Reveals a livelier Liz: lovely, clever, wise, and—like all the other Tudors—possessed of the “besetting sin” of “rapacity.”...
In brisk, bracing prose, a freelance historian follows England’s first Queen Elizabeth from birth to the early days of her reign.
Starkey (Henry VIII, not reviewed) develops the thesis that among the young queen’s principal virtues was “a sort of humanity” that distinguished her from most of her predecessors, including her own sister, “Bloody Mary” Tudor (who burned 300 religious opponents at the stake during her short reign). Starkey believes Elizabeth’s early life should read like “a historical thriller” and, at least until the final chapters (which focus on religion), succeeds admirably in breathing fresh life into one of England’s most overstudied monarchs. Unconventionally brief chapters (one consumes less than a page) explore Elizabeth’s family background and rise to the throne. Starkey sprints through the life and loves of her father, Henry VIII, consigning poor Cardinal Wolsey to a mere prepositional phrase and gliding through the fates of wives four through six in barely a page. Elizabeth, Starkey demonstrates, was an “infant phenomenon,” mastering Latin, French, and Italian (her Greek was less impressive), while absorbing vital lessons from the political intrigues swirling around her. After her father’s death and her consumptive half-brother Edward VI’s brief reign, sister Mary became queen, reestablished Catholicism as the religion of the land, married an unpopular Spaniard, failed to deliver an heir, and died miserably. Arguably Mary’s principal legacy was her decision to arrest rather than execute Elizabeth, who was patently a participant in several failed attempts to seize power. “The Tower made a good classroom,” quips Starkey, ending this fluid biography with the observation that Elizabeth’s decision to both hire and heed capable advisers was “crucial to the success of [her] government.” Alluding to Adrian Mole and Goldilocks, freely employing clichés (“like a duck to water”), and cracking wise (a “rolling stone gathers dross”), Starkey pens a light, even frisky historical narrative.
Reveals a livelier Liz: lovely, clever, wise, and—like all the other Tudors—possessed of the “besetting sin” of “rapacity.” (16 pp. color photos and illustrations)Pub Date: Dec. 2, 2000
ISBN: 0-06-018497-3
Page Count: 368
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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