How do you do,
North and South ended just as the Civil War was beginning and that is where Love and War takes up. North and South is basically the first of a three act drama, making Love and War the second act, which thus has the main conflict involved. The third act is where everything is resolved (remember what George Lucas said about that when discussing his Star Wars Trilogy? If not, click here). In someways, also, the first book is just prologue, meant to get everything and everyone into the proper location for the second book. The second book, meanwhile, is the main story, which is why I deem this the Civil War epic as opposed to its prequel and sequel. Jakes stretched the narrative to encompass the four years of war into a thousand page novel, as opposed to the eight hundred pages dealing with nineteen years of peace. Unlike the first book that has a used title (as from Gaskell) this one can easily be seen to come from the phrase "All's fair in love and war."
The Mains are now in the Confederacy while the Hazards stayed in the Union, with only Billy and Brett as the binding tie. Given the size of the novel, it would be too much to go too deep, especially as the first book revealed that Jakes puts too many incidental events within the confines of 800 pages that summarizing it is a Herculean task. It would have worked if it was done as a chapter by chapter analysis, but the hand is on the plow now and I cannot look back. So, to get back to this, the basic way to summarize it is Orry and Madeline live together at Mont Royal, basically getting Madeline divorced from Justin so they could wed; Billy and Brett are married with the latter living among the Northerners, becoming the symbolic Pro-Union Southerner without the sentiment; Ashton and James Huntoon became part of a web of deceit with one taking on adulterous affairs with another man while James takes part in a secret, and treasonous, conspiracy to undermine President Davis; Charles rides in the Confederate cavalry, even taking part of Gettysburg under J.E.B. Stuart; Cooper becomes part of the operation involving the CSS Hunley, an experimental submarine; Billy also rides in the US cavalry and even winds up in Andersonville prison camp; Bent returns for development and even takes part in Sherman's March to the Sea; George becomes at odds with Stanley again over Washington politics. That's the gist of the story.
During the course of Jakes' door stopping sequel, the characters witness it all: the opening maneuvers, First Manassas, Antietam, Fredericksburg, the Emancipation Proclamation, the first draft in American history, the blockade runners, the rise of Generals Lee and Grant, and the climatic surrender of the former at Appomattox. I do no believe the miniseries that was produced on both books has done any of the moments their proper justice.
Things noteworthy are to be brought up. For one, James Huntoon goes from the bully lawyer that we love to see gotten rid of to a more sympathetic character, as Ashton cheats on him for the sake of power in Richmond society. The narration does it more in making her seemingly unsatisfied with his performance, which includes going to penis sizes. While obesity may be linked to shrinkage lately, it's a fact that size doesn't really matter. Anyone can tell you that. Of course, Jakes goes to where many popular writers, romance novelists, and erotica authors tend to do and make bigger penises the desired item for men. It's something that ads have plagued the internet on for a bunch drugs that are supposed to make one bigger down there and yet it's all a scam (and caused the plastic surgery industry to boom with that, also). So, this makes Ashton more sinister than in the previous book. All she cares about is having a place in Richmond society. Since women can't get that that place on their own, she needs a man to put her there. Since her husband is not the man for the job, she seeks out others and gives them sexual favors. In fact, the narration claims she gives these favors just to get what she wants. In short, to women like Ashton men are nothing but tools for personal gain. I know some women like her exist, and some existed in the 1860s, but that doesn't make them the rule.
