Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Diament, Sean M.

Titel

The Pragmatic Idealist: An Exposition and Review of Alan Cranston – Senator from California: Making a “Dent in the World” by Judith Robinson, Telegraph Hill Press, 2012

Ist Teil von

• California journal of politics and policy, 2013-10, Vol.5 (4), p.755-767

Ort / Verlag

De Gruyter

Erscheinungsjahr

2013

Quelle

Worldwide Political Science Abstracts

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Alan Cranston, former Senator from California, achieved so much in his life that an equally prodigious biography is required to present his story to the world. In , historian Judith Robinson seizes the opportunity to write an incredibly detailed, thoughtful memoir about a person who lived through, and participated in, some of the most important events of the twentieth century. The purpose of this book review is to highlight the key components of Robinson’s exhaustive biography, which in doing so, will explicate the themes, characters, and key events that compose the story of Cranston’s life. This takes shape by engaging the book as it chronicles Cranston’s life from his creative adolescence, to his early adulthood exploring much of the world as a foreign correspondent, and finally, his over half-century as a key figure in California politics. By utilizing Cranston’s personal papers, letters to friends and colleagues, interviews with key figures in his life, and media coverage of important historical and political events, the review will demonstrate Robinson’s dedication to telling the story of Alan Cranston in rich detail, with many revelatory anecdotes to pique the reader’s interest. Taken as a whole, the biography is an essential read in explaining the significance of Cranston’s life in the larger context of political and social change in California, national legislative and electoral politics during the Cold War, and the work to build closer bonds between the political entities that represent the people of the world.