|
|
|
|
|
|
|
HELP | |
|
  $9.50 List price:
TRADE PAPER, USED
Ships in 1 to 3 days
More copies of this ISBN:How to Be Alone: Essaysby Jonathan Franzen
Synopses & ReviewsPublisher Comments:From the National Book Award-winning author of The Corrections, a collection of essays that reveal him to be one of our sharpest, toughest, and most entertaining social critics While the essays in this collection range in subject matter from the sex-advice industry to the way a supermax prison works, each one wrestles with the essential themes of Franzen's writing: the erosion of civil life and private dignity; and the hidden persistence of loneliness in postmodern, imperial America. Reprinted here for the first time is Franzen’s controversial l996 investigation of the fate of the American novel in what became known as "the Harper's essay," as well as his award-winning narrative of his father's struggle with Alzheimer's disease, and a rueful account of his brief tenure as an Oprah Winfrey author. Review:"These canny, well-researched essays...range over a variety of subjects...but they are united by a single passionate insistence that, in a cookie-cutter world, people who want simply to be themselves should have the right to do so." Publishers Weekly Review:"The other essays, most previously published in Details, the New Yorker, and elsewhere, deliver sufficient bang for the book, though none quite stands up to the centerpiece [Harper's essay]....Smart, solid, and well-paced: a pleasure for Franzen's many remaining admirers." Kirkus Reviews Review:"The author makes himself a colorful presence throughout these essays....This collection emphasizes his elegance, acumen and daring as an essayist....He's funny, too....How to Be Alone is a captivating but uneven collection. Some of its entries have clearly aged better than others....The more recent entries, less showy about their brilliance, tend to flow more smoothly." Janet Maslin, The New York Times Review:"I reached the limits of my tolerance for most essays about "the writer's life" long ago, but I've always got time for good writing about reading. The miscellaneous pieces in this collection are not exclusively on that subject — there are reported pieces on the Chicago post office, prisons and Franzen's father's death from Alzheimer's disease, as well — but the author of The Corrections has a respect for readers and a concern for the practice of reading that's surprisingly and lamentably rare among his colleagues....If the collection has any one theme, it's a very welcome one, on the value of privacy, of stretching out in the space inside one's own head and of not allowing your preoccupations to be dictated by the media's jangly siren song." Laura Miller, Salon.com Review:"As a nonfiction advocate for his one-man novelistic cause, Franzen doesn't ape the Norman Mailer of Advertisements for Myself and flaunt his ambition like a Popeye tattoo, muscling aside the competition to clear more legroom for himself in the first-class section. Nor does he try to blow up the rickety structures blocking his own fictional constructions, like Tom Wolfe in some of his broadsides. As with so many of his generation, Franzen is conflicted about conflict. Arguing is what grownups do when they are mad (Mommy, Daddy, don't fight); and swagger doesn't play well on the current scene, which has partly converted into a Generation X recovery ward for the depressed, medicated, and formerly addicted children of divorce. Rather than swinging from the heels, he hugs the ropes in these essays, taking all the pain, the indignity, and the bland indifference that a mass-media culture can inflict on a passionate bookworm. He is not a masochist, he is a shrewd passive-aggressive (aren't they all?), courting sympathy by constantly telling us where he hurts and fastening reader interest on himself, regardless of the issue or controversy. No matter what is flying around Franzen, the soft-focus lens is always on him." James Wolcott, The New Republic (read the entire New Republic review) Synopsis:From the National Book Award-winning author of "The Corrections," a collection of essays that reveal him to be one of the sharpest, toughest, and most entertaining social critics.
Synopsis:From the National Book Award-winning author of "The Corrections," a collection of essays that reveal him to be one of the sharpest, toughest, and most entertaining social critics. Table of Contents"A Word About This Book" "My Father's Brain" "Imperial Bedroom" "Why Bother" "Lost in the Mail" "Erika Imports" "Sifting the Ashes" "A Reader in Exile" "First City" "Scavenging" "Control Units" "Mr. Difficult" "Books in Bed" "Meet Me in St. Louis" "Inauguration Day, January 2001" What Our Readers Are SayingBe the first to add a comment for a chance to win!Product Details
Other books you might like
Related Aisles
| ||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
Don't Miss
