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Naturalist and bioacoustics researcher Katy Payne stood near an elephant cage at a zoo and felt a strange "throb and flutter" in the air. When she later realized that the feeling was very like that caused by the lowest notes of a pipe organ, she embarked on a journey of scientific and personal discovery that took her to Africa to study how the huge mammals communicate. For years, she lived close to the elephants she loved, getting to know individuals and describing their long-distance infrasound "conversations." After her fifth such expedition, one third of the elephant population she was studying was killed in a planned cull by the Zimbabwean government. Whether or not you accept Payne's hypothesis that elephants are extraordinarily intelligent and capable of communicating with each other and with other species (including humans), you will find her descriptions of the animals compelling and compassionate. Her grief at the loss of her elephant friends is palpable, and she uses it to utmost effect in decrying not only the ivory trade, but the way in which humans have decided to live on the planet. --Therese Littleton
Book Description
Scientific discovery is not always the result of a careful accumulation of data or a measured consideration of the facts. Sometimes it takes a leap of imagination. Katy Payne, a naturalist and conservationist, took just such a leap and made an amazing discovery about how elephants communicate. And that was only the beginning of her adventure.
In 1984, Katy Payne visited the elephants at Washington Park Zoo in Portland. Oregon. She had been studying whale songs for the last fifteen years, and she was curious about the ways that elephants -- the largest living land mammals -- communicated with each other.
What Payne observed in her first week seemed, at the time, to be little cause for scientific excitement. But on her flight home, she flushed back to a childhood experience of singing in the church choir. Suddenly she realized that she had felt, in the presence of the elephants, a deep throbbing in the air just like the lowest notes of the church organ. Payne and two colleagues were soon able to show that elephants are powerful infrasound -- sound pitched too low for the human ear to hear -- in communication. This "silent thunder" allows elephants to intract over long distances.
This brilliant, unorthodox, nonlinearless was the basis of her discovery of infrasonic communication among elephant and is typical of Payne's work as a naturalist. It also infuses this deeply felt and observed book with an extraordinary spirit, Payne and her colleagues went on to do important field research on elephant communication in Kenya, Namibia, and Zimbabwe. But in 1991 the peaceful rhythms of their work were violently interrupted by a cull -- a planned killing -- that destroyed five of the elephant families they were studying. This destruction convinced her that all life is sacred. Payne determined to challenge the philosophies that support culling.
Silent Thunder is a natural history rich in ponderings about the animal world and how humans participate in it. It is also a passionate story of Payne's own spiritual quest as she turns an observant eye on her own role in this world and honors the holistic perspective of her indigenous friends, who became her teachers in Zimbabwe, Payne's courage and empathy shine through on every page, giving this unique combination of scientific journal and personal memoir an unforgettable emotional power.
Customer Reviews:
Marvelous Bush Stories About Elephant Communication.......2006-07-10
Did you know that elephants communicate with sounds that are below the range of human hearing? Similar to whales, they can speak over long distance with each other using infrasound. I can't help but wonder if their infrasonic vocalizations are what contribute to the palpable energetic vibrations I felt, sitting amongst the clusters of elephants in Northern Kenya.
Katy Payne is one of the elephant researchers in Amboseli Park, Kenya, that helped to discover the infrasonic rumbles of elephant communication (along with Joyce Poole and Cynthia Moss) during the late 1980's and early 1990's. She is also an eloquent writer with a passion for the elephants she studied for many years.
In Silent Thunder: In the Presence of Elephants, she shares some facinating stories of what it's like to be in the bush with wild elephants...and one gripping story of an encounter with a lion. Her personal accounts hint of her strong intuitive gifts, where she touches on her precognitive dreams. She stops short of using direct language on some of these topics, which left me longing to hear more of what the real Katy Payne is all about. But I applaud her for bringing up spiritual topics at all. It's unusual for a scientific researcher to make personal revelations. I found it refreshing that she did.
Jaya Schillinger
Matriarch of Sacred Elephants.net Blog
silent thunder is the new star wars.......2005-10-06
silent thunder has been the best book ever it teaches you about elephants and it is a great read. i wish that i could on the book but i can't i only rented it but finished it in one day. the charecters are great and it is really nice but not many people read it.
