Stylish, insightful narratives of exemplary love affairs- -liaisons conducted in French, during the Romantic period and the Belle Epoque, when intellectual talk and passionate correspondence lent formal brilliance to the work of love. The luxurious prose that New Yorker contributor Hofstadter (Goldberg's Angel, 1994, etc.) crafts here provides the perfect medium for transmitting the extravagant stylings of his subjects, French literati active during the years 17961834 and 18871915. Presenting evidence drawn from their public and, moreover, their private writings, Hofstadter shows how their romantic effusions shaped their lives to aesthetic ends. His story begins with the sentimental novelist Madame de Charriäre, who fairly late in her life established a deep yet apparently platonic relationship with the youthful Benjamin Constant. Constant left her for the celebrated author Madame de Staâl. Later, after emerging from de Staâl's influence, he would write an extraordinarily misogynist novel, Adolphe—based, ironically enough, on his mentor Madame de Charriäre's Caliste. Madame de Staâl's protegÇes also included Juliette RÇcamier, who fell for the Vicomte Chateaubriand, whose Memories from Beyond the Tomb Hofstadter presents as a brilliant achievement of memory and of lying. Hofstadter moves on to develop a second, similar picture of literary romance. This time the work of Marcel Proust, who modeled many of his characters on his contemporaries, provides the focus. Key actors include the novelist Anatole France; his lover, the salonniäre LÇontine de Caillavet; and her son, Gaston, who competed with Proust himself for the affections of Jeanne Pouquet. Like Chateaubriand, Proust inevitably brings the topic around to memory and its vicissitudes. Hofstadter, for his part, hesitates to draw any resolutions from them for our time. He stresses instead the gulf that lies between these worlds of letters and our own society. Hofstader's recreation of French romanticisms exemplifies the art of collective biography. But without larger conclusions, his tale, however artfully crafted, remains a mere melodrama of literary life.
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-374-19231-6
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1995
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
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
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