A fascinating addition to the growing shelf of Springsteen studies, probably best read in doses.
A career-spanning collection of interviews with The Boss.
There is little doubt that Bruce Springsteen is among the most influential and important rockers of all time. The many books about him are only a small measure of his cultural impact. However, while critical and popular opinions about Springsteen’s work may change with time, there will always be The Boss’ own words about his career. Phillips and Masur (Lincoln's Hundred Days: The Emancipation Proclamation and the War for the Union, 2012, etc.), noted Springsteen scholars in their own right, have collected this definitive volume of interviews, even transcribing rare TV and radio broadcasts. The book charts Springsteen’s evolution from a withdrawn New Jersey teen playing the local bar circuit to an international rock star. From Springsteen’s earliest interview in 1973 with the Asbury Park Evening Press, which described his demeanor as “characteristically sullen,” to discussions with major media outlets like Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, and 60 Minutes, Springsteen has, above all else, maintained a consistent philosophy of music first, never allowing triviality or ego to take over. He has proved this ethos time and again during his marathon live shows, always remaining honest to the audience, never conforming “to the formula of always giving the audience what it wants.” There is much to glean from Springsteen’s insights as he talks about his unpleasant upbringing in New Jersey or how, upon seeing Elvis’ infamous waist-up performance on Ed Sullivan in his early teens, he decided to dedicate himself to music. While the collection very clearly navigates a narrative of Springsteen’s life, it is a narrative already well-known by many and one that Springsteen is content to perpetuate throughout these interviews. As Springsteen admitted to Mojo in 2006, “Trust the art, be suspicious of the artist. He’s generally untrustworthy.” There is the music, after all.
A fascinating addition to the growing shelf of Springsteen studies, probably best read in doses.Pub Date: Aug. 20, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-62040-072-2
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: June 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2013
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
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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