Although Shattuck occasionally leaves us to converse with (or assail) more erudite companions, he nonetheless remains a...
The celebrated literary scholar (Candor and Perversion: Literature, Education, and the Arts, 1999, etc.) and authority on Proust guides readers through one of the most complex works in literary history.
Shattuck acknowledges that the lengthy, labyrinthine Search `looked at first like a conspiracy against readers.` But he has identified in the 2,000-page novel a variety of useful signposts. First, he establishes that knowing Proust’s biography is essential; then he moves into a chapter (`How to Read a Roman-Fleuve`) that could just as well have been titled `Proust for Dummies.` (In a footnote he urges readers familiar with the novel to skip this chapter.) Employing a variety of charts and summaries, Shattuck makes visible the hidden chassis of the novel (settings, characters, plot). Next he provides an analysis of Proust’s humor (the novel, Shattuck asserts, is `overlaid with amusing scenes and details”). Following are discussions of Proust’s `optical images` (a subject Shattuck explores further in an appendix), `literary aesthetic,` and the overall plan of the novel. In a chapter called `Continuing Disputes,` Shattuck takes aim at his academic foes and delivers salvos of criticism about editions and translations—surely a satisfying enterprise for Shattuck but less so for his nonacademic audience. Ending the principal portion of the book is an interesting discussion of the value of literature; Shattuck argues persuasively that literature is a `virtual experience` that offers `a formative or preparatory role in training our sensibilities.` Among his many provocative observations is that Search resembles A Thousand and One Nights more than any other literary work. In a striking `Coda,` the author elucidates Proust’s theory of thought by employing a dialogue among persons planning a radio broadcast about Proust.
Although Shattuck occasionally leaves us to converse with (or assail) more erudite companions, he nonetheless remains a peerless guide to this most intricate of creations.Pub Date: May 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-393-04914-0
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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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