CADENZA

by Ralph Cusack ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 2, 1959

Termed ""autobiography"" by its English publisher (Hamish Hamilton) and ""an excursion"" by its obviously musical author this book, which partakes of poetry, music and an irritating preciousness, falls between fact and fiction. Beautifully written but with no apparent arrangement or aim it wanders back and forth over time and geography, from a dentist's chair to the author's Irish boyhood; from waiting in terror as a boy, bullied by a race-track gang to shoot at race-horses, to England and the South of France; from a girl near Ljubljana to a factory near Glasgow; from a drunken French priest to the author's beloved, violin-playing uncle, his life, death and semi-comic burial, and the whole shot through with dogs, poetry, food, music and a faint odor of decadence. Bizarre and at times macabre, this book will delight some readers and repel others. Of limited and highly specialized appeal it is not for those who demand autobiographies with beginnings, ends and orderly arrangement. Poets, musicians and devotees of the unusual should enjoy it.

Pub Date: April 2, 1959

ISBN: 091658304X

Page Count: -

Publisher: Houghton, Mifflin

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1959

Categories: NONFICTION