A Wonderful Writer with Tremendous Talent.......2003-06-12
Katy Payne is a wonderful writer with a tremendous talent for integrating life with her research. This book is about elephants, about Katy, about the men and women and societies that she meets in a wonderful pilgrimage. You experience her joys, her sorrows, her love for elephants, her research breakthroughs and the distress of the wildlife situation, especially within Zimbabwe. Katy also has a beautiful talent for gracefully understanding how other societies function and for developing a culturally sensitive learning posture. This is a great book. For those reviewers who want "more pictures," there are thousands in this book that Katy brings to your mind when you READ it. I learned a tremendous amount about elephant behavior/communication, wildlife biology and the lifestyle of a wildlife biologist in this book. Wonderful, wonderful work! Thank you Katy!
something is missing.......2001-06-23
I have not read the book yet, but I am very disappointed that she has not photos! Having read Joye Poole's book that lots of tremendous photos and Cynthia Moss's book that at least some black & white photos, I thought this book would have some also. As a photographer and elephant lover, I expected them.
Happy.......2000-05-13
FANTASTIC book. Can't believe it's on sale when I bought it for full-price! Definitely the thing for anyone who likes non-fiction. It's totally poignant and fascinating - not an easy combination.
Book Description
This digital document is a journal article from Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, published by Elsevier in 2005. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Description:
Seagrass meadows are important primary producers in SE-Asia coastal areas that are increasingly threatened by human activities resulting in a deterioration of the underwater light environment. The resilience of seagrass meadows to decreasing light availability should be approached in an integrative manner, because they shelter complex communities of primary and secondary producers. The aim of this study was to measure the in situ metabolism of a seagrass community under different levels of light availability following changes in the water column dissolved oxygen (DO) and dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC), the sediment redox potential and seagrass production. Net community production (NCP) and respiration were measured along two diel cycles to produce a balance of NCP under different light treatments. On a daily basis, at full irradiance, the community metabolism presented a net production which was close to zero, with values of -7.75 to 16.6 mmol O"2 m^-^2 day^-^1 for DO, and -56.8 to 22.7 mmol C m^-^2 day^-^1 for DIC in the first and second incubation runs, respectively. Compensation irradiance for the NCP was thus found to be close to 80% of the present light availability. Shading resulted in a general decrease in the sediment redox potential, while the initial redox potential had not recovered 6 days after exposure to full sunlight. This community appears to be in a fragile equilibrium with the environment, and any minor decrease in the water transparency would lead to a shift from an autotrophic to a heterotrophic system.
Book Description
Sophisticated and brutal. Exhilarating and oppressive. Earthy and aloof. A thorough description of New York City might exhaust the largest vocabulary. A city of dynamic contrasts, from the sleek granite powerhouses of Wall Street and Midtown to the charming tenements of Brooklyn and the Bronx, from the Bohemian spirit of Greenwich Village to the old-money atmosphere of the Upper Fifth Avenue, and from the avant-garde art galleries of SoHo to the historic churches of Harlem - New York is all of this and more.
Following extensive updating and re-writing post-9/11, this 10th edition of Access New York City is comprehensive, fully updated and filled with revised maps, sidebars and points of interest, offering travelers the best of this citys myriad pleasures, guaranteeing that when they've said and done as much as they can, they'll wave good-bye to the Statue of Liberty while humming New York, New York.
Customer Reviews:
The BEST New York walking around book........2007-05-12
The layout of this series of guide books is excellent to have along on the trip. Laid out street by street, area by area, with color coded text for different types of attractions - hotels, dining, shopping, etc.- it is wonderful for finding your way. Much easier than a book with all hotels in one chapter, all dining in another. This way, if I'm shopping in SoHo or visiting an Upper East Side museum and want to have a bite to eat, its a breeze to find a good place nearby. I have used ACCESS NY for many years and find their reviews of dining to be spot on.
Highly recommend.
ACCESS NEW YORK CITY 12e.......2007-02-15
Out of date info.
Waste of your money.
Do not purchase.
Wait for new edition.
