Nicholas ShradyReseñas

from the Things bookbox; I had no idea that this landmark was a bell tower and part of a cathedral complex in Pisa, nor the history of Pisa. This book outlines how the tower came to be, and how well meaning preservationists (and a war) almost destroyed it.

Heading back out in the latest round of the things bookbox.

The book is actually shaped like a parallelogram, so it tilts. The story of the Tower, started in 1173, but which began leaning even before it was finished in 1370, and the 16 + commissions that were formed to investigate the cause and attempt to fix it.

This is a most interesting book, and I have to say hats off to Nicholas in making all these journeys. His writing is undramatic, and this makes some of the adventures even more dramatic.

The conversations that he has had with people ring true, and allow us to pierce through the hollowness of much modern worship.

Our God, we cry. Yet, we need to find God within.

Excellent travels through the holy lands of many religions - Christianity, Islam, the Jews, Buddhists, Hindus and the Sufis. Ultimately, we find our own truth

Nicholas Shrady has woven together a fascinating little tale of the famous Leaning Tower of Pisa; from its inception as monument to the Pisan city-state’s military and trading might in the 12th century through to its near collapse and belated rescue in the 21st century. An enthralling read.½

I started reading this short monograph on the history of the Tower of Pisa by Nicholas Shrady as a preparation for my Grand Tour of eight weeks across the European continent, of which two weeks in Italy, where I visited Venice, Florence, Pisa and Rome.

Tilt. A skewed history of the Tower of Pisa is a very nice,small book, which excellently served its purpose in giving me a lot of background to the history of Pisa and many interesting facts and anecdotes about the tower. I agree with other reviewers that, as the tower is skewed, so is the book, leaning heavily to giving more information about the late Middle Ages and Renaissance, while almost neglecting, or glossing over recent history.

Unfortunately, I did not finish reading the book before my trip, and did not bring it along. As a result, I missed Chapter 7 describing the Pisa Circle of poets and artists such as Shelley, Byron and Leigh Hunt, whose traces I would have looked for had I known.

Entertaining architectural/technological/cultural history along the lines of Longitude. A lot of fun to read, especially understanding the context and motivations in the early section, helping explain the genesis and significance of the tower. The characters really came alive for me, a real credit to the author.

I do wish the last century got more of the kind of energetic coverage that the author invested in the tower's first century. When we finally arrive at the last chapter in which the tower is stabilized for the next several centuries, I don't meet the characters, understand their motivations, or even get much depth of understanding of the solution.

It's early morning, and you are heading to church. Once there, a massive earthquake strikes. You rush outside to see buildings start to collapse due to a second tremor just minutes later. Within an hour, parts of the city are ablaze, which does nothing to quell the panic. You rush to the river, hoping to flee the city in a boat. But several huge waves come rushing down the riverbed. It sounds like a plot for a summer blockbuster, but this "perfect storm" really did strike Lisbon in 1755. Two recent books cover the history of the event: Wrath of God by Edward Paice, and The Last Day, by Nicholas Shrady.

The Last Day starts out in media res, putting the reader in the churches of the somewhat devout Portuguese city minutes before the earthquake. Shrady then gives some of the history of Portugal, especially concentrating on the Catholic influence and the Brazilian importation of gold and slaves. The book bounces back and forth through history as Shrady takes a topic and gives its history, which made it feel like some parts were repetitive. Shrady's main focus through the last half of the book is the Marques de Pombal (Sebastiao Jose de Carvalho e Melo), a man who positioned himself well in the rebuilding of Lisbon (and, in essence, the entire country).

Wrath of God follows a more chronological structure, giving the history of Lisbon for the first seventy pages (one irritating point: the author uses many Portuguese words without always giving definitions). When the earthquake finally happens, Paice has established a number of characters which he follows throughout the middle third of the book. While this sometimes seems to jumble their stories, it really shows the confusion and terror that must have occurred during this disaster. The end of the book does discuss the rebuilding process, plus it gives a longer philosophical discussion starring Voltaire, who wrote two commentaries on the earthquake.

With his important part in the rebuilding of Lisbon, the Marques de Pombal plays a large role in both books. He's generally portrayed with all his faults: he's certainly a man of action who seems to have wanted to revitalize his country, but he's not above petty politics, likely fabricating plots to have his detractors exiled or killed. The Last Day offered a slightly more positive story, noting other areas of Pombal's interest (his ideas for educational reform, for example).

Because both books work from the same primary sources, there's a lot of repetition between the books. Even so, they both tell slightly different stories. The Last Day was a quicker read, which told the story of the disaster and its aftermath. Wrath of God was a bit more academic, noting the struggle of the Church and philosophers to explain why such a religious country would be punished by God in this way. While both titles offer extensive footnotes and bibliographies, I'd recommend The Last Day if you're just interested in the history of the great earthquake, but read Wrath of God if you're doing research in history or earth science.½

Nicholas Shrady has attempted an heroic task: authentic pilgrimage to some of the world's most revered sites of religious worship--authentic to himself (and his own inner questioning), heedful to the customs and spirit of the destinations themselves, and true to the disorder of postmodern life. In his accounting of these journeys, he has woven contemporary concerns with sacred history, providing a living context for understanding Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism, and Sufism. I only wished that he lingered longer at pivotal points, allowing himself to be touched more deeply and the reader to more fully appreciate, through him, the significance of moments of tribulation, generosity, or revelation before moving on to the next chain of mundanities that link all such stations on life's path. At its best, "Sacred Roads" is a tale of adventure and an introduction to world religions and, at its dullest, a cooly removed reporting of a string of facts, which leave the reader as spiritually lost as the writer seems to be. It offers glimpses into the drive of the human spirit and an unromanticized depiction of the sometimes unseemliness of human nature and serves as an important addition to any collection of pilgrimage literature, if only to show, by omission, that humility, longing, and imagination are necessary to transform wandering into pilgrimage.½

Pilgrims and pilgrimages/Shrady, Nicholas > Journeys