I really enjoyed the book. I am skeptical of a modern version of the movie.
Victor Davis Hanson has a great Lew Wallace story in his “Ripples of Battle” book.
Wallace was in charge of the Union rear guard at Shiloh and was ordered to march around in circles on the first day.
The next day he fought bravely and effectively.
Afterwards the newspapers and politicians needed a scapegoat for the Shiloh slaughter and blamed Wallace.
His promising military career was destroyed.
Good read. I went to see the remake last night. It was terrible. Worse movie I’ve seen in a long time.
“Every calculation based on experience elsewhere fails in New Mexico.”
He was correct to this very day.
So, when will we see Wallace’s THE FAIR GOD made into a movie! It was promised back in 1962!
Cortez Conquers Mexico! Think of the PC rewrites!
As I understood it, Grant actually sent TWO orders to Wallace, and somehow the second got there first, and (memory fuzzy) but as I recall Wallace actually turned his column around twice.
Bump!
One of my all-time favorite books!
The John Swansburg article at the link is a bit shorter than the novel BEN HUR (but for a while I was wondering). It provides interesting info on the novel’s admirers including prominent ones in the South.
Slate has proven themselves to be hypocrites. In what war did Lew Wallace fight? And what war are ‘the progressives’ attempting to erase at this time? I rest my case.
I read the book about 30 years ago and enjoyed it immensely.
The Slate article is most interesting about Wallace and the context of the book in Reconstruction and its role in healing the nation. Thanks for posting.
FTA. Interesting:
Grant, a gifted horseman, admired Old John and proposed a race back to camp. Wallace assented, but reined his horse in as the race began. “Let him out!” barked Grant, seeing that he was being afforded a handicap. Wallace did as he was ordered, and though Grant was in a furious gallop, Old John easily sprinted ahead. After a mile or two, Grant called a halt—and offered to buy Old John on the spot. Wallace refused. “Neither love nor money,” he said, “can buy Old John.”
Or maybe Wallace did write of the race, but only under the veil of fiction. In every incarnation—novel, play, the 1925 silent film, Wyler’s 1959 spectacle—Ben-Hur’s most celebrated scene has always been the chariot race between Judah and his friend-turned-rival Messala. Early in the story, Messala betrays his boyhood companion, accusing Judah of a crime he didn’t commit: the attempted murder of Judea’s Roman governor. After years of suffering in exile, Judah is afforded an opportunity to avenge himself in the arena. Though Messala is heralded as the greatest charioteer in the empire, he can’t contain the superior horsemanship of Judah, who rides to victory.
The new Ben-Hur movie is bombing. The lead just isn’t. Too bland.
Read the comments: http://www.slate.com/articles/life/history/2013/03/ben_hur_and_lew_wallace_how_the_scapegoat_of_shiloh_became_one_of_the_best.html
Wow another bit of hidden history. To me Ben-Hur has always just one of those old movies occasionally played on tv that didn’t particularly interest me so I’ve never watched it. Now it’s on my list of things to make time for both book and movie wise, with Heston, of course. Then later maybe the remake. Thanks for posting. I forwarded this to a friend who is a civil war reinactor, he may all ready know about this.