Stimulating, provocative and unfailingly intelligent—in short, vintage Smiley.
Bracing literary criticism from a practitioner’s point of view.
Bogged down in the midst of writing a novel she didn’t much like, fearing at age 52 that she was running out of inspiration, Smiley (Horse Heaven, 2000, etc.) decided in 2001 to read 100 novels—not a “Hundred Greatest,” she is quick to stipulate, “only a list of individual novels that would illuminate the whole concept of the novel.” The resulting book offers 12 chapters on various aspects of the form (“The Origins of the Novel,” “The Novel and History,” etc.) and a 13th with 101 short essays on individual titles (Jennifer Egan’s Look at Me got added after Smiley read it on a post-project vacation). Naturally, the author’s selections and judgments reflect her sensibility and artistic convictions. She’s capable of appreciating a modernist classic like Ulysses, but she writes far more enthusiastically about other works, from The Princess of Cleves to Zadie Smith’s White Teeth. Whether praising or damning—The Great Gatsby is among the books that get severe though never nasty appraisals—Smiley approaches literature in a refreshingly direct, unpretentious way. She considers Lady Murasaki and Boccaccio her peers just as much as John Updike and Ian McEwan; you never forget in her down-to-earth assessments that novels are written by and about human beings. She likes Daniel Defoe for “his habit of giving advice and yet forgiving his characters’ trespasses”; she dislikes Henry James’s “prissy, domineering manner.” There are funny, apt phrases on every page, and Smiley’s analysis of the novel’s evolution over a millennium is cogent and convincing. Her “case history” of Good Faith (2003), the manuscript whose bumpy progress prompted her 100-novel intermission, offers a fascinating look at the working writer’s life. What ties together the casually organized text is Smiley’s profound love for her chosen genre, an art form she believes is accessible to everyone because “the novel is based on the most primal human materials, emotion and language.”
Stimulating, provocative and unfailingly intelligent—in short, vintage Smiley.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2005
ISBN: 1-4000-4059-0
Page Count: 560
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2005
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
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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