Bent returns to largely plague the heroes, even those who stayed in the Union. However, he becomes less of a cartoon villain than in the first book. He is not really a Bent, as it turns out, but the son of a Starkwether, who fathered him out of wed lock. John Jakes had started his Kent Series with The Bastard where the title character was spawned from the House of Kents, to which he took the name upon coming to America. Though just as black hearted as North and South's characters, Philip Kent is the relatable protagonist in the first two books, seeing the rebellion of the United States against Britain and proves a useful asset. Of course, Jakes later had him become Pro-British in the political field and unfeeling father who only shows up in the early chapters and dies off stage in the third book. Bent is different. He is not really someone to relate to and the "Luke, I am your father" moment doesn't happen here, not to the same degree. Besides, the man doesn't claim him as his son, which is the only thing to make Bent sympathetic as he is resentful. I was born in wedlock, which is why it is beyond me, and since I haven't fathered a child, yet, the whole business novel to me. Bent got the last name from the Bent family, which is said to be farming one from Ohio (and he took pride in the state in the first book) where the husband spent most of the time away from the house while the wife was said to be quite a family woman. She would visit her relatives and drag him along, or lecture him on the scripture reading each day. She even whipped him till he bled just for catching him in the act of masturbation (in this time, people still considered it a grave disorder and they told tales on how it can lead to blindness, baldness, and even effeminism in boys). Bent was also seduced by a homosexual (or bisexual, the text didn't say) man before going to the academy, to which his father secured his appointment, which was about the only good thing he ever did to Bent. And, of course, he overate and got fat in a time when most farmers were thin.
Such is the history of Bent. During the course of this book, Bent does try to weasel out of the War, which is enough to keep one from sympathizing with him. I will add that not everyone in the US got to fight in Virginia or Tennessee, given how big the armies were. In fact, there were plenty of those boys in blue who got deployed in the West instead, some sent on guard duty at some supply post in the rear, and some put in the forts around Washington. The reason for that is things happened while the Civil War was on going: the Sioux made an uprising that was put down in 1862, another conflict with the Native Americans erupted in Colorado, which included the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864, California was still being settled and order was necessary, Confederate raiders were loose in Kentucky and Missouri, as well as Kansas, and there was a moment where the US almost went to war with Great Britain from the Trent Affair. The US didn't send everyone to fight the main armies of the Confederacy, just like it didn't send everyone to face the Nazis and the Japanese. Common sense is the key. So, Bent might try to apply to have a change in orders and not wind up in Kentucky. This doesn't work out and eventually takes on a moment in Shiloh. Still, even the War doesn't reform the man.
Bent, Ashton, and Virgilia are three of the villains in Love and War. Virgilia comes in with her radical support of Abolitionism which gives her a black and white morality of her own. She sees all Southerners as evil and must be killed. To a point, she actually lets a wounded soldier die of his wounds in one scene as a nurse. This action is enough to make one want her removed as a nurse, who is expected to tend to any in need. Bent remains evil with his vendetta. Then there is Ashton who, with her husband and a group of lovers, is taking part in an operation to undermine the Confederacy. If there is one problem with such characters as villains in historical fiction it's that it often distracts from the tragedy in the historical sense. Logically, Jakes could have had his fictional villains retire or have both sides settle their differences to fight the War and then it resumes in the third book. Of course, this doesn't happen.
The reason it would seem that they distract is many points in history brings its own heroes and villains, that often are more developed than anything character of fiction. The Civil War has a legion of such men and women, and it was something Shelby Foote used to his advantage in his narrative. In a way, Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis were the two protagonists of the drama, along with the generals, none of whom could be considered bad guys but simply men who were doing their jobs (though it is easy to see Sherman, Forrest, Sheridan, and Quantrill in a villainous light, they each were fighting a war and had their ideas on how to win it). Davis and Lincoln wouldn't be the ultimate villains either, being that they were committed men in their causes. They were simply men who were called to duty as president of their respected sides and they answered with reluctance, especially as fate dealt them a situation no one would ever want: a war that tears families and friends asunder. If there were any who could be considered the bad guys in the narrative, it would be the people who either took steps to prolong the War's conclusion or hampered with the war effort. Jakes even points this out in his afterward, Governor Brown and Vance of Georgia and North Carolina opposed President Davis the way the Copperheads did to Lincoln and withheld everything from the Confederate military in the name of States' Rights (ironic that Southerners will spout off States' Rights as the chief cause of the Civil War and yet a group of Southerners undermined the Southern effort in the name of it). The said Copperheads were Northern Democrats who were simply protesting for the sake of liberty even as the man best known to freeing the slaves was curtailing civil liberties in a time of war. In short, history provides a not so black and white issue with heroes and villains, because often the villains might be doing the morally right thing or the heroes are, and vice versa.
