Reading the Usual Suspects' "Serenity" thread later this week reminded me I finished listening to this book. There I read that Michael Shaara's Pulitzer-winning novel inspired Joss Whedon to write "Firefly," down to Jubal Early being a character's name. Heroism, romance, and mythology fuel the battle narrative, and also make this an excellent companion piece for the Deptford trilogy, in whose characters these themes seethe.
The narrator does a splendid job with Maine and Virginia accents. I wouldn't say I came away from the novel with a perfect understanding of the tactics and decisions of Gettysburg, but I do understand the personalities of the major players.
Also, I learned that the phrase "the bubble reputation," which is the title of a novel by Kathie Pelletier (an author of little prominence but whom I met at a booksigning), is from Shakespeare. If Pelletier gives the quote from "The Seven Ages of Man" in an epigram, I didn't notice. So when Longstreet contemplates it, I had a pleasant shiver.
Sgt. Malcolm Reynolds says, in the "Firefly" pilot, that they can't die because they are so very pretty. It hadn't occurred to me to link the two texts (can a complete television series be a text? I'll say yes), and now linking them is probably irreverently heretical, but that's Robert E. Lee, a mythologized, romantic hero to both sides, and the idea that valor can hold its own against any opponent.