I started listening to this audiobook on the drive to and from the St. Louis area in October and finished it up last weekend on a trip to Poplar Bluff. It’s read by Arte Johnson, whose name I recognized. He was that guy on that one comedy sketch show you played a Nazi. You know, when you could laugh at Nazis instead of think they were the worst thing to compare your contemporary foibles to. No, not the “I saw nothing!” Nazi. The “Very Interesting” Nazi from Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In:
I guess it was only twenty-five years later that he was vocal talent for audio books. Speaking of which, these cassettes are now almost 30 years old, and they still sound pretty good. I guess audio books and the like didn’t get played as often as popular music tapes did.
At any rate, the book is a snarky look at “myths” of history which are really only myths to people who get their history from popular culture. Well, the popular culture of the 1990s. The 21st century study of history, at least the teaching of it to children and the professional class of it (or the journalists who pretend to be the purveyors of knowledge), has its own newer myths and greater ignorance.
I mean, we have chapters on Ancient Rome, the Barbarians, the Crusades, British Royalty and its traditions, and a whole section on sex, amongst other things, and all of the snark is couched upon setting up some myth/lie/legend of history and knocking it down. So maybe it’s a good intro to some of these things, or maybe it’s best for the snooty who know these things and want to be along for the ride as Shenkman voiced by Johnson knocks down something the igno’ant believe.
I guess I got more into it on the last couple of cassettes (this book is on four with a running time of about 6 hours), as I was less annoyed on the trip to Poplar Bluff, but still not my favorite bit of history reading. You definitely get more depth out of an American Scholar or Teaching Company/Great Courses series, even the surveyish ones, which are six hours better spent. But if you can find this set for a buck or fifty cents or whatever I paid for this, I guess it’s worth it.
