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Books in Review
Father and Sons
(Page 2 of 2)
When he was 23, Bill Buckley made him a secret offer he couldn’t refuse. He would be Bill’s successor as editor in chief; in the meantime, he’d become senior editor and eventually managing editor. Eight years later, Buckley withdrew the offer, coldly, in a letter left on Rick’s desk in an envelope marked “confidential,” while Buckley himself was out of the country. He praised Rick’s writing but said he lacked “executive flair.” Nothing in this memoir suggests Buckley’s assessment was unfair. The mistake was extending the offer to Rick in the first place, whether to keep him from going on to Yale Law School, where he’d been accepted, or to treat him as a surrogate for Christopher, who clearly was not disposed ever to succeed his father at the helm of National Review.
If any good came from this devastating blow it was Rick’s being reminded of the decency and goodness of his own father, who, in case he wanted to pursue them now, offered to pay for his law school studies. “[H]e was a better man than the idol I had put in his place,” Rick notes. Throughout the rest of his book, though friendly enough toward Buckley (Rick is never that outwardly friendly to begin with, as he’d be the first to admit, calling himself “consumed with snobbery” and a “know-it-all”), he persists in taking snipes at him, or at bringing him down a peg if he can, and taking great satisfaction when in later years Bill did ask him for editorial help only he could provide.
He provides memorable portraits of various NR writers, not all of them (D. Keith Mano) my cup of tea, or figures he properly appreciates (John Simon), though surely he is on target recalling the wondrous Joe Sobran:
He loved the great actors, and was an excellent mimic. He could begin some soliloquy—“Now is the winter of our discontent”—as Olivier; I would call out Gielgud, Burton, and he would change voices like gears.
Less defensible are the friendly words he has for figures who on Buckley’s death criticized or even savaged him in print. He is kind toward Bob Tyrrell and our magazine, though he does give a hint as to why he stopped writing for us in the mid-1990s: he found the jokey shots taken at the newly elected Clintons at our 25th anniversary dinner unbecoming and had absolutely no use for any of the subsequent political wars, finding the 1990s “high pitched and frantic.” He does spare a best friend, however, praising him as someone who made his mark in those years publishing “hard-hitting” books. What he doesn’t tell you is that they were anti-Clinton books. It could also be, regarding The American Spectator, that the National Review-firster in Rick didn’t like the higher profile we acquired at the time. I don’t take it personally. You should see how dismissive he is of the Weekly Standard—even though by book’s end his expression of support for the Iraq War could have been dictated by Bill Kristol.
Years ago, at a dinner honoring Buckley not long after he’d stepped down as NR editor, Rick offered a toast to Bill. Buckley liked it so much he asked for a copy. But Rick hadn’t spoken from prepared text, and never did follow up, in part because there still were “wounds…too fresh to be bandaged over.” He now reproduces those words at the close of his book, too late for Buckley to read them. Call it another Pyrrhic victory for a surviving son.
Comments
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Mrs. Jackson| 6.8.09 @ 8:22AM
Mr. Pleszczynski, your insight has answered some unanswered questions.
Many thanks.
Red Phillips| 6.8.09 @ 9:27AM
Richard Brookhiser is, in addition to being a pompous jackass, an arch-Federalist/nationalist. This explains his choice of subjects for his Founders biographies. Thus he fits in well with certain elements at Nationalist Review, but it puts him outside the decentralist and regionalist strain of authentic American conservatism.
Note his contempt for Ron Paul and Paul's supporters in the last campaign.
http://etherzone.com/2007/phill100807.shtml
Teflon93| 6.8.09 @ 9:44AM
Brookhiser and Buckley the Dumber are snobs.
Worse, they have done little to earn their snobbery.
Certainly they are not in WFB's league, which is why they can only sling mud at his memory knowing it will inevitably overshadow theirs.
Unfortunately, of National Review's current roster only Mark Steyn comes close to the Old Man's legacy and he's more of a humorist than an ideologue.
NR has far too many vipers of the Buckley/Brookhiser stripe looking to jump ship just as soon as Strange New Respect becomes available. You can tell them by their attempts to find "common ground" with the Obama Administration---they are the next David Frums, Rod Drehers, etc.
