The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald -- 17 February 1998
by Robert A. Caro
This book is epic. Yet, the reader may find its subject such a heinous individual, that one may have to regularly put down the book and read something else. That subject is Robert Moses, who dominated public works construction in New York from 1926 to 1968. His incredible dominance over mayors and governors, reflected a deftness with playing powerful and wealthy people off of eachother. Moses created for himself, from the roots of his involvement with government reform and public park development, an incredibly powerful position, leaving him solely in charge of parks, highways and housing construction in the city and state of New York. At one point, he held twelve separate positions, and held them strongly by surrounding himself with a coterie of yes-men. His power was such that he openly laughed at public rancor over his neighborhood-destroying projects. His arrogance and taste for revenge seem to have been unquenchable. Though responsible for turning New York's transit system into one largely dependent on the automobile, pushing through hundreds of miles of highways and expressways, he is also responsible for dozens of other projects that are monuments in that city today. The fact that he offered his resignation in anger dozens of times in his career, only to have it waved off and his wishes appeased, also shows his power play against mayors who supposedly had power over him. His amazing ability to secure this power, immune to public scrutiny or removal from office as head of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority, is disturbing. Much of his policy is blamed for many of the urban problems that plague New York today.
The book is densely packed with a catalog of Moses's confrontations and disturbing victories. It is written, though, in an often cumbersome style, with some awkward literary structure. Still, at 1162 pages, this book is a daunting must-read for anyone interested in how big cities get big projects built, and for anyone who claims to know anything about 20th century politics New York.
(For this work, Caro was awarded the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for biography.)