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CHICAGO

A collage of impressions and historical anecdotes by the author who over the years has become the guru of the Second City. Certain to be popular "in the state of Elanoy," this brief (144 pages) reminiscence may fare less well in the remaining 49. Terkel assumes his readers will be familiar with many of the personalties and events he depicts. And, while it is true that much of the material is well known—the career of Al Capone and the Haymarket Riot, for example—all too often Terkel fails to provide much in the way of background and exposition of his more obscure references. From time to time, colorful details surface which briefly capture the attention but much of the time the material is too specialized and/or minor to hold much interest for the general reader. As he had before (The Good War, Working and Hard Times, among others), Terkel brings his own individual voice to the work. As an "oral historian," it is in recreating his conversations with fellow Chicagoans that he is most appealing. Here he exhibits the breezy vitality that seems characteristic of the Windy City. The re is no denying that Terkel's enthusiasms are wide-ranging. They include everything from inner-city murals to Greek coffeehouses; from Pablo Picasso's controversial sculpture to the Dreamland Ballroom; from blizzards to "no-hitters" at Wrigley Field. For "out-of-towners," however, these glimpses of Chicago life are just not striking enough to rivet the attention. Fifty-five black-and-white photographs "by several generations of the city's most renowned photographers" (not seen) will doubtlessly do much to flesh out this paean to Terkel's hometown. As text, however, Chicago is too obviously aimed at those Second City dwellers who wish to revel in nostalgia and self-congratulation. For others, it is likely to prove frustrating and less than completely satisfying.

Pub Date: Sept. 15, 1986

ISBN: 0517050668

Page Count: -

Publisher: Pantheon

Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1986

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

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.

Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955

ISBN: 0670717797

Page Count: -

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955

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IN MY PLACE

From the national correspondent for PBS's MacNeil-Lehrer Newshour: a moving memoir of her youth in the Deep South and her role in desegregating the Univ. of Georgia. The eldest daughter of an army chaplain, Hunter-Gault was born in what she calls the ``first of many places that I would call `my place' ''—the small village of Due West, tucked away in a remote little corner of South Carolina. While her father served in Korea, Hunter-Gault and her mother moved first to Covington, Georgia, and then to Atlanta. In ``L.A.'' (lovely Atlanta), surrounded by her loving family and a close-knit black community, the author enjoyed a happy childhood participating in activities at church and at school, where her intellectual and leadership abilities soon were noticed by both faculty and peers. In high school, Hunter-Gault found herself studying the ``comic-strip character Brenda Starr as I might have studied a journalism textbook, had there been one.'' Determined to be a journalist, she applied to several colleges—all outside of Georgia, for ``to discourage the possibility that a black student would even think of applying to one of those white schools, the state provided money for black students'' to study out of state. Accepted at Michigan's Wayne State, the author was encouraged by local civil-rights leaders to apply, along with another classmate, to the Univ. of Georgia as well. Her application became a test of changing racial attitudes, as well as of the growing strength of the civil-rights movement in the South, and Gault became a national figure as she braved an onslaught of hostilities and harassment to become the first black woman to attend the university. A remarkably generous, fair-minded account of overcoming some of the biggest, and most intractable, obstacles ever deployed by southern racists. (Photographs—not seen.)

Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1992

ISBN: 0-374-17563-2

Page Count: 192

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1992

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