A meticulously crafted description of a writing teacher’s apprenticeship in bookbinding and conservation with an internationally known master of the field. Wilcox tells her story by referring to the copious notes she compiled while serving as the first female apprentice to William Anthony, the founder of the Center for the Book at the University of Iowa. She found that writing down her experiences was the best way to “hold onto the terrors and successes of learning a handcraft,” and it’s her preservation of the freshness of her encounter with a new craft that makes this book compelling reading for those who may not share an interest in its rather narrowly focused subject matter. She draws readers into the world of book arts by immersing us totally in its richly descriptive technical jargon: Leather bindings have red rot (a condition that causes them to crumble at the slightest touch), pages are foxed (spotted with rust from bits of iron), books are rebound in alum-tawed pigskin. She describes restoration processes, such as chemical washing, mending torn pages, resizing, and sewing bindings, with such detail and precision that one is left with the impression that he or she is actually learning the craft rather than merely reading about another’s experience. Her relationship with Anthony (who died of cancer before the end of the five-year apprenticeship program) is an integral part of her story, and she chronicles his patient advice and support as he guides her through her first restoration, teaches her to sew her first Coptic stitch across a binding spine, helps her to manufacture her own tools, and advises her on professional matters, such as estimating private restoration jobs. The rarity of such intense personal mentoring relationships in today’s economic climate renders Wilcox’s experience both a nostalgic throwback to an earlier era and a potential model for recuperating current pedagogical practices. Book lovers will love this book. (Book—of-the-Month Club alternate selection)
Pub Date: June 30, 1999
ISBN: 0-89823-188-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1999
The sub-title of this book is "Reflections on Education with Special Reference to the Teaching of English in the Upper Forms of Schools." But one finds in it little about education, and less about the teaching of English. Nor is this volume a defense of the Christian faith similar to other books from the pen of C. S. Lewis. The three lectures comprising the book are rather rambling talks about life and literature and philosophy. Those who have come to expect from Lewis penetrating satire and a subtle sense of humor, used to buttress a real Christian faith, will be disappointed.
Pub Date: April 8, 1947
ISBN: 1609421477
Page Count: -
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1947
Graceful and deeply felt.
A collection of personal pieces, combined into an affecting memoir by longtime New Yorker editor Angell.
The author, a noted baseball writer (A Pitcher’s Story, 2001, etc.), has many intimate connections to the magazine Gardner Botsford once dubbed “The Comic Weekly,” in which most of these reminiscences originally appeared. His mother, Katherine, was the New Yorker’s fiction editor; years later, Angell held her former job—and occupied her office. His stepfather, E.B. White, was the magazine’s most important contributor during its most influential years. The memoir mostly concerns New Yorker colleagues and other remarkable people who have been a part of the author’s life. His father, lawyer Ernest Angell, lost Katherine to the younger White but over the years became a figure of immense importance to Roger. Angell loved his mother, loved White, loved his first wife (not much here about the cause of their 1960s divorce), loved his coworkers, loved his job. His portraits are really tributes, whether of the well-known William Maxwell, V.S. Pritchett, Harold Ross or William Shawn, or the lesser-known Botsford and Emily Hahn. Angell offers some New Yorker–insider tidbits (Ian Frazier mimicked Shawn’s voice so well that he could fool colleagues over the phone) and a bit more than you want to know about some of his aunts, one of whom wrote a book about Willa Cather. A dazzling story-within-a-story describes a 1940 round of golf with a mysterious woman who lost a valuable ring. The author seems uncertain how an iPod works but reveals an expertise with machine guns. His fickle memory frustrates and bemuses him. Sometimes he can recall only sensory images; sometimes the story unreeling in his mind skips, stops, fades, dissolves into something else. In several of his most appealing passages, he writes about the fictions that memory fashions.
Graceful and deeply felt.Pub Date: May 8, 2006
ISBN: 0-15-101350-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2006
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