BOOKS
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cation reveals how mechanization, or at least a particular pattern
of its development, raised the level of control through systemiza–
tion. All of these dimensions-and others-of his notion of in–
corporation converge in the Chicago World's Fair, the subject of
what already is Trachtenberg's strongest chapter.
That Trachtenberg failed to reap the full benefits of his
theme can be traced to his-and perhaps the discipline's–
unpreparedness for such synthesis as he attempted. I certainly do
not want to discourage synthesis and large interpretation; noth–
ing is more needed in the profession at this moment. But some
things cannot be done simply because they ought to be or need to
be . Since the collapse of the progressive synthesis, American his–
torians have lacked a compelling image of the past. With that
synthesis first challenged by the so-called consensus historians
and more recently and importantly by the proliferating and rich
literature emphasizing regional, racial, ethnic, class, and gender
differences in the American experience, historians have struggled
without success for a conceptualization of the past that is re–
sponsive to the complexity of the past yet compelling as narra–
tive interpretation. Trachtenberg lacked the means for what he
auempted, and he failed to write a good book. He almost cer–
tainly would have written a better book had he stuck closer to the
mode of his previous one and the pattern of those rather success–
ful works I mentioned at the outset. But such advice is, perhaps,
at once unfair to Trachtenberg and self-defeating to all of us. He
had the courage to attempt what everyone else has eschewed.
And even his fail ure forces us to confront crucial historiographi–
cal problems that have paralyzed most of us.
THOMAS BENDER
ANTI-INFLATIONARY FICTION
ETERNAL CURSE ON THE READER OF THESE PAGES.
By
Manuel
Pulg.
Random House. $13.50.
AUNT JULIA AND THE SCRIPTWRITER.
By
Marlo Vargas lIosa.
Translated by Helen R. Lane. Farrar, Straus,
&
Giroux. $16.50.
By the mid-seventies, when the so-called boom in
Latin American fiction finally echoed in the United States,