A great help for practical touring.......2006-08-17
Very helpful approach that discusses sights, restaurants, shops, and hotels block-by-block. Subway stops should be superimposed on these maps, although they are included separately.
This book is outdated!.......2004-04-13
We just returned from a trip to New York City. I am a HUGE fan of Access books and have used them for cities around the world for the last 14 years. However, the current version of the New York City Access is woefully outdated and was a waste of money. We found several businesses had moved and one, the venerable Balducci's, had gone of out business. Needless to say, this de-railed us a few times and was inconvenient to say the least.
Things change quickly in New York. If Access wants to be in the business of publishing guides of New York, they need to commit to annual updates.
Glad I bought it........2003-10-30
In preparing for 3 day sightseeing trip to New York City with my wife, this was the first book I bought. It helped me determine where to stay, some sights not to miss, & a couple excellent restaurants to try. I was very satisfied with the information I learned from this book & I'm glad I bought it. I'm not saying you shouldn't buy other books on NYC because I bought 3 or 4 others and I learned some addition things from each of them. For me, I don't know if I'll ever get back to NYC and I wanted to make sure I would see all the spots I felt would be important to me. Other very good books are "Eyewitness Travel Guide New York,", "Lonely Planet New York City,", & the "Zagat Survey on NYC Restaurants."
Average customer rating:
- Suspenseful reading for my son
- Stupid Mistake Ruins Lives
- Swalloing Stones is a story with an intriguing plot
- Swallowing Stones
- Swallowing Stones
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Swallowing Stones
Joyce Mcdonald
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ASIN: 0440226724
Release Date: 1999-07-13 |
Book Description
It begins with a free and joyful act--but from then on, Michael finds it impossible even to remember what it felt like to be free and joyful. When he fires his new rifle into the air on his seventeenth birthday, he never imagines that the bullet will end up killing someone. But a mile away, a man is killed by that bullet as he innocently repairs his roof. And Michael keeps desperately silent while he watches his world crumble.
Meanwhile Jenna, the dead man's daughter, copes with desperation of her own. Through her grief, she tries to understand why she no longer feels comfortable with her boyfriend and why a near stranger named Michael keeps appearing in her dreams.
Suspenseful and powerfully moving, this is the unforgettable story of an accidental crime and its haunting web of repercussions.
Customer Reviews:
Suspenseful reading for my son.......2007-09-09
My 13-year-old son (whom I would say has only an average interest in reading) was required to read this book over the summer for his pre-AP English class (8th grade). It was so good, that at the end he couldn't put it down, and unbeknownst to me, stayed up till 2 a.m. to finish reading it.
Stupid Mistake Ruins Lives.......2007-06-03
On the Fourth of July Michael has a huge birthday party. He is seventeen, everything is going well and tomorrow his best friend Joe will take him to get his driver's license. Michael's grandfather sent him his old military rifle as a birthday present, and Michael and Joe take it out into the woods behind his house and shoot it off once into the air in celebration before going back to the party.
Somewhere across town, Jenna's father is up on the roof of his house, fixing a leak. He is hit in the head by a stray bullet that seems to have dropped right out of the sky. Moments later he is dead from the gunshot wound.
When Michael hears the news the next day, he suspects that it was probably his bullet that killed Jenna's father, but Joe convinces him that no one could ever prove that and he should jsut keep quiet abou it. Michael follows his friend's advice and buries the rifle where he figures nobody will find it. But he is still haunted by what he has done, especially when he starts seeing Jenna all over town.
Jenna's life is falling apart. She can't seem to get over her father's death and she is obsessed with finding out who shot the bullet, harassing the police about the investigation on a daily basis. She notices a guy a year or so older than her who seems to be watching her wherever she goes, but thinks she may just be imagining it.
When the investigation starts closing in on Michael's street and the police start asking some difficult questions, Michael is forced to make choices that have the potential to ruin his life--or the life of his best friend.
I liked Michael's building relationship with Amy, although it is never clear why Amy had the reputation she had in this book. I liked the way Michael's and Jenna's lives intertwined. It was sad but interesting to see how Joe's guilt ended up putting him into such a horrible downward spiral.
