A soulful intellectual inquiry and reflection on life and art, artfully done.
Acclaimed Scottish novelist Smith (There but for the, 2011, etc.) considers the places where art and life intersect, sometimes collide and meld.
The guide on this extraordinary journey is a woman who, after “twelvemonth and a day” of mourning, sees her dead lover before her. She offers the apparition tea and begins to ask questions, but the responses are garbled and confused. Smith’s storytelling facility and critical eye are evident in the fact that this ongoing conversation—adapted from a series of lectures at St. Anne’s College, Oxford—about time, memory, loss, longing, love, art and nature stirs the mind and heart all the more because it takes place between the imagination and reality. In the essay “On time,” Smith reminds us of Shakespeare’s “Devouring Time, Time’s pencil, Time’s fell and injurious hand, Time’s scythe, Time’s fickle glass.” Even books, she writes, are “tangible pieces of time in our hands…they travel with us, they accompany us from our pasts into our futures….” In each of the essays, the woman continues her struggle with grief and letting go. Her lost lover returns again and again in an alarming state of increasing decay, and she regrets the failings of her imagination to call up an odorless, less-ragged form. Smith seamlessly connects the narrator’s smart, funny, regret-infused observations to an expansive discussion of aesthetics, metaphor, the tension between form and fluidity, what it means to be on the edge in life and art, the power of Oliver Twist (in all its forms) and Alfred Hitchcock movies, and the acts of giving and taking. On this quest, the author goes into the “margins that burn with the energy of edit” to shed light on the human spirit through art. But does the grieving woman ever let go of her lover’s spirit and move on? It’s all beautifully revealed.
A soulful intellectual inquiry and reflection on life and art, artfully done.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-59420-486-9
Page Count: 220
Publisher: Penguin Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2012
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s...
Music journalist and musician Wald (Talking 'Bout Your Mama: The Dozens, Snaps, and the Deep Roots of Rap, 2014, etc.) focuses on one evening in music history to explain the evolution of contemporary music, especially folk, blues, and rock.
The date of that evening is July 25, 1965, at the Newport Folk Festival, where there was an unbelievably unexpected occurrence: singer/songwriter Bob Dylan, already a living legend in his early 20s, overriding the acoustic music that made him famous in favor of electronically based music, causing reactions ranging from adoration to intense resentment among other musicians, DJs, and record buyers. Dylan has told his own stories (those stories vary because that’s Dylan’s character), and plenty of other music journalists have explored the Dylan phenomenon. What sets Wald's book apart is his laser focus on that one date. The detailed recounting of what did and did not occur on stage and in the audience that night contains contradictory evidence sorted skillfully by the author. He offers a wealth of context; in fact, his account of Dylan's stage appearance does not arrive until 250 pages in. The author cites dozens of sources, well-known and otherwise, but the key storylines, other than Dylan, involve acoustic folk music guru Pete Seeger and the rich history of the Newport festival, a history that had created expectations smashed by Dylan. Furthermore, the appearances on the pages by other musicians—e.g., Joan Baez, the Weaver, Peter, Paul, and Mary, Dave Van Ronk, and Gordon Lightfoot—give the book enough of an expansive feel. Wald's personal knowledge seems encyclopedic, and his endnotes show how he ranged far beyond personal knowledge to produce the book.
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s personal feelings about Dylan's music or persona.Pub Date: July 25, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-236668-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
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Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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