Fiction does provide freedom to use that black and white morality, as long as its not abused. Jakes, sadly, abuses it. He does show the opposition to Davis, and then has his villains take part in a conspiracy to form another Confederacy. There is also a subplot added to attempt to have him assassinated, which is foiled by Orry. For any who feels the Confederacy has no moral ground to stand on, the villains in the book could easily be rooted for as opposed to being what they are: saboteurs. At the same time, if the villains prove to be more evil than the historic characters it kind of downgrades the evil of the latter. This is one of the things that wasn't brought up with Titanic, but having Tim Curry's character as a villain does what the villains of Cameron's blockbuster does and distracts from the tragedy by adding in a villain to it, especially one who doesn't even have a hand in it. The same if there was World War II being done to where you have someone more evil than Hitler in Germany, and suddenly the Holocaust seems tame. With this instance in the Civil War, having opposing sides voiced is okay, but not in the way that Jakes does.
It's especially note worthy that he doesn't go into details on slavery other than to say it's wrong. I won't do what some liberal blogger would do and claim Jakes' whiteness has something to do with it. Slavery is basically the sun that many other causes orbit around in the solar system model that led to the outbreak of the Civil War, though it doesn't make it the one and only cause any more than a solar system is the sun alone. Either way, the moral debates on slavery, begun some in the first book, doesn't get into detail in book two. There doesn't seem to be a black character involved with relatives he would like to free. Jakes instead focuses on the tragedy with friends and relatives killing each other, which is the tragic event in this war, but it seems freedom and slavery must be side lined. Again, the use of the fictional villains has distracted the reader from this and we don't get to see much of slaves being eyed when the Emancipation Proclamation arrived, the debate of arming slaves being skirted and shot down with one or two words, or Forrest's supposed cold blooded massacre of black Union soldiers at Fort Pillow, any one of which he could have had his bad guys take on. Yet, he does not. Instead, the villains are men and women of selfish ends who seek to make the South actually lose, or make it hard for the Union to be restored while committing actions that any with a heart would consider a war crime if they are Northern. The villains Jakes had had their place in book one, but book two is where they should have retired in the wings and allow history to happen on its own, given the way it was planned.
So, do they get their comeuppance? James Huntoon and his wife are led to Texas in the later stages of the War and basically get lost in the desert. They have basically become their own Lucifers who chose to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven. Of course, Huntoon is killed during his time. Ashton, his widow, finds out that because she withheld sex from him he will withhold everything entitled to her after death. Basically, it's a battle of entitled sexes: the man doesn't get have sex with his wife went he wants it, than the woman doesn't get anything of his when he is gone. Now, I am sure she has a right withhold her body and access to it, just as he has the right to remove her from the will. So, it would be tedious to start a debate on sexism from this. Bent disappears after a few attempts to take his revenge on Orry. Virgilia does the surprising move and begins to reform, especially after hearing from Brett of Madeline being one eighth black. At the same time, there is a death among the good guys. Cooper doesn't go down with the submarine, Hunley, which saved his life as it sunk after striking her only victim. Yet, Orry is killed in a scuffle late in the book, leaving Mont Royal and Madeline for all to claim.
What of Charles? Charles encounters a girl named Augusta and they get married and have a child named Charles Augusta. At the end of the book, Charles vows to raise the boy as an American. In the meantime, the War eventually ends with the events that are recited as legendary to all Americans: Robert E. Lee surrenders to Grant at Appomattox, President Lincoln is assassinated at Ford's Theater, and Jefferson Davis is captured. With the Civil War ending and the Confederacy falling, it would seem that there is nothing else to look forward to except the Reconstruction. A much better term would be Reconciliation, since now it is the time to reach across and attempt to restore what was lost while enjoying something that is won. That is basically what leads to the third installment in John Jakes' North and South Trilogy: Heaven and Hell.
