Echoes of the Titanic
As the world knows, the RMS Titanic — a sparkling, gigantic ship on its maiden voyage — sank a century ago this month. And why does the world know? Because the doomed ocean liner set off waves of interest that to this day lap on the shores of culture. Ask Harvard historian Steven Biel about those waves, starting with the 100 songs published within a year of the sinking, and the one-reel movie released a month after the ship went down. ( The film was “Saved from the Titanic,” a product of the improbably named Éclair Film Co. of Fort Lee, N.J. It starred Dorothy Gibson, a Titanic survivor.) A second edition of Biel’s study, “Down with the Old Canoe: A Cultural History of the Titanic Disaster” (W.W. Norton), just appeared. “This book,” he wrote in the new afterword, “traces the life of an event of mythic stature.” The tragic events of the...