A critical sampling of important American authors that arouses the appetite.
Letters on Dead White Mostly Male Writers in the American 19th Century.
In the forward, Green jokes of having considered and rejected the above title for his collection of letters on Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman, Poe, Hawthorne, Melville and Dickinson. It’s appropriate, of course, with six of the seven authors being male and all of them white. A professor of English since 1964, Green doesn’t stick to a tenure track style in these essays–written in the manner of letters addressed to a family member or friend–he weaves an interesting course in and out of this rich literary landscape. Blunt candor and clarity trump lit-crit pretense–the author is simply interested in elaborating on the essences that make each writer worthy of his or her greatness and Green’s admiration. He lays the book’s foundation with transcendentalists Emerson and Thoreau, then moves on to the ebullient Whitman, romantic Hawthorn, epic Melville and daunting Dickinson, often providing the proper historical and intellectual context for each writer, as well as how and to what extent they influenced one another. The authors frequently speak for themselves, with Green quoting passages of each work discussed. The author set out on this quixotic adventure in amateurish criticism, and while he might hogtie small works like Thoreau’s “On Civil Disobedience,” he can’t possibly pin down Moby Dick. But that was never Green’s objective. After reading this book, one will likely get the urge to dust off an old copy of Walden or The Scarlet Letter, or set out to a used book store in search of a collection of Emerson’s essays. That was the author’s aim, and he has succeeded.
A critical sampling of important American authors that arouses the appetite.Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-4363-5319-9
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
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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