Doctor Scratch wrote:You can still read fairly recent posts on MAD---posts written by highly respected and prominent Mopologists which strongly advise TBMs that Quinn's writing is "untrustworthy." Every possible effort has been made to undermine and discredit him.
Well, this has become the group speak, hasn't it? Every group has a "group speak," which reflects the interests of the group far more than it reflects reality. And frankly, the faithful scholars' view of Mike Quinn is tainted by his excommunicant status and the kind of smear that equates his work with Hofmann's forgeries (even if it is mixed with some reasonable criticism).
And what exactly qualifies as real good Mormon history these days? My impression is that even those things that are vaunted as landmark works are often tedious, over-bloated, dry, agenda-driven, etc. Bushman's biography is a fine collection of facts and arguments that when added together leech all remaining traces of protein out of Joseph Smith's corpse... and I really like this guy a lot. I think he is a first rate historian. Quinn's books are a chore to slog through. One of the problems these guys get caught up in is that they know exactly what they are facing in their hyper-exacting critics... and so they write on the defensive, piling on every last bit of evidence in the hopes of keeping the levees firm against the tidal-wave onslaught of nitpicking.
Yes, these guys may be good historians, but they are all a pretty poor lot when it comes to writing books.
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