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Jack Kennedy: Elusive Hero (2011)

by Chris Matthews(Favorite Author)

4.01 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

1451635087 (ISBN13: 9781451635089)

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Simon & Schuster

review 1: simply wonderful and not at all, what I had thought when I began to read...Chris M does a masterful job of getting "to the inner side" of Jack Kennedy, whom despite so much having been written about him, truly brings the reader I think into the inner space of JFK like no other book has doneI think its among the best books about him and his character and his life, as told mainly thru the eyes of those so close to him all of his life, especially those in the adult political world of his but also, those critical formative years, His insights are invaluable into the mindset of the young JFK at his boarding school up thru his time in Europe as a young socialite and student traveling there w/ his father the Ambassadorand then, his serious illnesses and the battles of his own w... moreillingness to want to enter into the life of politics and the ambition to want to seek to become president, at a very young ageits a truly wonderful, touching and yet serious history of the story of JFK's masterful life, his seriously beautiful Irish friends and inner circle and the sad but yet understanding Jackie as the dutiful knowing young but intellectually gifted wife who herself, touched so many with her own grace and charm and beauty and how she handled Dallasthe book in its climax presents and if I may, retores....Jack Kennedy, to his rightful place in history...not just American political history...but world historythe focus is on how JFK given his personal development and his own "becoming a man" ...from his years in the navy the war hero who truly did save his men's lives.....transformed him into the hero for humanity itself, even the Russian peoples, themselves...who undboutedly...and the millions of others who would have perished...in a nuclear exchange "within ten minutes"...if any other kind of human being or leader at that time, had been seated where he was..especially given the fact that every single advisor and major war general and cabinent official was pushing him to launch and to take "it to cuba"....he hestitated...and he didn't do this out of weakness or fearbut because...everything that he had been thru, from his early days in Choate, his serious illnesses and his long suffering with much pain and his own intellectual understanding of history and his negative experience in the bay of pigs, at the outset of his administration...all of this..and more....he made the decision to utilize "the other path", the none military option....diplomacy instead of outright first strike capabilities that the US had at the time and he was being advised by everyone good and bad around him except his brother....to do at the extreme hour...that the world was in JFK is a testament to a true hero out of time, larger than life...but somehow, Chris Mathews pulls off the improbable making this legend, the elusive historical figureseem....like the truest older brother, the best friend, ...one never had, or always wanted and had longed forclearly, he convinced me, JFK was, excepting FDR, was handsdown, the greatest single president and hero president, a genuine individual, flawed in some respects as a husband, but yet very independent, a man's man, who from his earliest days, was forced in this life, to playing with constant painbut nonetheless, moulded himself and by circumstances, well beyond the rich kid of joe kennedyto become, a truly great, if not singularly greatest modern era US and worldwide leader...and doing so, in a thousand days...
review 2: I really sped through this, and enjoyed it immensely. It was an interesting perspective, and I think, justifies the intense interest in the Kennedys. It paints Jack Kennedy as a man, someone who liked practical jokes, and for all his personal flaws, was a brilliant and tactful politician. But what really sealed the deal for me was the end of the book. Chris Matthews had access to many of Kennedy's close friends. He recounts the interview with Life Magazine Jackie Kennedy gave about a week after his death as part of an attempt to carefully craft his legacy, even at such an early stage. What I really connected with, however, was the question he asked Kennedy's close friends and colleagues: what was Jack Kennedy like. The answer that struck me most was "he was the agony and the ecstasy." It's just an incredibly interesting way to describe a person, and gives the impression that, even when he was alive, those in his presence and inner circle understood the intensity and importance of the man. I don't know - I just really liked the book. less

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