I had read Sullivan's Our Times, a 6-volume history of the U.S. from 1900-1925 that kept turning up in the footnotes of other books about the period. I disagreed with some of his views (particularly his decidedly 19th century views on racial issues), but he's a beautiful writer and the set contained many interesting stories.
This book, a personal memoir, I found absolutely fascinating. It's a window into a bygone America, where everyone knew each other and there were no radio, TV, telephone servi
I had read Sullivan's Our Times, a 6-volume history of the U.S. from 1900-1925 that kept turning up in the footnotes of other books about the period. I disagreed with some of his views (particularly his decidedly 19th century views on racial issues), but he's a beautiful writer and the set contained many interesting stories.
This book, a personal memoir, I found absolutely fascinating. It's a window into a bygone America, where everyone knew each other and there were no radio, TV, telephone service, or internet to distract. Where you knew which neighbor was passing your house by sound of the horse's footsteps. The book reveals as much about the society in which Sullivan lived as about his own life. He does, however, share some very poignant moments, especially about his parents.
I had the distinct impression that Sullivan didn't fully appreciate how unrepresenative his story was of the Irish Catholic experience in the U.S. of the 1890s. As a teenager Sullivan was hired by a local newspaper. In those days guests in a small-town hotel would all dine together and converse. One fine day a dinner companion, daughter of Ohio's governor, told Sullivan she would write her personal friend, the president of Harvard, to get him in. Soon Sullivan was on his way to Cambridge, at a time when few Americans attended college of any kind. That kind of thing didn't really happen to most first-generation Irish then, and it sure doesn't happen today. In this book and some of Sullivan's other writings, he shows little sympathy with those who had to fight for progress instead of having it fall into their laps, which I found unfortunate.
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