Roads To and From White House

Those hungering for perspective after the unsettling presidential campaign of 1992 are likely to find it in Theodore White’s America in Search of Itself: The Making of the President 1956-1980 (Books on Tape). White records in detail the shifts and changes that have rocked American politics during the past quarter-century.

Listening to Grover Gardner’s narration, you can relive not only the public life of the country with its conflicts but also your own personal life as you recall just where you were at any particular time and what you felt about the issues. At the same time, you are taken behind the scenes and made aware of much that you never knew, or if you had any hint of it you may well have forgotten. On both levels, White’s work provides a fascinating reconstruction of political maneuvering and the shifting public climate of American political opinion.

White’s monumental record is divided into two parts, the first consisting of eight 1 1/2-hour cassettes and the second of seven. He notes in particular the basic changes that television has brought about in national politics and the curious cults of personality that have resulted from this. Narrative drive provides the movement of these works, and White is able to maintain a feeling of suspense and doubt even when you know perfectly well what the outcome of conflicting factions will be.

White has not confined himself to the political movements of this country alone. In his autobiography, In Search of History (Books on Tape), read by Don Lazar in two parts roughly paralleling the parts of his less personal work, we encounter world figures like Mao of the Peoples Republic and Americans like Eisenhower and MacArthur, who at one time cherished his own presidential ambitions. White skillfully combines his personal rags-to-riches story with world events, and again, his control of narrative gives his memories momentum and suspense.

If anyone would prefer a lighter, and at the same time slightly more acid comment on many of the events covered in these objectively historical works, a great deal of entertainment and information can be enjoyed in Alice: The Life and Times of Alice Roosevelt Longworth by Howard Teichmann, read by Jay Fitts (Books on Tape). Always witty, and usually embarrassingly on the mark, “Princess Alice” never hesitated to express her views on persons and politics. To call her reactions bipartisan would be inaccurate, for she was always partisan by her own standards. But Longworth’s standards had little to do with party politics as she amused herself by keeping Washington society on the alert as she indulged in such unconventional jaunts as visiting Ezra Pound from time to time during the years he was held in St. Elizabeth’s Hospital for the criminally insane, under suspicion of being a traitor.

Another daughter of the White House, Margaret Truman, has used her inside experience in an entirely different way, allowing the listener to gain a sense of both Washington politics and society and at the same time escape from the all too partisan issues of the day. Two of her murder stories--Murder at the Kennedy Center and Murder in the CIA, both narrated by Richard Poe--are available on tape from Recorded Books. In the first, the senior senator from California, who has presidential ambitions, finds his campaign embarrassed by the presence of a corpse. In the second, a CIA courier apparently dies of a heart attack while standing in line at Heathrow. For this listener, nothing could sound more plausible, but others wisely suspect foul play.

A different sort of historical perspective is provided by Flo Gibson’s brilliant narration of Henry Adams’s Democracy: An American Novel, recently issued by Classic Books on Cassettes. Published anonymously in 1880, this classic deals with the perennial issues of power and corruption in government. Mrs. Lightfoot Lee, a wealthy young New York widow, comes to Washington to establish a salon with her sister Sybil, hoping to understand, and even influence, the sources of national power. She is shocked by the blatant political tactics she encounters in the person of a suitor, Senator Ratcliffe. The President, “Old Granite,” based on Rutherford B. Hayes, is no match for the manipulators of power, who buy votes as they deal in graft and slander. When Ratcliffe proposes marriage, Madeleine Lightfoot is faced with a moral decision.

Adams himself, great-grandson of one President and grandson of another, at one time labeled himself a “Conservative Christian Anarchist.” In his youth he served as private secretary to his father, who was the U.S. minister to the Court of St. James’s during the Civil War. Eventually settling in Washington, he observed the scene at first hand, but without political ambition.

Then, as now, the eyes of the world were on the United States, and the publication of “Democracy” created a stir in both London and Paris. A French translation rapidly sold out two printings. The Washington diplomatic corps titillated themselves as they tried to identify the characters’ originals.

We are already hearing “ plus c . a change . . . “ from some quarters, but didn’t we hear change more than once in purely American variations of accent? All of these tapes offer an enjoyable way to fill in the time as we wait for an answer.

WHERE TO ORDER CASSETTES:

Books on Tape: P.O. Box 7900, Newport Beach, Calif. 92658 (800) 626-3333. Purchase or rental.

Recorded Books: 270 Skipjack Road, Prince Frederick, Md. 20678 (800) 638-1304. Purchase or rental.

Classic Books on Cassettes: P.O. Box 40115, Washington, D.C. 20016-0115. (202) 363-3429. Purchase or rental.