A polychrome pastiche that soars with delicious insights.
Previously published essays by novelist, playwright and cultural critic Indiana (The Schwarzenegger Syndrome: Politics and Celebrity in the Age of Contempt, 2005, etc.).
“In a dauntingly, often viciously anti-intellectual society, [Susan] Sontag made being an intellectual attractive,” the author writes in a 2004 obituary to his late friend. Much the same could be said of Indiana, who seems to take perverse pleasure in sectioning the underbellies of the world’s most sacred cows. None escape his scandalous, sobering, satirical pen in this new collection, which ranges from a biting lampoon of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s gubernatorial win and a review of the film Brokeback Mountain to a critical homage to Louis-Ferdinand Céline. As the writer explains in the preface, “We live in the wreckage of a century I lived through the second half of, a century of false messiahs, twisted ideologies, shipwrecked hopes, pathetic answers.” With this precursor, readers see the author critically sifting through that wreckage in an attempt to make sense of turn-of-the-century bedlam. Whether dissecting America’s increasingly narcissistic consumer culture or surveying the landscape of post-9/11 sensibilities, Indiana injects much of his own personality into his work, often contradicting his seemingly nihilistic point of view with a subtle if intense concern for humanity and for his readers. Unlike Let It Bleed (1995), an early roundup, this collection is heavier on analysis, lighter on the first-person and more intense in its urgency. Indiana’s thorough and balanced research coagulates into a convincing argument that the ills of the world are not natural occurrences like glaciation; there is accountability, and these people are responsible.
A polychrome pastiche that soars with delicious insights.Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-465-00248-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Basic Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
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
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