Another volume of Beauvoir’s correspondence to lay on the shelf beside Letters to Sartre (1991), this time featuring letters written to a most unlikely lover, the American novelist Nelson Algren. It would be hard to imagine two more discrepant writers (or temperaments) than Beauvoir and Algren, but when they met while she was touring the US in 1947, it was love at first sight. Neither knew much about the other when they were introduced in Algren’s beloved Chicago, but before she returned to Paris, they spent two frenzied weeks together in New York, connecting on an intensely visceral level. Beauvoir often referred to him as “my husband.” She wrote to him in English, sometimes berating him for his stubborn refusal to learn French. The letters in this volume offer a view of the existentialist and the French literary elite of the late ’40s and ’50s as Beauvoir gives Algren a Cook’s tour of her daily life. Readers glimpse the torrid political atmosphere in Paris during the Indochina conflict, with Sartre the recipient of death threats, and of the ruffian behavior of such literary lights as Arthur Koestler, depicted by de Beauvoir as belligerently anticommunist when drunk, apologetic but self-absorbed when sober. Felicities are many in this hefty compendium, ranging from Beauvoir’s encounter with “this ridiculous thing which is called Truman Capote” to an encomium on flying (“I think when you are at a high pitch of emotion, it is the only way of traveling which fits with your own heart”). Her occasionally fractured English is not without charm, but too much of the book consists of repetitively girlish affirmations of love that are odd coming from such a writer and thinker. Minimal notes and (apparently) almost no editorial intervention make this a hard slog for all but the most ardent Beauvoirians.
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1998
ISBN: 1-56584-422-X
Page Count: 576
Publisher: The New Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1998
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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