I thought Michael should have been smart enough to realize that the police weren't going to give up as easily as he thought. I could understand his initial lie, but then when they kept coming back and it was obvious they thought he was involved, he should have known enough to come clean.
Swalloing Stones is a story with an intriguing plot.......2007-03-28
Joyce McDonald has written a remarkable story about a boy who accidentally killed a man and how he has to live with it forever.
In the story Michael has to deal with the fact that he killed a man. As the story progresses Michael realizes that every time he sees Jenna Ward he feels an enormous pile of guilt. Will Michael tell the police that he is the one who killed Charlie Ward, or will he let his best friend take the blame?
Jenna is a normal teenage girl, until he father falls off the roof because he was shot. She wants to seek revenge on who ever killed her father. At night Jenna has a reoccurring dream and Michael MacKenzie keeps appearing in. Will Jenna forgive whoever killed her father?
This is a great mystery story. I would recommend this story to adolescents who love a story that you can't predict what is going to happen next. It is an extremely easy read. I love this book because as I was reading I couldn't put it down, it grabbed my attention from the first page.
Swallowing Stones.......2006-10-26
This book was a good book. It had so many different points in which a person good relate to. It touched such a soft topic but made it interresting. It allowed me to connect with all the character especially Jenna and Michael. It showed two different point of views on the same event. They had the opposite perspective which made it draw you in and want to never put the book down. This is why I recommend the book Swallowing Stones.
Swallowing Stones.......2006-09-20
Michael McKenzie is turning 17. It's the fourth of July and his parents are throwing him an all day barbeque and pool party with all of his friends. He's having the time of his life! Little does he know that this day will change the rest of his life---for the worse. Swallowing Stones by Joyce McDonald made me realize how an innocent act can turn your life upside down. The protagonist, Michael, is in conflict with himself throughout the entire book when he realizes that he has unknowingly killed a man with the 45-70 Winchester rifle that his grandfather has just given him. Michael goes from an athletic, popular, well-liked student with a wonderful girlfriend to a withdrawn kid who loses most of his friends. I felt sorry for him as the plot thickened. He was scared and since he remained silent he didn't have anyone he could turn to for help. He loses all of his relationships and is alone. His personality changes and he is constantly on edge. News of the details spread throughout town as the police close in on their investigation. When the detectives appear on his doorstep to question his father, Michael's story becomes twisted and he even implicates his own best friend. Will Michael clear his conscious and turn himself in? Read Swallowing Stones by Joyce McDonald to find out how this thriller ends.
Book Description
Lisa St Aubin de Terán's Swallowing Stones is a fictionalized account of the extraordinary life of one Oswaldo Barreto Miliani, code-named Otto -- adviser to Castro, confidant of Salvador Allende, and sharp thorn in the sides of both the CIA and the KGB. In the riveting and remarkable invented memoirs of the legendary seventy-year-old revolutionary scholar, the explosive history of twentieth-century Latin America unfolds before us -- viewed through the sharp, unflinching eyes of a uniquely indomitable character as he progresses, through consequence and fateful accident, from philosophy student to guerrilla fighter, political activist, and outlaw.
Customer Reviews:
Cervantes meets Castro and other revolutionaries........2006-05-26
I had never heard of the author or the book, but bought it as one of three books to sustain me on a two-week trip in Asia. On more than one occasion, I was asked by strangers what I was reading that made me lol. This is, quite simply, one of the best books that I have ever read. There is a sadness over the failures of human nature with a sweetness and lyrical humor. More than once, I thought of Cervantes. Only here, you get Castro and a whole, wide, cast of characters. A classic.
silya the translator::).......2006-05-11
hi:) this is my first time writing a review... and I am so proud that I am writing this review for the book I am translating from English to Turkish:) I can say that this book is fascinating. Teran has made her best efforts for writing this book. Otto is a great character, who has a very very different life than you would imagine... I am laughing and I am crying at some pages... but I am really having fun while reading and translating:) so, what I can say is that you really have to buy and read this book and have a journey throughout in otto's life which passed on the WORLD:)
Product Description
Michael is having the greatest fourth of july, it's his 17th birthday and his grandfather has given him a rifle. With one shot into the air his day has changed and each day is like swallowing stones.
