Having predicted that high-profile news readers were an endangered species in Anchors (1990), the Goldbergs follow up with a dirt-dishing biography of the madcap media mogul who has done as much as anyone to imperil network television. While they steer clear of value judgments on whether Robert Edward (``Ted'') Turner III has been a force for good or ill, the authors make a fine job of recounting how he built a transnational Atlanta-based empire that encompasses a half-dozen TV networks (including CNN), the MGM film library, pro sports franchises, movie studios, satellite facilities, and allied show-biz assets. Wall Street Journal correspondent Robert Goldberg and father Gerald (an emeritus professor of English at UCLA) also offer credible perspectives on the pivotal role a domineering, alcoholic parent played in the development of their subject's career and character. By their authoritative anecdotal account, Turner (b. 1938) has been a world-class philanderer, toper, and yachtsman as well as entrepreneur. Even so, the thrice-married (most recently to Jane Fonda) Turner has done more than well for himself. Among other unlikely accomplishments, he created an immensely influential (and now profitable) infotainment enterprise from the regional billboard-advertising firm he inherited after his father's suicide. An ultracompetitive operator, ``Terrible Ted'' (as he's known to friend and foe alike) relishes going against the grain of conventional wisdom in the cable-television industry and elsewhere. Nor does the so-called Mouth of the South shy from broadcasting either his idiosyncratic opinions or bedroom and boardroom conquests. Along his wayward ascent, however, Turner acquired a social conscience; at any rate, the erstwhile archconservative now devotes much of considerable energy to environmental causes and international peace. A gossipy, human-scale rundown on an American original whose larger-than-life ambitions and appetites have yet to be sated. (16 pages photos, not seen) (Author tour)
Pub Date: July 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-15-118008-3
Page Count: 672
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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