Tag Archives: Reviews

A Year in Books/Day 145: Marilyn-The New York Years

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  • Title: Marilyn-The New York Years
  • Author & Photographer: Sam Shaw
  • Year Published: 2004 (Lardon)
  • Year Purchased: 2004
  • Source: Unknown, but it was in conjunction with a show of Sam Shaw’s Marilyn photographs.
  • About: Sam Shaw was a photographer who also worked as a movie producer (most notably on several John Cassavetes films). He was a long-time close friend of Marilyn Monroe, and acted as the still photographer on The Seven Year Itch (1955). After her famous move to New York City to study acting with Lee Strasberg, during which time she married playwright Arthur Miller, Sam Shaw took up his camera to capture his friend at her luminous best. The trust she felt for Shaw is apparent: whether candid or posed, there is an ease and casual glamour to most of the images not seen since her earlier modeling work with Andre de Dienes. It is a beautiful coffee table volume that allows the photography to shine; the text is limited to a few brief quotes by Shaw and Monroe.
  • Motivation: Sam Shaw is my favourite Marilyn photographer; many of the images in this book were never-before-published. Win-win.
  • Times Read: A few
  • Random Excerpt/Page 4: “Eventually, Marilyn found herself in the business of being a superstar. She became a business woman. She became a big tycoon trying to lay the law down to the Hollywood bigshots. And she nearly beat them. In today’s atmosphere, with women all over demanding more rights, she would have won hands down.”
  • Happiness Scale: 10+++

A Year in Books/Day 144: Anthony Trollope

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  • Title: Anthony Trollope
  • Author: James Pope-Hennessy
  • Year Published: 1971/This Edition: 2001 (Phoenix Press)
  • Year Purchased: 2003/2004
  • Source: Unknown
  • About: The creator of fictional Barsetshire, and its memorable inhabitants, receives an excellent biographical treatment by Pope-Hennessy. To read a Trollope novel-especially one from this famed series-is to step into one of the greatest of all fictional worlds. It’s a beautifully self-contained experience. As part of the careful unfolding of the novelist’s life, we are introduced to his formidable mother, Fanny; a professional writer with a deep social conscience, she has been sadly neglected by most modern scholars. Her story offers an interesting counterpoint to that of her famous son.
  • Motivation: I am a Trollope fan. I love dead writers. Biographies are an obsession.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 102: “To sum up: we know extremely little about the pretty Yorkshire girl whom Anthony Trollope met at Kingstown near Dublin in the summertime of 1842, to whom he was engaged for the best part of three years, and whom he finally married.”
  • Happiness Scale: 9
    English: Anthony Trollope

    English: Anthony Trollope (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

     

A Year in Books/Day 143: Longfellow’s Poems

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  • Title: Longfellow’s Poems
  • Year Published: 1900/This Edition: 1901 (A.L. Burt Company, Publishers)
  • Year Purchased: Unknown
  • Source: My Step-grandmother
  • About: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the great American poet of the 19th century, is remembered for Evangeline, Paul Revere’s Ride, and The Song of Hiawatha.
  • Motivation: This is another book that I ended up with after my Step-grandmother’s death nearly 20 years ago; it was given to her by her mother, who had been a school teacher during The Great War. This beautifully preserved volume was, I thought then, something of a reward for having been frightened by my stepfather’s severe (yet kindly enough) Grandmother Doris. During the few years that I knew her, when she was in her nineties, she was every inch the prim, dour school marm. Each encounter with her was like an inspection, where I was assessed head to foot then grilled about my school work. In her presence, I instinctively knew not to speak until spoken to; fortunately, simply being in the same room with her cowed me (and my natural chattiness) to the point of panicky muteness.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page vii: “The reader observes also the absence of the wit and humor which is almost universal in poets. While Longfellow was always cheerful, he was never droll.”
  • Happiness Scale: 7 1/2

    English: Engraving of American poet Henry Wads...

    English: Engraving of American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, presumably after a portrait by Samuel Lawrence. From the book The Song of Hiawatha, Moscow, 1931. Published by OGIZ. Sepia. Русский: Генри Лонгфелло. Портрет. “Песнь о Гайавате”. ОГИЗ – Молодая гвардия – 1931. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A Year in Books/Day 142: American History

