Arts & Humanities Reviews, July 2011
Jul 15, 2011
ARTS
Kalisher, Simpson. The Alienated Photographer. Two Penny. 2011. c.80p. photogs. ISBN 9780578071343. $49.95. PHOTOG
Kalisher (Railroad Men) began his career as a photojournalist in 1948 and eventually embraced photography as an art form independent of journalism. Most of the 63 black-and-white images included here show people on the streets of New York City in the 1960s. The book opens with a brief, conversational introduction by art critic Luc Sante and is thereafter devoted entirely to the images. No titles, dates, descriptive text, or other information about the photographs is available. In Kalisher’s afterword, he describes his career and his intent in composing this book—to order the photographs in such a way that they might convey a message. VERDICT The lack of context provided here will be either encouraging or frustrating, depending on the audience. Kalisher shows how a photographer can control the entire creative process by producing images and designing a book as a total work of art. Libraries with large photography collections will want to add this.—Valerie Nye, Santa Fe Univ. of Art & Design Lib., NM
Levy, Harriet Lane. Paris Portraits: Stories of Picasso, Matisse, Gertrude Stein, and Their Circle. Heyday. 2011. 120p. illus. ISBN 9781597141574. $21.95. FINE ARTS
Levy (1867–1950) was a noted journalist and drama critic in San Francisco early in the last century. In 1907, her friend and neighbor Alice B. Toklas convinced Levy that they should move to Paris. It was there that she once again crossed paths with her former acquaintances Gertrude and Leo Stein. Levy and Toklas’s survival of the great San Francisco earthquake of 1906 made them instant celebrities in the Steins’ inner circle of artistic friends, namely Matisse and Picasso. Gertrude championed Picasso, while her sister-in-law Sarah pushed Matisse, creating a substantial rivalry. Gertrude fully believed she was a genius, so must be right, and was less than gracious to anyone who disagreed. Levy and others were caught in the middle. Although Levy says that Gertrude taught her to see art in a new way, all the Steins come off as monstrously egotistical and self-aggrandizing in these pages, and the reader can feel how uncomfortable it was for Levy and other nongeniuses to be around them. VERDICT Previously unpublished, Levy’s manuscript has been kept in the Bancroft Library (Univ. of California, Berkeley). She writes in an easy conversational style, making this a quick, pleasant outing. Readers interested in behind-the-scenes intelligence on the Steins or any of the artists portrayed here will enjoy this. A worthy purchase for art and lit collections.—Mike Rogers, Library Journal
Pelkonen, Eeva-Liisa. Kevin Roche: Architecture as Environment. Yale Univ. in assoc. with Yale Sch. of Architecture. 2011. 280p. illus. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780300152234. $65. ARCHITECTURE
The work of notable American architect Kevin Roche is characterized by designs that balance built forms with the natural environment. His projects span half a century, beginning with such early works as the Oakland Museum of Art (1966), the Ford Foundation Headquarters in New York City (1967), and the New Haven Veterans Memorial Coliseum (1972), now demolished, and extending to the present moment. Pelkonen (architecture, Yale) ties together this retrospective with three essays on Roche’s many museum projects, his workplace designs, and the theme of environmentalism in his work. While the heavily footnoted text provides context and refreshing relevance for Roche’s contributions to architecture, true value is added by the portfolio photographs and drawings, which fully illustrate over 100 of the architect’s projects. An interview with the subject is included. VERDICT A valuable addition to academic collections, as no other comprehensive work devoted to this important Pritzker Prize–winning architect is still in print.—Nancy Turner, Syracuse Univ. Lib., NY
Picasso’s Paintings, Watercolors, Drawings and Sculpture: A Comprehensive Illustrated Catalogue 1885–1973; The Blue Period 1902–1904, Barcelona and Paris. Alan Wofsy. (Picasso Project). 2011. 272p. illus. ISBN 9781556603273. $150. FINE ARTS
