, or Beatty was right, or whatever - just the sailors (And,f rom time to time, Jellicoe and Scheer etc) telling their story. The book is outstanding.
So - a fire again on warships from world war one. Whn I should be concentrating on all the news tuff on Russia.
well, where ever the wind .... and now, the wiond blows over the North Sea. And no - I do not know anyhting obout Distant Victory, the 2006 book on jutland ... yet.
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