Translator — Emily Wilson I learned of the new translation of the Odyssey last summer and figure that perhaps I should revisit classic that I had last read in college. This new translation makes the old story sparkle. Wilson does a marvelous job of avoiding the baroque language of previous translations and presents the adventures …
Category Archives: books
Four Books on the Modern Essay
In the last couple of months I have been reading a lot about essays. Of the four books reviews here, the one I’d most recommend for the general reader is the D’Agata. It’s a collection of essays with short introductory notes suited those curious about the shape of the modern essay and how it got …
Ragtime — E. L. Doctrow
It starts out so oddly. It’s off putting. There is a family whose members have no names only markers for their places Mother, Father, Younger Brother, the Boy. Then Houdini crashes his car into a tree and ends up sweating out an afternoon in the family parlor and that seems so unpromising. And yet. Stick …
2a.m. at the Cat’s Pajamas — Marie-Helene Bertino
Follow a handful of characters through a single day in Philadelphia. 9 year-old Madeline aspiring jazz singer and newly motherless and in more than a bit of trouble.
Oranges — John McPhee
One of the original “things” essays. It didn’t age all that well. I was hoping from something much more accomplished and much less out of date.