A forty-year retrospective of American trivia, trends, pseudo-objective insights, quick portraits and strained paradoxes. The Depression is infused with the Roosevelt glamour and scorn for Republican troglodytes; Horton's dixie cups, Okies, 25-cent movies and six-cent-an-hour jobs give way to G.I. Joe with his Ernie Pylesque paraphernalia, then to the age of Robert Hall, Sputnik and the "dusky" Angela Davis. Often enough, as with the "sex-drenched" 1960's, Manchester foregoes explicit interpretation. His basic slant is an epiglottal liberalism of the sort which expresses some sympathy for Owen Lattimore but fails to question the guilt of the Rosenbergs, while assuming a patrician superiority to the McCarthyites. The Bomb — had to be used to save lives; the Bay of Pigs — too bad the CIA muffed it. Legal and moral turpitude such as Judge Hoffman's at the Chicago Seven trial is often covered by omission. The book's farinaceous view of the world is speckled with American violence (the Republic Steel massacre, postwar comic books) and with a certain synthetic journalistic competence (Truman's 1948 whistlestop buildup). Even after gorging on the author's conventional wisdom and patronizing glosses, the reader will know little of what it was really all about. A big comedown from Manchester's The Arms of Krupp (1968).
Pub Date: Nov. 15, 1974
ISBN: 0553341472
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Jan. 4, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1974
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
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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