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  • Title: American History
  • Year Published: 1911/This Edition: 1933 (The Athenaeum Press)
  • Year Purchased: 1930s
  • Source: My Step-grandmother.
  • About: This book belonged to my Step-grandmother. She started high school the year this edition hit classrooms. It was, as the excerpt below testifies, a very modern take on the subject. What was new then is, nearly 80 years later, a piece of history itself. It is a window into how education was approached during the early part of the 20th century.
  • Motivation: I just love old books (and history!). The books I inherited from my Step-father’s mother (and grandmother) are still in excellent condition; I treasure them deeply.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page iii: “The present volume represents the newer tendency in historical writing. Its aim is not to tell over once more the old story in the old way, but to give the emphasis to those factors in our national development which appeal to us as most vital from the standpoint of today. However various may be the advantages of historical study, one of them, and perhaps the most unmistakable, is to explain prevailing conditions and institutions by showing how they have come about.”
  • Happiness Scale: 8

    New $1.62

    New $1.62

A Year in Books/Day 141: Silent Players

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  • Title: Silent Players A Biographical and Autobiographical Study of 100 Silent Film Actors and Actresses
  • Author: Anthony Slide
  • Year Published: 2002 (The University Press of Kentucky)
  • Year Purchased: 2010
  • Source: Half Price Books
  • About: Most of the stars profiled in this book were forgotten within a few years of the end of the silent era; the rest-the lucky few- are mere by-words for Old Hollywood, names disconnected from faces. Leftovers from our great-Grandparents’ childhoods. Anthony Slide, over the course of a couple of decades, had the pleasure or the privilege to have met the majority of entertainers featured in this volume. Thus, Silent Players is not dry biography or weak conjecture, nor is it pure scholarship (although it has a foundation of extensive research); it is alive with personal experiences and revealing reminiscences. His passion for his subjects shines through his clear, yet keen writing. A must-have for anyone interested in silent cinema and those who graced it with their magic.

    Publicity photo of Mae Marsh from Stars of the...

    Publicity photo of Mae Marsh from Stars of the Photoplay (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  • Motivation: Many of my favourite film performers appeared in silent movies. I write on the subject. A lot. In fact, silent movies are one of my biggest passions!
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 127: “The number of Hollywood extras is probably in the hundreds of thousands. As early as November 1934, Photoplay reported some 17, 541 individuals registered as extras with Central Casting. Among the number of small part and bit players available at that time were former stars, including Monte Blue, Betty Blythe, Mae Marsh, and Dorothy Phillips, and silent directors, including Francis Ford, Frank Reicher and George Melford. One-time stars might become extras, but the only extra to ever be accorded the celebrity and fame of stardom is Bess Flowers.”
  • Happiness Scale: 10+++

A Year in Books/Day 140: Evelyn Waugh

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  • Title: Evelyn Waugh The Later Years 1939-1966
  • Author: Martin Stannard
  • Year Published: 1992/This Edition: 1994 (W.W. Norton & Company)
  • Year Purchased: 2000?
  • Source: Barnes & Noble clearance rack
  • About: I’m currently on a Bright Young Things reading binge; although it focuses on Waugh’s mature years, this book almost instantly came to mind. It is one of the better biographies present on my sagging shelves. A potent reminder that he was more than just the writer of Brideshead Revisited (which, if it came down to that, wouldn’t be such a bad thing), Stannard succeeds in making the complex yet usually unapproachable Waugh, for good and bad, seem human. It is a masterly work.
  • Motivation: I collect dead writer biographies like kids collect toys.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 170: “The delay in departure was all Waugh needed to fire his imagination. There was, he felt, a story in this about everything that had troubled him since leaving the army, and Scott-King’s Modern Europe was to be his revenge on his hosts.”
  • Happiness Scale: 9
    Portrait of Evelyn Waugh

    Portrait of Evelyn Waugh (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

     

A Year in Books/Day 139: Schott’s Original Miscellany

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  • Title: Schott’s Original Miscellany
  • Author: Ben Schott
  • Year Published: 2003 (Bloomsbury)
  • Year Purchased: 2004/2005
  • Source: Bas Bleu
  • About: If I decided to write a reference book, it would be in this mould: eccentric, far-reaching and a treat to read. The entries are ridiculously fun yet still informative (as, of course, all such books should be): Eponymous Foods, Hampton Court Maze, Public School Slang, The Language of Flowers, Churchill & Rhetoric, Proverbially You Can’t, Super Bowl Singers, George Washington’s Rules and The Bond Films are just a few. It is a little treasure of a volume, and one that suits those of us for whom so-called useless knowledge is one of life’s great enjoyments.
  • Motivation: We all know that I LOVE reference books. Of any kind. I also hanker after eclectic knowledge because, well, why not?
  • Times Read: Cover-to-cover:1/As reference tool: countless
  • Random Excerpt/Page 5: “An encyclopedia? A dictionary? An almanac? An anthology? A lexicon? A treasury? A commonplace? An amphigouri? A vade-mecum? Well…yes. Schott’s Original Miscellany is all of these and, of course, more.”
  • Happiness Scale: 10++

