American women take the essay form and make it their own in this excellent collection edited by Martin (English/Claremont Graduate School). She divides these pieces by well-known writers into categories that themselves reflect important truths about women's priorities and experiences: ``Generations: Essays on the Family,'' ``Breaking the Silence: Women Confront Oppression and Violence,'' ``Women's Bodies, Women's Choices,'' and so on. The individual essays deal with issues that touch many women— relationships, identity, and abuse—personal stories told with often startling candor. Nancy K. Miller's ``My Father's Penis'' breaks that holiest of taboos against women acknowledging their fathers' sexuality. Shana Penn, in ``Death of Popeye,'' tells of her sexual abuse by a male babysitter and the resulting loss of both innocence and her sense of control over her environment. And there is an anonymous first-person account, reprinted from Harper's, of a 20-year-old woman's rape. The authors do not pontificate, they share. The results are often more nonfiction short stories than what we generally think of as essays, and in this way American women writers have adapted the form to suit their own methods of exposition. There are examples of more traditional essay writing: Mary Gordon's ``A Moral Choice,'' for one, which dispassionately discusses the abortion issue. And Martin also stretches her definition of essay to include what is certainly the least traditional piece, ``I Just Came Out Pregnant''—the oral history of Felicita Garcia, a Puerto Rican woman who became pregnant at the age of 16. With hardly a discordant note in the group, beautifully wrought pieces from some of our finest contemporary American authors.
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-8070-6346-0
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Beacon Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
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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