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DIDEROT

Name: DIDEROT
Author: P.N. Furbank
ISBN: 0-679-41421-5

A CRITICAL BIOGRAPHY

by P.N. Furbank ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 6, 1992

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Philosopher, art critic, novelist, and co-editor of the EncyclopÇdie (the ``bible'' of the Enlightenment), Diderot enjoyed a reputation for wit, wisdom, and intellectual generosity—which is sustained in this admiring critical biography. But, as in his E.M. Forster (1978), Furbank sees his subject's ``dark'' side as well, obliquely revealed in Diderot's fiction. Aside from an early marriage to an unsuitable and shrewish wife, a liaison with a longtime mistress, and a relationship with his daughter AngÇlique, Diderot subordinated his personal life to his public life as a man of letters. But there are hidden emotional conflicts and mysteries suggested in Furbank's readings of Rameau's Nephew, The Nun, and Jacques the Fatalist. Furbank carefully traces the origins of Diderot's eclectic philosophy in Lucretius, Locke, Shaftesbury, and Hume; his many literary associations and quarrels (especially with Rousseau); his finances; his role in the pamphlet ``war'' over the relative merits of French and Italian music; his ``invention'' of art criticism; and his impact on European culture, especially on Lessing, Goethe, Zola, and August Comte, who, like many, considered Diderot the ``greatest man'' of the 18th century. While Diderot's dogmatic and impractical ideas on government alienated Catherine the Great, who thought he needed a ``keeper,'' Diderot was considered dangerous in France, where ideas were taken seriously enough for society women to hold salons for intellectual exchange and for philosophers to be imprisoned or exiled. It is that sense of the centrality of intellectual life that Furbank conveys, while intimating another nature—repressed, passionate, even bestial—hidden in Diderot's novels, short stories, and dramas, on which the biographer comments at length. Polite and respectful, with some fashionable allusions to Roland Barthes and M.M. Bakhtin. (Eight pages of photographs—not seen.)

Pub Date: Nov. 6, 1992

ISBN: 0-679-41421-5

Page Count: 528

Publisher: Knopf

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1992

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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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

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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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.