A work of piercing loveliness and sadness, an inquiry into the meaning and significance of life, from Pulitzer-winner Dillard (Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, 1972; The Living, 1992; etc.). Early on in her inquiry, Dillard quotes St. Augustine: “We are talking about God. What wonder is it that you do not understand? If you do understand, then it is not God.” It is this dilemma, the incomprehensibility of God and our profound need to understand, that underlie this graceful examination of the big questions—life and death, good and evil, the source of holiness. Dillard considers these cosmic issues by looking at the particular, whether a blue crab spied in the desert or a newborn being bathed and swaddled by a nurse. Agilely, Dillard weaves together several narrative threads that seem disparate but that through the poetry of her thought and style come together into an Ecclesiastes-like series of examinations. A thread called “Sand” follows paleontologist and religious thinker Pierre Teilhard de Chardin through his long exile to China and the journey on which he discovered Peking Man. And “China” is set during the author’s own trip to the East, when she witnessed the unearthing of thousands of statues, an army of clay soldiers dating back 2,200 years and intended to guard the grave of the ancient Emperor Q—in. These soldiers represent the might of the great emperor—but in Dillard’s delicate inquiry, they come also to represent his cruelty and by extension the cruelty of tyrants throughout history and, by further extension, all calamities, even natural, that have befallen humankind. “Seeing the broad earth under the open sky,” she writes of the clay army, “and a patch of it sliced deep into corridors from which bodies emerge, surprised many people to tears. Who would not weep from shock? I seemed to see our lives from the aspect of eternity, I seemed long dead and looking down.” One of those very rare works that will bear rereading and rereading again, each time revealing something new of itself.
Pub Date: March 30, 1999
ISBN: 0-375-40380-9
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1999
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
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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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