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Undaunted Courage : Meriwether Lewis Thomas Jefferson And The Opening Of The American West
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Undaunted Courage : Meriwether Lewis Thomas Jefferson And The Opening Of The American West description
A biography of Meriwether Lewis that relies heavily on the journals of both Lewis and Clark, this book is also backed up by the author's personal travels along Lewis and Clark's route to the Pacific. Ambrose is not content to simply chronicle the events of the "Corps of Discovery" as the explorers called their ventures. He often pauses to assess the military leadership of Lewis and Clark, how they negotiated with various native peoples and what they reported to Jefferson. Though the expedition failed to find Jefferson's hoped for water route to the Pacific, it fired interest among fur traders and other Americans, changing the face of the West forever. |
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Undaunted Courage : Meriwether Lewis Thomas Jefferson And The Opening Of The American West Customer Reviews
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♥♥♥♥♥ |
poor pop history
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READ DEVOTO'S EDIT OF THE JOURNALS INSTEAD! There is probably a link for it somewhere on your screen. Please get that instead, you will enjoy reading about the trip from Lewis more then from Ambrose.
I read DeVoto's edit of the journals first, and it was great. I could have read a thousand more pages, and I might, by getting a copy of the entire journals. The journals themselves give the best, most exciting, and clearest version of the trip. There really is no comparing the journals themselves to this second hand retelling. Please don't review this critique unless you have read both, because I bet you would agree with me.
It really upsets me that people like this book or think it has any value. It shows how limited peoples understanding of history is. It's completely worthless to Lewis and Clark historiography and is really poorly written. I had a difficult time finishing it. This is a book for people who don't have a history background and don't know any better, for people who read the current best selling fiction books and want to try some non-fiction. It is not for historians or people serious about learning about Lewis and Clark. Historians will read the complete journals and read the various articles about parts of the trip. Serious history fans with time constraints will read an edited version of journals. Unfortunately, most people read this cheap literature and love it.
There is, however, an important purpose to secondary accounts of the trip.
When reading the edited journals there will be questions that you want answered that DeVoto either did not put in or they were not yet researched at the time DeVoto edited the journals. Things like why people got sick, or background information about different tribes, ect. Things that the journsls do not themselves explain but that maybe a doctor or a historain could clear up.
An example is the loud noise heard by the party near the mountains. If my memory serves me correctly this is not explained in the Journals or Courage, however after reading a book about David Thompson, who was also in the area at this time, it seems likely that the sound was in fact frequent, intense avalanches. This is what Ambrose is supposed to tell, and in fact he did a respectable job of it. The problem is with the rest of the book.
'Courage' can be divided into three separate parts, though the parts switch back and forth frequently throughout the book.
(1)- the details, info, and unanswered questions that you can't get from the journals themselves but really want to know after reading the journals
(2)- a brief narrative of lewis's life and the trip
(3)- worthless speculation and opinion
(1) is what we are here for, and there is some good stuff here, but lets be honest, this isn't really Ambrose's work. He is building off the work of many other Lewis and Clark scholars, researches, doctors, ect. who have in numerous other works helped explain many of the events of the trip
(2) Ambrose isn't a great story teller. It's about as exciting and detailed as reading a wikipedia entry. To be fair, I read it right after the journals, so it's hard to compete with the people who actually did it.
(3) I'm not sure why Ambrose would periodically end a chapter or whatever with some worthless hypo about would could of happened if this and this Indian killed Lewis or he fell of this mountain, or whatever. His random speculations about possible out comes or opinions about behavior sound more like a high school teacher, a tour guide, or a jr. history enthusiast, than a historian.
And while I'm at it, what kind of book is this anyway? A history, a biography? I'm not sure Ambrose had decided himself, just look at his long apologia at the beginning. He knew what he was writing didn't really fit into Lewis and Clark scholarship. He was in two minds when he wrote this book. Half of him wanted to tell the story of the trip to his kids around the camp fire, the other half wanted to narrate the life of Lewis. Both came off half cocked.
So, 1/3 of the book is good stuff, 1/3 is ok, and 1/3 is worthless.
3/3 of the journals are priceless.
Someone needs to take the info that we all wonder about when we read the DeVoto's journals and put it in foot notes of a re'edited version. When that happens Ambroses book will be 3/3 worthless. This is POP HISTORY and it sucks. Read the Journals.
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