Review by Booklist Review
In Jane Smiley's scintillating introduction to the second collection of columns from the exceptional New York Times series "Writers on Writing," she piquantly observes that in writing about themselves and their art, writers both indulge the urge to tell secrets and battle the fear of disclosure, and this tension is, indeed, present in the two dozen essays that follow. Yet the overriding feeling is that of deep and abiding pleasure in putting thoughts into words and words onto paper. Here's Diane Ackerman marveling over the confluence of psychotherapy and poetry; Alan Cheuse pondering late bloomer-hood; and Leslie Epstein musing over writer's intuition. Allegra Goodman writes amusingly about outwitting the "inner critic"; William Kennedy celebrates fiction and the "metamorphosis of experience"; and Shashi Tharoor puzzles over his quandary as an Indian author writing about India in English. Why write, what about, for whom, and in whose voice are crucial concerns addressed by some of the finest living practitioners of this noble art, and readers will love being privy to their ruminations. Donna Seaman
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
The 45 writers who contributed to this second compendium of the weekly column in the Times arts section are nearly all A-list names-and highly contemporary, too, as most of the articles originally coincided with the publication of their latest books. The prosaic headlines ("Fiction and Fact Collide, With Unexpected Consequences") obscure the lively tone adopted by most of the authors, who seem to be enjoying the opportunity to wax anecdotal about various aspects of their career. Thus we have Ann Beattie on the book tour, David Shields about reacting to bad reviews, Elinor Lipman on the perils of getting (and giving) jacket blurbs and Stephen Fry's hilarious account of the questions fans ask about his writing methods. Though some of the authors choose to deal with contemporary events, as in A.M. Homes's eyewitness account of September 11 ("not something you want to remember, not something to want to forget"), nobody strays far from the literary, and quite a few offer insights into the creative process. Kathryn Harrison explains how a photograph seen in childhood led to the writing of The Seal Wife, while mystery writer Marcia Muller reveals that she once built scale models of her protagonist's regular haunts to help her understand the character. And Elmore Leonard offers practical advice on how to write better prose, including this gem: "If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it." Aspiring writers will find plenty of inspiration-and helpful counsel-from this collection, in which the writing is less stuffy and more relaxed than in a similar collection from the Washington Post. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Originally published in the New York Times, these 45 essays by renowned writers provide an interesting perspective on the art of writing. In his essay, Andrew Greeley asks, "Why then tell a story?" and reveals that one writes to illuminate, thus setting the tone for the entire collection. Ranging from the comic to the tragic, the writings included in this follow-up to last spring's Writers on Writing: Collected Essays from the New York Times not only illuminate but also entertain. Topics include the thrill of seeing one's first publication on a bookstore shelf, the challenge of turning a Hemingway work into a screenplay, the difficulties of legitimizing a writing career to one's family, the struggle to write in the wake of 9/11, and the importance of the writer's recognizing that emotional truths can apply across centuries. Contributors include Margaret Atwood, Chitra Divakaruni, A.E. Hotchner, David Mamet, Arthur Miller, Anna Quindlen, and Amy Tan. Anyone interested in literature will find these personal writings intriguing, and aspiring writers should add them to their personal collections. Highly recommended for all academic and public libraries.-Erica Swenson Danowitz, American Univ. Lib., Washington, DC (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
An uneven second collection of essays on writing from the New York Times. The 45 pieces collected here are neither as solid as those from the first go-round (2001) nor as entertaining as the ones in Marie Arana's similar Washington Post anthology, The Writing Life (see above). In such short essays, all it takes is one false step, and interest evaporates. Stumbles include the typically crack Herbert Gold using ridiculous dialogue ("Sorry, but I'm a very busy dermatologist. I only have time to keep up with well-validated books"), A.M. Homes making the baffling statement that to have witnessed in real time the destruction of the World Trade Center was "irreconcilable," and Anna Quindlen's overly generous self-appraisal of her work as journalist and novelist ("good writing is good writing no matter where you find it"). Ann Patchett in one swoop neatly undercuts the decidedly sniffy sense that these writers have been anointed by the paper of record (even if some of the names leave you scratching your head) when she casually remarks, "This essay, for example, which I asked to write . . . " Let it be said that the volume also contains some dandies: Arthur Miller on writing about anti-Semitism in Focus ("I knew what I knew, what I had seen and heard"), or William Kennedy tracking like a hard-bitten gumshoe his contention that "fiction demands the necessary falsity, the essential lie that the imagination knows is truer than what your rational self thinks is true." What work best are not the pretentious expoundings on "craft," but the glimpses into writers and the circumstances that shape them, as when Amy Tan excavates her family genealogy, or David Mamet comments on his encounters with the piano, "how much can one remove, and still have the composition be intelligible?" More self-consciously literary than its predecessor, but still some valuable gleanings. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
