THE PARABLE OF THE TRIBES is an awesome achievement that will completely restore your faith in human nature. The book presents a stunning theory of social evolution every bit as revolutionary as Einstein's theory of general relativity or Darwin's theory of natural selection. Like those two previous theories, the PARABLE represents a paradigm-shift in thinking. (My jaw hung open the whole time I was reading.) The book provides a path beyond guilt, shame, and hostility toward love, compassion, and wholeness within the human condition. Ranging over the subjects of psychology, anthropology, religion, and sociology, the book's implications could not be more sweeping and profound. It presents a breathtaking critique of civilization that shows us how humankind is more the victim and less the instigator of history's violence and oppression. It disproves the erroneous commonsense view that civilization is merely human nature and human choice writ large. It leads us to understand fully our predicament so that we might solve our problems intelligently. For a couple million years, humanity lived within a fairly circumscribed biological niche. Culture evolved slowly and was in step with biological evolution. Suddenly with the agricultural revolution 10,000 years ago, social evolution began to outstrip biological evolution. In an unprecedented way, our genetic inheritance came to be out of joint with our environment. Schmookler's book shows that with the advent of large-scale agriculture, suddenly anarchy came to characterize the inter-societal system. Societies began to compete using the vast new possibilities offered by civilization. A process of selection began, continuing to this day, which favored the ways of power--a process that is utterly indifferent to natural human needs. Ways of being that had been inherently more humane and more sustainable were slowly but surely swept away in favor of cultures and societies wielding ever greater power. Schmookler reveals how Power is a contagion that leaves destruction, despoliation, and misery in its wake. The book also presents possible solutions to this problem of power. The PARABLE will definitely be one of the greatest, most liberating books you'll ever read.

If I were to list the top ten books of the century, this book would be one of them. Why? Because it dares to answer a question that few others have attempted, a question that is fundamental and vital to our future. It is the question: "What determines the direction in which civilization evolves?" Or, "What explains the overall thrust of history?" Or, "Are we shaping our own destiny, and if not, what is?" Not only does Schmookler dare to address the question, but the answer he comes up with is equal to the dimensions of the task.

If you think that the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is adequate for explaining the history of civilization, this book is not for you. If you think that everything is made crystal clear by the Marxian analysis of the "material conditions" of life, this book is not for you. If you believe that spirit-beings elsewhere in the universe are guiding us toward some wonderful end, this book is not for you. But if you think big, and are ready for a magnificent, breathtaking, and sobering view of humanity's course, based on best-science research into prehistory and panoramic interdisciplinary insights, you will come to cherish this book. I, for one, am glad that it has a poetic title, The Parable of the Tribes, and not just an academic title such as its subtitle, The Problem of Power in Social Evolution, because the sweep of the book includes but encompasses more than straight intellectual analysis. It tells the human story, our story, with all the poignant, tragic, and hopeful implications.

The stroke of genius that powers this book is Schmookler's insight into the broader applicability of Darwin's categories of "diversity" and "selection." In effect, Schmookler has shown that these are categories from the discipline of logic. Darwin's genius was to take these purely logical categories and show how they could be applied to, and did apply to, the natural world, resulting in biological evolution. Schmookler's genius is to free these categories from their usual ties with biology, and to show us how they have operated in human history as the fundamental underlying forces shaping our destiny, for good or ill.

Just one of the many themes in this book is that there is a commonsense view that human creativity is what accounts for the diversity in variations of forms of civilization, and that human choice accounts for which of these variations get selected. Hence the idea of simple progress. But we live in a disenchanted era that knows better. Schmookler reminds us that "For a story of improvement, the history of civilization makes rather dismal reading, and as the culmination of ten thousand years of progress the twentieth century is deeply disappointing." (p. 7) Similarly, the "invisible hand" of the free market, where human choice is supposed to reign sovereign, has led to only pockets of prosperity in the world (granted that some are big pockets), and even that prosperity is itself rent with stress. What is it that is systematically distorting our cultures, our civilizations, in directions that we are not deliberately choosing? If we don't gain comprehension of it, how can we ever alter it toward selection of more humane, more intelligent, more loving, more fun variations?

