Intellectually stimulating but self-aggrandizing—a portrait of the artist in portraits of other artists.
An experimental memoir told in a series of biographical sketches of the author’s friends and colleagues.
In his latest book, Meyers (Robert Lowell in Love, 2016, etc.) attempts to revive appreciation for 14 underrecognized writers, artists, and scholars. Composed of short profiles on authors like Phillip Knightley and Paul Theroux, the book provides an insider’s view of their personal and professional lives. Drawn from “learned gatherings” and the author’s lengthy correspondence with his subjects, the narrative consists of intriguing, brief portraits, rendering each into “a colorful legend among the colorless academic drudges” (about critic Donald Greene). In the first section, Meyers focuses on his personal acquaintances, and the second features essays on five inspirational men he wishes he could have met—e.g., scholar and Russian spy Anthony Blunt. Meyers appears prominently throughout his book; while the texts are meant to honor these artists and exalt their histories and bibliographies, they transform into recurring reflections of Meyers and what his subjects think of him. It’s a brilliant way for a biographer to finally write about himself, although the author frequently revels in his own praise. The all-male focus feels old-fashioned, as does the author’s “interest in masculine writers” and love of gossip (many profiles recount affairs and other sordid morsels). Meyers is frequently “eager to win his [subject’s] respect,” and he seeks relationships based on a mutual intellectual appreciation. He mentions his search for an “ideal father figure” throughout the book, but he rarely moves past his own reflection. On Hugh Gordon Porteus, Meyers explains Porteus “was delighted to be rediscovered by me.” Later, the author recounts his “treasured” friendship with James Salter through dinner-party anecdotes and snippets of their storied intellectual discourse. He circles around self-affirming details like how “Jim inscribed twenty-six various editions of his books for [him]” and even shares “the three best” dedications (inscribed in Salter’s A Sport and a Pastime: “To Jeffrey. Represents, I think, the apogee”).
Intellectually stimulating but self-aggrandizing—a portrait of the artist in portraits of other artists.Pub Date: Oct. 9, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-8139-4168-4
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Univ. of Virginia
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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