This volume affectionately looks at famous texts, though some points remain muddled.
A collection of essays focuses on venerable literary works.
Chaudhuri (War of Thrones, 2017) asserts in the preface that her goal in this book is to present some personal opinions on a few celebrated volumes. These texts include two by Shakespeare (Othello and Hamlet), one by Keats (Ode to a Nightingale), and one by the Indian writer Rabindranath Tagore (The Lost Jewels). Each one is examined with the help of writings by established scholars, including A.C. Bradley and T.S. Eliot. The author adds her own analysis to topics that include the question of Hamlet’s sanity and the reflection of the human experience in Keats’ poetry (in contrast to his esteem for nature). The works are treated tenderly; Chaudhuri clearly holds them all in high regard. As the author writes of Keats, “His poetry has rarely been equaled in descriptions of the beauties perceptible to the senses.” Such earnest praise shows that these oft-discussed volumes can still inspire strong emotions in modern readers. Additionally, the inclusion of Tagore among the more famous authors (at least to the average American reader) makes for a noteworthy juxtaposition. But some of Chaudhuri’s views can be confusing. The author compares Othello’s death to Iago’s life, saying that the Moor’s suicide is certainly tragic “but of, to live as Iago lives, devouring the dust and stinging—this is more appalling.” The phrasing is awkward and, while Chaudhuri’s assertion is eventually clear, such sentences may require rereading. This makes much of the book slow going. The author writes of Hamlet that “with the appearance of the Ghost a second time, the structure of the action emphasizes that the ‘command’ that made the climax of the exposition has failed to be performed.” The passage is nearly as wordy as the scene it is describing. Nevertheless, even readers familiar with these volumes can glean new, thought-provoking details. For instance, as Chaudhuri points out, readers do not really know how old Hamlet is. That such considerations can still attract attention helps to prove the author’s contention that these works are worthy of discussion.
This volume affectionately looks at famous texts, though some points remain muddled.Pub Date: March 29, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5437-0244-6
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PartridgeIndia
Review Posted Online: July 25, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
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
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