A fascinating look at the life and thought of the great jurist and scholar that vividly connects his sometimes dry legal pedantry and his remarkable life and personality. White (Law and History/University of Virginia; Earl Warren, 1982, etc.—not reviewed) presents a more rounded portrait than Livia Baker's The Justice from Beacon Hill (1991), which emphasized Holmes's life and character. Instead, White underscores the evolution of the jurist's unique career and jurisprudence from the unusual circumstances of his life. White represents Holmes's commitment to ``professionalism'' as a reaction against the dilettantish literary culture of his father: The jurist, he tells us, gave up his early love of letters and philosophy in order to devote himself totally to legal scholarship (he became editor of the prestigious American Law Review while still a practicing attorney). White also doesn't neglect the effect of Holmes's Civil War career on his philosophy: Holmes spent most of the war recovering from wounds incurred at Ball's Bluff, Antietam, and Chancellorsville, and White speculates that the experience led to an early emphasis on ``duties'' rather than rights in Holmes's legal thought. The author points out, however, that this emphasis faded after Holmes became a judge, first on Massachusetts's Supreme Court, then on the US Supreme Court; he evolved, in fact, into one of the early champions of First Amendment rights. White devotes a chapter to Holmes's classic The Common Law (1881), which he shows as reflecting the pragmatic and empirical cast of Holmes's thought, and he also discusses at length the quirks of Holmes's personal life—his childless marriage, his many flirtations, and his emotionally significant romance with Clare Castletown—making the jurist come alive despite the many contradictions of his personality. Here, Holmes is depicted not as the civil libertarian of legal myth but as a judge and scholar whose jurisprudence reflected his life and the intellectual milieu in which he lived. A fine, balanced portrait. (Fourteen halftones)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-19-508182-X
Page Count: 624
Publisher: Oxford Univ.
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1993
BOOK REVIEW
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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