THE PLANK DECEMBER 15, 2006
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It's hard not to laugh, or at least smile, when you see, say, Larry McMurtry give glowing praise to Gore Vidal's new memoir in the New York Review of Books. After all, this is the publication commonly known as the New York Review of Each Other's Books. But on the incestuous reviewing front, I was glad to see that National Review is giving NYRB a run for its money. In the latest issue, the first back-of-the-book essay heaps fawning praise on John O'Sullivan's new history of Reagan, Thatcher, and Pope John Paul II (all heroes of freedom, coincidentally). O'Sullivan, of course, is one of NR's editors-at-large. The ensuing piece is a glowing encomium to... wait for it... senior editor David Pryce-Jones's newest book. And this particular review is courtesy of contributing editor David Frum. Here's a small snippet:
Pryce-Jones relates this history with his characteristic literary force, but without rancor or overstatement. Pryce-Jones is a man deeply at home in France and keenly aware of the French intellectual tradition. He writes with sadness and regret, not anger. As readers of NR well know, his excellence as a writer is based above all on his fineness as a man: generous, humane, and fair-minded.
I guess he liked the book. --Isaac Chotiner
8 comments
You're not getting any takers on this graituitous jab at the NYRB. I am not that surprised. Despite the wild figments of Messrs. Foer and Wieseltier, the NYRB is a fine publication and, unlike TNR, never bought into the Bush, neo con delusion on Iraq. Perhaps the reason for the incestuous nature of the reviewing pool at NYRB and other reputable rags is the simple fact that book writing and reviewing is, well, an incestuous pool of blighters. You're all reviewing the same books, written by the same people. Sort of like those wonderfully wild orgies that we all wished we had enjoyed back in the 60's and 70's.
- MrCookie1
December 15, 2006 at 2:23pm
Whenever I see authors flogging each other's books, I head for the nearest exit. It's, like, they can't get a decent review from a respectable critic for the dustjacket blurbs, so they have to resort to each other.
- jm_rice
December 16, 2006 at 6:37am
but they did have a great continuing feature called "Logrolling in Our Time" (title of the previous post)--perhaps TNR should start something similar here . . .
- norval13
December 17, 2006 at 10:36am
"Blighters"? What's a Latino brother with heavy Jewish vibes doing using idiommatic British? But maybe the nugget common to Jewish litigators I know has spread West: "Think Yiddish, speak British"!
- basman
December 17, 2006 at 12:04pm
Like John Shaft, I am a complicated mother f-er...
- MrCookie1
December 17, 2006 at 3:52pm
did you see that marty removed his nasty post on isaac? perhaps he does listen, after all... part of me thinks he should own it, since he posted it, and the other part is happy that discretion is the better part of valor. sometimes he can be needlessly mean. but i kind of took isaac's post to mean more than just in house reviewing-- and your (now erased) posts seem to confirm a fundamental conundrum-- 1) it can be difficult to take at face value a review that is done in house, because one assumes that some other relationship has clouded/affected the judgment of the reviewer in question-- and that the value of that relationship has taken its toll on the review text because there is a reluctance to speak the kinds of truths that would jeopardize that bond. 2) however, an reviewer must also have expertise to judge, and a familiarity with the subject to evaluate a work. and often, the reality is that the knowledgable community is (by definition) small and that some sort of professional or personal contact between people is all the more likely. the circles are small indeed. i review colleagues' work all the time for scholarly journals-- and there the community is even smaller, and some might say, more anemic. but, truth be told, the truly knowledgable wonks capable of writing a solid review on a policy book are pearls just as rare. the most felicitous exchange seems to be the one between the communities of academia and journalists-- although often limited to public policy, politics or political history, there is something to be said for bridging that gap. in my mind, it is a sorry state of affairs when academics and journalists retreat into their own corners, full of the self-satisfied knowledge that theirs is the true public service that educates the public. neither group has a monopoly on this, and dialogue is of the utmost importance because the intelligentsia (if there is really such a thing) is too fragmented. that, in the end, is why i come to these pages-- not just to be personally more informed, but to read the reflections of intelligent journalists and talkback citizens, whatever their political persuasions might be and whatever their professions. i just wish Open U were working a little better on that front, because the idea is stellar, but the execution seems dry because the material of the posts is hermetically sealed, not allowing the commenter to enter. i suppose that this is the fault of academia-- we're taught (or learn quickly) to write not to incite debate and leave the field open, but rather to persuade, deliver expert opinions in as authoritative voice as can be mustered and to parry criticisms, both past and future.
- acgraves
December 17, 2006 at 5:23pm
I did notice that. My gut is that Foer was alerted and took it off. But, if Marty had the grace to do that, then good. You know, often when I read the ridiculously entitled Spine, I remember a great story from Scott Berg's bio on Sam Goldwyn. Let's see...it was in the 1960's when the old mogul was way past it and he was at some garden variety Hollywood buffet, shuffling along the trough line when, probably lost in some fond recollection of his pants pressing days - or was that Mayer - he knocked into a table and some food and drink fell. He whirled, foggy of mind but as always, In The Right and spat out at some hapless starlet behind him, "Look at what you MADE me do!" Some young turk - it might have been Beatty or Hoffmann - nearby looked the sputter old fool up and down and said, "How did you ever get to be the head of anything?" As I said, when loitering at the Spine, I often think of that story...
- MrCookie1
December 17, 2006 at 6:53pm
...Look British, think Yiddish.
- ChanRobt
December 19, 2006 at 4:54am