Average customer rating:
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SWALLOWING STONES
Joyce McDonald
Manufacturer: Delacorte Press 3rd Printing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000Q3ZSVC |
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Swallowing Stones
Manufacturer: Scholastic
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: 0439123720 |
Book Description
An illustrated collection of Wangerin's rich and original fairy tales, including Branta and the Golden Stone and Elisabeth and the Water Troll - plus fresh and insightful essays on writing, reading, story and faith.
Customer Reviews:
Fanciful and fascinating fairy tales.......2002-05-17
Swallowing The Golden Stone: Stories And Essays by Walter Wangerin, Jr. is a superbly presented selection of fanciful and fascinating fairy tales and poems suitable for reading to children and by young adults. Enhancing this wondrous collection are some very thoughtful essays and comments upon these treasured classic stories. Swallowing The Golden Stone is comparable to the best of the Brothers Grimm, the tales of Hans Christian Anderson, the stories of C.S. Lewis, or the writings of Frank L. Baum and very highly recommended for family, school, and community fairytale and folktale collections.
Average customer rating:
- Technical but fascinating
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Ancient DNA: Recovery and Analysis of Genetic Material from Paleontological, Archaeological, Museum, Medical, and Forensic Specimens
Manufacturer: Springer
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ASIN: 0387943080 |
Book Description
Ancient DNA refers to DNA which can be recovered and analyzed from clinical, museum, archaeological and paleontological specimens. Ancient DNA ranges in age from less than 100 years to tens of millions of years. The study of ancient DNA is a young field, but it has been revolutionized by the application of polymerase chain reaction technology, and interest is growing very rapidly. Fields as diverse as evolution, anthropology, medicine, agriculture, and even law enforcement have quickly found applications in the recovery of ancient DNA. This book contains contributions from many of the "first generation" researchers who pioneered the development and application of ancient DNA methods. Their chapters present the protocols and precautions which have resulted in the remarkable results obtained in recent years. The range of subjects reflects the wide diversity of applications that are emerging in research on ancient DNA, including the study of DNA to analyze kinship, recovery of DNA from organisms trapped in amber, ancient DNA from human remains preserved in a variety of locations and conditions, DNA recovered from herbarium and museum specimens, and DNA isolated from ancient plant seeds or compression fossils. Ancient DNA will serve as a valuable source of information, ideas, and protocols for anyone interested in this extraordinary field.
Customer Reviews:
Technical but fascinating.......1999-03-01
I am not involved in the scientific disciplines and so parts of this good were neither useful nor particularly comprehensible to me. Nevertheless I understood enough to be fascinated. I strongly recommend that you avoid this book if you are looking for an engrossing read aimed at the layperson.
Average customer rating:
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Ancient DNA: Recovery and Analysis of Genetic Material from Paleontological, Archaeological, Museum, Medical and Forensic Specimens.: An article from: American Scientist
Manufacturer: Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
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ASIN: B00096KOHY
Release Date: 2005-07-28 |
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Spectral Analysis in Engineering, Concepts and Case Studies
Grant Hearn , and
Andrew Metcalfe
Manufacturer: Butterworth-Heinemann
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ASIN: 0340631716 |
Book Description
This text provides a thorough explanation of the underlying principles of spectral analysis and the full range of estimation techniques used in engineering. The applications of these techniques are demonstrated in numerous case studies, illustrating the approach required and the compromises to be made when solving real engineering problems. The principles outlined in these case studies are applicable over the full range of engineering disciplines and all the reader requires is an understanding of elementary calculus and basic statistics.
The realistic approach and comprehensive nature of this text will provide undergraduate engineers and physicists of all disciplines with an invaluable introduction to the subject and the detailed case studies will interest the experienced professional.
