Books
Shakespeare’s “Coriolanus” deals with the difficultly of recognizing superiority at a time of radical social breakdown, specifically when it is democracy that is in extremis.
For anyone interested in classical music, “Motherless Child” is a novel to be savored. And there is no doubt that Zeitlin has gotten those details right. She is the widow of the great violinist and teacher, Zvi Zeitlin, who died this past May at 90.
As monster fiction, “Vlad” has hints, now and then, of what “Talulla Rising” doesn’t aspire to. In the former, Carlos Fuentes peels back the familiar to provide glimpses of the genuinely horrific.
Irving Berlin fans will be pleased to see such items as the complete Jerome Kern letter, (written in 1925!) in which Kern writes: “Irving Berlin has no place in American music. HE IS AMERICAN MUSIC.”
Poet Mel Kenne, like a desert ascetic, has pared away everything that is not essential -— no words have been wasted in the making of this collection.
Norman Manea’s compelling novel “The Lair” tracks the ambiguities, contradictions, and confusions of the exile’s psyche as he struggles to find footing in surroundings that are often unintelligible. It is a highly cerebral, labyrinthine book, filled with mystery, paranoia, and illegible codes.
Here you have it: Werewolves are horny, vamps merely thirsty. This, to be sure, is material to work with, as novelist Glen Duncan does. But I can’t help thinking about great nineteenth-century novels of involuntary transformation.
Cultural Commentary — Northrop Frye at 100
Northrop Frye, inspired by the poet William Blake, demands that the critic be a warrior in a “mental fight,” articulating the liberating value of literature as a source of imaginative energy that generates possibilities.
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