The "parable" is that once some human tribe becomes habitually aggressive toward other tribes, all others are eventually forced to adopt the "ways of power." "Eventually" can mean a long time, but the systematic distortion is there. The ways of power seep into every aspect of human life, from relations between men and women to harsh upbringing of children to weapons development to forms of economic exchange. It is part of the wondrousness of this book to make your way through section after section, discovering how yet another broad area of human life is illuminated by the quiet or not-so-quiet struggle for power.

In the end, it is a noble vision that is offered by The Parable of the Tribes. It simultaneously engenders compassion for the human race (trapped in the struggle for power), and clears away the confusion and the obfuscation that is part of the problem. The ability to see the human race in its last ten-thousand-year development has only recently become possible, and Schmookler has made it actual. His book gives me hope that we humans can understand our own long history and begin to shape our own destiny for good.

Parable of the Tribes

Gripping in its fascinating subject matter, Andrew Bard Schmookler's The Parable of the Tribes flows with the elegance of language rarely seen in writing today. This important work highlights the essence of human existence, that which makes the complicated and messy business of civilization work: Power. The evolution of biological systems discounts the idea that organisms are slowly giving way to more perfect descendents, and the same holds true for civilization. Civilization doesn't get "better," it gets "different" depending on the interface between power and the environment. Like the blood coursing through our bodies, power flows through each and every one of us, an invisible force between minds and souls. Tapped into this power, each man, woman and child since the beginning of human existence has contributed its share to the super-organism called civilization. Power drives the vast majority of our individual decision-making process. Individual freedom in the true sense of the concept never existed in the first place. We, it turns out, are less in control of our destinies than once thought. It is the constantly changing invisible nexus of power that determines how, when and why we respond the way we do to the world around us. It is important to know that power is a child of the merging of many intellects, and not some brutish club wielded against the weak, as is so often described in texts on politics and war. It is a unified human force that can be described on a relative scale of both good and bad, with shades in between. I can honestly say that few pieces of literature have moved me in a profoundly thought-provoking way like this work. After reading The Parable of the Tribes, human events both tragic and beautiful that characterize our civilization suddenly make sense. One begins to understand why and how wars are fought and peace is forged. The beauty of this work is that it describes in wonderful detail the bond we share with each other, that we are literally linked together to form a single, very impressive experience called civilization. Leaders would do well to read this book, and learn the true ways of power. Many believe that power is a thing sprouting from the few, and that some, indeed most do not have this supposed talent. The reality is that power is in all of us, like the current pulsing through our nerves, its dendritic connectors tapped into our fellows around us. Scmookler, it must be said, does not believe even remotely that we are puppets floating about in a river of power, forever subject to its unknowable flow. Schmookler's point is that while we may make decisions based on what we believe is best, it is power, manifesting itself in the millions of human interactions which occur every millisecond, that long ago set events in motion forcing you to make a decision in the first place. We, one realizes, are the power.

should be required reading for all parents-to-be!

This is my fourth book by Miller, having recently finished 'For Your Own Good' and 'Thou Shalt Not Be Aware.' Those works were hard hitting and unrelenting ('ferocious' said one reviewer) and for me that was what made them so effective. I found 'Paths of Life' to be weak reading at times, and if I had not read Miller's earlier more strident work, I don't know if I could have appreciated what she was trying to do here, with models of healing built from the realizations of our past injuries. I truly love Miller's message, as painful as it is at times to me personally, and I believe time will show her to be a prophet. Just the same, this book does not convey her message the most effectively and I don't recommend it as a starting point for her ideas.

So, why did I give it 5 stars? The closing chapter of the book, 'What is Hatred' is one of the most powerful and coherent looks yet at what happened in Nazi Germany. Miller recognizes the value of works like Goldhagen's, while pointing out how he too misses the mysterious question of why did the holocaust happen, why then, and why Germany? Miller's buring insight into this, the greatest mystery of our century, is worth the price of this book alone. She offers some explanation of the unexplainable. I could not put the book down during this closing essay. Highly recommended.