Picasso’s searching eye is evident in this latest volume of the “Picasso Project,” originally begun in the mid-1990s by Alan Wofsy Fine Art under the direction of the late art historian Herschel Chipp. The series is a catalogue raisoné in chronological volumes, though not published in chronological order. The Blue Period, traditionally thought to have been precipitated by the suicide of Picasso’s best friend, Carlos Casagemas, is considered significant in his development as a modern artist in his precubist days. Many of these works, made when he was 20 years old, are painted in blue and show depressed or emaciated and melancholy figures. The book begins with a bibliography of cited works; a “Notes on the Catalogue” section, which describes the data elements used to catalog each artwork; a preface that places Picasso’s works of this period in historical context; and a lengthy chronology. The main section is filled with black-and-white reproductions of all the known artworks from this period. VERDICT Like the rest of the catalog, this title is notable for its consistency of quality, detail, comprehensiveness, and ease of use. Scholars of modern art, curators, and art dealers will want to consult it. This volume is recommended for libraries that collect the series, and those with major interest in modern art and/or Picasso should obtain the set.—Ellen Bates, New York
Pollock, Jackson & family. American Letters, 1927–1947. Polity, dist. by Wiley. 2011. c.250p. illus. ISBN 9780745651552. $25. FINE ARTS
First published in France, this compelling collection of letters among the members of Pollock’s extended family traces the course of a tight-knit group of Americans from the Jazz Age through the Great Depression and World War II. Pollock was the youngest of five sons born to parents whose peripatetic lives carried them across several states. Jackson and his brothers’ creative philosophies were nurtured despite the hard times, and although they scattered in adulthood, the family remained close. These letters are less an account of a famous painter’s early years—only a few were written by Jackson—than a portrait of the growth and struggles of an articulate, intellectually engaged family during extraordinary times. And there is no dearth of fascinating historical details. One moving letter from 1933, written by Pollock’s mother, Stella, relates the news of her husband’s early death on the heels of FDR’s auspicious first inaugural and a terrifying earthquake in Long Beach. Other missives report on the travails of discrimination within New Deal job programs, gratitude for small loans, debates about political struggles, and reactions to news of the war. VERDICT By turns engrossing and charming, this family chronicle is a slice of 20th-century Americana that will appeal to all interested in history or art.—Douglas F. Smith, Berkeley P.L., CA
LITERATURE
Bartlett, Rosamund. Tolstoy: A Russian Life. Houghton Harcourt. Nov. 2011. c.544p. illus. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780151014385. $35. LIT
Lev Tolstoy did nothing halfway. He was respected as much for his impressive aristocratic pedigree as his outspoken political views, brave and courageous military career, prodigious literary output, and, nearer the end of his life, religious austerity. As a national icon, he was celebrated; as a political dissenter, untouchable. He was the biggest celebrity in Russia. Tolstoy the family man was dictatorial, his larger-than-life personality intimidating. His wife, Sonya, ran the household and, it’s reported, found time to revise the entire manuscript of War and Peace seven times. Apparently, running Tolstoy’s life demanded as much from his family as from the writer himself. Bartlett (Wagner and Russia), an authority on Russian cultural history, objectively explores all facets of Tolstoy’s life, from youth to looming public persona to controlling family man, producing an epic biography, tapping into newly available sources, that does justice to an epic figure. VERDICT Many books have been written about Tolstoy, but few give his family life its due. Written for both the curious, educated reader and the academic scholar, Bartlett’s book is an exemplary literary biography. [See Prepub Alert, 5/16/11.]—Lisa Guidarini, Algonquin P.L., IL
Dellamora, Richard. Radclyffe Hall: A Life in Writing. Univ. of Pennsylvania. (Haney Foundation). 2011. c.320p. illus. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780812243468. $34.95. LIT
Radclyffe Hall (1880–1943; born Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall) is best known today for her 1928 lesbian novel, The Well of Loneliness. Dellamora (English & cultural studies, emeritus, Trent Univ., Ont.) commendably investigates Hall through more than a single lens. Although relationships between women were of upmost importance to Hall as an individual and artist, Dellamora focuses on the multifaceted person she was, including her interests in human psychology, Roman Catholicism, and paranormal phenomena (she had an intriguing association with the Society for Psychical Research). Dellamora moves away from a traditional biographical structure by relating Hall’s life principally through her writing. Chapter titles including “Reading the Poetry” and “The Well of Loneliness as an Activist Text” demonstrate how the book is as much a literary study as a biography. Dellamora’s archival research in the United States, Canada, and the UK is evident. He also studied the unpublished writings of Una Troubridge, Hall’s longtime companion. VERDICT This dense, scholarly work, with helpful chapter notes and a bibliography, is suited for an academic audience with an interest in LGBTQ and women’s literature.—Stacy Russo, Chapman Univ. Libs., Orange, CA
