Philip Roth Has Died
Philip Roth died yesterday at the age of 85 from congestive heart failure. And ? what else can be written about Philip Roth that hasn?t already been written? Or that Roth himself hasn?t written? Self-exploration?starring America, Newark, Jewishness, and sex?drove the plot of many of Roth?s novels, most notably Portnoy?s Complaint, where the title character…
continue reading
The Bonfire Extinguished
Pamela Paul, editor of the New York Times Book Review, described Tom Wolfe’s death as the “passing of an era.? He was known for coining phrases such as “radical chic”?a derogatory term for pretentious liberals?and “the Me Decade,? which described the self-indulgence of the 1970s. Wolfe once told the Wall Street Journal: “I think every…
continue reading
Mickey Spillane’s guys and dolls
The first time I remember seeing the name ?Mickey Spillane? was in TV Guide, which had a full-page ad proclaiming ?Stacey Keach in Mickey Spillane?s ?Mike Hammer!?? These were too many names for me, and where was Stacey Keach? All I saw was some guy. It took awhile for it to dawn on me that…
continue reading
#tbt The Book of Lists
I love trivia. Trivial Pursuit is the only board game I’ll play. Probably because it?s the only one I?m good at. (Well, that and Stratego.) I get very competitive?for me, trivial knowledge is personal. I knew that Craig Claiborne was The New York Times? restaurant critic when the first Genus edition of Trivial Pursuit came…
continue reading
The Ice Wagon’s Wheels Come Off: Mavis Gallant and Sadia Shepard in The New Yorker
Yesterday I learned that an short story featured in the January 8, 2018 issue of The New Yorker??Foreign-Returned? by Sadia Shepard?bore a more than casual resemblance to the late Mavis Gallant?s story, ?The Ice Wagon Going Down the Street.? (Gallant?s story was also originally published in a 1963 issue of The New Yorker.) Francine Prose,…
continue reading