A pleasant trove of work notes released to coincide with the 50th anniversary of The Grapes of Wrath. Editor DeMott (English/Ohio Univ.) accidentally dug up this brief manuscript material while researching another book on Steinbeck. It's presented here with copious critical apparatus, including introduction, commentary, critical notes, and illustrations (not seen). In fact, there is more spectacle than event to the finished product. Steinbeck's journal "entries" are mostly short, rushed notes exhorting himself to finish the book. They explain little about Grapes, and reinforce the impression of skeptical critics that he mechanically plodded through the novel filling average people with clichÇd speech. More compelling is Steinbeck's anxiety over external obstacles that arose during the book's five-month composition (June-October 1938), which shows him losing almost all control and confidence. He began the journal and novel shortly after the death of his brother-in-law, was constantly bothered by loan-seekers and self-doubt, and worried over everything from Hitler's war maneuvers to the sale of his house. "Did ever a book get written under such excitement," he writes, and collapses into disappointment when finished: ". . .it isn't the great book I had hoped it would be. It's just a run-of-the-mill book." Admirably compiled and annotated by DeMott, and a must for Steinbeck fans, this is an otherwise modest literary treat.
Pub Date: April 14, 1989
ISBN: 0140144579
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1989
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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