Hughes, Evan. Literary Brooklyn: The Writers of Brooklyn and the Story of American City Life. Holt. Aug. 2011. c.352p. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780805089868. pap. $17. LIT
In his “hybrid of literary biography, literary analysis, and urban history,” Hughes, who lives in Brooklyn, examines writers associated with the borough, including Walt Whitman, Hart Crane, Marianne Moore, Alfred Kazin, Richard Wright, Truman Capote, Arthur Miller, Paul Auster, and many others. Some settled in Brooklyn for cheap rent or to escape the hustle of glittering Manhattan; others, like Brooklyn-born Kazin, viewed the borough as a place to flee from to achieve success. Along with his literary analysis, Hughes notes the impact of historical, economic, and sociological changes in Brooklyn on the authors and their works. He provides the various addresses of the writers as they moved around (map included). The final chapter surveys postgentrification writers, including Edwidge Danticat, Susan Choi, and Rick Moody. What’s most surprising is whom Hughes has left out; Betty Smith (A Tree Grows in Brooklyn), Norman Rosten (Under the Boardwalk), and Paule Marshall (Brown Girl, Brownstones) are mentioned only in passing, if at all, although they have a stronger literary connection to Brooklyn than Capote or Wright. VERDICT A book on this subject is long past due. This one makes a good beginning, but is not the final word. It will be of most interest to readers with a connection to the borough or who are studying the subject.—William Gargan, Brooklyn Coll. Lib., CUNY
PERFORMING ARTS
Beal, Amy C. Carla Bley. Univ. of Illinois. (American Composers). Oct. 2011. c.120p. photogs. discog. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780252036361. $55; pap. ISBN 9780252078187. $22. MUSIC
Beal (music, Univ. of California, Santa Cruz) seeks to give American composer Carla Bley the scholarly attention she deserves. Bley is a prolific composer, bandleader, performer, and activist akin to Charles Mingus. She is an immensely important figure in American music of the latter half of the 20th century, and thorough examination of her impact is lacking in most other major works. Written for a musically educated audience, Beal’s book delves into theoretical analyses of Bley’s work, especially her jazz opera Escalator Over the Hill. Beal also expertly contextualizes Bley’s career within the landscapes of emergent avant-garde, free jazz, and experimental music while also exploring her creative relationships with the legendary Steve Swallow, Charlie Haden, and others. VERDICT Beal not only captures the essence of Bley’s dual identity as a major player in both the classical and the jazz worlds but also makes an essential contribution to scholarship on both American jazz and modern composers. Readers and researchers interested in women composers, American music history, music theory, or jazz from 1950 to the present will find this book invaluable.—Carolyn M. Schwartz, Westfield State Univ. Lib., MA
Gaines, Caseen. Inside Pee-wee’s Playhouse: The Behind-the-Scenes Story of a Pop Phenomenon. ECW, dist. by IPG. Sept. 2011. c.232p. photogs. ISBN 9781550229981. pap. $19.95. TV
Can Pee-wee’s Playhouse—the transformational children’s show that was for an entire generation in the Eighties what the intellectually subversive Rocky & Bullwinkle & Friends was in the Sixties—really be celebrating its 25th anniversary? Today’s secret word, boys and girls, is “youbetcha!” This serviceable and simple guide to Pee-wee’s seminal show also traces the trajectory of actor Paul Reubens through the TV show, movies, the notorious 1991 incident, and comeback, culminating in his recent successful Broadway adaptation. First-time author Gaines constructs an easy and gently flowing narrative blissfully devoid of academic semiotic deconstructions and metaphorical high-wire linguistic acts. Utilizing interviews with key cast and crew members, Gaines follows the development and run of Pee-wee’s Playhouse and liberally adds anecdotal material and behind-the-scenes gossip from numerous insiders. An episode guide for all five seasons and a “Puppetland Directory” that identifies key personnel enrich the text. VERDICT Gaines reached out to interview over 200 people connected with the show, including Reubens, who declined to participate because of a planned memoir. That will be the story we need to hear. Until then, all Pee-wee fans will enjoy this informative and fun text.—Barry X. Miller, Austin P.L., TX
Spera, Keith. Groove Interrupted: Loss, Renewal, and the Music of New Orleans. St. Martin’s. Aug. 2011. c.256p. ISBN 9780312552251. $26.99. MUSIC
Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Spera chronicles the New Orleans Jazz Fest and various musicians of the Crescent City and the effects of Hurricane Katrina on their work. Interestingly, 2011 has already seen the publication of John Swenson’s New Atlantis, which on the surface covers the same subject matter. However, Swenson focuses on music in New Orleans neighborhoods—the brass bands, bar bands, rappers, and other locally known musicians. Spera discusses better-known artists such as Fats Domino, Mystikal, Pete Fountain, Alex Chilton, Jeremy Davenport, Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown, and Aaron Neville. Spera interviewed all of his subjects, some many times over the years, and he brings his intimate knowledge of their personalities and work to this splendid book. VERDICT The research is strong, the writing is personable and engaging, and the spirit of America’s most musically diverse and unusual city emerges at every turn. An outstanding study of the late-20th-century and early-21st-century music of the luminaries of New Orleans and the effects of Hurricane Katrina on their lives and work. Essential for fans of all the included artists as well as anyone interested in the cultural effects of Katrina.—James E. Perone, Univ. of Mount Union, Alliance, OH
Sullivan, Denise. Keep On Pushing: Black Power Music from Blues to Hip-Hop. Lawrence Hill: Chicago Review, dist. by IPG. Aug. 2011. c.256p. photogs. bibliog. index. ISBN 9781556528170. pap. $16.95. MUSIC
Sullivan (The White Stripes: Sweethearts of the Blues) combines impressive research and wide-ranging interviews in a multilayered narrative about the power of music within black liberation, civil rights, antiwar, and gender-related movements. Folk, blues, rock, hip-hop, punk, and other styles helped to define sweeping social issues while stirring listeners from the age of Martin Luther King Jr., the Black Panthers, and Woodstock to that of women’s issues and gay rights. Sullivan incorporates the personal stories and challenges of the artists who shared their hopeful and sometimes defiant messages of freedom, pride, and equality, including Nina Simone, Odetta, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Richie Havens, Curtis Mayfield, and Phranc. She is candid about the cultural complexities of each era and discusses how the music was powerful enough to draw strong reactions from political, social, and corporate sectors. VERDICT This is for anyone interested in a thorough analysis of music as a commanding force in change as well as a continually evolving artistic presence. The book is packed with informative details and commentary, and those who are willing to give it the thoughtful reading it deserves (perhaps along with listening to a sampling of recordings) will be rewarded.—Carol J. Binkowski, Bloomfield, NJ
Tiel, Vicky. It’s All About the Dress: What I Learned in 40 Years About Men, Women, Sex, and Fashion. St. Martin’s. Aug. 2011. c.304p. illus. index. ISBN 9780312659097. $26.99. FILM
Tiel’s breezy memoir oozes a self-confidence that teeters on braggadocio as she takes readers through the highlights of her life as a fashion designer and friend to the stars, beginning in the 1960s. Tiel and her slinky, body-baring clothing designs took Paris and New York by storm (as she will be the first to tell you). Many of her stories would be hard to fact-check—she was part of a clinical trial for birth-control pills, Woody Allen “won” her virginity in a contest, Warren Beatty is a great multitasker. Her claim to have invented the miniskirt would certainly be disputed by Mary Quant and André Courrèges. Tiel isn’t coy about her bedroom activities, though her quest to achieve five stars in all categories on a particular actor’s chart will rub some readers the wrong way. Her playful line drawings, celebrity “Life Lessons,” recipes, and words of wisdom appear throughout. VERDICT A gossipy, name-dropping read, much of which must be taken on faith. Fans of behind-the-scenes Hollywood tell-alls will love it, though Tiel’s attitudes about men, drinking, and marital fidelity will not be for everyone.—Maggie Knapp, Trinity Valley Sch. Lib., Fort Worth, TX
Tom Waits on Tom Waits: Interviews and Encounters. Chicago Review, dist. by IPG. Aug. 2011. c.480p. ed. by Paul Maher Jr. index. ISBN 9781569763124. >pap. $19.95.MUSIC
Tom Waits has been an idiosyncratic, eccentric singer/artist/actor with a devoted cult following for over 40 years. He has carefully guarded his private life, but, as this book shows, he has cooperated in many entertaining if not always informative interviews. The book covers Waits’s entire career and focuses on interviews and interview excerpts about each of his albums. Maher (Jack Kerouac’s American Journey), who compiled a similar book on Miles Davis (Miles on Miles), presents a wide range of interview styles and results. He interjects short narratives to highlight Waits’s life events and progress from album to album. VERDICT For fans who have not discovered the interviews section of the comprehensive website devoted to Waitsana (www.tomwaitslibrary.com/interviews.html), this book will provide a wonderful overview of the artist and his many distinctive albums. Recommended for all Tom Waits fans.—Bill Walker, Stockton-San Joaquin Cty. P.L., Stockton, CA
Vogel, Joseph. Man in the Music: The Creative Life and Work of Michael Jackson. Sterling. Nov. 2011. c.384p. photogs. ISBN 9781402779381. $24.95. MUSIC
The many fans of the King of Pop are going to love this book. Huffington Post writer Vogel began it in 2005, long before Michael Jackson’s untimely death, and he wisely focuses on the music and groundbreaking recordings of Jackson’s solo career. Scandals and eccentricities are relegated to the background in this critical musical analysis, which will delight even the most knowledgeable Jackson fan. Each track on each record, from 1979’s Off the Wall through 2001’s Invincible, including posthumously released recordings, gets a thorough analysis, with listings of the involved writers, producers, and musicians. There is plenty of contextual biographical detail, and Vogel describes the cultural and political backdrop that makes Jackson’s achievements all the more remarkable. VERDICT A thoroughly enjoyable analysis of the music and life of the most popular musician of an era.—Bill Baars, Lake Oswego P.L., OR
Zimmer, Kim with Laura Morton. I’m Just Sayin’!: Three Deaths, Seven Husbands, and a Clone! My Life as a Daytime Diva. NAL: Penguin Group (USA). Aug. 2011. c.320p. ISBN 9780451233431. $26.95. TV
Although some may not have heard of four-time Emmy winner Zimmer, big soap opera fans know about Reva Shayne, the character she played on Guiding Light for 25 years. Zimmer spends the bulk of her memoir on what led to the show’s cancellation in 2009, primarily arguing that a new producer drove it into the ground. Despite the book’s subtitle, she writes that she is just a regular gal from Michigan who is friends with everyone. Yet Zimmer has many strong feelings about what made the show great (she did), and it’s obvious she thinks she could have done a better job of producing it. As her book went to press, Zimmer had snagged a role on One Life To Live, another popular soap, and she was looking forward to a long run there. That one was recently cancelled, too. VERDICT For soap fans who care about the real life behind the character. Most libraries can pass on this one; there will be much more demand for Susan Lucci’s recent All My Life.—Rosy Brewer, Sno-Isle Libs., Marysville, WA
PHILOSOPHY
May, Simon. Love: A History. Yale Univ. 2011. c.304p. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780300118308. $27.50. PHIL
May (Birkbeck Coll., Univ. of London; Nietzsche’s Ethics and His War on “Morality”) finds the key to love in “ontological rootedness.” People want to feel at home in the world, and intense rapture for a particular person can help us achieve this. Though love is thus of vital significance, May warns against exalting love to quasidivine status, a process he argues has taken place since the 18th century, as belief in God has declined in Western societies. Placing love in God’s stead has led to distortions about it. Love, contrary to common opinion, is not in essence unconditional, selfless, and eternal. May traces the idea of love as ontological rootedness to its beginning in the Hebrew scriptures. He goes on to consider transformations of the idea through Plato, Aristotle, New Testament Christianity, the Middle Ages, Rousseau and the romantics, Nietzsche, Freud, and Proust. VERDICT This book deserves to rank with Denis de Rougemont’s classic Love in the Western World. Readers interested in the history of ideas, philosophy, and religion, as well as the proverbial general reader, will gain much from May’s well-crafted study.—David Gordon, Bowling Green State Univ., OH
POETRY
Barry, Quan. Water Puppets. Univ. of Pittsburgh. Aug. 2011. c.80p. ISBN 9780822961604. pap. $15.95. POETRY
Readers of Barry’s two previous books, Asylum and Controvertibles, will recognize the signature weave of her work: the cross-hatching of world events, multicultural perspective, and autobiographical detail into sharply rendered yet fluid reflections on the impossibility of living a “guilt-free life” within the scarred moral topography of human history. Less uniform in execution than 2004’s Controvertibles, the poems in this book (whose title references Vietnam’s ancient art of aquatic puppet theater) span a variety of forms from short lyric to lengthy narrative, showcasing Barry’s photographic eye for despair both collective (Congolese refugees “sifting down a broken road...many of them/ with the agony gouged into their bodies”) and solitary (“One man standing in the slushy winter light, torso twisting/ like a weathervane as he holds/ a cardboard sign high in the air”). VERDICT Some will find Barry’s subjects—genocidal war, pornography, the slaughter of Thanksgiving turkeys—disconcerting, but she treats them with a candor, persistence, and tonal control that aims to question and comprehend rather than simply indict or dismiss. An engrossing collection.—Fred Muratori, Cornell Univ. Lib., Ithaca, NY
Bottoms, David. We Almost Disappear. Copper Canyon. Aug. 2011. c.65p. ISBN 9781556593314. pap. $16. POETRY
Bottoms (Waltzing Through the Endtime) fits comfortably into the grand Southern literary tradition, with a delightful facility for language and a keen awareness of place, even as he tips and turns both to his own advantage: “Bump and jostle, the road falling fast into rut, ditch, washout,/ pines cuffing the windows, and me in the cab/ a constant bounce between my old man and my uncle/ as we bring up the tail.” He writes with a sure yet casual rhythm and an attention to detail, especially locating the significant in the everyday and celebrating the everyday for its own significance. These are intimate, personal poems, much closer to the heart than his earlier collections. In poems for a lost youth, a country of childhood and innocence, we understand how, among the older men of his family, “mostly there was silence, as though they’d all agreed/ the world was beyond comment.” The book’s last section, featuring poems about Bottoms’s father and the hard truth and trials of aging, will be most haunting. VERDICT Bottoms is again at the top of his game, smart, passionate, and compassionate. This collection will appeal to all readers of contemporary poetry.—Louis McKee, Painted Bride Arts Ctr., Philadelphia
Cole, Henri. Touch. Farrar. Sept. 2011. c.80p. ISBN 9780374278359. $23. POETRY
In a cynical age, the Wordsworthian poetry of “powerful feelings” may be the hardest to write successfully, but Cole has mastered the genre convincingly enough in more than two decades to garner widespread critical praise, including a 2004 Pulitzer nomination. On the heels of last year’s Pierce the Skin, this new collection of plain-spoken lyrics, many of them sonnets, continues the poet’s quest to connect his own physicality and emotion (“the salt of sweat,/ the salt of tears”) to the larger world (“the salt of the sea”) by “seeing into love, seeing into suffering.” The external prompts for this connection may be as innocuous as hens, seaweed, and bats or as devastating as the death of the poet’s mother and a relationship with a drug-addicted lover. “I want to be real, to think, to live,” Cole writes, as unabashed a cri de coeur as one will likely find in poetry this side of the Confessionals. VERDICT Moving through “fraught territories/ of self and family” in so heightened a state of awareness risks solipsism and sentimentality, but Cole’s meticulous craft prevents his fragile-boned structures from tipping either way, revealing an aesthetic and tonal awareness of equally impressive magnitude.—Fred Muratori, Cornell Univ. Lib., Ithaca, NY
Gilbert, Sandra M. Aftermath. Norton. Jul. 2011. c.96p. ISBN 9780393081121. $24.95. POETRY
“How could I (but I could)// not think of my dead—/ their faces quickly withering/ & blown along these roads.” In her eighth collection (after Belongings), noted poet/critic Gilbert considers grief, loss, and what follows. Employing sonnets (sequences and series), carefully constructed tercets, and metered quatrains, she pursues bereavements that are mostly personal but sometimes global; she writes of “another slam of war” and questions the “struggle” to “name the bullets in a sonnet.” Personifying grief as “a vase of bloody roses,” a “young birch swaying & scabrous,” and “a dull pot/ at the back of the stove,” she is mindful that the poet’s work is to record these moments. In language and imagery that is as lush as it is simple, Gilbert explores the aftermath of sorrow, which is, at best, the comfort of memory and the possible return of joy. “When I put my lenses in/ the world returns to the spectacle it was/ before darkness swallowed us.” VERDICT A highly recommended book by an important poet.—Karla M. Huston, Wisconsin Acad. of Sciences, Appleton
Harrison, Jim. Songs of Unreason. Copper Canyon. Oct. 2011. c.98p. ISBN 9781556593895. $22. POETRY
