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These and other errors known so far are minor, even trivial, considering the thousands of facts that Manchester had to deal with. It is far too soon to tell whether the cumulative effect of even small mistakes will undermine the over all credibility of the book — or whether major ones will yet appear. There is no question that Manchester did an honest and herculean job, handicapped by his self-imposed lack of assistance, the fact that he was not in Dallas on the fatal day, and perhaps his inevitable emotional involvement. In the tendency he has sometimes shown in relating himself to the late President. Manchester evokes a line from a famous Kennedy speech: "Lass' sie nach Berlin kommen [Let them come to Berlin]!"
Addressing potential critics of his book, Manchester paraphrases the line in bastardized German: "Lass' sie nach bas das Buch kommen." Without question, readers will come to the book, and keep coming. They will relive the horror, the sadness and the waste of the occasion, with the aid of a guide who at times obviously would rather weep than write. The dry-eyed historian and tragic poet will come later.
* Manchester stands to make at least $1,250,000 before taxes, but the great bulk of the book's profits—which may be as much as $10 million more—will go to the Kennedy Library at Harvard.