The subjects in this collection of scrupulous, varied, but sometimes ephemeral essays from poet and novelist Leithauser (Seaward, 1993, etc.) range from mathematical to literary creativity, from Japan to Iceland. Whether writing about his intellectual leanings or new locations, Leithauser has a bifurcated, paradoxical attraction to the rational and the irrational, but he can cleverly isolate the rarefied points of their intersection: computerized chess, the literature of science biographies, the freewheeling quantum prose of Italo Calvino, the ratiocinated ghost stories of Henry James, the enigmatic novels of Kobe Abe. The collection's best is a lengthy piece of New Yorker reportage on a computer chess tournament, which is replete with astute, poetic reflections on mathematics, artificial intelligence, and human creativity. In lesser pieces, apart from functional but disposable book reviews, Leithauser courts the supererogatory (detailed but unexceptional essays on H.G. Wells, Thomas Pynchon, and, his personal favorite, Icelandic Nobel laureate Halldor Laxness) as well as the merely idiosyncratic (reviews of Colin Martindale's statistics-based aesthetics in The Clockwork Muse or Austin Wright's cult-novel utopia, Islandia). In ``Places,'' Leithauser tellingly opens with the multiple expatriate Lafcadio Hearn, who popularized Japan at the turn of the century but, he notes, could not truly penetrate the Meiji zeitgeist. Leithauser's own, literate forays into Japan popularize its more important, relatively unexported pre- and postwar authors, such as recent Nobel Prize winner Abe (now slightly less obscure in America). Though under-represented by comparison, Iceland benefits more than Japan from Leithauser's literary approach to its history and carefully preserved language. As Leithauser remarks about his attraction to Iceland (and by extension, all the topics here), he needs subjects remote from his experience and literary tradition, a guiding principle that leads both to exotic insights and, occasionally, to the abstruse.
Pub Date: Feb. 22, 1995
ISBN: 0-679-42998-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1995
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
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
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