What the critic sees as brutal honesty too often seems unhinged and even irrelevant.
There’s some guilty pleasure for readers in these transgressive literary responses, but most of this collection reads more like blowhard venting than thoughtful criticism.
Titled after a column Williamson (Oakland, Jack London, and Me, 2008) wrote for a French magazine, where his brand of outlaw discourse has found favor, this Texas-based novelist-professor offers knee-jerk response rather than reasoned analysis. He inhabits a literary universe of verities that can occasionally sound more like prejudice: Female novelists hate men (except for the sainted Marilynne Robinson, “America’s Quiet Genius," whom Williamson embraces in part because he says female readers don’t like her.) Black novelists hate whites. Obscure is better than renowned (or popular). Small presses are better than large publishing houses. The South is better than the Northeast. Poor is better than middle class. Streetwise experience is better than pointy-headed intellectualism (though the author makes much of his multiple postgraduate degrees and his academic tenure, often with more revulsion than pride). Williamson either loves or hates, with little to no middle ground, though he writes that an author can move from one extreme to another by violating the verities. Thus, the once-obscure Cormac McCarthy (“the greatest fiction writer alive, bar none”) becomes “a dried-up, sentimental has-been” with his introduction to the viewership of Oprah. Many of the titles of these essays, some of them little more than book reviews that summarize plot, tell readers all they need to know (“Because He Has Wasted My Time, I’d Like to Bitch-Slap F. Scott Fitzgerald and Take His Lunch Money”; “Nathan Zuckerman Goes Pee-Pee in His Pants and We’re Supposed to Care: Or, Zuckerman Unzipped”).
What the critic sees as brutal honesty too often seems unhinged and even irrelevant.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-933896-38-0
Page Count: 234
Publisher: Texas Review Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
