Volume 25, Number 10 · June 15, 1978
The Party Isn't Over
By Garry Wills
The Parties: Republicans and Democrats in This Century
by Henry Fairlie
St. Martin's, 236 pp., $8.95
It is difficult for any man to look serious while prescribing for all Americans a Robert Taft bone-implant. And it does not help to permit a subsequent Taftectomy. Fairlie does not improve things when he divides his book into elephant and donkey sections. The symbols are flogged with relentless cuteness. In fact, animal similes turn the book into a mad little animal farm. When the Republicans are not elephants (usually with two broken tusks), they resemble dead fish afloat; their candidates are horses from Caligula's stable. Journalists are birds twigged with the lime of a phrase (he says this!). Roosevelt's cabinet was a team of horses marvelously driven. Readers in the Library of Congress are grazing deer. Dewey was the runt of a litter, none of which deserved survival—but Dewey least of all:
Review, 3876 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |