Tasty junk food for book lovers.
Film biographer Baxter (Woody Allen, 1999, etc.) reveals another true love in this entertaining account of his admittedly nerdy life.
The author is a near-rabid bibliomaniac who has chased first editions across several continents and now lives happily with the cream of his collection in the same Paris building where Sylvia Beach’s Shakespeare & Co. once hosted Joyce, Hemingway, et al. Baxter, who grew up in Australia, dates the conception of his obsession to 1951, when, at 11, he acquired a copy of The Poems of Rupert Brooke. Thereafter, he chased Graham Greene’s ouevre (a collection he eventually sold once he’d acquired just about all there was), works about the cinema, books somehow related to the place where he happened to be living, and volumes by Edward Gorey, Lafcadio Hearn (!), and others. His tenet was “anything can be anywhere,” and, indeed, he did find amazing things in unlikely places. At a Virginia “swap-meet” in the mid-1970s, he discovered a 1927 issue of Sylvia Beach’s periodical transition in a box of what was otherwise rubbish. For that item (and two others) he paid a total of 25 cents. Baxter showers us with anecdotes and bons mots, a majority of them amusing (“Most librarians don’t like books any more than butchers like lamb chops”), but also finds time to trace the history of the dust jacket. He identifies the best cinematic sex scene in a bookshop (The Big Sleep), explains proofs and galleys and limited editions, and tells us why unsuccessful authors sometimes resent signing first editions of their failed books (no profit for them!). Baxter describes the devastating effect of the Internet on ye ole bookshoppes (scads of which have folded) and examines the primitive book trade that now exists on eBay. Like all nerd memoirs, this one features sexual conquests too, but the passages about his love life aren’t as interesting as those voicing his passion for books.
Tasty junk food for book lovers.Pub Date: Dec. 11, 2003
ISBN: 0-312-31725-5
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2003
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
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
