OYENTE

neilium

  • 5
  • opiniones
  • 31
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  • 15
  • calificaciones

Dense, difficult subject presented well

Total
5 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
5 out of 5 stars
Historia
5 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 01-26-15

Any additional comments?

This was the most difficult Great Courses lecture series I've encountered yet. I gave the entire course a second listen and listened for a third or fourth time to several of the later lectures. After all that, I'd at best get a C if I had to take a test.

This is not to say that Professor Kasser does a poor job. He actually does a pretty stunning job of shining a light for the uninitiated on a very deep and fascinating subject. Seriously, it's quite an undertaking. I thoroughly enjoyed it and was surprised and entertained by the breadth of scope.

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great subject, overwrought prose, terrible reading

Total
3 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
2 out of 5 stars
Historia
4 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 11-24-14

Any additional comments?

The subject is fascinating and worth exploring. The modern world is a continuing echo of the Enlightenment, and the despotic leaders profiled in this book are of no small importance to any student of history. That said, the writing style is overwrought and too clever by half. The narrator's performance is a bizarre attempt at goofball entertainment, with a cheeseball "voice of God" reverb used in place of quotes. The overall effect is embarrassing.

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esto le resultó útil a 4 personas

Outstanding lectures on a challenging topic

Total
5 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
5 out of 5 stars
Historia
5 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 11-24-14

What does Professor Patrick Grim bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Patrick Grim doe a very good job of making these very complex ideas palpable to the non-scientist and non-philosopher. He sounds a little like John Lithgow (not a complaint, just an observation.)

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esto le resultó útil a 6 personas

Predictable corporate humor for the witless

Total
3 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
3 out of 5 stars
Historia
2 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 01-20-14

Any additional comments?

What could be a really important and interesting topic, that the Roman Empire was a multi-continent moneymaking venture and the first of its kind, is instead a slog through cheap jokes and lame pop culture references.

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esto le resultó útil a 1 persona

The tone grows wearisome after a few chapters

Total
4 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
2 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 04-24-13

Any additional comments?

Any book on the subject of the Eastern Front of WWII is welcome. It's a part of WWII that for my generation (graduated college during the Cold War) was mostly ignored in history class. Yet it was the largest and deadliest theater of the war. However, Mosier's tone and pet phrases such as "You would think...but you'd be wrong", "Contrary to conventional wisdom..." gets more and more grating with each chapter.

Despite his insistence that he is speaking the truth against the official accepted history, much of his view of the Eastern Front is not unique or shocking. His scrutiny of evidence from the belligerents is biased to support his thesis (that the Germans were much closer to victory in the East, and that it was the Allied offensive in the West that compelled Germany to retreat in the East to better defend the West). Official Soviet numbers (from casualties to weapons production et al) are laboriously explained away as propaganda, but rarely is the same level of examination given to Nazi numbers. In fact, to support his contrarian view that German troops were not demoralized during their retreat Mosier refers to photos of happy German soldiers from that period. He insists without proof that they were candid and not staged, and somehow a handful of photos is a clear indicator of overall sangfroid up and down the German lines as they marched backwards through Poland.

Overall, I can't recommend this book. However, I will give Mosier credit for his insights at the end of Deathride. No single book could sum up what a tragedy the War was for the people of Eastern Europe, but Mosier's overview of the staggering human costs can be felt as it is read. His summary of the post-war consequences of Stalin is apt and thoughtful, too. The Soviet Union never recovered from the incalculable death and damage or the War, and Stalin's incompetence and ruinous policies that beat the Nazis led to the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union.

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esto le resultó útil a 9 personas

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