Cleopatra's Nose: Essays On the Unexpected

Be it stipulated that Daniel Boorstin, the distinguished Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and Librarian of Congress Emeritus, has never written a bad sentence. But he has certainly turned out his share of polite ceremonial prose, altogether too much of which has found its way into this meticulous, but largely uninspired collection of essays. Consisting mostly of prefaces, introductions, lectures, and keynote addresses, Cleopatra's Nose: Essays On the Unexpected deals with topics Boorstin has written about more persuasively in books like The Discoverers and The Americans: the history of science, the progress (and necessity) of intellectual freedom, and the genius of the Founding Fathers. For all Boorstin's erudition, too much of it reads like the Reader's Digest version of a book by Stephen Jay Gould. A fine exception is ''My Father, Lawyer Sam Boorstin,'' a telling and affectionate memoir of the unassuming Tulsa attorney who did so much to shape his brilliant son's intellect and heart. B--Gene Lyons