Some pleasant surprises are displayedalong with some dreary redundanciesin this nevertheless welcome first English translation of the German writer's fables and parables. Hesse (18771962) was, of course, the Nobel Prizewinning author of such complex and intellectually challenging novels as Steppenwolf (1927) and Magister Ludi (1943). But many readers prize him most as a Western interpreter of Eastern wisdom, especially as transmitted in such equally famous ``fictions'' (discursive as they are) as Siddhartha (1922) and The Journey to the East (1956). Even Wordsworth fainting at the sheepfold seems robust compared with the lachrymose romanticism of Hesse's little prose sermons on the fragility of the artist's temperament (``The Poet,'' ``Flute Dream''), the evils of progress and technology (``The City''), or the superiority of pacifist introversion (``The European,'' ``The Empire''). Too many of these stories trail off into inconclusiveness, and there's a fulsome excess of sentences like ``The mountain lived on silently in his greatness.'' That said, there's also much to admire in this superbly edited and vigorously translated gathering of 22 such tales, all written and published between 1904 and 1918. ``Augustus'' and ``Iris'' are interesting complementary explorations of the ironies of mingled romantic failure and artistic success. ``The Dwarf'' contrives a Poe-like story of revenge in a solidly realized Italian Renaissance setting. ``The Forest Dweller'' radiates some of the confident animism, and also the vivid specificity, of Kipling's best tales in this vein. And ``A Man by the Name of Ziegler'' is magically gifted with understanding the language of animalsonly to discover these ``noble'' creatures are no better than their human counterparts. Unfortunately, the later pieces are weaker, so the volume ends with a distinct whimper. No matter: Zipes's English versions, which lucidly convey both Hesse's vapid generalizations and his athletic lyricism, often manage to show this very uneven writer to best advantage. Minor work from a more-or-less major writer, and a lot more fun than much of Hesse's major fiction.
Pub Date: Oct. 9, 1995
ISBN: 0-553-10023-8
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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