Truman

Yes, it has been a while since I’ve posted a book review. There are several reasons for this: We now have an 11-month-old running (literally) around the house; Karla bought me the hardbound edition of the complete collection of The Far Side, and I entertained myself going through it page by page; and Truman has to be the most densely written book I’ve read since I left school. It’s only 1000 pages, but it felt about twice that long, spanning 84 years and featuring a Tolstoy-sized cast of American and European politicians and notables.

The only other book I’ve read by McCullough was 1776, and I think it took me about three days. In comparison, I turned the first page of this book last January, and I read about thirty pages a week until I was finished. The story is compelling, and certainly had its hooks in me for four months or I would have simply set it aside. What made it such a challenge to finish was the sheer breadth of the story. In my opinion, it should really have been written as three volumes, covering the periods prior to, during, and after World War II, and had much better pacing and flow. Had this been the case I would have been tempted to simply read the middle volume, clearly the most momentous and captivating part of the story. Nevertheless, I would have missed out on some interesting material about Truman’s earlier life, including his decorated military career. I was also drawn to his struggles to follow his moral compass during years of the machine and cronyism that dominated Missouri politics for decades.

Yet it is the WWII period that was, as predicted, the most fascinating part of the story. A handwritten note authorizing the nuclear actions against Hiroshima and Nagasaki is included among the several photos. The portrayal of Truman, having been willfully kept in the dark by a resentful Roosevelt, assuming command so effectively in such a short period, was inspiring. The story of how Truman so unexpectedly charmed Churchill and the British delegation at Potsdam (as he did so many other national and world figures throughout his life) was delightful. McCullough’s account was at its best when it portrayed how Truman’s Midwestern practicalities were key to his success in a variety of endeavors, not the handicap they were widely perceived to be. Truman was consistently underestimated and underappreciated throughout his career, but that did not stop him from accomplishing some truly amazing things.

The account bogged down a bit when it came to Truman’s presidential campaign, second term, and Korea. The “whistle stop” campaign was remarkable as the last great political effort before the dawn of television-centric politics, but it hardly deserved a treatment encompassing 15% of the entire biography. Korea of course was far more significant, and could not be recounted briefly while still doing Truman justice. Since I was born over two decades after the war ended, the whole picture, political and military, was a revelation to me, yet I found familiar echoes in press and personal accounts of “our boys dying for a foreign war” and accounts of military ineptitude being loudly proclaimed by Congress (1952, meet 2007). I think it would profitable for politicians on both sides of the aisle today to review the circumstances of Korea and the way in which the Truman and Eisenhower administrations dealt with the crisis.

Overall, Truman is a compelling portrait of one of America’s most remarkable presidents. Certainly the quality of a biography is dictated by the source material, and McCullough’s treatment does Mr Truman justice. In the future, however, I’ll be more aware of what I’m getting into when I pick up a 1000-page biography.