It's a shame Buckley the Elder didn't choose more wisely in picking his successor. Rich Lowry lacks the ideological underpinnings and willingness to be the bad guy necessary to preserve NR's status as conservative flagship. As a result, NR's largely just a place for neocons to cash a check these days.
Perhaps the colors ought to be struck at NR and raised at The American Spectator.
George| 6.8.09 @ 11:05AM
My God, you do snipe at one another. It's so precious. I can sure see why Christopher didn't want to dive into the middle of the writhing worms of pomposity at NR. Didn't Christopher mention in his memoir "Upmanship?" That seems to be the name of the game with you literary types.
Tim| 6.8.09 @ 11:42AM
Seems like family and personal intrigues afflict the elites as they do the rest of us. I miss Mr. Buckley and he had a singular talent, but I do not expect, nor do I demand that his son become him to make me feel better.
NR has seemed to succeed in transitioning from a family business into a going concern. That's a good thing.
Mary| 6.8.09 @ 12:15PM
I’ve not read any of WFB’s books. I was a fan of Firing Line, and a fan and subscriber of National Review.
I just started reading Kirk’s The Conservative Mind and reading this review evoked a sense that Losing Mum and Pup is a fitting end to a particular conservative mood. Jonathan’s story is the final act. May God raise him to super both his grandfather and his father: to love them, though they did not love him.
Since we’re talking about books, I’d like to recommend Sándor Márai’s Embers
Red Phillips| 6.8.09 @ 2:12PM
Teflon93, I agree that both C. Buckley and Brookhiser are snobs. Buckley especially. I believe his snobbery is one of the main reasons he endorsed Obama and distanced himself from movement conservatism. Like the elitist circles he runs in, he considers the GOP base to be witless, unsophisticated yahoos. Brookhiser is still friendly with the mainstream conservative base, but he is quick to distance himself from elements outside that mainstream, such as Paul supporters.
I would not say they have no reason to be snobbish (other than snobbishness is bad manners and uncivil.) Both are accomplished authors. Brookhiser is just on the wrong side of a great divide, nationalist centralizers vs. regionalist and localist decentralizers.
Lowry, does not lack “ideological underpinnings.” He has been thoroughly ideologized by the movement he is entirely a product of. The problem is he lacks knowledge and understanding of the long conservative tradition that pre-dates the movement.
Also, some of us hashed this out in another thread, but it is a mistake to lump Dreher and Frum together. They are both critics of the current conservative movement, but their criticisms are for far different reasons. Frum is a moderate counseling moderation (except on foreign policy), and Dreher is a “Crunchy Con” battling modernity. I am not crazy about Dreher’s style because I think it allows him to be mischaracterized as a Frumesque moderate, but Dreher actually does have an understanding of the older conservative traditions that I said Lowry lacks.
Tim| 6.8.09 @ 2:39PM
"Frumesque " let's hope that doesn't catch on...
barbara anderson| 6.8.09 @ 9:01PM
Read 'Losing Mum and Pup and was appalled. Chris Buckley said that his parents had class. Too bad he didn't inherit any of it. His absolute egotism in telling us that he forgave his mother was disgusting. Someone with class may have done that at a parents deathbed but would certainly not have informed the world about it. Mr. Buckley was a very successful man, but like Ronald Reagan, seems to have failed in rearing his child. He only produced an ungrateful brat who writes well. Thank you, Wlady, for also pointing that out.
Roy| 6.8.09 @ 9:31PM
Re:Phillips:
I know what you mean about Dreher, but I really think that anybody where that was their real priority would not come anywhere near even thinking about dreaming about cozying up to the Left the way he does. Somebody whose real goal was the preservation of tradition would understand that while the Right may be problematic from that point of view the Left is its unalterable, thoroughgoing enemy.
That's my biggest problem with intra-Right squabbles - they may have a point, but it should never be forgotten that the Left is always worse, and that can never be pointed out too often.
Alan Brooks| 6.8.09 @ 10:08PM
Brookhiser did me a big favor by pointing out Tofflerism is "Marxism for computer geeks", so even if he is a Federalist and a [fill in a tinhat epithet] he himself is nobody's chimp and nobody's chump.
