Ingenious writing about the cosmos and life itself.
An insightful examination of life—not only on Earth, but also where it might exist on the myriad of newly discovered planets and distant stars.
Since the first exoplanets were discovered in 1992, numerous books have explored the subject. Accounts of the origin of life are also an established genre, but science journalist Green, the series editor of the Best American Science and Nature Writing, casts her net even wider, adding a compelling exploration of the nature of life as a whole. Almost everyone enjoys discussing the possibility of life elsewhere in the universe despite zero evidence to date. Life on Earth appeared surprisingly soon after the young planet cooled, so it may be inevitable under the right conditions—but what those are remains subject to speculation. Rather than taking up space with unnecessary conjecture, Green begins with history, revealing that few thinkers paid attention to the question until Copernicus and Galileo removed Earth from the center of the universe, after which writers imagined life everywhere, including the sun and moon. Twentieth-century advances turned life into a thorny but interesting problem, so scientists largely gave up cosmic fantasies. Most popular writers followed their lead, but Green gives science fiction a major role, which turns out to be a fascinating approach. The horrors of War of the Worlds play a minor role; Green’s SF authors are a thoughtful group whose work—from Contact to Solaris to Arrival—explores deep questions. How would life operate without Darwinian evolution? Or light? How would an intelligent plant behave? Is there a language spoken without syntax or through smell instead of sound? Scientists point out that Earth is far from the oldest planet in the galaxy; older stars with older planets would have a few billion years’ head start, so we may find them incomprehensible—“not just in the way a person from the Middle Ages couldn’t imagine a computer, more like how we can’t understand what it’s like to be a bat.”
Ingenious writing about the cosmos and life itself.Pub Date: April 18, 2023
ISBN: 9781335463548
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Hanover Square Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2023
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
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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