Preserving What Works

Demagoguery. Tyranny. War. Pandemic. Famine. Gun violence. Climate change. Terrorism. Nuclear threats. Racism. Repression. The dreary parade of the world’s woes marches on, even in an era of relative prosperity, galloping technological advancement, astonishing medical breakthroughs, breathtaking cultural richness. No wonder Michael R. J. Bonner opens his new book, In Defense of Civilization, with the saddest sentence of this publishing season: “Human hist­ory is largely a record of failure.”

Fortunately, by the second page comes something of a salve, which suggests that plowing further into this little volume may be heartening: “But our reflections should not be confined to the melancholy contemplation of disaster and destruction.” Whew. What a relief. History is — like medical procedures that heal tissues and organs and restore functions injured due to age or illness — regenerative. Things fall apart, the poet tells us. But Bonner tells us that the centre...