An astute and informed, if eclectic, assemblage of essays.
An essay collection blends autobiography with broader observations about history, culture, and religion.
“We are a mystery to ourselves,” writes Giskin in this insightful volume, “so writing about oneself and one’s interests is both a revelatory act as well as a process of discovery.” The first two-thirds of the book’s 44 essays are autobiographical in nature, as the author offers vignettes from his childhood and observations about his own family, travels, and inner life. Having grown up in New York City in the early 1960s as his father completed a doctorate from Columbia University, Giskin delivers personal essays that effectively balance nostalgia and wit with poignant retrospective analyses on such topics as playgrounds, drive-in movies, and Halloween. An avid world traveler, the author offers readers nearly a dozen essays that use trips to Japan, Greece, Africa, and elsewhere as lenses through which to explore metaphysical concepts related to life, death, love, and humanity. The collection’s final third moves away from Giskin’s personal experiences and perspectives toward a broader commentary on culture, science, history, and philosophy. As a retired educator, the author has a solid grasp of art across genres and time periods, classical and modern philosophy and literature, and world religions. Essays in this section provide scholarly commentary, for instance, on the visual arts and include high-quality, color reproductions of various works. One piece provides an in-depth exploration of the poetry of Walt Whitman. Other essays analyze the poetry and art of World War I and critique Arnold Toynbee’s A Study of History. Though an agnostic, Giskin, whose previous books on Chinese culture have been published by academic presses, is clearly influenced by Eastern spirituality and thought. A predilection toward concepts like Zen Buddhism, combined with the author’s American upbringing and deep knowledge of the Western canon of high culture, provides a unique, erudite perspective that thoughtful readers will appreciate. Alternately, Giskin’s “exercise of getting on paper things swarming about in my head” is at times disjointed, focusing on topics that are perhaps better suited for a separate collection.
An astute and informed, if eclectic, assemblage of essays.Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-03-912280-2
Page Count: 342
Publisher: FriesenPress
Review Posted Online: March 31, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.
A warts-and-all portrait of the famed techno-entrepreneur—and the warts are nearly beyond counting.
To call Elon Musk (b. 1971) “mercurial” is to undervalue the term; to call him a genius is incorrect. Instead, Musk has a gift for leveraging the genius of others in order to make things work. When they don’t, writes eminent biographer Isaacson, it’s because the notoriously headstrong Musk is so sure of himself that he charges ahead against the advice of others: “He does not like to share power.” In this sharp-edged biography, the author likens Musk to an earlier biographical subject, Steve Jobs. Given Musk’s recent political turn, born of the me-first libertarianism of the very rich, however, Henry Ford also comes to mind. What emerges clearly is that Musk, who may or may not have Asperger’s syndrome (“Empathy did not come naturally”), has nurtured several obsessions for years, apart from a passion for the letter X as both a brand and personal name. He firmly believes that “all requirements should be treated as recommendations”; that it is his destiny to make humankind a multi-planetary civilization through innovations in space travel; that government is generally an impediment and that “the thought police are gaining power”; and that “a maniacal sense of urgency” should guide his businesses. That need for speed has led to undeniable successes in beating schedules and competitors, but it has also wrought disaster: One of the most telling anecdotes in the book concerns Musk’s “demon mode” order to relocate thousands of Twitter servers from Sacramento to Portland at breakneck speed, which trashed big parts of the system for months. To judge by Isaacson’s account, that may have been by design, for Musk’s idea of creative destruction seems to mean mostly chaos.
Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2023
ISBN: 9781982181284
Page Count: 688
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
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
© Copyright 2023 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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