Anyone who quotes Bialystock instead of Derrida is our kind of guy. Who says fun has to be brainless?
Having recently become a deliberative septuagenarian, prolific commentator Epstein (Alexis de Tocqueville: Democracy’s Guide, 2006, etc.) gathers another profusion of personal essays.
Most of this varied fare first appeared under the byline Aristides in the American Scholar, the literary quarterly he edited from 1975 to 1997. Epstein practices the craft of the essay quite proficiently in multi-layered pieces that often prompt reflections beyond the subject matter directly at hand. True, his literary musings on favorite authors sometimes draw so heavily on said authors’ biographies that they sound a bit like prefaces to the Collected Works. But that’s fine by us, as they say in his hometown (Chicago), when he shares his thoughts about favorites like Auden, Valéry, Beerbohm, Karl Shapiro and, of course, philosopher Max Bialystock, the famous producer who supplies the book’s title. Proust, Epstein avers, produced a masterwork so good “it shouldn’t even be read for the first time.” Capote, as a “savvy man” and Keats, as a medical man, are considered anew. Nice as the appreciations may be, the best fun here is in the ad hominem pastings administered to panjandrum know-it-alls like Edmund Wilson, Mortimer Adler and (more contemporaneously) big old Harold Bloom. Epstein also considers such issues as book disposal, poets laureate, pedagogy, the wisdom of his father, movies and what’s wrong with the world—“too many people in it just like me,” he concludes. As is proper for a talented teacher and essayist, he is wonderfully opinionated. He hates “public intellectuals” and turgid writing. He’s a guileless snob, an Anglophile and a bit of a Francophile too, with a trace of Yiddishkeit.
Anyone who quotes Bialystock instead of Derrida is our kind of guy. Who says fun has to be brainless?Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-618-72193-1
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2007
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
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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