More of a pamphlet than a book, this is a useful introduction for those interested in learning about the waist-training...
A brief guide to waist slimming via corsets.
The corset gets a bad rap. Before the restrictive undergarment fell out of favor with the general population, doctors and reformers blamed corsets for everything from tuberculosis to permanently damaging the wearer’s internal organs. Author B. (Knock-Off Nina, 2013) aims to correct those purported misconceptions in this economical how-to guide for novice waist trainers—those who wear corsets “with the intention of semi-permanently slimming and reducing the waist circumference.” When used correctly, she argues, a corset will narrow the wearer’s waist and help her achieve an hourglass figure. With a measured tone throughout, the book begins with a brief history of corsets peppered with interesting “did you know?” facts; for example, pregnant women and men sometimes wore corsets. That’s followed by an explanation of corset construction and their different types, as well as what to look for when shopping for one. Sensible advice includes avoiding cheaply made fashion corsets in favor of more costly models with steel boning and better-quality fabrics. Next are tips on getting started with waist training, including determining what size corset to buy and how to properly wear the garment. While the author is convinced that committed corset-wearing can semipermanently reshape a person’s body, she cautions beginners not to expect overnight results; she points out that overly aggressive waist training is likely to be unsuccessful and may even be harmful. She also doesn’t claim corsets are a magical fix for those seeking a curvier figure, and she perfunctorily includes some advice on healthy eating. More in-depth is a section on exercises (with black-and-white photo illustrations) intended to improve core strength, which is especially important for waist trainers, as there is evidence that long-term corset-wearing can weaken the abdominal and back muscles. At the same time, little convincing evidence is offered to support the contention that wearing a corset will actually produce lasting changes to the body. The advice isn’t bad, but the bias is clear.
More of a pamphlet than a book, this is a useful introduction for those interested in learning about the waist-training lifestyle.Pub Date: June 4, 2014
ISBN: 978-0985351540
Page Count: 84
Publisher: Hope Street Publishing, LLC
Review Posted Online: Nov. 13, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Necessarily swift and adumbrative as well as inclusive, focused, and graceful.
A light-speed tour of (mostly) Western poetry, from the 4,000-year-old Gilgamesh to the work of Australian poet Les Murray, who died in 2019.
In the latest entry in the publisher’s Little Histories series, Carey, an emeritus professor at Oxford whose books include What Good Are the Arts? and The Unexpected Professor: An Oxford Life in Books, offers a quick definition of poetry—“relates to language as music relates to noise. It is language made special”—before diving in to poetry’s vast history. In most chapters, the author deals with only a few writers, but as the narrative progresses, he finds himself forced to deal with far more than a handful. In his chapter on 20th-century political poets, for example, he talks about 14 writers in seven pages. Carey displays a determination to inform us about who the best poets were—and what their best poems were. The word “greatest” appears continually; Chaucer was “the greatest medieval English poet,” and Langston Hughes was “the greatest male poet” of the Harlem Renaissance. For readers who need a refresher—or suggestions for the nightstand—Carey provides the best-known names and the most celebrated poems, including Paradise Lost (about which the author has written extensively), “Kubla Khan,” “Ozymandias,” “The Charge of the Light Brigade,” Wordsworth and Coleridge’s Lyrical Ballads, which “changed the course of English poetry.” Carey explains some poetic technique (Hopkins’ “sprung rhythm”) and pauses occasionally to provide autobiographical tidbits—e.g., John Masefield, who wrote the famous “Sea Fever,” “hated the sea.” We learn, as well, about the sexuality of some poets (Auden was bisexual), and, especially later on, Carey discusses the demons that drove some of them, Robert Lowell and Sylvia Plath among them. Refreshingly, he includes many women in the volume—all the way back to Sappho—and has especially kind words for Marianne Moore and Elizabeth Bishop, who share a chapter.
Necessarily swift and adumbrative as well as inclusive, focused, and graceful.Pub Date: April 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-23222-6
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
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