Assassination Vacation
My literary crush on Sarah Vowell went from mild to obsessive after the introductory paragraphs of Assassination Vacation, in which Ms. Vowell manages to reference Stephen Sondheim (my favorite dramatist), Assassins (my favorite musical), 1776 (my favorite musical about the Declaration of Independence) and more then a dozen references to obscure points of Americana, my favorite topic of conversation, especially when I want to either amaze people or bore them (usually I managed to do both). Given that Ms. Vowell is equally enamored with both American history and America's history of political murders, I suspect if we met at a cocktail party, we'd have a great deal of fun amazing / boring all the other guests. All of which is to say Assassination Vacation feels very much like it was written just for me. Thanks Sarah!
Ms. Vowell seems to be rocketing towards a trilogy of history books / memoirs / travelogues that connect 19th century Americana with modern day events. Assassination Vacaton, written in 2005, chronicles her journey through the various museums and landmarks dedicated to Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield and William McKinley, the three presidents killed during the 19th century (McKinley was shot in 1901, but why quibble?). Along the way, Ms. Vowell draws parallels with the Bush administration, the war in Iraq and the dawning of American imperialism. These themes only continue in her recent book, Unfamiliar Fishes which chronicles the history of Hawaii leading up to its annexation during the Spanish-American War (see here for my thoughts).
Assassination Vacation is filled with great tidbits of history surrounding the presidents, their assassins and the various political flunkies in their entourages - such as Robert Todd Lincoln's dubious role as an oracle of death (he was around during all three assassinations) or the story of William McKinley's widow knitting four thousand pairs of slippers as she mourned her husband's death. The direction of Ms. Vowell's research is often tangental, which makes it all the more intriguing. She devotes a large section of her Garfield chapter to the Oneiada community, a free-love cult that was home to Charles Guiteau, Garfield's assassin; and she manages to put in intriguing information about the 19th century's most intriguing obscure political personnel, like Senator Roscoe Conkling of New York or the virtually forgotten President Chester A. Arthur.
Her parallels to modern times are pretty chilling - the McKinley's administrations incursions into the Phillipines have eerie similarities to America's more recent entry into Iraq; and Ms. Vowell even manages to make the administration of Rutherford B. Hayes seem relevant - another forgotten president, President Hayes, like George W., became president despite losing the popular vote. Along the way, Ms. Vowell continues her breezy, addictive style, mashing up the genres of history and memoir into a book that tells us as much about the author as it does about American history.
Most of all, this book stands as a testament of our addiction to testaments: our love of statues, souvenirs, keepsakes and memorials. Who knew that the tiles William Mckinley was standing on when he was shot had been preserved? Or that pieces of Lincoln's brain are still floating somewhere in a jar? Hidden in-between the lines of Assassination Vacation are some sharp observations about our desire to immortalize our leaders and, by extension, the people they led - namely ourselves.
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