Just because it fooled Newt doesn't mean the rest of us have to be fooled.
Alan Brooks| 6.8.09 @ 10:17PM
I was a futurist from 1976 - 2006;
if I'd listened to Brookhiser in '95, 12 years could have been reduced from the original 30 year sentence.
JUDGE: Prisoner roped-and-doped, I hereby reduce your futurist sentence to time served.
PCP Smoker| 6.8.09 @ 10:35PM
Good piece. I'm sure WFB was not an easy man to live with, but these biographies seem unbecoming.
Hunter Baker| 6.8.09 @ 10:37PM
Fantastic piece, Wlady. Your knowledge of the game and players makes these pieces on the movement highly worthwhile.
Red Phillips| 6.8.09 @ 11:28PM
"tinhat epithet"
That's right. Instead of challenging the substance just call names. That Brookhiser is everything I said he is is a verifiable fact. Do you disagree? Why the name calling? Just defend his positions if you support them.
I have been calling Gingrich a futurist and not a conservative since he was my rep in GA. If Brookhiser recognized the inherent non-conservatism of Toffler then good for him.
CC Ryder| 6.9.09 @ 12:53AM
I detest people who air their dirty laundry in public. Christopher Buckley may have money and position, but he is a piker just the same.
He'll never be his father and that's what galls him. Shame on him for his petty, callous treatment of his mother.
He's a disgrace. I hope the tell-all books his children write someday will even the score.
Creep.
Teflon93| 6.9.09 @ 8:41AM
Red-
When I said that Lowry lacks "ideological underpinnings", your point is exactly what I was getting at: he is not grounded in the Burkean roots of modern conservatism.
A good litmus test for me regarding whether one is a conservative or not is this thought experiment: were the French Revolution underway today, how would one react and why?
Burke's denunciation of it (and his support for the American Revolution---within limits)---illuminates true conservatism and exposes faux conservatism. It is the difference between the man guarding the wellsprings of liberty and the ancien regime toady. Both oppose Robespierre, but for very different reasons.
Frum and Dreher simply do not oppose liberals---to the extent they do AT ALL---for the same reason that Buckley, Reagan, and other true conservatives did. Their interest is not in maximizing liberty but in codifying their particular eccentricities through the handiest vehicle around.
Lowry is like a boy wearing his father's suit. Even to the extent that he pulls it off, he has little concept of why it works. It is a very shallow understanding he displays and NR drifts accordingly.
Frum wants to win but doesn't know why---this is the disease which struck the Republicans post-1994. Dreher wants to be validated in his Ludditism-by-convenience---he's no Russell Kirk.
Conservatives play for much higher stakes---we wish to preserve, protect, and promulgate liberty. True liberty---not mere libertinism.
Even now, as Obama readies Madame Guillotine for physicians, financiers, soldiers, and other Old Regime bulwarks, even as the Powells and the Noonans and the weaker Buckleys and the Douthats and the rest wonder if "liberte, egalite, and fraternite" is ALL that bad, conservatives sharpen their swords and prepare to put an end to the bloody spectacle once and for all.
Red Phillips| 6.9.09 @ 9:06AM
Teflon93, but in the perspective of the French Revolution, which is indeed the litmus test, conservatism is not about "maximizing liberty." "Liberte" was the cry of the left. Now they certainly aren't doing a good job of protecting it these days except when it comes to the right to kill your baby or marry your boy friend, but the mess that is modern liberalism is a direct result of the spirit that was unleashed by the French Revolutionaries. Conservatism is about natural sustainable order, inherent authority (such as the Church), tradition, family and community, etc. Conservatism is not about atomistic individual liberty. Dreher, too some degree, does understand this, even if his style is sometimes off-putting.
Teflon93| 6.9.09 @ 1:27PM
Red, I think you're confusing "liberty"---the obsession of conservatives---with "libertinism".
If you consult Edmund Burke's seminal document "On the Revolution in France" you'll see what is meant.
The same principle is of course codified in the Declaration of Independence. It was Burke who first showed how a conservative properly embraces the American Revolution but condemns the French. This was before the worst excesses of the Terror (although Burke wasn't really surprised).