No more than a knowledge of elementary calculus, and basic statistics and probability is needed
Accessible to undergraduates at any stage of their courses
Easy and clear to follow
Average customer rating:
- One of the Best Critics of the Century
- Needed book
- Yes, Another Book
- I stick by my guns
- A Mis-selection
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No Other Book: Selected Essays
Randall Jarrell
Manufacturer: Harper Perennial
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Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0060956380
Release Date: 2000-06-20 |
Amazon.com
"Most critics," Randall Jarrell wrote in a 1952 essay, "are so domesticated as to seem institutions--as they stand there between reader and writer, so different from either, they remind one of the Wall standing between Pyramus and Thisbe." His complaint was as accurate then as it is now. Yet Jarrell himself had nothing of the literary obstructionist to him. The essays he wrote over the course of three decades--in which he mingled his assessments of poetry and prose with the occasional cri de coeur over the state of American civilization--always escort the reader directly into the inner sanctum of the work at hand. And they do so with such scintillating, comical brilliance that most other criticism seems to pale into testy insignificance. We should be grateful, then, that Brad Leithauser has assembled No Other Book, which returns to print many of Jarrell's imperishable picks and pans.
Jarrell's slash-and-burn style caused a certain discomfort among his fellow poets, particularly those who fell short of his sky-high standards. And indeed, his inspired jabs have lost little of their pungency or amusement: Oscar Williams's poetry, for example, "gave the impression of having been written on a typewriter by a typewriter." Even Walt Whitman, whose reputation Jarrell single-handedly repaired, gets the occasional spanking.
Only a man with the most extraordinary feel for language, or none whatsoever, could have cooked up Whitman's worst messes. For instance: what other man in all the history of this planet would have said, "I am a habitant of Vienna"? (One has an immediate vision of him as a sort of French Canadian halfbreed to whom the Viennese are offering, with trepidation, through the bars of a zoological garden, little mounds of whipped cream.)
A master of the sublime putdown, Jarrell was even more masterful when it came to praise: his essays on Whitman, Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, and Wallace Stevens permanently changed the way we read these poets. He also functioned as a early-warning system for his own generation and the one to follow--who else was sufficiently prescient to pick out Robert Lowell, John Berryman, Elizabeth Bishop, and Adrienne Rich as front-runners? And unlike his New Critical contemporaries, Jarrell never made the mistake of divorcing life from art. His comment on Frost's poetry applies equally to his own productions: "How little they seem performances, no matter how brilliant or magical, how little things made primarily of words (or of ink and paper, either), and how much things made out of lives and the world that lives inhabit." No other poet has ever written about his art with such electricity and intelligence--which makes No Other Book one of the true treasures of this or any other year. --James Marcus
Book Description
Randall Jarrell was only fifty-one at the time of his death, in 1965, yet he created a body of work that secured his position as one of the century's leading American men of letters. Although he saw himself chiefly as a poet, publishing a number of books of poetry, he also left behind a sparkling comic novel, four children's books, numerous translations, haunting letters, and four collections of essays. Edited by Brad Leithauser, No Other Bookdraws from these four essay collections, reminding us that Jarell the poet was also, in the words of Robert Lowell, "a critic of genius."
Customer Reviews:
One of the Best Critics of the Century.......2005-09-25
I came across this book about a year ago. I picked up a used copy of it, and read "The Age of Criticism." Afterwards I could not put the book down. I was not familiar with Jarrell's essays, and they amazed me. "The Age of Criticism" is one of the most prescient essays that I have ever read. These essays are in no way dated. They hold a position similar only to some of Dr. Johnson's best critical works. The only other comparison that I can make is to Paul Fussell. In other words, essays that are enornously insightful and will remain read (Unlike so many pieces of criticism).
After reading Mr. Leithauser's selection, I bought Jarrell's four books of criticism, and have read them all. Some of the reviewers have complained about Mr. Leithauser's choices. I think it is great. A wonderful introduction to Jarrell's great essays. Mr. Leithauser's short selections for "A Jarrell Gallery," demonstrate quite easily the epigrammatic nature and customary brilliance of Jarrell (they include short selections from many of Jarrell's essays that he did not include in this Selected). In fact Mr. Leithauser's selection made me re-evaluate the editor. I still don't care for his poetry, but he's an intelligent man.
