While not completely persuasive, this alternative theory on van Gogh’s death manages to provoke doubt as to what actually...
A debut work of historical investigation argues that the famous painter of The Starry Night was murdered.
Most historians believe that the clinically depressed Vincent van Gogh died in 1890 of wounds he had sustained when he shot himself in the abdomen with a revolver. Physician and amateur sleuth Arenberg feels differently. The great artist, the author argues, was the victim of a murder and coverup so devious that they have gone largely unsuspected for well over a century. “This intriguing and epic cold case of the death of Vincent van Gogh involves multiple theories and scenarios of what happened on July 27, 1890,” writes Arenberg. “With almost no agreed-upon facts, it remains one of the most enduring legends and enigmatic unsolved mysteries of art history.” Using modern forensic analysis, documents from van Gogh and his associates, and the most recent theories of experts, the author meticulously examines the case for suicide and accident, attempting to show the ways in which the record has been misinformed, misinterpreted, or ignored. He then chases down the various suspects that might have been involved, landing finally on those who he believes actually killed the man, offering their reasons for doing so and the ways in which they were able to keep the truth from the public. Arenberg’s prose is exact and excited, making it clear just how much fun he has had trying to solve the puzzle. “She was there and saw and heard everything!” he writes, defending the credibility of Adeline Ravoux, the subject of one of van Gogh’s paintings. “She has no obvious or nefarious agenda.” As with many conspiracy-minded books, this one sometimes gets lost in the weeds, slowing momentum and diffusing tension. The audience will likely think a tighter, less shaggy work would have been a better read. Even so, there is much to be learned about the artist’s milieu and his final days, and the author enjoyably transforms some of the famous faces in van Gogh’s portraits into whodunit suspects. Fans of the revisionist theory genre should enjoy this earnest work in which the pleasure lies not in the truth but in the uncertainty.
While not completely persuasive, this alternative theory on van Gogh’s death manages to provoke doubt as to what actually happened.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-72950-757-5
Page Count: 350
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: June 6, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
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