One thing that is brought to Jakes' attention in the Afterword for the next installment is the common appearances of horses in the trilogy. The horses stand for chivalry, which comes from the Latin word for horse. Of course, the gritty realism of the modern war in this story makes a remarkable contrast to the horse. Take the submarine Hunley. Submarines are machines and thus can be considered unfeeling, especially as it attacks from under the water where conventional ships are above the water (on equal terms). With the representation of a machine with the horses, you can see how anachronistic chivalry becomes in modern war. Might work better if we have more chivalrous characters, but I am willing to bet that George, Orry, Billy, and Charles are the knights in this retelling of the Medieval story, with the modern fair ladies in the picture, the politicians in place of a wicked aristocrat, and the black slaves being the modern serfs. Of course, many other stock characters in such a drama are missing.
In fact, the clash between the unfeeling and inequality of the machine aged war with the chivalry of a pre-enlighted period as illustrated by the horse is prominent even in Love and War. I mentioned how the characters are hard to relate to and the scenes are soap opera styled, in the end it doesn't really matter when reading this book because we don't really get in to the characters or how accurate the picture is, something Jakes tries to strive for. It is the image of George recovering a meteorite and making plans on exploiting this rare phenomena for a person profit; it is the desperate horse ride of Charles and his squadron as they race against time to join up with Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, not knowing that the Confederates were actually winning at Gettysburg at this point; it is Cooper missing out the maiden attack of the Hunley and having a survivor's guilt; it is Billy's experience in the prison camp with the tortures of Corporal Vesey coming upon him like the Inquisition's torture on a heretic, and Charles willing to go to great lengths to rescue his old friend from that; all of these show this clash and I would expect the miniseries to at least try to give those scenes their proper justice.
Another I will bring up is that masculinity is a theme recurrent in John Jakes, as evidenced of it in the North and South Trilogy and Kent Family Series. John Jakes has the motif of that manliness in having egotistical male characters dominate the landscape and are often sociapathic, if not psychotic. Almost every Jakes book to my knowledge has this exemplified with violence where in almost every couple of pages the men get into a brawl, which result with one character kneeing or kicking another in the groin and then beating the guy up, sometimes one gets kneed and the other gets beaten up. In short, one reading Jakes is reading constantly about a bunch of men kicking each other's asses, to put it vulgarly. In Jakes' world, there are two kinds of men; those who are ready to fight with a fist and those who are merely there to provoke. In North and South, the entire trilogy opens with a man and a boy poised for conflict and the man is just pushing the boy toward it. Orry and George's introduction is the same way with Orry facing off with the Stevedore and two men who turn out to be robbers. Forbes LaMotte is even shown beating up a tourist in Charleston who was just opinionated. The same in the sequel with some of it directed to the fighting in the War. Basically, John Jakes defines being a man as having the ability to switch punches at everyone, even women and children, smoke, cuss, and fornicate. It's an animalistic definition at best -- he also admits to not trying the kind of dialogue people would have spoken in 1860s. People might not speak it either, but it really is anachronistic to have people in the period talk like people from the 1970s. Also, it matches to the clash of chivalry with the inhuman modern war where we see men hitting women and children in his books.
The Catch-22 with the equality of the sexes is it permits men to hit women in anyway they like, while making the kick to the groin less of dirty fighting, but making a rule for men and women to not fight each other means there is a superior and inferior sex. That seems to be what Jakes is saying in this kind of characteristic style, as North and South and Love and War have shown. The irony is chivalry does promote equality by making sure two men fighting each other don't get the upper hand over the other. As a result, never have the strong pitted against the weak; either strong against strong and weak against weak. However, to some, if we are to be really have true equality we have to get rid of the phrase that "real men don't beat women", as it falls under the definition of "No true Scotsman" fallacy and it ignores situations where self defense is necessary (there is such thing as a female mugger) while redefining the word "abuse". The problem with using Jakes as an example is he still relies on what is referred to as "gender stereotypes" where men are violent and animal like while women are seductive and mischievous, and Love and War does this on plenty of occasions. This is only for start, to get really deep would take too much in this entry. Best save it for another entry. I will add that John Jakes does fall under what feminists would call "poisonous masculinity".
