SOURCE: Sheehan, James J. Review of On Looking into the Abyss, by Gertrude Himmelfarb. American Historical Review 100, no. 2 (April 1995): 483-84.

In the following review, Sheehan provides a brief gloss on each of the seven essays collected in On Looking into the Abyss. Sheehan asserts that Himmelfarb's arguments are not persuasive, and that she distorts the views of those whom she opposes.

This book by Gertrude Himmelfarb [On Looking into the Abyss: Untimely Thoughts on Culture and Society] consists of seven essays that began as lectures and occasional pieces; all have been published before. As is common in collections of this sort, the essays vary in subject matter and weight. “Where Have All the Footnotes Gone?”, which the author describes as a jeu d'esprit, laments the decline of the footnote in scholarly publications. (The footnote, I must say, is not an endangered species in most of the books I...