Therapy in the erotics of reading from one of Israel’s most cosmopolitan novelists and essayists. When Oz (Panther in the Basement, 1997, etc.) was in the seventh grade, a very businesslike nurse appeared to tell him and his school chums all about the procedures, complexities, and especially the dangers of sex. Her manner was grave, and, he recalls, she made no mention of pleasure. He draws a literary parallel: “And this is precisely what some of the literati are doing to us: they analyze everything ad nauseam, techniques, motifs, oxymorons and metonyms, allegory and connotation . . . Only the pleasure of reading do they castrate—just a bit’so it doesn’t get in the way.” Oz wants to return us to the eros of reading. To achieve his aim, he offers exemplary discussions of ten different novels and stories, including works by Theodor Fontane, Nikolai Gogol, Raymond Carver, Franz Kafka, Anton Chekhov, Gabriel Garc°a M†rquez, S.Y. Agnon, and others. He takes the problem of narrative beginnings as a focusing device and suggests that, at the beginning of any tale, a sort of contract is established between writer and reader. No doubt, this is more or less true, but he makes no particularly compelling case for it. Still, the idea works effectively as a heuristic device, allowing him to do what he does best: demonstrate the pleasure of reading, with vivid, brief explorations of all different sorts of beginnings. Oz’s sensitive readings show a way of taking fiction seriously as pleasure and then heightening that pleasure by exploring the different ways in which writers achieve meaning. Translator Bar-Tura renders Oz’s prose in powerful, simple, and evocative English. Oz writes with wonderful force of conviction in this urbane set of essays, and his own pleasure in both reading and writing is contagious.
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-15-100297-5
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1999
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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