Back to the book, Love and War is a massive entry to the trilogy and covers the War in one volume, which is more than what Jeff Shaaras can say. It might seem to be easier if Jakes split the whole thing into two books, given the amount of incidents that happen, but that can't be changed. It's set in stone now. Sure, at over 1000 pages, it seems a hard stretch, but there are thicker novels. It does feel tedious that Jakes takes twenty of the 147 chapters before we are out of July 1861 and the discussions of the generals might only interest a Civil War bluff, but the scenes described are worth it and so do the morphing of the characters. Rather or not it can equal such classics like Absolem! Absolem!, Gone With the Wind, or Jubilee is highly debatable.
The Mains are now in the Confederacy while the Hazards stayed in the Union, with only Billy and Brett as the binding tie. Given the size of the novel, it would be too much to go too deep, especially as the first book revealed that Jakes puts too many incidental events within the confines of 800 pages that summarizing it is a Herculean task. It would have worked if it was done as a chapter by chapter analysis, but the hand is on the plow now and I cannot look back. So, to get back to this, the basic way to summarize it is Orry and Madeline live together at Mont Royal, basically getting Madeline divorced from Justin so they could wed; Billy and Brett are married with the latter living among the Northerners, becoming the symbolic Pro-Union Southerner without the sentiment; Ashton and James Huntoon became part of a web of deceit with one taking on adulterous affairs with another man while James takes part in a secret, and treasonous, conspiracy to undermine President Davis; Charles rides in the Confederate cavalry, even taking part of Gettysburg under J.E.B. Stuart; Cooper becomes part of the operation involving the CSS Hunley, an experimental submarine; Billy also rides in the US cavalry and even winds up in Andersonville prison camp; Bent returns for development and even takes part in Sherman's March to the Sea; George becomes at odds with Stanley again over Washington politics. That's the gist of the story.
During the course of Jakes' door stopping sequel, the characters witness it all: the opening maneuvers, First Manassas, Antietam, Fredericksburg, the Emancipation Proclamation, the first draft in American history, the blockade runners, the rise of Generals Lee and Grant, and the climatic surrender of the former at Appomattox. I do no believe the miniseries that was produced on both books has done any of the moments their proper justice.
Things noteworthy are to be brought up. For one, James Huntoon goes from the bully lawyer that we love to see gotten rid of to a more sympathetic character, as Ashton cheats on him for the sake of power in Richmond society. The narration does it more in making her seemingly unsatisfied with his performance, which includes going to penis sizes. While obesity may be linked to shrinkage lately, it's a fact that size doesn't really matter. Anyone can tell you that. Of course, Jakes goes to where many popular writers, romance novelists, and erotica authors tend to do and make bigger penises the desired item for men. It's something that ads have plagued the internet on for a bunch drugs that are supposed to make one bigger down there and yet it's all a scam (and caused the plastic surgery industry to boom with that, also). So, this makes Ashton more sinister than in the previous book. All she cares about is having a place in Richmond society. Since women can't get that that place on their own, she needs a man to put her there. Since her husband is not the man for the job, she seeks out others and gives them sexual favors. In fact, the narration claims she gives these favors just to get what she wants. In short, to women like Ashton men are nothing but tools for personal gain. I know some women like her exist, and some existed in the 1860s, but that doesn't make them the rule.
Bent returns to largely plague the heroes, even those who stayed in the Union. However, he becomes less of a cartoon villain than in the first book. He is not really a Bent, as it turns out, but the son of a Starkwether, who fathered him out of wed lock. John Jakes had started his Kent Series with The Bastard where the title character was spawned from the House of Kents, to which he took the name upon coming to America. Though just as black hearted as North and South's characters, Philip Kent is the relatable protagonist in the first two books, seeing the rebellion of the United States against Britain and proves a useful asset. Of course, Jakes later had him become Pro-British in the political field and unfeeling father who only shows up in the early chapters and dies off stage in the third book. Bent is different. He is not really someone to relate to and the "Luke, I am your father" moment doesn't happen here, not to the same degree. Besides, the man doesn't claim him as his son, which is the only thing to make Bent sympathetic as he is resentful. I was born in wedlock, which is why it is beyond me, and since I haven't fathered a child, yet, the whole business novel to me. Bent got the last name from the Bent family, which is said to be farming one from Ohio (and he took pride in the state in the first book) where the husband spent most of the time away from the house while the wife was said to be quite a family woman. She would visit her relatives and drag him along, or lecture him on the scripture reading each day. She even whipped him till he bled just for catching him in the act of masturbation (in this time, people still considered it a grave disorder and they told tales on how it can lead to blindness, baldness, and even effeminism in boys). Bent was also seduced by a homosexual (or bisexual, the text didn't say) man before going to the academy, to which his father secured his appointment, which was about the only good thing he ever did to Bent. And, of course, he overate and got fat in a time when most farmers were thin.
