Many of the illustrious contributors to The New York Review of Books have had deep and abiding relationships―both personal and intellectual―with other poets, writers, artists, composers, and scientists of equal stature. The Company They Kept is a collection of twenty-seven accounts of these varied friendships―most of them undeniably fraught with "idiosyncratic complexities."
One of the sweetest and funniest is Prudence Crowther's memoir of her romance, at age thirty, with the seventy-four-year-old S. J. Perelman ("As a friend of mine put it, 'Yeah, too bad you couldn't have met when you were twenty-six and he was seventy ―or when he was thirty, and your parents hadn't met yet'"). Darryl Pinckney recalls his unsettling stint as Djuna Barnes's handyman. Susan Sontag's piece on Paul Goodman is more about how they never hit it off; Seamus Heaney's remembrance of Tom Flanagan has all the melancholy affection of a bereft and beloved son.Larry McMurtry and Ken Kesey were graduate students together―for years afterward, McMurtry recalls, the Merry Pranksters would show up unannounced, and throw his family and neighbors into hilarious chaos. Derek Walcott recalls his parting of the ways with Robert Lowell, and of their bittersweet reconciliation. And Robert Oppenheimer writes that he wants to dispel the clouds of myth surrounding Albert Einstein: "As always, the myth has its charms; but the truth is far more beautiful."
From Anna Akhmatova's dreamlike description of wandering through Paris with the impoverished Modigliani to Joseph Brodsky's account of his first meeting with Isaiah Berlin (from which he returned to report, around the kitchen table, to Stephen Spender and W.H. Auden), these pieces are tantalizing glimpses into the lives of those who have made The New York Review of Books into what Esquire magazine calls "the premier literary-intellectual magazine in the English language."
The many contributors include:
Stanley Kunitz on Theodore Roethke
Robert Lowell on Randall Jarrell
Susan Sontag on Paul Goodman
Jason Epstein on Edmund Wilson
Saul Bellow on John Cheever
Robert Craft on Igor Stravinsky
Darryl Pinckney on Djuna Barnes
Derek Walcott on Robert Lowell
Enrique Krauze on Octavio Paz
Elizabeth Hardwick on Mary McCarthy
Larry McMurtry on Ken Kesey
Seamus Heaney on Thomas Flanagan
Robert Oppenheimer on Albert Einstein
Maurice Grosser on Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
The Company They Kept "Our most remarkable writers share what has influenced them the most: each other. " Many of the illustrious contributors to "The New York Review of Books" have had deep and abiding relationships-both personal and intellectual-with other poets, writers, artists, composers, and scientists of equal stature. "The Company They Kept" is a collection of twenty-seven accounts of these varied friendships-m... Full description
Beautifully produced, and rich in revealing vignettes, this gathering of friends would make a perfect girft for a literary friend, especially one who agrees with EM Cioran that the two most interesting things in the world are gossip and metaphysics. (Irish Times)
This enticing collection brings together "the best 27 memoirs" published since the New York Review of Books was launched in the 1960s. (Guardian)
Memories wrapped in tender prose, yet are unflinching in their portrayal of these talented friends, failings and all... These vignettes steer away from hero worship to give us something more moving. (Independent)
Writing is a lonely and uneventful business, and this collection is a useful reminder that literary life involves friendship, admiration and affection as well as envy, malice and the other qualities so well assembled in 'Poisoned Pens'. (Literary Review)
An immensely enjoyable and varied celebration of both the pleasures and pain of friendship. (Good Book Guide)
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Shipping:
£ 3
Within U.S.A.
Shipping:
£ 3.19
Within U.S.A.
Seller: Goodwill Books, Hillsboro, OR, U.S.A.
Condition: VeryGood. Minimal signs of wear. Seller Inventory # 3IIT5G003P1P_ns
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: Goodwill Books, Hillsboro, OR, U.S.A.
Condition: Good. Signs of wear and consistent use. Seller Inventory # 3IIT03003JS1_ns
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: Better World Books, Mishawaka, IN, U.S.A.
Condition: Very Good. Former library book; may include library markings. Used book that is in excellent condition. May show signs of wear or have minor defects. Seller Inventory # 3772491-6
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: Better World Books: West, Reno, NV, U.S.A.
Condition: Very Good. Former library book; may include library markings. Used book that is in excellent condition. May show signs of wear or have minor defects. Seller Inventory # 3772491-6
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: Better World Books: West, Reno, NV, U.S.A.
Condition: Very Good. Used book that is in excellent condition. May show signs of wear or have minor defects. Seller Inventory # 3772490-6
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: ThriftBooks-Dallas, Dallas, TX, U.S.A.
Hardcover. Condition: Good. No Jacket. Former library book; Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less 1.01. Seller Inventory # G1590172035I3N10
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: ThriftBooks-Dallas, Dallas, TX, U.S.A.
Hardcover. Condition: Good. No Jacket. Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less 1.01. Seller Inventory # G1590172035I3N00
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: ThriftBooks-Atlanta, AUSTELL, GA, U.S.A.
Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. Former library book; May have limited writing in cover pages. Pages are unmarked. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less 1.01. Seller Inventory # G1590172035I4N10
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: ThriftBooks-Atlanta, AUSTELL, GA, U.S.A.
Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. May have limited writing in cover pages. Pages are unmarked. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less 1.01. Seller Inventory # G1590172035I4N00
Quantity: 1 available
Seller: ThriftBooks-Dallas, Dallas, TX, U.S.A.
Hardcover. Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. May have limited writing in cover pages. Pages are unmarked. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less 1.01. Seller Inventory # G1590172035I4N00
Quantity: 1 available