A Year in Books/Day 138: Fanny Stevenson

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  • Title: Fanny Stevenson Muse, Adventuress & Romantic Enigma
  • Author: Alexandra Lapierre
  • Translator: Carol Cosman
  • Year Published: 1995/This Edition: 1996 (Fourth Estate)
  • Source: Barnes & Noble clearance rack
  • About: This book was my introduction to Fanny Stevenson, the wife and widow of Robert Louis Stevenson. Lapierre’s wonderful, detailed and complex biography neatly answers two questions: Why did the great Scots writer fall in love with, and sacrifice so much for, this unknown, controversial American woman? Who, exactly, was Fanny Vandegrift Osbourne? In order to explicate on the great mystery that is the former, Lapierre goes to impressive lengths of research to figure out the latter. In answering these questions, it is obvious that the subject and her extraordinary life would have been worth the resultant biography even had she never met and married the writer of the Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Treasure Island and Kidnapped. As a plucky, resourceful, intelligent, resilient and talented woman, she emerges as much more than just a ‘great man’s’ muse.

    Fanny Osbourne, shortly before her meeting wit...

    Fanny Osbourne, shortly before her meeting with Robert Louis Stevenson. Français : Fanny Osbourne, peu de temps avant sa rencontre avec Robert Louis Stevenson. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  • Motivation: I love obscure artistic ladies, especially when they are armed with an excessive amount of fighting spirit and intelligence.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 272: “Fifteen years later, on the eve of his own death, Robert Louis Stevenson described his wife to one of his friends: Hellish energy relieved by fortnights of entire hibernation…Doctors everybody, will doctor you, cannot be doctored herself.“
  • Happiness Scale: 10

A Year in Books/Day 137: Lion in the White House

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  • Title: Lion in the White House A Life of Theodore Roosevelt
  • Author: Aida D. Donald
  • Year Published: 2007 (Basic Books)
  • Year Purchased: 2008/2009
  • Source: History Book Club
  • About: This short biography of the 26th President of the United States of America manages, in spite of its abbreviated length, to chip away at the bull in the china shop cliché that has followed T. Roosevelt down the decades. Ably written and engaging, it’s a remarkably satisfying read in a small package.
  • Motivation: It was sent to me by mistake. I paid for it and kept it, anyway. Probably from sheer laziness.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 64: “The more prosaic Roosevelt plunged right in to his new social environment, entertaining as though he were still in a smaller world. In Washington, social life depended on officeholders who had money beyond their salaries and who could, therefore, entertain lavishly in sumptuous houses. These leading lights mixed business with pleasure all the time, something Roosevelt found new but bracing. That the Roosevelts lived in modest circumstances was irrelevant; he fit into the Washington social scene because he came from an elite background and held an important position.”
  • Happiness Scale: 8
    Theodore Roosevelt (1904) English: President o...

    Theodore Roosevelt (1904) English: President of the United States Theodore Roosevelt, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front.(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

     

A Year in Books/Day 136: Starstruck

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  • Title: Starstruck
  • Author: Jib Fowles
  • Year Published: 1992 (Smithsonian Institution Press)
  • Year Purchased: 1993?
  • Source: Little Professor Book Center
  • About: Jib Folwes would like to welcome you to Star Village, a term he coined to cover the 100 celebrities who, at any given time, receive the highest concentration of interest by the public. Although early 21st century forms-such as the Internet, YouTube, and reality television-have perhaps skewed the numbers and demographics, the foundation of his theory remains strong. He dissects every aspect of stardom, starting with how modern celebrity came to be, how it is achieved, maintained, and how, for some, it dies. He uses a cross-section of actors, musicians, comedians, and athletes, including: Louis Armstrong, Clara Bow, Doris Day, Buster Keaton, Billie Jean King, John Lennon, Liberace, Steve McQueen, Marilyn Monroe, Roy Rogers, Babe Ruth, Lawrence Welk and Mae West. It is a fascinating, almost sociological, look at a hierarchy we are born into, take for granted, and rarely seriously question.
  • Motivation: I’m a sucker for old Hollywood. I also love the logic, research and data behind serious sociological studies, even when the subject is pop culture.
  • Times Read: 2
  • Random Excerpt/Page 75: “Viewed within the context of the twentieth century’s eruption of metropolitan living and machine production, the star phenomenon can be seen to have resulted from two historical imperatives. The need of uprooted city dwellers for personality models was compelling enough, but a second force-related yet distinct-was at work.”
  • Happiness Scale: 9 1/2
    Publicity photo of musician Lawrence Welk.

    Jib Fowles will tell you why, exactly, I became famous! (Photo of Lawrence Welk courtesy of Wikipedia)