Seward, a renowned British historian (The Wars of the Roses, 1995, etc.), sets out to reassemble the shadowy life of the 17th-century Italian chiaroscuro master Michelangelo de Caravaggio. Born in 1571, Caravaggio lost his father to the plague when he was only six. From then on, death followed close on the painter’s heels, leaving its reflection in Caravaggio’s portrayal of corpses and severed heads in his art. A man of violent temper, prone to fits of jealousy and uncontrollable rage, Caravaggio committed a crime in nearly every city he lived in and had to flee the law on numerous occasions. Arriving in Rome in 1592, he lived for many years on the fringe of respectability, making a meager living in the workshops of other artists. Eventually, one of his paintings caught the eye of Cardinal del Monte, who invited Caravaggio to become a resident painter at his palazzo. The cardinal’s patronage ensured a quick rise to fame and numerous commissions—especially from clergy, who were perpetually smitten by Caravaggio’s Madonnas (even if many of them were modeled by prostitutes). Caravaggio’s success culminated in a commission to paint the pope’s portrait, but soon after, he was implicated in a duel that ended in the death of his tennis partner. Caravaggio became an outlaw in Rome, but he continued to exploit his talent and even sought admission to the Knights of Malta. The master of the order relaxed the rules to admit the famous artist but was just as soon obliged to expel him for attacking another knight. Caravaggio would remain on the run until death finally caught up with him. Penniless and exhausted from wounds and illness, Caravaggio died on the shore at Porto Ercole in 1610. Given the glaring lack of historical data, Seward does a fine job of piecing together circumstantial evidence of the painter’s turbulent life, while skillful juxtaposition of Caravaggio’s personal narrative and art illuminates the origins of his dramatic style.(16 color illustrations, not seen)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-688-15032-2
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1998
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
If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.
The authors have created a sort of anti-Book of Virtues in this encyclopedic compendium of the ways and means of power.
Everyone wants power and everyone is in a constant duplicitous game to gain more power at the expense of others, according to Greene, a screenwriter and former editor at Esquire (Elffers, a book packager, designed the volume, with its attractive marginalia). We live today as courtiers once did in royal courts: we must appear civil while attempting to crush all those around us. This power game can be played well or poorly, and in these 48 laws culled from the history and wisdom of the world’s greatest power players are the rules that must be followed to win. These laws boil down to being as ruthless, selfish, manipulative, and deceitful as possible. Each law, however, gets its own chapter: “Conceal Your Intentions,” “Always Say Less Than Necessary,” “Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy,” and so on. Each chapter is conveniently broken down into sections on what happened to those who transgressed or observed the particular law, the key elements in this law, and ways to defensively reverse this law when it’s used against you. Quotations in the margins amplify the lesson being taught. While compelling in the way an auto accident might be, the book is simply nonsense. Rules often contradict each other. We are told, for instance, to “be conspicuous at all cost,” then told to “behave like others.” More seriously, Greene never really defines “power,” and he merely asserts, rather than offers evidence for, the Hobbesian world of all against all in which he insists we live. The world may be like this at times, but often it isn’t. To ask why this is so would be a far more useful project.
If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-670-88146-5
Page Count: 430
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1998
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