A Time for Heroes.

• Author: Lawlor, Bruce M.
• Position: DIRECTOR LIBRARY - Book Review

A Time for Heroes

By Robert L. Dilenschneider

Published by Phoenix Press, Beverly Hills, Calif., 244 pages, $24.95

ROBERT DILENSCHNEIDER wants us to think about what it means to be a hero. In his latest book, A Time for Heroes, he sets out to explore the idea through the eyes of contemporary leaders.

If you are interested in who the heroes are of Senators Lamar Alexander and Orrin Hatch, former Presidential candidate Steve Forbes, former Deputy Secretary of Defense John Hamre, and other notables, and why these individuals chose to admire the people they do, it is all here in A Time for Heroes.

The book is an enjoyable and interesting read and, depending upon your interest in the metaphysics of heroism, potentially provocative. As you march through Dilenschneider's conversations with the leaders of our times, you find yourself--by agreeing or disagreeing with their assessments of what it means to be a hero--defining your own sense of the term.

A Time for Heroes identifies many important role models: men and women of great determination, strength, persistence, and compassion--people who clearly have excelled in their chosen fields and who deserve our respect.

But heroes? Here the book falters. The author, who heads a strategic communications consulting firm and has authored several books that examine leadership, fails to address the prerequisite for heroism--i.e., the nature of adversity--and by doing so he ends up embracing the idea that heroes are everywhere. They are school aides, foster parents, security personnel, and just about anybody. Of course, they can be. People who otherwise lead relatively ordinary lives can, when the occasion warrants, display great personal courage.

However, in Dilenschndider's mind, heroes are "anyone who has the courage and commitment to make the world a better place." His premise assumes that all adversity is equal and leads to a conclusion that people who persevere in the face of common adversity deserve the same accolade we have traditionally reserved for those who overcome adversity of the most uncommon type, such as men and women who voluntarily risk their lives to help or to defend others.

The book assigns hero status to authors, ministers, commentators, CEOs, AIDS activists, politicians, and industrialists. For sure, everyone the book identifies is a person of enormous achievement. They have all overcome adversity to achieve their goals.

But it is hard to think of a businessman who overcomes economic...