For fans of economical language and thoughtful journalism, a pleasure.
Journalist and essayist Morrow (Evil, 2003) gathers the work of four decades, most from the pages of Time.
Morrow has a capacious mind and a light hand, good qualities for a generalist writing about pretty much whatever he wants in a mass-market publication. Some of the seven-dozen-plus pieces here seem a little pedestrian, to be sure, including the opener, a so-what meditation on sailing and the evanescence of human life; others go nowhere fast, as with a couple of rural cat-on-the-porch, corn-in-the-field reveries that no one does as well as Verlyn Klinkenborg. Still, all are readable, and many are memorable. There’s a slyly subversive piece on the opening of the Nixon Library, for instance, with its mega-sized statues of the likes of Mao and de Gaulle: “Nixon,” Morrow writes, “has always had a habit of dressing the set with giants, setting the delay timer, and then jumping into the picture himself.” Exactly. Morrow is no easier on any of the other politicians who come into his crosshairs: “That has been one trouble with Reaganistic good feeling: a suspicion that it was based on camera angle.” “At his worst moments on the stump, Bush is a sort of amateur terrorist of language, like an eleven-year-old Shi’ite picking up a Kalashnikov assault rifle for the first time and firing off words in wild bursts.” “Nero gave the people circuses. Clinton is the circus.” Against a vaguely dissatisfied take on politics and modern life, though, Morrow offers a humane and even hopeful vision: Remarking on the red state/blue state divide, for instance, he notes that “Americans have always been each other’s evil twins,” which ought to inspire a tiny bit more tolerance, and he closes by observing that forgiveness may be one of the best tools we have for surviving our time, though it “is not an impulse that is in much favor.”
For fans of economical language and thoughtful journalism, a pleasure.Pub Date: Jan. 3, 2006
ISBN: 0-465-04750-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Basic Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2005
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 2026 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.