Such is the history of Bent. During the course of this book, Bent does try to weasel out of the War, which is enough to keep one from sympathizing with him. I will add that not everyone in the US got to fight in Virginia or Tennessee, given how big the armies were. In fact, there were plenty of those boys in blue who got deployed in the West instead, some sent on guard duty at some supply post in the rear, and some put in the forts around Washington. The reason for that is things happened while the Civil War was on going: the Sioux made an uprising that was put down in 1862, another conflict with the Native Americans erupted in Colorado, which included the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864, California was still being settled and order was necessary, Confederate raiders were loose in Kentucky and Missouri, as well as Kansas, and there was a moment where the US almost went to war with Great Britain from the Trent Affair. The US didn't send everyone to fight the main armies of the Confederacy, just like it didn't send everyone to face the Nazis and the Japanese. Common sense is the key. So, Bent might try to apply to have a change in orders and not wind up in Kentucky. This doesn't work out and eventually takes on a moment in Shiloh. Still, even the War doesn't reform the man.
Bent, Ashton, and Virgilia are three of the villains in Love and War. Virgilia comes in with her radical support of Abolitionism which gives her a black and white morality of her own. She sees all Southerners as evil and must be killed. To a point, she actually lets a wounded soldier die of his wounds in one scene as a nurse. This action is enough to make one want her removed as a nurse, who is expected to tend to any in need. Bent remains evil with his vendetta. Then there is Ashton who, with her husband and a group of lovers, is taking part in an operation to undermine the Confederacy. If there is one problem with such characters as villains in historical fiction it's that it often distracts from the tragedy in the historical sense. Logically, Jakes could have had his fictional villains retire or have both sides settle their differences to fight the War and then it resumes in the third book. Of course, this doesn't happen.
The reason it would seem that they distract is many points in history brings its own heroes and villains, that often are more developed than anything character of fiction. The Civil War has a legion of such men and women, and it was something Shelby Foote used to his advantage in his narrative. In a way, Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis were the two protagonists of the drama, along with the generals, none of whom could be considered bad guys but simply men who were doing their jobs (though it is easy to see Sherman, Forrest, Sheridan, and Quantrill in a villainous light, they each were fighting a war and had their ideas on how to win it). Davis and Lincoln wouldn't be the ultimate villains either, being that they were committed men in their causes. They were simply men who were called to duty as president of their respected sides and they answered with reluctance, especially as fate dealt them a situation no one would ever want: a war that tears families and friends asunder. If there were any who could be considered the bad guys in the narrative, it would be the people who either took steps to prolong the War's conclusion or hampered with the war effort. Jakes even points this out in his afterward, Governor Brown and Vance of Georgia and North Carolina opposed President Davis the way the Copperheads did to Lincoln and withheld everything from the Confederate military in the name of States' Rights (ironic that Southerners will spout off States' Rights as the chief cause of the Civil War and yet a group of Southerners undermined the Southern effort in the name of it). The said Copperheads were Northern Democrats who were simply protesting for the sake of liberty even as the man best known to freeing the slaves was curtailing civil liberties in a time of war. In short, history provides a not so black and white issue with heroes and villains, because often the villains might be doing the morally right thing or the heroes are, and vice versa.
