Richardson (The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, a memoir, 1999), once head of Christie’s US operations and now a contributor to...
Engaging essays about an odd mix of artists, writers, tycoons, trendsetters, and con guys from the worlds of literature and art.
Richardson, noted author of the ongoing three-volume Picasso life (A Life of Picasso, Vol. II: 1907–1917, 1996, etc.), has taken time off from that work to bring us some lighter but equally mesmerizing mini-biographies. His 28 delightfully gossipy essays are also extremely insightful, taking us behind the scenes in the lives of the famous, if not always the rich and famous. These are articles about people the author has known, or would like to have known, intrigued by their genius or quirkiness. And readers will be, too. Richardson’s flawless style, incisive wit, and extensive knowledge make the volume a pleasure. Openings are colorful: “Most people who had dealings with Salvador Dalí’s Russian wife, Gala, would agree that to know her was to loathe her.” “Those cultivated American playboys of the 1920s who drew upon sizable trust funds to support their forays into the avant-garde and lavish bohemian lifestyle tended to end sadly or badly.” Although it helps if you’re already familiar with the cast of characters—like Dr. Albert Barnes of the Barnes Museum in Merion, Pennsylvania, whom Richardson says had an “acute case of paranoia”; Lucian Freud, the youngest of Sigmund’s three sons, who set his art school on fire by smoking at night; or Pablito Picasso, the grandson of Pablo who committed suicide by swallowing a bottle of bleach—the author provides just enough history and background to fill in readers who may be newcomers. Ten pages or so on average, these crisply written pieces focus on the compelling idiosyncrasies of each subject, whetting the appetite and impelling readers to move on to full-length biographies.
Richardson (The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, a memoir, 1999), once head of Christie’s US operations and now a contributor to Vanity Fair, the New Yorker, etc., proves again that he’s one of our foremost biographers.Pub Date: Nov. 13, 2001
ISBN: 0-679-42490-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2001
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
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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