Panama Fever: The Epic Story of One of the Greatest Human Achievements of All Time-- the Building of the Panama Canal
Doubleday - Doubleday
Release date: 2008-03-18
Hardcover
Author: Matthew Parker
Central America - History, Civil Engineering (General), History - General History, History: World, Americas (North Central South West Indies), History, Latin America - Central America, United States - 20th Century (1900-1945), History / Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies), Panama Canal (Panama)
average reviews
0 vote
0 vote
React and review
Panama Fever: The Epic Story of One of the Greatest Human Achievements of All Time-- the Building of the Panama Canal
Date undefinedParker's Panama Fever is a magazine article. The 500-page book is padded with mind-numbing detail. I can't think of a friend to whom I might pass on (inflict?) my partially-read copy. Van
Panama Fever: The Epic Story of One of the Greatest Human Achievements of All Time-- the Building of the Panama Canal
Date undefinedThis book is subtitled "The Epic Story of One of the Greatest Human Achievements of All Time - the Building of the Panama Canal." It should have been subtitled "The Tragic Story of American Racism, Imperialism, and Exploitation during the Building of the Panama Canal," because this is clearly the theme.
The heroes of this tale are the West Indian blacks, chiefly British subjects, who provided the bulk of the unskilled workforce. The villians are the Americans, who are depicted as ruthless opportunists and bullies. The French are cast as an idealistic people intending a great service to humanity who were misled and robbed by a few frauds and charlatans involved in their canal project.
The social history is an interesting and worthy topic, but suffers from being told out of context. There is a palpable pro-European, anti-American bias. The casual reader might well infer that the evils of racism and imperialism were uniquely American, because the British author gives few details that would allow a reasoned comparison of American attitudes and practice to those then prevailing in British India and South Africa.
But all histories are biased to some extent. The chief fault of "Panama Fever" is that the social history is told to the near-exclusion of the details of the engineering project that is the ostensible subject of the book. The technical aspects are glossed over, and the building of the canal appears merely as a picturesque but indistinct backdrop for the social and political themes.
Upon finishing this book, I feel much like the protagonist West Indian canal worker: thinking that I was to vicariously participate in a great engineering project, I have been brought to a strange land under false pretenses and cheated by one who clearly believes himself to be my social, moral, and intellectual superior. It is a bad feeling; my sympathy for the victims of racism and imperialism is increased. But I would still like to learn a bit about the canal.
Panama Fever: The Epic Story of One of the Greatest Human Achievements of All Time-- the Building of the Panama Canal
Date undefinedParker provides a fairly through history of the building of the Panama Canal, including both the French efforts and the final American success. There is a lot of social history (life of the laborers, that sort of thing) and some but not a lot about the engineering involved.
David McCullough's THE PATH BETWEEN THE SEAS is still the best account of the Canal and its construction, but you won't regret buying this book.
