Over PBS on May 8, the 40th anniversary of V-E Day, Americans accustomed to seeing WW II in black-and-white will have their first look at "virtually the only color films of the war in Western Europe": taken by Hollywood director George Stevens, head of a special Signal Corps unit, for his own, unofficial record. In this album, along with stills from those films—not so much scenes of combat as shots of soldiers and civilians—is a succinct and expert chronicle of events, from D-Day through the German surrender and its aftermath, by British military historian Hastings (Bomber Command. Overlord). The two elements don't fuse: we see General Leclerc and his French troops entering Paris, for instance, ten pages or so before Eisenhower makes the decision to let Leclerc take the city—probably because Stevens took a lot of footage of that dramatic event. It's a fair guess, in any case, that most readers will first look at the pictures, and only then (if ever) take in the text, with its focus on salient engagements—Normandy, the bridge at Arnhem, the Ardennes—and its battle maps. The stills are bound to mean more, too, after the PBS film showing. With a few exceptions, these are not powerful images on a par with the WW II photos of Capa and Mydans and Bourke-White and many an anonymous, black-and-white still photographer: there are lots of grinning German prisoners, cheerful French civilians, and "friendly" looking Russian soldiers (though, says the caption, they "inflicted a terrible revenge upon the German people"). Did Stevens' little movie camera perhaps elicit smiles? There is something to seeing Eisenhower and Bradley and Montgomery in living color, and the rubble of Caen and Aachen in monochrome. But visually the book has no tenor or direction, no intrinsic message: too much of it, indeed, is like souvenir photos of victory. Nonetheless the text is authoritative, and the program will be an event.
Pub Date: May 6, 1985
ISBN: 1566196086
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1985
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s...
Music journalist and musician Wald (Talking 'Bout Your Mama: The Dozens, Snaps, and the Deep Roots of Rap, 2014, etc.) focuses on one evening in music history to explain the evolution of contemporary music, especially folk, blues, and rock.
The date of that evening is July 25, 1965, at the Newport Folk Festival, where there was an unbelievably unexpected occurrence: singer/songwriter Bob Dylan, already a living legend in his early 20s, overriding the acoustic music that made him famous in favor of electronically based music, causing reactions ranging from adoration to intense resentment among other musicians, DJs, and record buyers. Dylan has told his own stories (those stories vary because that’s Dylan’s character), and plenty of other music journalists have explored the Dylan phenomenon. What sets Wald's book apart is his laser focus on that one date. The detailed recounting of what did and did not occur on stage and in the audience that night contains contradictory evidence sorted skillfully by the author. He offers a wealth of context; in fact, his account of Dylan's stage appearance does not arrive until 250 pages in. The author cites dozens of sources, well-known and otherwise, but the key storylines, other than Dylan, involve acoustic folk music guru Pete Seeger and the rich history of the Newport festival, a history that had created expectations smashed by Dylan. Furthermore, the appearances on the pages by other musicians—e.g., Joan Baez, the Weaver, Peter, Paul, and Mary, Dave Van Ronk, and Gordon Lightfoot—give the book enough of an expansive feel. Wald's personal knowledge seems encyclopedic, and his endnotes show how he ranged far beyond personal knowledge to produce the book.
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s personal feelings about Dylan's music or persona.Pub Date: July 25, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-236668-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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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