Extracts from Buckley's Firing Line program, plus much sparkling new commentary. The interview extracts, drawn from the show's 24-year-old files, include joustings with such figures as Norman Mailer, Barry Goldwater, Timothy Leafy, Muhammed Ali, Margaret Thatcher, Richard Nixon, George Wallace, and George McGovern. Buckley groups the interviews into subject categories—"The Sixties," "The Impossible Guest" (Panamanian Demetrios Lakas, who evaded all questions for an hour), "Crime and Punishment," etc., each introduced and interwoven with retrospective reflection that, as Alistair Cooke puts it in his introduction, "restores [Buckley's] roles of district attorney, mocker, lover of the last word, and. . .confessor of grevious sins." There are shocking moments (Lakas stating off camera that "I'd just as soon fuck Castro as sign a treaty with him") and priggish ones (Buckley pointedly ignoring porn star Harry Reems, an unwanted added guest: "He deserved," writes Buckley, ". . .the ostracism that anyone deserves who makes his living by exhibitionistic obscenity"). Buckley also shows his less astringent side by tackling cultural subjects—e.g., harpsichordist Rosalyn Tureck's thoughts on live vs. recorded performance—and his less dogmatic side, e.g., declaring that, in his fight for conscientious-objector status, Muhammed Ali was a victim of the establishment. Vintage Buckley, sure to preach to the converted and outrage the skeptical, executed with maximum charm.
Pub Date: April 28, 1989
ISBN: 394-57568-7
Page Count: -
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1989
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
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