[LEN-E] Bach book on Riefenstahl

[Ron Koster]

Hi Laura! Long time no "see"! :)

At 04:26 PM 2/17/2008 -0500, Laura Welch wrote:

>I was wondering whether I should get the new Stephen Bach book that 

>is out now.  I keep wondering if I should allow someone to profit 

>off of tarnishing the name of our lady?  Should I buy the book or 

>not?  I have seen it out on the non-fiction racks but still debating 

>if it is worth my while to buy it.  What does everyone think?


Well, it's a little late to stop Bach from profitting from his book 
-- after all, it was one of the best-selling and most highly-praised 
non-fiction books of last year, so he's already accomplished that. 
But if you don't want him to profit directly, you can always buy a 
used copy (on eBay or wherever). ;)

As for whether it's worthwhile getting, I would certainly say so, if 
only because he does have one of the best bibliographies on Leni that 
one can find anywhere. Where I have problems with his work is the 
conclusions that he jumps to based on what he found in those 
references -- and I do mean "jumps to", because some of the things he 
says are quite outlandish, and are clearly just his personal opinion 
and not really based on actual fact.

In that regard, it's interesting to note that the book jacket 
describes his work as being so very "objective" -- but even the most 
indiscriminating reader can surely see that it's not. Indeed, even 
Bach himself explained in an article (one of the ones that can be 
found in my news archives -- I can't remember which one, off-hand) 
that his book was most definitely his own very *subjective*, and 
*not* objective, perspective on Leni Riefenstahl. So never mind Bach 
calling Leni a liar -- Bach, himself, is effectively a self-admitted 
liar (assuming he gave approval to his book jacket, of course). Not 
to mention that he doesn't even know what his subject matter actually 
looked like (as I think we concluded here a couple of months ago, on 
that thread about Leni's appearance -- or not -- in Wege).

So yeah, go for it! But buy it used -- save yourself some money, and 
deny him some profits in the process.

Ron ;)