by Martin Puchner ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 14, 2017
A lucid entertainment for the humanists in the audience.
The world is shaped by books, and human history by texts sacred and profane: so this thoughtful treatise by the general editor of the Norton Anthology of World Literature.
“Literature isn’t just for book lovers,” writes Puchner (English and Comparative Literature/Harvard Univ.; The Drama of Ideas: Platonic Provocations in Theater and Philosophy, 2010, etc.), after opening with a thesis that isn’t quite novel but bears thinking about nonetheless: we gain much of our sense of history, morality, ethics, and religion through works of the imagination. Thus it’s no surprise that the astronauts who landed on the moon in 1969 couched their expressions of wonder in the words of the Bible or that Alexander the Great patterned his wars against the backdrop of the Homeric epics (“he wanted to meet Darius in a traditional battle and defeat him in single combat, the way Achilles had met and defeated Hector”). Sometimes, Puchner wanders into gods-for-clods territory, and his take is a little old-fashioned in its mistrust of technology and hints of disdain for mass culture of the Harry Potter variety; still, it’s all to the greater good of recognizing the significance of literature and its study. The book provides a nice collection of oddments of the bibliophilic nature, fitting neatly alongside works by Nicholas Basbanes and Alberto Manguel: it’s illuminating to know that the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal was once an accountant and “realized that his store of knowledge was useful only if it was organized,” giving birth to the world’s first known scheme of library classification; it’s also well to recognize that we know so much more about the Heian court of medieval Japan than about almost any other government of the time thanks to The Tale of Genji. In mounting a learned and, yes, literate defense for literature as an instrument of mind and memory, Puchner also argues against literary fundamentalism, allowing texts to be seen as living things and allowing “readers of each generation to make these texts their own.”
A lucid entertainment for the humanists in the audience.Pub Date: Nov. 14, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-8129-9893-1
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017
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by Chris Gardner with Quincy Troupe ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 1, 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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by Richard Wright ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 28, 1945
This autobiography might almost be said to supply the roots to Wright's famous novel, Native Son.
It is a grim record, disturbing, the story of how — in one boy's life — the seeds of hate and distrust and race riots were planted. Wright was born to poverty and hardship in the deep south; his father deserted his mother, and circumstances and illness drove the little family from place to place, from degradation to degradation. And always, there was the thread of fear and hate and suspicion and discrimination — of white set against black — of black set against Jew — of intolerance. Driven to deceit, to dishonesty, ambition thwarted, motives impugned, Wright struggled against the tide, put by a tiny sum to move on, finally got to Chicago, and there — still against odds — pulled himself up, acquired some education through reading, allied himself with the Communists — only to be thrust out for non-conformity — and wrote continually. The whole tragedy of a race seems dramatized in this record; it is virtually unrelieved by any vestige of human tenderness, or humor; there are no bright spots. And yet it rings true. It is an unfinished story of a problem that has still to be met.
Perhaps this will force home unpalatable facts of a submerged minority, a problem far from being faced.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1945
ISBN: 0061130249
Page Count: 450
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1945
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