Artfully observed, the bawdy and political wiles—for better and worse—of Madame de Pompadour. (8 pp. color illustrations)
Though bodices are ripped at the outset, French historian and biographer Lever (Marie Antoinette, not reviewed) settles down to offer an astute portrait of Madame de Pompadour in the court of Louis XV.
It was no mean feat for the parvenu Madame Le Normant d’Etiolles to become the “favorite” of Louis XV, the recognized mistress to the king. She had wealth—and a husband and child, for that matter—but she was no aristocrat. Louis’s ministers were wary, the court frowned, yet she was just the breath of fresh air the king needed, someone who was sensual enough to match his cravings, who tended his melancholia and kept him amused, who respected the Queen and the court’s way of doing things. Lever sings her charms from the start: “flawless white teeth and dimpled cheeks . . . the bewitching, tender, insistent gaze of her gray eyes, which burned at times with an incandescent light.” She also had brains and poise, learning the nuances of court etiquette, finding her way through the tangle of rites and intrigues. Louis admired her joie de vivre, and soon found he desired her mediation when granting favors as well. Gradually, Lever explains, Madame de Pompadour lost her role as lover but emerged as a power in the political sphere because she kept Louis’s favor. Despite Lever’s feeling that her initiatives were “motivated as much by her love for the monarch as by her resentment for personal enemies,” her influence with Louis was felt keenly in the wars with England and Prussia, the conflict between Parliament and the clergy, and negotiations with the pope. Lever details why Madame de Pompadour was never a favorite with the common folk, whose resentments ran the gamut from the gifts lavished on her to her association with French military defeats and woeful treaties.
Artfully observed, the bawdy and political wiles—for better and worse—of Madame de Pompadour. (8 pp. color illustrations)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-374-11308-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2002
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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