Paths of Life: Seven Scenarios, Alice Miller, Pantheon Book, New York, 1998

Paths of Life: Seven Scenarios is Alice Miller's optimistic project about human interactions and their potential for healing. This new book is the first in seven years, and the eighth overall, by the former psychoanalyst and author of an unbroken string of classics. The seven scenarios consist of seven chapters of imaginary encounters between mature adults, and illustrate honest communications based on new awareness. The characters describe their lives--their environments, their successes and failures--and how they came to terms with them. Also included are expert opinions on parenting, psychotherapy, gurus and cult leaders, and the nature of hatred.

Dr. Miller's seven scenarios are about handling life and changing things for the better, and are intended to inform people and to encourage them to think. These imaginative encounters illustrate ways in which tackling sensitive interpersonal issues directly can clear the air and bring a feeling of liberation for both sides--and sometimes make the unexpected happen. Miller freely admits that this latest project arose from a wish to spare others what she herself has suffered, and reflects her old yearning for a genuine form of communication. Her intention is to explore how early experiences of suffering and love affect people's later lives, and the ways they relate to others; her hope is that this material will serve as a stimulus for organized inquiry. Embedded in the text are many timely teachings, reflecting her notion that "information is everything" (p. 35)--that information, at the right time, can set off a valuable process of reflection.

Should adult-children forgive their parents for maltreatment during childhood? As mature adults we can feel our pain and thereby increase authentic understanding--of ourselves, of our parents, and of the complexities of life. Feeling and understanding, argues Miller, differ markedly from blaming and forgiveness. We need to take full responsibility in our relationships, including those with our parents. As adults, we are autonomous. No longer are there any real dangers in confronting one's parents. The "gift of truth" can sometimes, though not always, change things for the better.

Concerning the primal therapies, Miller displays an informed and cautious optimism. She rightfully condemns those charlatans who would claim complete cure via regression, and their "theories" which--despite their scientific facade-- have absolutely nothing to do with science (p. 147). The goal of genuine therapy is, quite simply, the liberation of individual patients from their suffering. Resolving one's childhood issues is essential. Old patterns need to be properly worked through in a safe and reliable relationship, in the presence of someone who is genuinely sympathetic and willing to listen. It is entirely unacceptable for therapists to blame patients, or to create destructive dependencies.

There are positive aspects of the primal approach which can be salvaged, argues Miller, once it is acknowledged that primal therapy has distinct limitations and that it can have negative effects. Fortunately, primal therapists have increasingly moved away from the "initial absolutism." Many have jettisoned both the Intensive and the darkened office, having discovered better methods to enable their patients to feel (pp. 147-8). The original primal techniques are increasingly combined with those of other approaches. Still, there is a need to revise old concepts in light of these new techniques. And finally, there are grave dangers when the power of the primal approach is used to manipulate and exploit, as has been demonstrated all too often by unscrupulous "therapists," gurus and cults leaders.

As in all her books, Dr. Miller again demonstrates how the violence done to children devolves back on society as a whole (p. 155). Children who are beaten, for example, become emotional time bombs (p. 169). Still, child-victims can almost always develop trust if they are shown an understanding environment, and if the harm is identified as such, not disavowed or played down. Such children benefit from a "helping witness" who extends honesty, affection and love (if not protection); or a "knowing witness" who actively helps one to become conscious of their maltreatment and to articulate their sorrow (pp. 155-6). In some cases, a confrontation with the past is unavoidable in order to change things for the better (p. 178). Remember--it is the denial of our sufferings that is the breeding ground for hatred, an act of self-deception and an impasse that is deflected onto innocent victims (p. 186); the only factor separating rescuers and persecutors is the quality of parental nurture (p. 174). But here again is cause for optimism. We live in an age where far more people than ever before are growing up free of physical abuse, and these people can help to counteract the tradition of destructive violence that has plagued us for thousands of years (p. 186).

