An impressive work of history that gives the reader a greater appreciation for the art, if not an understanding of the mind,...
A fascinating look at the paintings and history of 17th-century Spanish court painter Diego Velázquez, through the prism of one of his greatest masterpieces.
Longtime New Yorker writer Bailey (John Constable: A Kingdom of His Own, 2007, etc.) uses Velázquez’s painting of the 1625 surrender of the Dutch town of Breda to Spanish forces as an entry point into a richly detailed portrait of the court of King Philip IV as Spain’s Hapsburg empire crumbled around him. Though the basic details of Velázquez’s life are known and some 125 of his paintings survive, as Bailey apologetically reminds us throughout, when it comes to his inner thoughts and feelings, there is little to go on. The only description of the painter’s personality, given by several sources, is that he was phlegmatic—“in modern parlance, Velázquez was cool.” There is, however, much documentation about Philip IV’s court, and Bailey brings it vividly to life, as he simultaneously traces the artist’s rise from humble beginnings to eventual nobility. The author also thoroughly examines the military victory at Breda, a high point on the downward slope, along with other important events and many of Velázquez’s most famous works. Bailey does not resist the temptation to speculate about the painter’s inner life based on his work, with mixed results. Ultimately, Velázquez remains a cipher, a man whose ambition seems to have been focused on advancing at court rather than on becoming a great artist. That he did become one is confirmed by the paintings he left behind, and his influence, covered by Bailey in the penultimate chapter, on those who followed.
An impressive work of history that gives the reader a greater appreciation for the art, if not an understanding of the mind, of one of the world’s master painters.Pub Date: Nov. 8, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-8050-8835-9
Page Count: 288
Publisher: John Macrae/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2011
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
This autobiography might almost be said to supply the roots to Wright's famous novel, Native Son.
It is a grim record, disturbing, the story of how — in one boy's life — the seeds of hate and distrust and race riots were planted. Wright was born to poverty and hardship in the deep south; his father deserted his mother, and circumstances and illness drove the little family from place to place, from degradation to degradation. And always, there was the thread of fear and hate and suspicion and discrimination — of white set against black — of black set against Jew — of intolerance. Driven to deceit, to dishonesty, ambition thwarted, motives impugned, Wright struggled against the tide, put by a tiny sum to move on, finally got to Chicago, and there — still against odds — pulled himself up, acquired some education through reading, allied himself with the Communists — only to be thrust out for non-conformity — and wrote continually. The whole tragedy of a race seems dramatized in this record; it is virtually unrelieved by any vestige of human tenderness, or humor; there are no bright spots. And yet it rings true. It is an unfinished story of a problem that has still to be met.
Perhaps this will force home unpalatable facts of a submerged minority, a problem far from being faced.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1945
ISBN: 0061130249
Page Count: 450
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1945
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