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PSYCHO TOO

Name: PSYCHO TOO
Author: Will Self
ISBN: 978-1-60819-022-5

by Will Self & illustrated by Ralph Steadman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 2010

A journalistic feast best savored in small bites over several days.

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The quirky follow-up to the author/illustrator duo’s PscyhoGeography (2007).

Journalist and novelist Self (The Butt, 2008, etc.), who wrote a weekly column called “PsychoGeography” for the Independent, presents his second collection of those pieces with his friend and illustrator Steadman (Garibaldi’s Biscuits, 2009, etc.), whose pictures do far more than illustrate—they amuse, illuminate, amplify and, at times, almost editorialize on Self’s text. His rendering of an unhappy Self scrunched in a tiny airplane seat alongside two toothy snarling companions is typically boisterous. Self loves to walk, knowing, like some sort of 19th-century Transcendentalist, that truths lie along roads rarely taken—and he often finds them. The collection commences with the longest and strongest piece. “Walking to the World” is a tribute to the author’s longtime idol, the late sci-fi writer J.G. Ballard, whose life Self decided to honor by walking from Ballard’s home in Shepperton to Heathrow Airport, flying to Dubai City, walking from its airport to “The World,” Dubai’s collection of 300-artificial islands designed to look like the countries of the world, where the author planned to walk the length of its Britain. Nothing quite worked out as anticipated, but his keen eye misses little. The other literary snapshots vary in quality and humor and offer some evidence why a collection of so many pieces has its risks—for example, the author uses the word “Brobdingnagian” in at least four different essays and repeats himself in other ways as well. But Self crafts countless striking, buoyant phrases and/or sentences (“Wasps swarm on the lumps of chicken and beef we’ve left for them, then, too obese to sting, they blade-hop back to their subterranean nest in the rockery by the pool”). The author also includes pieces about the homeless of Los Angeles, American crayfish conquering the Thames, Baghdad’s Green Zone and “cardinism,” a kind of sexual relief provided by converting an old castle into a modern home.

A journalistic feast best savored in small bites over several days.

Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2010

ISBN: 978-1-60819-022-5

Page Count: 256

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2009

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
ELAINE
by Will Self

- BOOK REVIEW
WHY READ
by Will Self

- BOOK REVIEW
WILL
by Will Self

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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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

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.