Memoir

** Press president, buried by press ** This biography makes you root for Harding as a person more than most presidents. The author’s core project—rehabilitating a reputation long distorted by headlines rather than historians—largely works. It helps that the scandals that came to define him erupted after his death and never actually involved him. Yet for a century the narrative stuck, a reminder that journalism can outshine history, whether for good or ill. ...

** Topspin and Emotional Spin ** Even for tennis prodigies, the odds of making it are astronomically low—maybe one in ten thousand. Both Agassi and Sampras beat those odds, and yet, neither grapples with the unknowable question: What if they hadn’t? What if they had just been great athletes who never made it? That alternate life—the life of the 9,999—remains outside their scope, and perhaps understandably so. Agassi’s Open, ghostwritten with J.R. Moehringer, is an emotionally raw, stylistically intense book. At times, it feels over-seasoned—but perhaps that’s fitting. This is a man denied a childhood, trying to find his identity in the rearview mirror. His tennis-obsessed father’s upbringing was essentially child abuse, a relentless regime of pressure and forced training that left little room for self-determination. The emotional flavor is heavy because his life was. Open is less a sports memoir than an exorcism of trauma. It’s as though Agassi is still looking for himself, and hoping the writing process can help. ...

This isn’t Robert Caro, but it’s still pretty good. Truman is probably the most relatable president I’ve read about. And as we enter into the twilight of Pax Americana, it’s poignant to read about the person who laid the cornerstones of it.

Johnson is the villain, Stevenson is the hero, and it’s not a happy ending.

This is Game of Thrones for biographies, glad there are 3 more left.

** 81st, 82nd books of 2020: Work = Success** China does well with standard education. In the 2018 PISA results, China Singapore, Macao, and Hong Kong scored 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th respectively. (Link (https://www.oecd.org/pisa/PISA-results_ENGLISH.png)) In the US, Asian Americans are sufficiently overrepresented in academic pursuits such that it has become a meme in American culture. One way to describe this difference is in how we get kids to do the things they don’t want to do. In Little Soldiers, Lenora Chu is unable to get her son Rainey to eat eggs. She is astonished to discover that her Chinese preschool teachers had succeeded but horrified to learn how they did it. Every time Rainey spat out the eggs, the teachers would put eggs back in, until eventually Rainy gave up and swallowed. To our American author this was terrible: force-feeding akin to what would be found in Guantanamo. To a Chinese preschool teacher, it was standard discipline - eggs are a good source of protein and Rainy needed protein to focus during the day. ...

** 44th, 47th, 51st books of 2020: Roosevelt Trilogy: The most interesting American ** Theodore Roosevelt wasn’t supposed to be president. Coming from a wealthy family, he was nearly on track to become a naturalist. Living in a world of books, he devoured literature, “reading some twenty thousand books and writing fifteen of his own”. But since he suffered from asthma while growing up, doctors advised ‘avoiding strenuous exercise.’ “Doctor,” came the reply, “I’m going to do all the things you tell me not to do. If I’ve got to live the sort of life you have described, I don’t care how short it is.” ...

** 44th, 47th, 51st books of 2020: Roosevelt Trilogy: The most interesting American ** Theodore Roosevelt wasn’t supposed to be president. Coming from a wealthy family, he was nearly on track to become a naturalist. Living in a world of books, he devoured literature, “reading some twenty thousand books and writing fifteen of his own”. But since he suffered from asthma while growing up, doctors advised ‘avoiding strenuous exercise.’ “Doctor,” came the reply, “I’m going to do all the things you tell me not to do. If I’ve got to live the sort of life you have described, I don’t care how short it is.” ...

At first I thought it was a bit pretentious, but by the end I felt that Kalanithi got to the non-fiction equivalent of the hero’s journey. Death is the inevitable conclusion to all our lives, and our journey to the end is something worth contemplation. A great book to read along with Atul Gawande’s ‘Being Mortal’. Short and powerful, highly recommended.