Guggenheim winner Harrison’s 30-plus books include many novels (e.g., The Farmer’s Daughter), and his poetry illustrates how vital narrative is to all his work. These poems offer a unique worldview along with a keen knowledge of nature (“of late, I/ see waking as another chance at spring”) and a mastery of aphorisms (“The beauty of the rattlesnake is in its threat”). Unlike many contemporary poets, Harrison is philosophical, but his philosophy is nature based and idiosyncratic: “Much that you see/ isn’t with your eyes./ Throughout the body are eyes.” The last section, “Suite of Unreason,” provides a provocative 20-page series of vignettes about life, death, childhood, and travel that closely examine our relationships with other beings. The poems occasionally fall short in their needless repetition and reliance on full sentences when phrases would jump-start tension and create more music (“He thinks/ he’s as inevitable as a river but doesn’t have time/ to keep time”), but Harrison clearly has a probing and unrelenting eye. VERDICT As in all good poetry, Harrison’s lines linger to be ruminated upon a third or fourth time, with each new reading revealing more substance and raising more questions. Most readers of contemporary poetry will enjoy this work.—Doris Lynch, Monroe Cty. P.L., IN
Muske-Dukes, Carol. Twin Cities. Penguin Poets. 2011. c.84p. ISBN 9780143119647. pap. $18. POETRY
Acclaimed poet and novelist Muske-Dukes (Sparrow; Channeling Mark Twain) tenderly ponders the self as both center and margin, both a real and an imagined pronouncement. She writes about loss in a language that absorbs all the commotion yet is never overwhelmed by it, and her earthy images pay homage to places that embody her own secrets and wonders. Most of the poems have a sense of crisis, ethical and emotional, that the poet highlights by juxtaposing two or more scenes, with the crisis tending to dissolve theatrically: “One Chador–clad woman reading Calvino/ on the train/ …I’ll stand by the Kiss & Invisible Cities that/ Woman is reading/ Pal, they are saving us.” Fading away, decaying, examining the scars that the passage of time leaves on what used to be fertile and dazzling—this is what Muske-Dukes does throughout (“Beauty grew too fast, like your body:/ Ungainly, unfaithful”). VERDICT A collection that highlights the richness that makes life mysterious and yet clear and immediate; for all readers.—Sadiq Alkoriji, South Regional Lib., Broward Cty., FL
Zagajewski, Adam. Unseen Hand. Farrar. Jul. 2011. 112p. tr. from Polish by Clare Cavanagh. ISBN 9780374280895. $23. POETRY
Known for his “plain-speaking” poetry, Zagajewski (Eternal Enemies) blends past and present, mundane and mysterious in all his work. His new collection has a conversational, unadorned style reminiscent of William Carlos Williams but often without the imagery. It also has a certain atonality, although this may be the fault of the translation. The best poems establish a contradiction that is resolved at the end by paradox. Take “Poets Photographed,” which isn’t about photos of poets as much as it’s about the music of poetry that, according to Zagajewski, most people don’t understand. Born in 1945 in Poland, Zagajewski grew up Roman Catholic in a country ruled by the Polish Communist Party and found his poetic voice as a believer writing amid an official atheistic milieu. He refers to his Catholicism in several of these poems, but it’s a quiet Catholicism—often tinged with irony, as in “First Communion”: “I’m a beginning Catholic,/ who struggles to tell good from evil.” VERDICT Reminiscing about his youth in Eastern Europe and musing on his adulthood in the United States, Zagajewski is melancholy yet hopeful as his poems travel back and forth both in geography and in time. Most readers of contemporary poetry should enjoy.—Diane Scharper, Towson Univ., MD
RELIGION
Chase, Steven. Nature as Spiritual Practice. Eerdmans. Jul. 2011. c.288p. bibliog. ISBN 9780802840103. pap. $18. REL
In recent years we’ve seen a growing interest in the relationship between nature and spirituality, with many books discussing the role of nature in spirituality and its divine aspects. This book goes beyond that. Chase (resident scholar, Collegeville Inst. of Ecumenical & Cultural Research) offers insight into the spiritual side of nature along with exercises (called practices) that the reader can do to experience this relationship firsthand. The fairly easy practices can be done alone or in a group in a retreat setting. They include contemplative prayer, discernment, occasional scripture reading, and meditation on your relationship with nature. Most compelling is the concluding chapter, “The Green Beatitudes,” where Chase goes through the beatitudes one by one and offers an interpretation of each that relates it to nature. After each interpretation is a section that presents a way for the reader to relate with nature through that beatitude. VERDICT All in all, this is a distinctive book that offers readers different ways to reconnect to nature and to their own spiritual selves. Recommended to all collections with an emphasis on spirituality, especially nature spirituality. Those focusing on green theology or these new kinds of spiritual and meditative exercises would especially benefit.—Sonnet Ireland, Univ. of New Orleans Lib.
