the kind of minor factual errors ...
Aug. 18th, 2010 06:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
calimac"the kind of minor factual errors ... that will mean nothing to most people but that, when you do recognize them, and they keep popping up to poke you in the eye again and again, began to make a book seem like it was put together as a silent protest against the lack of editors in the publishing industry" - Phil Nugent
Charles Peters, distinguished founding editor of The Washington Monthly, who is 84 years old, just published a book on Lyndon Johnson for "The American Presidents" series edited by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., who is dead.
On page 33, we learn that after the Republican Party won control of Congress in 1946, "in the Senate, the new majority leader was Robert A. Taft." No. Taft was a leading Republican senator, but he did not become majority leader until a few months before his death in 1953.
On page 40, when Johnson joins the Senate in 1949, he "received a quick lesson in Senate culture when he attempted to pressure the Senate president pro tem, Carl Hayden, for a large suite of offices, only to have his importunings ignored." No. It was Hayden (Robert Caro tells this story in full), but though he was a leading Democratic senator, he didn't become president pro tem until 1957.
Come on, guys. I don't claim to have your knowledge and experience as a political junkie, but I know this stuff off the top of my head. Get it right, or don't waste our time with your books.
Charles Peters, distinguished founding editor of The Washington Monthly, who is 84 years old, just published a book on Lyndon Johnson for "The American Presidents" series edited by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., who is dead.
On page 33, we learn that after the Republican Party won control of Congress in 1946, "in the Senate, the new majority leader was Robert A. Taft." No. Taft was a leading Republican senator, but he did not become majority leader until a few months before his death in 1953.
On page 40, when Johnson joins the Senate in 1949, he "received a quick lesson in Senate culture when he attempted to pressure the Senate president pro tem, Carl Hayden, for a large suite of offices, only to have his importunings ignored." No. It was Hayden (Robert Caro tells this story in full), but though he was a leading Democratic senator, he didn't become president pro tem until 1957.
Come on, guys. I don't claim to have your knowledge and experience as a political junkie, but I know this stuff off the top of my head. Get it right, or don't waste our time with your books.