Conservatism is not communitarian---rights are individual rights, not group rights.
The trouble is that to be a conservative, one must understand rights to be God-given, not man-made. This is at the heart of Burke's disgust with the French Revolution, and at the heart of Thomas Paine's error. The French presumed to be granting citoyens new rights; the Founders merely sought to protect the natural rights the colonists had always enjoyed and do so in perpetuity.
Dreher's merely switching whip hands in support of his own preference. Kirk's embrace of the more natural life was quite different and far less confused than Dreher's.
Conservatives do indeed embrace order, but order of the sort recognizable to De Tocqueville---self-organized rather than imposed by elites, and American conservatives in particular do not confound "natural" with "ancient" in the sense that we have not been saddled with all the "great chain of being" class nonsense our British counterparts endure.
The trouble with Buckley the Dumber, Frum et al is that they have replaced time-honored conservative principle with a desire to be the ruling elite. They are motivated by a lust for power and influence---to be embraced by the "right" people, not the Right people.
And thus nobody in flyover country gives a fig what they say.
Daisy| 6.9.09 @ 4:11PM
Teflon, good post!! Too many Americans want the rights without the attendant responsibilities. I believe true freedom is a combination of rights and responsibilities. Yes?
Alan Brooks| 6.9.09 @ 8:05PM
Red,
States rights means so little in 2009 it's quixotic.
We wish.
BTW killing a baby is wrong, but marrying the boyfriend is okay--
where do you think the baby comes from ;-)
John Lennon Owns Your Ass| 6.10.09 @ 12:30AM
Bob’s sin? He’d apparently made light of former Beatle John Lennon’s death (“historic expiration” were, I believe, the offending words).
Ya geez, people tend to get pissed when brainless peons make fun of the death of a genius musician beloved by millions . You can hardly blame the guy. Fucktard.
Teflon93| 6.10.09 @ 7:51AM
Daisy-
I think you're right on the money: the conservative view of liberty must take into account duties as well as freedoms.
We see it in the Founders' willingness to risk life and limb to support the Declaration. They saw no essential conflict between the freedom they sought and the obligations they honored.
I'd guess Red would agree. In this age of radical individual libertinism---of eschewing all obligations but for the obligation to be politically correct at all times---Red rightly notes that conservatives do not stand for anarchy.
The difference is one of voluntary association. George Washington was not a draftee, however bound by duty he may have been to lead the Continental Army. He could have chosen the path of Coriolanus rather than Cincinnatus.
The Frums, the Drehers, the Powells et al simply do not understand liberty in the sense conservatives have for time immemorial: as the priceless gift of our ancestors which must be protected, preserverd, and promulgated unto posterity. They view it rather as the moneyed child views his trust fund---as something to be squandered over time to secure personal comforts.
Thus Frum will concede all notion of the duties and benefits of citizenship---just so long as Republicans can hope for that elusive Hispanic vote to keep them in power. Dreher will concede the prosperity-killing climate and energy policies of the Left---so long as the right mantra is chanted regarding "stewardship" and "sustainability". Powell will gladly toss aside our Israeli allies onto the irradiated dustbin of history so long as Democrats not be too naked in their anti-Semitism in so doing. And all would counsel loading the Supreme Court with Bill Ayers-approved radicals---wouldn't want to have ugly debate in the Senate, would we? Too divisive.
The trouble of course is that a coalition of people who adopt the social, economic, and foreign policy principles of the Democrat Party already exists: it's called the Democrat Party.
ron| 6.10.09 @ 8:22PM
Overreacting much?
It's amusing to read the sniping and carping in the comments criticizing the sniping and carping of these two authors.
My favorite is the one who decided to incoherently degrade the author of the article because he poked fun at John Lennon.
I think the point of this article is simple. A guy can have tremendous talent, ability and excellence, but it doesn't mean he's not human.
I am happy to hear that Brookhiser reconciled with his father. I had a similar experience. It seems that a man needs to admire his dad above all other men. And yet he needs to not just make his own mark but to even supersede his father.
A curious dilemma we all face.
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