In this, her most recent work, Alice Miller states that she has grown more tolerant and patient as she's aged; that she no longer feels alone in what she knows; that she no longer has anything to prove. Her current volume supports such assertions. Who could argue that Miller's core contributions--The Drama of the Gifted Child (aka Prisoner of Childhood), For Your Own Good, Thou Shalt Not Be Aware, Pictures of a Childhood,The Untouched Key, Banished Knowledge, Breaking Down the Wall of Silence, and now Paths of Life--have failed to increase our individual consciousness of self and psychology, or to raise our collective awareness of significant social issues? We are fortunate, then, to receive this latest offering about the paths of ordinary life, about new understandings based on real feelings, and about genuine love that can face up to such truth (p. 186).

Arrests your consciousness with its imagery and language. Rewards thoughtful reading with its insight and wisdom. The fundamental themes of generations and inheritance are a modern echo of Ecclesiastes. This is the best debut collection of poems I've read in years.

I found her poetry wonderful in the sense that she can articulate the voice of every narrator in each separte poem. Each with its own author, the storyteller, be it a worm or an old woman has a story. I'm not sure if that makes perfect sense, but I really loved her book.

Claudia Emerson Andrews's Pharaoh, Pharaoh is the rarest and best kind of discovery: a book full of poems by an author who has found her voice and allowed it to free, rather than limit, her explorations. Demanding to be read aloud alone or to others, the rhythm and language bring the reader along on a remarkable journey. Full of gentle reminiscences and powerful histories, Pharaoh, Pharaoh is quiet and profound, capturing moments in time and meaning with a heartbreaking and familiar clarity. The first book of the Southern Messenger series, Pharaoh, Pharaoh, like all the best Southern writing, contains messages for all its readers. Become one.

I read Dream Parlor first and was impressed. Pandora's Game solidifies my view that Mr. Andrews' is a brilliant writer and a wonderful storyteller. I started and finished it without putting it down. It's a smooth ride, it's weaving plot keeping you drawn in until the very end. I can't wait to get my hands on Mr. Andrews' next novel!

Andrews keeps you on your toes with every twist and turn of this unforgettable plot. He portrays vampires, werewolves and zombies not always as the bad guys. This is a great story and a must read.

This is a wonderful piece of work -- it does an excellent job of taking you into the characters' adventure and the consequences of their actions. Christopher Andrews did an excellent job of making it seem as if all this could really happen. I would love to see this put on the big screen!

Good for churches ecspecially for catholic

Every time I look at my copy, I find more to give thanks for. Our church has benefitted from the Banners and Quilts we have created, adapted from ideas we found in the book. My dream is to find it reprinted and get it for some friends. I have been fortunate enough to see the cover quilts at an Ecclesiastical exhibit and they are even more beautiful in person. This is a book that should be in everyone's library.

The Patchwork Pilgrimage) by Jill Liddell is a compendium of Christian liturgical art, especially quilted banners, altar cloths, and vestments. Nearly every page has at least one color plate depicting a church decoration found in Scandinavia, England, France, the U.S., Canada, Australia, or New Zealand. Though most are contemporary (1980's and 90's), examples from as far back as the Middle Ages are also included.

Jill Liddell's descriptions of the individual pieces are supplemented by Andrew Liddell's historical overview of church art. The sections entitled "Ways and Means" and "Christian Signs and Symbols" offer suggestions for quilters who might like to try their hands at liturgical art. Christian quilters will benefit from having this inspiring book in their collections.

reviewed by Andrea R. Huelsenbeck

This year's Peanuts calendar is fantastic! Every morning, I can't wait to read the comic strip of the day. The theme is "we all need a philosophy", which provides for inspiring and funny strips. Recommended to all Peanuts fans!

I put this calendar on my desk and every morning i rush to tear off the page to see what these little angels have to say today. it's a wonderful way to start a work day. i also save the pages as part of my collection. any one will enjoy this.