Fiction does provide freedom to use that black and white morality, as long as its not abused. Jakes, sadly, abuses it. He does show the opposition to Davis, and then has his villains take part in a conspiracy to form another Confederacy. There is also a subplot added to attempt to have him assassinated, which is foiled by Orry. For any who feels the Confederacy has no moral ground to stand on, the villains in the book could easily be rooted for as opposed to being what they are: saboteurs. At the same time, if the villains prove to be more evil than the historic characters it kind of downgrades the evil of the latter. This is one of the things that wasn't brought up with Titanic, but having Tim Curry's character as a villain does what the villains of Cameron's blockbuster does and distracts from the tragedy by adding in a villain to it, especially one who doesn't even have a hand in it. The same if there was World War II being done to where you have someone more evil than Hitler in Germany, and suddenly the Holocaust seems tame. With this instance in the Civil War, having opposing sides voiced is okay, but not in the way that Jakes does.
It's especially note worthy that he doesn't go into details on slavery other than to say it's wrong. I won't do what some liberal blogger would do and claim Jakes' whiteness has something to do with it. Slavery is basically the sun that many other causes orbit around in the solar system model that led to the outbreak of the Civil War, though it doesn't make it the one and only cause any more than a solar system is the sun alone. Either way, the moral debates on slavery, begun some in the first book, doesn't get into detail in book two. There doesn't seem to be a black character involved with relatives he would like to free. Jakes instead focuses on the tragedy with friends and relatives killing each other, which is the tragic event in this war, but it seems freedom and slavery must be side lined. Again, the use of the fictional villains has distracted the reader from this and we don't get to see much of slaves being eyed when the Emancipation Proclamation arrived, the debate of arming slaves being skirted and shot down with one or two words, or Forrest's supposed cold blooded massacre of black Union soldiers at Fort Pillow, any one of which he could have had his bad guys take on. Yet, he does not. Instead, the villains are men and women of selfish ends who seek to make the South actually lose, or make it hard for the Union to be restored while committing actions that any with a heart would consider a war crime if they are Northern. The villains Jakes had had their place in book one, but book two is where they should have retired in the wings and allow history to happen on its own, given the way it was planned.
So, do they get their comeuppance? James Huntoon and his wife are led to Texas in the later stages of the War and basically get lost in the desert. They have basically become their own Lucifers who chose to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven. Of course, Huntoon is killed during his time. Ashton, his widow, finds out that because she withheld sex from him he will withhold everything entitled to her after death. Basically, it's a battle of entitled sexes: the man doesn't get have sex with his wife went he wants it, than the woman doesn't get anything of his when he is gone. Now, I am sure she has a right withhold her body and access to it, just as he has the right to remove her from the will. So, it would be tedious to start a debate on sexism from this. Bent disappears after a few attempts to take his revenge on Orry. Virgilia does the surprising move and begins to reform, especially after hearing from Brett of Madeline being one eighth black. At the same time, there is a death among the good guys. Cooper doesn't go down with the submarine, Hunley, which saved his life as it sunk after striking her only victim. Yet, Orry is killed in a scuffle late in the book, leaving Mont Royal and Madeline for all to claim.
What of Charles? Charles encounters a girl named Augusta and they get married and have a child named Charles Augusta. At the end of the book, Charles vows to raise the boy as an American. In the meantime, the War eventually ends with the events that are recited as legendary to all Americans: Robert E. Lee surrenders to Grant at Appomattox, President Lincoln is assassinated at Ford's Theater, and Jefferson Davis is captured. With the Civil War ending and the Confederacy falling, it would seem that there is nothing else to look forward to except the Reconstruction. A much better term would be Reconciliation, since now it is the time to reach across and attempt to restore what was lost while enjoying something that is won. That is basically what leads to the third installment in John Jakes' North and South Trilogy: Heaven and Hell.
One thing that is brought to Jakes' attention in the Afterword for the next installment is the common appearances of horses in the trilogy. The horses stand for chivalry, which comes from the Latin word for horse. Of course, the gritty realism of the modern war in this story makes a remarkable contrast to the horse. Take the submarine Hunley. Submarines are machines and thus can be considered unfeeling, especially as it attacks from under the water where conventional ships are above the water (on equal terms). With the representation of a machine with the horses, you can see how anachronistic chivalry becomes in modern war. Might work better if we have more chivalrous characters, but I am willing to bet that George, Orry, Billy, and Charles are the knights in this retelling of the Medieval story, with the modern fair ladies in the picture, the politicians in place of a wicked aristocrat, and the black slaves being the modern serfs. Of course, many other stock characters in such a drama are missing.
