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THE BANK MANAGER AND THE HOLY GRAIL

Name: THE BANK MANAGER AND THE HOLY GRAIL
Author: Byron Rogers
ISBN: 1-85410-949-9

TRAVELS TO THE WEIRDER REACHES OF WALES

by Byron Rogers ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 2004

Would that you had a country like Wales to call your own, one so unblinkered and time-racked as the author’s.

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A shrewd and sorry, splendorous and celebratory, portrait of Wales, from one of its own.

The Welsh have a strong dislike to being observed, even by a native son like Rogers (The Green Lane to Nowhere, 2003), let alone occupied by a foreign presence: “What had the English ever done to the Welsh?” ask the untutored, and Rogers reminds them: “Conquest, ethnic cleansing, then colonisation with the attitudes that bred in coloniser and colonised, that's all.” But Rogers is not here to wail and moan, but rather to paint a picture of how Wales is faring these days. Or at least how the town and environs he grew up in has weathered the last half of a century: What has become of the language, the traditions, all the physical and dispositional manifestations of the place? Remarkably, despite the best efforts of both the English and compliant overseers, the language has held on—the great lyric language of the “oldest vernacular literature in Europe” (even if it possesses “no word for orgasm”). In a voice that’s wary, and an eye that’s versed and unwilling to genuflect before sentiment or glaze before personal history, he recounts the history of his house, his town, his school and neighboring lands, all rich with fertile irony: “This turns on the purest elements of old romance, a lost palace, the last prince of a ruined dynasty. . . . But chiefly it is the story of a woman who, two years ago, bought a chicken farm in north Wales.” There might be some moss on Rogers, but he’s also sitting next to you at the pub. He’ll tell you about Martin Borman's phonebook, located nearby, or the living archaeology of a coracleman and his demands for the river Towy. There are museums, but mostly the everyday.

Would that you had a country like Wales to call your own, one so unblinkered and time-racked as the author’s.

Pub Date: April 1, 2004

ISBN: 1-85410-949-9

Page Count: 270

Publisher: Aurum/Trafalgar

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2004

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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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

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.