Books
Sometimes works that major artists withheld — like songs that are not deemed worthy of release —are best kept in the vaults.
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Paul Fisher’s back-and-forth tease about John Singer Sargent’s sexuality starts out as intriguing, then becomes distracting, and finally irritating as the biographer never quite closes in on his targets.
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In Claire Keegan’s fiction, each sentence matters and each, sometimes very ordinary, action has real consequences.
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Again and again, one encounters vivid glimpses of a man whose passion for music and music-making was immense, and who was gifted at conveying that passion to colleagues and students.
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At points Greil Marcus’ digressive style can seem like nervy brilliance, at others, idle whimsy. What ennobles the book is the critic’s love for his underlying subject: the soulful search for a truer America.
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The point of Bob Dylan’s project is emotional rather than definitive: to probe the power of song to influence us, make us feel, and ultimately transform us.
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Kick the Latch (the title refers to what is done to open the starting gate in a horse race), through its plain and spare authenticity, is a powerful and impressive success.
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“As the old saying goes,” writes author and former prosecutor Valena Beety, “when you’re accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression.”
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These are compelling stories about the trials and tribulations of dynamic, working-class characters.
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Book Review: “Realigners” — Stuck in the Middle
In the end, the historical cavalcade Timothy Shenk presents doesn’t tell us much about how America ended up in such straits or how it will pull out of them, if at all.
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