What I’m reading

“The Cunning of History”

Richard Rubenstein

Harpercollins (1975; latest edition, August 1987)

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“Right now I’m reading ‘The Cunning of History’ by Richard Rubenstein. It’s a book positing that the Holocaust is not an aberration but a continuum of

a trend going back to the institution of slavery in the Civil War and workers in the Industrial Revolution. The book explores the slave labor in death camps more than the mass extermination, and sees it as one logical step in the 20th century belief system. It was written in 1975 and it is pointing toward the danger of a dominant nation such as America continuing the trend of dehumanizing people.”

-- Paul Weitz, co-writer, co-director, “About a Boy,” “American Pie”