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THE PUSHCART PRIZE XXIII

BEST OF THE SMALL PRESSES

Here’s the ever-welcome annual sampling of noncommercial publishing, full enough of poems, stories, and essays to redeem Henderson’s somewhat self-congratulatory introductory declaration of literary independence (and survival). This year the essays rank a bit higher than the stories, despite biggish-name contributions by Colum McCann, Jeffery Eugenides, Frederick Busch, and Stephen Dixon. Founding editor Joyce Carol Oates delivers a hallmark portrayal of family secrets and hidden violence in “Faithless,” and Thomas Disch offers a jet-black satire of NEA-sponsored theater in “The First Annual Performance Festival at Slaughter Rock.” Otherwise, the stories often show the watermark of writing workshops in their pages (although none of this basically competent selection could be confused with the assembly-line fiction of the ’80s). The idiosyncratic personal essay is clearly well suited to the Pushcart arena, although essays here are outnumbered by other genres. The best include Andre Dubus’s moving reflection on teaching Hemingway’s story “In Another Country”; Francine Prose’s quirky profile of her father’s career as a pathologist at New York City’s Bellevue Hospital; Julie Showalter’s vivid memoir of hardscrabble farming in “The Turkey Stories”; and Emily Fox Gordon’s tartly amusing rumination on girls’-school hierarchies and modern feminism in “The Most Responsible Girl.” The few essays about poetry, such as Carol Muske’s on Auden’s honorable self-sabotage of his laureateship in “There Goes the Nobel Prize,” outstrip in quality many of the poems. Among the poetry contributors are Toi Derricotte, Marilyn Hacker, and Grace Schulman. “Nobody wants to buy us!” exclaims Henderson, to account for Pushcart’s successful existence outside corporate publishing—no one, that is, except readers interested in good writing.

Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1998

ISBN: 1-888889-09-8

Page Count: 600

Publisher: Pushcart

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1998

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NUTCRACKER

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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THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE

50TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION

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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