false1886290191887William C. Codington55maleMinneapolis, MN01/200912/20091121true5760586read1true4133228currently-reading0true4133227to-read
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1746103
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Tue, 24 Nov 2009 20:31:25 -0800 Forgive me for not answering your flattering comment about my book! Unfortunately, I did not see your comment until now. Hopefully you have been able to get a copy. If so, and you have by now read my book, perhaps, if you have a free minute, you can let me know what you thought. Thanks in advance and best regards,
William Codington]]>
American Blue Blood: The Challenge of Coming of Age in Upper-Class America (Paperback) by William C. Codington]]>
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/42434166
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Sun, 11 Oct 2009 19:15:22 -0700 The families portrayed in this novel are inheritors of the WASP culture that founded our country and in later g...more...]]>
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/196811-what-is-this-book-about
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Thu, 20 Aug 2009 19:48:09 -0700
and professionally, but who has difficulty doing so because of Article 1, Section 9 of The Constitution of the United States, in which it is stated: “No title of nobility shall be granted.”
If it was necessary to sell Article 1, Section 9 to the American people, Alexander Hamilton did it in The Federalist, No. 84, in which he wrote: “Nothing need be said to illustrate the importance of the prohibition of titles of nobility. This may truly be denominated the corner-stone of republican government; for so long as they are excluded, there can never be serious danger that the government will be any other than that of the people.”
Despite the law of the land, shades of a European aristocracy have, nevertheless, come into being in America at certain times and places. Indeed, it is a natural trait of most men and women to want to create something of permanence, something that will continue when they are no longer. It is natural to want to pass along hard-earned economic and social capital to future generations. There is the assumption that those few individuals who do successfully establish dynasties will fear their mortality less.
But the American families that have amassed the trappings of aristocracy over many generations must ultimately come to terms with Article 1, Section 9 and the vast culture that has sprung from it, not the least of which are the many laws and government policies.
This book is the autobiography of Tom Lightfoot, an American blue blood. He has difficulty connecting with the world because our democratic society prefers the self-made man. He is the product of a family that is largely defined by the success of previous generations, but in a country whose existence is defined by the rejection of inherited privilege.
In the 1970s I was a schoolmate of Tom Lightfoot’s, and for the past ten years his partially completed, autobiographical manuscript has been sitting on my shelf. In the back of my mind for all those years I’ve wanted to get it into print, and now I finally have. To spare the reader, I’ve edited out many lengthy passages that went nowhere, though their wandering was symbolic of Tom’s coming-of-age years. There were also numerous gaps. I’ve filled them in with the help of my own memory, with the help of letters left behind, and by extensively interviewing members of Tom’s family, co-workers, and acquaintances.
Throughout the autobiography we find that the challenges faced by other members of the Lightfoot family spring from the same source as Tom’s: the family’s aristocratic heritage, unwelcome in a democratic country. To find acceptance, three generations of Lightfoots, each in his or her own way, attempt to reconcile that heritage with the democratic social currents of the late 20th Century. In the process family schisms have opened wide. Tom’s grandfather descends from American nobility: the Lees of Virginia. He is obsessed with Robert E. Lee as an ideal: the dutiful public servant, warrior, and educator. In contrast, Tom’s grandmother is of ancient Quaker heritage, and with it has come tolerance, liberal politics, the fear of vanity and the desire for harmony and peace. Her prize possession is an Edward Hicks Peaceable Kingdom. Over the decades the gap between grandfather and grandmother has widened, and we find that the younger generations have taken sides.
In Tom Lightfoot’s autobiography he and his family are confronting Article 1, Section 9. Tom himself is a voracious reader, and we see his search to make sense of the Lightfoot family’s place in America in the quotations he selected to begin each chapter. Many come from Democracy in America, a book Tom was drawn to because it is the perspective of another blue blood, Alexis de Tocqueville.
In The Federalist Alexander Hamilton called the prohibition of nobility the “corner-stone.” Indeed, the Lightfoot family story is at the heart of the American experience. ]]>
The Go-Between (Paperback) by L.P. Hartley]]>
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/44210877
http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1173210573s/258079.jpg1886290William C.http://photo.goodreads.com/users/1232840412p2/1886290.jpg
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Sat, 24 Jan 2009 15:35:21 -0800
http://www.goodreads.com/story/show/33701.Introduction_and_first_chapter_of_American_Blue_Blood?chapter=1
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Sun, 18 Jan 2009 02:37:06 -0800
This is the story of someone trying to connect"...more]]>