The highly regarded novelist (Grendel; Jason and Medeia) is also a Middle English scholar of long standing; his biographical companion to the present volume will appear this spring. The Poetry of Chaucer, intended for a scholarly audience, attempts an ambitious and eclectic critical survey of the Chaucerian oeuvre. Like most recent interpreters, Gardner combines elements of the school which stresses Chaucer's subtle manipulation of his first-person narrators and the rival school which insists on the expressly doctrinal purposes of all medieval Christian art. In addition, Gardner convincingly argues that the 14th-century "nominalist" controversies underlie the structure of the Canterbury Tales and the House of Fame; tries to show the medieval psychology of the tripartite soul at work in character and motivation; reinterprets a great part of the Canterbury Tales in the light of contemporary anxiety over the limits of royal authority. Yet all of these excellent purposes are continually hampered by factual vagueness (as when Gardner suggests that the nominalist thinker Occam preceded Roger Bacon) and by a tendency to break down into a mass of unselective detail. For example, the attempt to link the three books of the House of Fame with the three branches of the trivium requires so many minor jugglings and qualifications that all sense of narrative proportion and continuity is lost. Unselective pun-huntings and Bible-ransackings abound, and one continually thinks of forests and trees. Does John in the Miller's Tale really have to be named after the author of the Apocalypse? Should the less polished part of the Canterbury Tales be redeemed as "intentionally bad art" or unappreciated masterpieces of irony? Quite possibly—but Gardner presents the case with very little sense of alternatives. He is a critic of important perceptions—"In his best works, Chaucer makes the play of artifice against natural voice not simply a poetic technique but a dialectic method, a means of perceiving." Yet his broader insights are dissipated when he attempts to apply them closely. For all his obvious love and learning, Gardner has failed to make his own words, as Chaucer made his, "cousin to the deed.
Pub Date: March 1, 1977
ISBN: 0809308711
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Southern Illinois Univ.
Review Posted Online: March 30, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1977
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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