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SAMUEL PEPYS

THE UNEQUALLED SELF

A fine work of literary and cultural history.

A sparkling, wonderfully readable biography of the English official less well known for his contributions to good government than for his salacious, achingly self-doubtful diaries.

Plenty of tidbits from those diaries make their way into this thorough, richly detailed portrait by English writer Tomalin (Jane Austen: A Life, 1997, etc.): on one page we find Pepys (1633–1703) chasing after a servant girl and castigating himself for his success, on another recording a moment of sexual pleasure with which he graced his long-suffering wife—and then worrying whether she might “get a trick of liking it,” as no seemly woman should in those days. Sex was much on Pepys’s mind throughout his adult life, as was the attendant guilt; and there many biographers have left the matter. Tomalin, however, brings us the rest of Pepys’s story, notably his accomplishments as a businessman and naval administrator, one of the chief architects of the royal fleet that would soon after his time extend England’s empire to every corner of the world. Pepys entered the civil service in an era when officials were expected to enrich themselves at the public expense; indeed, Tomalin writes, one of the first bits of advice he received from a sea captain concerned “how to fiddle his expenses by listing five or six non-existent servants when he went on board and claiming pay for them all.” Though Pepys earned a fortune himself while in service, he conducted himself honorably and made noteworthy reforms, insisting that the navy’s accounts be squared and suppliers paid what they were owed (and nothing more). He also managed, more than once, to fall on the wrong side of events, backing King James, for example, in his struggle to keep the crown; forced into retirement, he spent his days with the likes of John Dryden talking about the works of Chaucer, his nights revisiting his remarkable diary—the product, Tomalin writes, “of both the most ordinary and the most extraordinary writer you will ever know.”

A fine work of literary and cultural history.

Pub Date: Nov. 14, 2002

ISBN: 0-375-41143-7

Page Count: 448

Publisher: Knopf

Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2002

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NIGHT

The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...

Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children. 

He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions. 

The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the sphere of suffering shared, and in this case extended to the death march itself, there is no spiritual or emotional legacy here to offset any reader reluctance.

Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006

ISBN: 0374500010

Page Count: 120

Publisher: Hill & Wang

Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006

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DYLAN GOES ELECTRIC!

NEWPORT, SEEGER, DYLAN, AND THE NIGHT THAT SPLIT THE SIXTIES

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

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