In fact, the clash between the unfeeling and inequality of the machine aged war with the chivalry of a pre-enlighted period as illustrated by the horse is prominent even in Love and War. I mentioned how the characters are hard to relate to and the scenes are soap opera styled, in the end it doesn't really matter when reading this book because we don't really get in to the characters or how accurate the picture is, something Jakes tries to strive for. It is the image of George recovering a meteorite and making plans on exploiting this rare phenomena for a person profit; it is the desperate horse ride of Charles and his squadron as they race against time to join up with Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, not knowing that the Confederates were actually winning at Gettysburg at this point; it is Cooper missing out the maiden attack of the Hunley and having a survivor's guilt; it is Billy's experience in the prison camp with the tortures of Corporal Vesey coming upon him like the Inquisition's torture on a heretic, and Charles willing to go to great lengths to rescue his old friend from that; all of these show this clash and I would expect the miniseries to at least try to give those scenes their proper justice.
Another I will bring up is that masculinity is a theme recurrent in John Jakes, as evidenced of it in the North and South Trilogy and Kent Family Series. John Jakes has the motif of that manliness in having egotistical male characters dominate the landscape and are often sociapathic, if not psychotic. Almost every Jakes book to my knowledge has this exemplified with violence where in almost every couple of pages the men get into a brawl, which result with one character kneeing or kicking another in the groin and then beating the guy up, sometimes one gets kneed and the other gets beaten up. In short, one reading Jakes is reading constantly about a bunch of men kicking each other's asses, to put it vulgarly. In Jakes' world, there are two kinds of men; those who are ready to fight with a fist and those who are merely there to provoke. In North and South, the entire trilogy opens with a man and a boy poised for conflict and the man is just pushing the boy toward it. Orry and George's introduction is the same way with Orry facing off with the Stevedore and two men who turn out to be robbers. Forbes LaMotte is even shown beating up a tourist in Charleston who was just opinionated. The same in the sequel with some of it directed to the fighting in the War. Basically, John Jakes defines being a man as having the ability to switch punches at everyone, even women and children, smoke, cuss, and fornicate. It's an animalistic definition at best -- he also admits to not trying the kind of dialogue people would have spoken in 1860s. People might not speak it either, but it really is anachronistic to have people in the period talk like people from the 1970s. Also, it matches to the clash of chivalry with the inhuman modern war where we see men hitting women and children in his books.
The Catch-22 with the equality of the sexes is it permits men to hit women in anyway they like, while making the kick to the groin less of dirty fighting, but making a rule for men and women to not fight each other means there is a superior and inferior sex. That seems to be what Jakes is saying in this kind of characteristic style, as North and South and Love and War have shown. The irony is chivalry does promote equality by making sure two men fighting each other don't get the upper hand over the other. As a result, never have the strong pitted against the weak; either strong against strong and weak against weak. However, to some, if we are to be really have true equality we have to get rid of the phrase that "real men don't beat women", as it falls under the definition of "No true Scotsman" fallacy and it ignores situations where self defense is necessary (there is such thing as a female mugger) while redefining the word "abuse". The problem with using Jakes as an example is he still relies on what is referred to as "gender stereotypes" where men are violent and animal like while women are seductive and mischievous, and Love and War does this on plenty of occasions. This is only for start, to get really deep would take too much in this entry. Best save it for another entry. I will add that John Jakes does fall under what feminists would call "poisonous masculinity".
Back to the book, Love and War is a massive entry to the trilogy and covers the War in one volume, which is more than what Jeff Shaaras can say. It might seem to be easier if Jakes split the whole thing into two books, given the amount of incidents that happen, but that can't be changed. It's set in stone now. Sure, at over 1000 pages, it seems a hard stretch, but there are thicker novels. It does feel tedious that Jakes takes twenty of the 147 chapters before we are out of July 1861 and the discussions of the generals might only interest a Civil War bluff, but the scenes described are worth it and so do the morphing of the characters. Rather or not it can equal such classics like Absolem! Absolem!, Gone With the Wind, or Jubilee is highly debatable.
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