by Malcolm Bradbury ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 1996
In another of his able (if not overly inspired) surveys, Bradbury (The Modern American Novel, 1983, etc.) traces the ``flourishing traffic in fancy, fiction, dream, and myth'' between the old world and the new. Ranging from Washington Irving and Charles Dickens to Evelyn Waugh and Martin Amis, Bradbury attempts to reveal, as reflected in European (primarily British) and American fiction, ``the barter of myths and illusions,'' the ways in which writers on opposite sides of the Atlantic have imagined (and influenced) each other's societies. He points out that the fantasies that each have nursed of the other have often had a profound impact and have sometimes led to disillusion. The protagonist of Herman Melville's novel Redburn goes to England and discovers that the idyllic travel guides he's read have little to do with reality. Such works, Melville writes, ``are the least reliable books in all literature; and nearly all literature, in one sense, is made up of guide- books.'' Bradbury considers Chateaubriand's Indian romance Atala, Washington Irving's History of New York and Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon, Dickens's Martin Chuzzlewit, Hawthorne's The Marble Faun, and the works of Henry James, Oscar Wilde, and Mark Twain, among others, as he plots the ways in which ideas of American ``innocence'' and European ``civilization'' have clashed, flourished, and intermingled. Toward the end he flags a bit, giving perfunctory summaries of the Lost Generation and Modernism, but the narrative revives in his discussion of the the perennially new America imagined by the French critics Jacques Derrida and Jean Baudrillard. Bradbury suspects that, despite the emergence of a new ``Euro-identity,'' and despite America's growing interest in the Pacific Rim, the great fictions that Europe and America share, and which are ``part of our essential record of human understanding,'' will retain their power. Bradbury necessarily skimps here and there, but he digests, summarizes, and critiques enough to make this into a readable, useful, original guide.
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-670-86625-3
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1996
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996
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
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis
by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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developed by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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