JFK: Up Close and Personal, Again

WE HAVE ALL heard the story. From this author we have already heard it twice before, in Portrait of a Presidency and Death of a President. In One Brief Shining Moment, a series of personal recollections of Kennedy, Manchester returns to tell the tale again. His latest work is an attempt to recreate the past, to transport the reader back through the misty timewarp of memory. "If I have been successful," writes Manchester in his preface, "you should feel not only that these events happened, but that they are happening as your eye roves down the page, and that you--not the author or any other source--are really there." But for those of us who were never there, Manchester's book only reinforces our knowledge that we weren't, and makes us sorry for the author that he can't go back and stay.

The incidents and anecdotes range from Kennedy's childhood to his first campaign, through his presidency and his assassination in 1963. From Harvard to Hyannis Port to the Oval Office, Manchester drops us right into the middle of the arena, whether it be the family football game or Kennedy's funeral procession, Manchester's main device is to remove any reference to his sources--obstacles which would ostensibly remind the reader that he's still here. Sometimes Manchester dons the traditional cloaks of anonimity ("The President told a friend..."; "The President said privately..."), but more common is his use of the second person: "As you alighted from the congressman-elect's convertible you thought that Hyannis Port must by an ideal place for relaxation. You couldn't have been farther wrong."

The "you" could be a presidential aide, or Arthur Schlesinger, or any of the 150 people that Manchester has interviewed. But more often than not it is Manchester himself "When Jackie asked you to write an account of the President's last days and funeral...your literary agent, who was rightly regarded as the best in his craft, predicted that by then the public would have lost interest in Jack." Unnamed all the sources becomes Manchester, until the author's presence in the book becomes unbearable. Photos of Mrs. Kennedy reading Portrait of a Presidency do not help the situation very much.

More satisfying moments are the unimportant ones where Manchester's presence or feelings are irrelevant--little bits of information, like the fact that Kennedy borrowed taxi-fare from everyone and anyone during his early campaigns, or that he enjoyed (and warped) his books most when reading them in the bathtub. More politically controversial subjects, on the other hand, seem out of place here; Manchester brushes over them in his desire to blame no one. Yes, Kennedy sent troops into the Bay of Pigs, but military advisors had misled him; and he sent more to Vietnam, but planned to recall them by 1965. Even more disturbing, however, are the intensely personal moments Manchester forces us to share, such as Kennedy's reaction to the death of his infant son Patrick. These seem like intrusions on sacred ground, and leave one with the embarrassment of an unwilling voyeur.

In his final pages, Manchester turns to the transformation from Kennedy to Camelot; again, he tells us that if we had been there this is what we would have felt. After all his attempts to recreate the past, though, all that remains of Kennedy is "the receptacle of the wishful longings of the world." Perhaps this is Manchester's admission that history cannot be recreated. But he seems to hope that it can be repeated. Or that at least he can convince us that the shining moments took place. Cristine A. Mesch