This calendar has 365 strips - one on each day. Some are not reprinted in the regular reprint books meaning this may be the first time for a reprint! The Sunday strips include ALL panels. This is a must for any REAL Peanuts fan.

Phil Sheridan lacks a worthy biography, but this is the best around. It focuses on the post-Civil War period but ( I think)
could have done more to save the General's reputation from that of a 'bigot and Indian hater'.

For example, the unfair ascription of the so-called proverb 'The only good Indian is a dead Indian' is not challenged, I wonder when it ever will be. From my own limited research, I have found the first recorded public use of this phrase by a Montana politician in 1868, one year before Sheridan is supposed to have uttered similar words. Further, Sheridan's brother Mike also traces the phrase to Montana, saying 'some fool' ascribed the words to Sheridan. Finally, we only have the hearsay evidence
of a single witness (ie someone told someone else who wrote it down), written down 20 years later, that Sheridan used the words at all.

There is of course the larger accusation, that whatever Sheridan said, this is how he felt. Hutton effectively refutes that charge, I only wish he had come out and roundly stated it somewhere in the book. Sheridan shared the objectives of his contemporary humanitarian critics - he wanted Indians to settle down on reservations and adopt white ways, or just live of the bounty of the government. Where he differed was how he treated 'hostiles' or recalcritant Indians. Sheridan believed in waging war on the Indians just as he had made war in the Shenandoah Valley - devastate the enemy's resources, limit his power to make war by depriving him of supplies, with the added extra of rounding up families to be taken to where they white soldiers could watch them.

In essence, Sheridan was given a dirty job, and did in the only way he knew. But he had no especial hate for the Indians - he was not a Himmler figure, as some have made him out. He was fair to Indians who kept the peace. For example, he adjudicated in a dispute between Indians and cattlemen who had leased reservation land. Despite his personal feeling about development, he came down firmly on the Indian side, and thanks to him, the cattlemen were given 3 months to remove their herds, which humbered hundreds of thousands head of cattle.

Sheridan also sponsored early efforts to study Indian lore and customs, and was instrumental in preserving Yellowstone National Park for the nation.

In short this man was not a saint. He had glaring defects - for example, he aggressively defended subordinates even when they were in the wrong, he looked after cronies in the Army and outside. But he was totally uncorrupt in a corrupt age (his personal fortune was quite small at the end of his days, even though he could undoubtedly had many opportunities to enrich himself illicitly). Also, one feels that someone who said "If I owned Hell and Texas, I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas" can't be all bad! Right or wrong, he had a certain spirit, that Little Phil!

If anyone wonders how Custer could have been so driven to relentless pursue Sioux and Cheyenne to the Little Big Horn one must understand his mentor Phil Sheridan. As Hutton points out, Sheridan aggressiveness from his men and he could inspire them to such great lengths that one Union Soldier at the battle of Five Forks shot through the primary artery in the neck starts to seek medical help only to be blistered by Sheridan. Although mortally wounded, the young man turns to continue to attack and then immediately collapses to his death. The picture of the angular red haired cadet Sheridan at West Point looks just like the devil and his temper was evident there as he almost bayonets an upper classman that chews him out on parade. Sheridan applies his aggressive nature to the Indian campaigns such that if he is unable to capture the Indians (typical), he systematically destroyed their way of life by eradicating anything they needed to exist. Whether its buffalo, horses or village food stuffs, Sheridan essentially does to the Indians what he did to the Virginia Shenandoah valley during the Civil War where he or Grant made the comment that "a crow would have to carry rations if it flew over the valley" after Sheridan got through. Sheridan's effective Indian campaigns were often fought in the winter when the Indians had less food and were less mobile. Custer and Terry's campaign was desperate from the start since it started in the summer when the opposite was true. Hutton demonstrates Sheridan's black and white side and his Victorian views when Sheridan refuses to trade six horses for a captured white woman because he imagined her to be too sullied by the Indian braves and thus unfit for civilization. Hutton states in his introduction that he hopes that his daughter never has to meet a man like Sheridan which if he were your enemy it would be a relentless challenge without rules of war.

