Building bridges

Even if it's selective, a new history of world culture is still enriching and educational.

-  LINDA HERRICK

CULTURE: A New World History, by Martin Puchner (Ithaka Press, $39.99)

Who is Martin Puchner, whose book boldly asserts that it's "a new world history"? Is it even possible to traverse, in a single volume, the evolution of cultures during the human history of all the world? No. Puchner, a German-born comparative English literature professor at Harvard University, makes a valiant attempt, but he ignores, for instance, the systematic suppression of the native tribes of his adopted land, as well as its slave trade. He also bypasses the colonial process that ravaged the people and cultures of Australasia and the Pacific. So let's leave "world" out of it.

However, Puchner is a respected academic writer, whose book The Language of Thieves, about his Nazisympathising grandfather, was well received. So, if you can accept that Culture is selective, it is an enriching and educational account. A warning, though: Puchner's writing style can be dry and the complexity of details challenging. It's a book best absorbed slowly.

His thesis rests on a range of pivotal periods in history when various cultures and beliefs intersected. He frames these events as bridges, when unique systems of communication, expression and knowledge "storage" (books, art, theatre, libraries) crossed over into other societies, then generated into new forms. He argues that culture is not owned by groups, nations or religions. "Culture is a huge recycling project."