Gracefully written, keenly observed, Fruchter’s portrait limns the joys of friendship and of lives devoted to art.
Musician and journalist Fruchter recalls 15 warm, happy years with actor/musician Dudley Moore.
How refreshing that “Intimate” in the subtitle of this show-business memoir refers not to sensational revelations, but to personal, often tender recollections the author shares about her subject. Fruchter does relate that Moore seduced women, suffered four troubled marriages and was uncircumcised—the latter, however, noted only because he and Fructer considered producing a documentary about circumcision. Otherwise, Fruchter offers a charming, endearing account of Moore’s work as an actor and musician. A former music critic for the New York Times and an accomplished pianist, Fruchter first spoke to Moore by phone for an article she was writing in 1987. Drawn together by their love of music, they eventually met for lunch, the first of a series of witty, sometimes loopy conversations they shared—many of which Fruchter reconstructs here in delightful detail. Soon, Fruchter and Moore toured the world in a series of classical concerts. Along the way, turbulence from Moore’s fourth marriage unnerved the actor, making his Platonic relationship with Fruchter, married and the mother of four, a tranquil refuge. Late in the ’90s, Fruchter observed Moore falter as pianist (“My fingers feel like sausages,” he complained). His speech began to slur and he often lost his balance, misleading many to think he was just like Arthur, the alcoholic title character of his most successful film. Ultimately, Moore was diagnosed with Progressive Supranuclear Palsy, an incurable, degenerative neurological condition. Fruchter and her family drew close to Moore, as does the reader, following their visits to a cabin in Nova Scotia, Moore’s farewell journey to England and his heartbreaking demise in 2002.
Gracefully written, keenly observed, Fruchter’s portrait limns the joys of friendship and of lives devoted to art.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2005
ISBN: 0-09-190080-8
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Ebury Press/Trafalgar
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2005
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Skloot's meticulous, riveting account strikes a humanistic balance between sociological history, venerable portraiture and...
A dense, absorbing investigation into the medical community's exploitation of a dying woman and her family's struggle to salvage truth and dignity decades later.
In a well-paced, vibrant narrative, Popular Science contributor and Culture Dish blogger Skloot (Creative Writing/Univ. of Memphis) demonstrates that for every human cell put under a microscope, a complex life story is inexorably attached, to which doctors, researchers and laboratories have often been woefully insensitive and unaccountable. In 1951, Henrietta Lacks, an African-American mother of five, was diagnosed with what proved to be a fatal form of cervical cancer. At Johns Hopkins, the doctors harvested cells from her cervix without her permission and distributed them to labs around the globe, where they were multiplied and used for a diverse array of treatments. Known as HeLa cells, they became one of the world's most ubiquitous sources for medical research of everything from hormones, steroids and vitamins to gene mapping, in vitro fertilization, even the polio vaccine—all without the knowledge, must less consent, of the Lacks family. Skloot spent a decade interviewing every relative of Lacks she could find, excavating difficult memories and long-simmering outrage that had lay dormant since their loved one's sorrowful demise. Equal parts intimate biography and brutal clinical reportage, Skloot's graceful narrative adeptly navigates the wrenching Lack family recollections and the sobering, overarching realities of poverty and pre–civil-rights racism. The author's style is matched by a methodical scientific rigor and manifest expertise in the field.
Skloot's meticulous, riveting account strikes a humanistic balance between sociological history, venerable portraiture and Petri dish politics.Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-4000-5217-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
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