"To compensate a little for the treachery and weakness of my memory, so extreme that it has happened to me more than once to pick up again, as recent and unknown to me, books which I had read carefully a few years before . . . I have adopted the habit for some time now of adding at the end of each book . . . the time I finished reading it and the judgment I have derived of it as a whole, so that this may represent to me at least the sense and general idea I had conceived of the author in reading it." (Montaigne, Book II, Essay 10 (publ. 1580))

Monday, March 30, 2015

Falling Upwards - How We Took to the Air (Richard Holmes, 2013)

Kind of disappointing - the subject matter just isn't interesting enough to me to support all of the detail.  The author runs through the history of ballooning.

I was optimistic because of how interesting and useful I found this work by the same author.  Plenty of similarities in time period and subject matter.  But the earlier book covered a wider range of topics - this book didn't benefit from tighter focus.

The first balloon passengers were pretty amazed at how the world looked from overhead - that's cool because it's rather hard to imagine these days.

Early efforts to use balloons in war - including U.S. Civil War - not terribly effective.

Something I hadn't realized:  balloonists played a key role in maintaining communications between Paris and the rest of France during the German siege of 1871.  Not that it helped France a whole lot. (Victor Hugo heavily involved at this time - he returned from his "exile" once Napoleon III was out of power.)

Author wraps up with a tale of folks seeking to use a balloon to reach the North Pole.  Touching story, good finale to this era.
Posted by at
Labels:

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)