Warm recollections of a singular literary life.
An erudite critic recounts the pleasures of rereading.
In his latest posthumous literary memoir, eminent critic and scholar Bloom (1930-2019) remarks on the fresh insights and renewed joys that awaited him when, nearing the end of his life, he reread 48 novels. Organized chronologically—from Don Quixote, published in 1615, to Joshua Cohen’s Book of Numbers, published 400 years later—the essays often contextualize Bloom’s readings: when, where, and why he read certain novels; what teachers and readings enriched his perceptions; and how his responses changed or remained consistent over time. Although he read Moby-Dick as a child and Dickens as a young teenager, Bloom mostly read poetry before becoming obsessed, as he puts it, with Thomas Hardy at the age of 15; through Hardy, he found his way to D.H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, and E.M. Forster. Bloom’s selections draw heavily on the Western canon, mostly British and European writers, including Samuel Richardson, whose Clarissa Bloom reread every other year; Jane Austen, whose Persuasion, Emma, and Pride and Prejudice all “seem equally grand”; Stendhal, whose “vision of life is rather like a masked ball or a carnival performance”; Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Thackeray, whose Vanity Fair Bloom first read just before starting college at Cornell. Bloom admits to having read “only twelve” of Balzac’s novels, and of Wharton’s novels, he writes about the “sinuous and disturbing” The Reef rather than her better known The House of Mirth. A fervent admirer of Ursula Le Guin, to whom the volume is dedicated, he commemorates their brief but intense epistolary friendship. He candidly analyzes what he considers a novel’s shortcomings and where he differs with other critics’ assessments. Bloom’s ardent celebration of novels is tinged with the inevitable losses of old age: illness, physical diminishment, and the deaths of friends, mentors, and colleagues. Other novels under consideration include Tom Jones, Ulysses, The Magic Mountain, To the Lighthouse, and Blood Meridian.
Warm recollections of a singular literary life.Pub Date: Nov. 24, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-525-65726-2
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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