I highly recommend this collection to anyone interested in poetry (his essays on individual poets are exceptional. Though I often disagree with Jarrell's estimate of Graves, Williams, Moore, Cummings and others, they are nevertheless a delight to read--should not criticism be enjoyable??), the state of criticism (in other words, atrocious, which Jarrell had predicted--"The first generation [of critics] wrote distinguishably well; the second wrties indistiguishably ill; who knows how the third will write?"), and how criticism should be written (there is much we can learn here--he informs our own opinions (what he says of Pound, for example--much blue clay, but some wonderful diamonds within), he might change or force us to think about them, and he shows how to write). Jarrell can be a blistering critic, and that is delightful to read. What emerges, however, is not a cynical view or that of a curmudgeon, but an enormously positive approach simply to reading, and enjoying literature. He concludes one essay, brilliantly with, "Read at whim. Read at whim." He writes about what has so often been though, but never quite so well expressed.
Needed book.......2002-08-25
So much of Jarrell's prose is either out-of-print or just so hard to find, that we are lucky to have this book. For those who lament the inclusion of so many pieces on pop culture, they need to remember that some of those pieces made Jarrell both popular but also got him in trouble. To not include them would be to misrepresent Jarrell historically (and deprive us of some very funny writing). Unfortunately, there really were only 2 Jarrell essays on Auden (he never got around to writing the book he planned), and one of those is here. Everything in this book is useful, and this is a good representative collection of Jarrell's prose.
Yes, Another Book.......1999-12-02
Jarrell's lush communication style has always thrilled me. For the rare impact Jarrell's style has on me.
I am moved simply by the effort to bring Jarrell back to the fray.
It is enough for me to be touched once more by the rare combination of language-as-electrical current unique to Jarrell's voice.
I stick by my guns.......1999-08-08
The reader from Zion does have some legitimate points to make--that late essay on Stevens is sorely missed, and perhaps Brad Leithauser has indeed weighted the collection too heavily towards Jarrell's lamentations on contemporary culture. Yet I still can't understand how anybody with an ear for English prose could complain about this delightful, witty, supernaturally wise collection. And the nitpicking about the book's "precious" production values is even nuttier--what did you want, a volume bound in corrugated cardboard? Until the Library of America wises up and devotes a book to Jarrell--and really, between Poetry and the Age, Kipling Auden & Company, and The Third Book of Criticism, there's PLENTY of material--this one will have to do. And it does, handsomely. Can we stop the griping, please?
A Mis-selection.......1999-08-02
Quite unlike the last writer, I think the main failing of the selection is that it includes too many of J's sad-state-of-the-culture pieces, which are repetitive, certainly don't call on the best of his critical acuity, and in general perhaps too general and in specifics often quite dated. This isn't necessarily bad, that they were addresses of and for the time, but I had much rather had more of such pieces as the Auden and Housman, as well as the Frost and Whitman, etc. The fine essay on Stevens last poems is a conspicuous absense, and there are others. That's the core of Jarrell and the reason to read him (others, such as Dwight MacDonald, could write the Decline and Fall pieces quite as well). His insight and passion send you forth to poets you'd skipped and back to ones you thought you knew. Yes, the intro. is best skipped and there's something about the look and feel of the book I don't like--it feels a little precious in the bad sense. But it's good to have J back in print---but why settle for this? Why not a Collected Essays (there isn't that much, sadly...)with selected passages from the letters? By the Library of America?
Book Description
This digital document is an article from American Scholar, published by Phi Beta Kappa Society on September 22, 1999. The length of the article is 2547 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: NO OTHER BOOK: SELECTED ESSAYS.(Review)
Author: Evelyn Toynton
Publication:
American Scholar (Refereed)
Date: September 22, 1999
Publisher: Phi Beta Kappa Society
Volume: 68
Issue: 4
Page: 134
Article Type: Book Review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
This digital document is an article from World Literature Today, published by University of Oklahoma on January 1, 2002. The length of the article is 792 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Randall Jarrell: No Other Book: Selected Essays.
Author: John Boening
Publication:
World Literature Today (Refereed)
Date: January 1, 2002
Publisher: University of Oklahoma
Volume: 76
Issue: 1
Page: 157(2)
Article Type: Book Review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
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