Any critic who interprets a publisher’s claim that a “lean” book means “very short, especially considering the price” is...
A chronologically arranged series of literary essays by the eminent scholar and critic, “offered indifferently to defense and prosecution, of the way in which a now quite long professional life has been spent.”
Cambridge don Kermode (Shakespeare’s Language, 2000, etc.) never met a Shakespearean soliloquy or a biblical passage that he hasn’t cared to pull apart to see how it ticks. In this lively collection, he sticks to favorite themes worked hard over many years, taking in not only Shakespeare and the Bible, but also moderns such as Auden and Wallace Stevens (“perhaps one could say that Stevens was a better poet than Heidegger and a better philosopher than Hölderin, and so found himself, in a manner, betwixt and between”). Humane and learned, Kermode’s essays carry a lot of weight, to say nothing of circuitous asides and deep allusions; one has the sense throughout that someone who has read every book ever published is at work. Yet Kermode wears his learning lightly, and even takes a few good-natured shots at himself, as when he opens a rather dense piece on the theme of secrets and narrative sequence with the self-effacing remark, “My lecture could be called aridly academic, but I include it as a reminder that in the Seventies I spent much time devotedly doing this kind of thing.” Fortunately, arid academicism for its own sake is seldom on view here. Instead, the reader is treated to splendid considerations of such matters as the rise and fall and rise of Renaissance artist Sandro Botticelli’s renown, and its implications for the making of canons; the meaning of canons in general, and the promise that a canonical work contains “perpetual modernity”; and the twisted politics of writers of the 1930s, to name but a few topics that have taken Kermode’s interest.
Any critic who interprets a publisher’s claim that a “lean” book means “very short, especially considering the price” is worth reading. Another feather in Kermode’s wide-brimmed cap.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-8090-7601-2
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2003
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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