edited by Gregory McNamee ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 6, 2000
Extensive and provocative: This collection will fire in readers the need to head for the hills in all weathers. (20 b&w...
Mountains have been everything to people at one time or another—wild and terrifying, comfort and sanctuary— but it is in their transcendence "from our normal modes of being" that McNamee (Blue Mountains Far Away, etc.) chose the material in this broad and powerful collection.
McNamee has divided these essays, poems, songs, myths, and tales up by continent. Each contribution addresses some experience with mountains. Certainly there is a wide sampling of dead white males here, but there is also a sizeable contingent of women writers (Freda du Faur, Mary Austin, Isabella Tree), and McNamee has scoured the available literature to insure that native peoples are represented with telling source material. Ancient Celtic chants to protect highland herds, southern Paiute songs ("The rocks are ringing. They are ringing in the mountains"), and Sikkimese hymns are a welcome counterbalance to the glibness of Mark Twain in the Himalayas: "You can see where the boundaries of three countries come together, some thirty miles away; Thibet is one of them, Nepaul another, and I think Herzegovina was the other." The quality of the contemporary writing is terrific, including Bob Shacochis's purgative ascent of Anatolia's Mount Ararat and the understated recounting of the eruption of an Icelandic volcano by the Lutheran minister of Sandfell, Jon Thorlaksson: "As I stood at the altar, I was sensible of a gentle concussion under my feet." Other pieces describe Henry David Thoreau having his transcendental circuits baked on Mt. Katahdin, Bulgarian folktales (on why all wise men come from Khorosan), and fabulous creation stories from the !Kung, Xan, and Ashanti.
Extensive and provocative: This collection will fire in readers the need to head for the hills in all weathers. (20 b&w line drawings, not seen)Pub Date: June 6, 2000
ISBN: 0-87156-898-5
Page Count: 320
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2000
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by Mike Burns & edited by Gregory McNamee
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996
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
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis
by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955
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.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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developed by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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