It is time we had books that celebrate the great HEROES of freedom like Grant Sherman Sheridan ect instead of the cowadly likes of Quantrill and his gutless backshooting ilk who would have run from a Blue Coat drummer boy or a Federal Army nurse!
It is about time that Americans honored those who stood and fought for freedom and WON. This book is a fine start.

The Andrew Lang collections are well worth it. I read them when I was a child (bless that library) and when I saw them for sale I couldn't resist. The stories have retained their freshness and it is interesting to see similar themes dealt with by different cultures.

These would be great for parents reading to their children or for children looking for something interesting and fun to read.

Definitely worth it!

I was at the library with my father and mother when I first saw this book. I looked at all the colors and decided by pink being my favorite color. I read the whole book in gaps between 2 days and at bedtime. And I was so amazed at the mermaids, princesses, and fairies and all the wonder that a few days later I took out the orange, green, and crimson fairy book just so I could dwell in the land of fairy tales for a few more weeks! Im a young girl of fourteen, and I love fantasy stories. The Pink fairy book is my favorite because it was my first, but the whole collection are my favorites and I recomend them to boys and girls (There are plenty of stories boys would like too) and adults! (for they are just as interesting) I love art, and the pictures by H.J ford are so amazing and attractive, I stared at them for hours!

I am a teacher and I read many stories from The Pink Fairy Book to my class. They were amazed that there were so many more wonderful fairy tales that they had never seen on cartoons. I recomend this to all teachers and parents to read to treir kids.

The book is long and melodrmatic. Deeper than that, the nihlistic movments in Russia is intresting to see devolop.

I was intrigued when John Updike picked this over Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov as one of the ten greatest works of literature of the millenium. After reading it I still claim that Karamazov is better, but this novel is certainly not to be missed. It is touter than some of Dostoevsky's other works, and it contains some of his best characterizations, all suffused with a very dark and very penetrating sense of humor. No one will forget the nihilist Kirilov, who wishes to kill himself in order to become God, the naive aesthete Stepan Trofimovitch and his final, farcical escape into peasant Russia, or Nikolai Stavrogin, haunted by a terrible crime that is made all the worse because it is too ordinary. The whole novel is an unabashed piece of anti-revolutionary (indeed, reactionary) propaganda, but even the characters that are intended as caricatures come across as fascinating and oddly believable. This novel displays as well as any other of his works the author's extraordinary understanding of the tortured ways of the human spirit.

This books improves upon the Divine Comedy and revives the New Testament. This book is a bible of Dionysiac dismemberment. Dostoevsky has translated Job's Jehova for us, from the original thunder.

I've only read Ch 12 - Designing Web Applications and Servlet Patterns, via PDF online at the authors site. It's worth the price alone - I went to my local bookstore to purchase it last night - but alast the isles are full of MS C# and .NET books.

However on to what I learned from Ch 12 - the patterns that are put into action are wonderful! I've used MVC in the past - but adding the 'Command & Controller' to MVC is a real boon! I've not been successful with pattern books in the past, because they typically do not provide code examples, which I find a great learning tool [ I'm a "visual" learner ]. This book includes great code examples, the graphics are very professional, and helpful also.

4 of 5 stars - I've not read the whole book - I've got to reserve total commitment til then.

This is a very good book.
It is a must have for any serious web-application devloper.
It explains well all the subjects you need to know about servlet programming.

Buying this book saves you lot of learning-by-step time.
I really suggest this title.
Finally one book that i'm glad to pay.

This is my forst wrox book but, if all worx books are like this one, for sure not the last.

Hiya All,

I have this book for sometime now, and I think, you can't have a better book to learn Servlets 2.3 API. Specially, the Chap on MVC pattern was very good. I liked the way the book has been written. There are lots of practicle examples in the book. The Patterns have been explained in a very good manner. But my favourite is Chap 8. Its downright interesting that how you can combine a database with a JSP page to create a Web Apps. I had some problems in Running the code and had to take the help of Wrox People, But I managed it with there help. Overall, a dependable book.