Laird, Martin. A Sunlit Absence: Silence, Awareness, and Contemplation. Oxford Univ. Aug. 2011. c.208p. ISBN 9780195378726. $18.95. REL
Laird (theology, Villanova Univ.) provides a sequel to his Into the Silent Land: A Guide to the Christian Practice of Contemplation, which deals with distraction and boredom in contemplative prayer. Here, he focuses more on the contribution that “negative” emotions make to true surrender to reality or to God. In such surrender, one no longer identifies oneself with the series of emotions one feels during meditation but rather develops a “sunlit absence” that deepens into the divine presence. Laird provides encouragement for those beset by all manner of distracting difficulties, sleepiness, and doubts during prayer. He shows how, with spiritual maturity, the mind and heart expand into perceiving the divine luminosity that pervades reality. VERDICT Especially intended for beginners and intermediates but useful to anyone on the contemplative path, this book deals profoundly yet simply with matters treated only superficially, if at all, in many other guides to contemplation. Laird writes within a Christian worldview, but the book may help other contemplatives both in their practice and in their perception of the role of contemplation in life itself.—Carolyn M. Craft, formerly with Longwood Univ., Farmville, VA
Landes, Richard. Heaven on Earth: The Varieties of the Millennial Experience. Oxford Univ. Aug. 2011. c.592p. bibliog. ISBN 9780199753598. $35. REL
In a significant contribution to the study of millennialist movements, Landes (history, Boston Univ.; Encyclopedia of Millennialism and Millennial Movements) studies the varieties of such movements across the centuries, movements that hope for a human society made perfect via an apocalypse creating heaven on earth. Landes points to apocalyptic arcs in secular history that have led us out of and back into normal time. Such movements can be dangerous when believers gain authority, whether in the founding of new religions, in secular revolutions, or in holocausts. Landes contrasts “owls”—recorders of normal time in history—with the “roosters” of apocalyptic time who voice the hidden transcript. He carefully analyzes common elements in tribal, agrarian, modern secular, and postmodern apocalyptic movements and warns that today’s mutually reinforcing apocalyptic threats—“anthropogenic global warming” and “global jihad”—are subject to dichotomous left-right political posturing rather than sober reflection and action, amplifying the dangers of both. VERDICT This work places Landes high among millennialism historians such as Michael Barkun (A Culture of Conspiracy) and Catherine Wessinger (Millennialism, Persecution, and Violence). Addressed to educated readers interested in religious, political, and social apocalyptic movements, it succeeds in both analyzing past catastrophic millennialist movements and predicting what the future may hold.—William P. Collins, Library of Congress
Norwich, John Julius. Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy. Random. Jul. 2011. c.528p. illus. bibliog. index. ISBN 9781400067152. $30. REL
Popular British historian and travel writer Norwich (A History of Venice) offers a readable, sweeping history of the papacy, concentrating on the role of the various popes in world politics, while treating little of the religious aspects of the papacy. In some cases, he follows the popular view with little notice that there are serious historians who hold a contrary opinion. While he seems to emphasize the more sordid tales of the papacy, there are some popes, such as Gregory the Great, for whom Norwich expresses the highest admiration. Some critical comments show a definite liberal slant, and Norwich is not afraid to express his personal opinion. There is a fascinating chapter on the Pope Joan legend, and Norwich offers his opinion on whether John Paul I was murdered. VERDICT This lively if opinionated view of the political aspects of one of the most powerful positions in world history will appeal to history buffs. Eamon Duffy’s more scholarly Saints and Sinners: A History of the Popes treats more directly the papacy as a religious institution.—Augustine J. Curley, Newark Abbey, NJ
Transitions: Leading Churches Through Change. Westminster/John Knox. 2011. c.256p. ed. by David N. Mosser. ISBN 9780664235437. pap. $20. REL
The foreword to this book describes living in a “white-water world.” How does a pastor or congregational leader succeed in ministering and preaching in the midst of life-altering transitions? Mosser (homiletics, Southern Methodist Univ.) brings together an impressive collection of essays, sermons, and other short pieces centered on the theme of preaching in the face of incredible changes among pastors, congregations, and church communities. Each selection approaches the topic with its own distinctive writing style, ranging from the academic to actual sermons to case studies, along with a few humorous musings. The results are a fine mixture of high-quality scholarship and practical, helpful content. Just the chapters on preaching to the elderly, neighborhoods in transition, funeral sermons, and pastoral transitions would make this a worthwhile purchase. VERDICT While many of these pieces contain excellent material on the themes of change, the preaching perspective limits the audience to clergy largely in conservative mainline denominations, although with some crossover appeal to evangelicals. Recommended to applicable seminaries and academic libraries.—Ray Arnett, Fremont Area Dist. Lib., MI
SPORTS & RECREATION
Codling, Stuart. Real Racers: Formula 1 in the 1950s and 1960s; Rare and Classic Images from the Klemantaski Collection. Motorbooks: Quayside. 2011. 208p. photogs. index. ISBN 9780760338919. $40. SPORTS
In this stunning, oversize volume, Codling takes a trip through Formula 1 (F1) racing’s early years, focusing on the people who drove under wildly dangerous conditions. Most F1 drivers died in spectacular crashes, and those who weren’t killed suffered horrific injuries. Playboys, royalty, and mechanics’ sons pitted their skills and their machines against one another over often hazardous courses. Jackie Stewart, Juan Manuel Fangio, Stirling Moss, Graham Hill, and others offer insights into what racing was like in those formative years. There was little in the way of safety equipment, and on-site emergency help was crude. “I was put on a stretcher and left on the floor, which was covered in cigarette ends,” recalled Stewart, “All the skin was coming off my body.” Photos are from the archives of noted race photographer Louis Klemantaski. VERDICT The top-notch photography and text that includes history with biographies and just a touch of scandalous gossip will appeal to any reader interested in F1 racing.—Susan Belsky, Oshkosh P.L., WI
