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WHEN WE WERE GOOD

Name: WHEN WE WERE GOOD
Author: Robert S. Cantwell
ISBN: 0-674-95132-8

THE FOLK REVIVAL

by Robert S. Cantwell ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1996

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Jargon-rich but provocative study of the folk-music craze of the '60s. Cantwell (American Studies/Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill) is typical of a new school of academic critics combining personal memoir with sociocultural analysis and writing in a highly specialized language understood only by its practitioners. He believes that the original folk revival of the '30s and '40s, as embodied in the work of performers like Woody Guthrie and the young Pete Seeger, failed because of its ideological links to left-wing politics, making it anathema to the postWW II generation. In the late '50s groups like the Kingston Trio created a new folk resurgence by reviving the music without the political message. He also argues that folk music appealed to urban, young, middle-class listeners because it enabled them to act out a mild rebellion against their upbringing and build at least imaginative ties with a purer American culture, nostalgically linked to the past. Cantwell outlines these theories in dense prose that will be barely comprehensible to the uninitiated; for example, he describes Mike Seeger's life work as that of ``cultural cathexis, dreaming the felt but untheorized political urgencies of the present into historical memory.'' Moreover, his theories oversimplify the many strands that went into creating the folk revival. While the Kingston Trio were an apolitical and largely commercial group, the young Bob Dylan was deeply engaged in expressing a social message through his music. Moreover, Cantwell can't seem to decide how he feels about these folk revivalists. While ostensibly praising their lives and work, he slips in many negative remarks about them; he compares Mike Seeger to a blackface minstrel, dismisses Pete Seeger as a person who is ``basic[ally] sad,'' and describes Dylan as possessing ``gallant fraudulence.'' An odd hodgepodge, which will be of interest primarily to the academic folklore community. (17 b&w photos)

Pub Date: April 1, 1996

ISBN: 0-674-95132-8

Page Count: 416

Publisher: Harvard Univ.

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1996

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.