New York Books

I read this book first in the 1980s, while I was actually working in the theater (and I had met a few of the people talked about in the book). What I like about it so much is that Goldman expresses his opinions, especially about the fare on Broadway at the time (not so good), the deficiencies of some of the actors and actresses and his sweeping view of the whole milieu. I don't always agree with him, but he's so incisive that you gain enormous respect for him, particularly when he's writing about Judy Garland, Sandy Dennis and Tom Stoppard. Students of theater history should turn to this book to find out what a bygone era (before huge corporations and nonprofits took over Broadway) was all about.

This book is it. It's just it. If you have any inclination at all to work in the theatre in any capacity, this book is required reading. Do not move to New York without it. I did, and I barely barely survived the few days it took me to find a copy. Order it now while you still have time! I'm serious!

William Goldman is not only a great screenwriter, but a wonderful writer of prose/criticism, as evidenced by "The Season," probaby the smartest, if not funniest, book ever written about the (sorry) state of Broadway. Here he tells you all you would want to know about the making of a Broadway show--all the compromises, betrayals, fits of ego, and under-the-table deals that keep the "fabulous invalid" (a phrase, by the way, that makes Mr. Goldman want to vomit) alive for another season. As a lover of theater, you may become depressed at the cynical machinations that go on to get what is, after all, usually pretty mediocre material to the stage; however, Mr. Goldman's prose is so crisp and entertaining that your spirit is ultimately lifted by his keen analysis. Although the patient is very sick, here's a doctor who has a prescription to offer. And all through the book, he does offer suggestions on how Broadway can better serves us, the theatergoers. Alas, the advice wasn't followed then (the late 60s), and it's not being followed today.

This is an extraordinary book. It is written by an author with a first class mind and genuine curiosity about his subject. Whilst one may not agree with all of it, the writing is a delight and he does not shirk dealing with controversial issues such as the influence of homosexuality on the stage and the corrupt financial practices in relation to theatre tickets, etc. Even though it was written for the 1967-1968 season, it still resonates and viewed in retrospect, it provides crucial evidence relative to the aetiology of the culture wars.

William Goldman's groundbreaking book The Season is all it's cracked up to be and more. Though a number of the people he deals with are no longer with us, many of the shows have been forgotten, and the ticket prices are quite a bit higher, it's astonishing how much the Broadway of the late 1960s resembles the Broadway of today. The same problems, the same headaches, the same disappointments, and the same triumphs are all still a part of the Great White Way. No Broadway enthusiast should be without this book; The Season is a stunning history--and current events--lesson on Broadway theatre.

We've Come This Far is an insider's inside look at a pillar of African American Christianity, Abyssinian Baptist Church. Bob Gore's skill as a photographer and his commitment to his faith are evident on each page of this lovingly crafted work. In some cultures in the world, taking a photograph of a person is looked at with trepidation because it is believed to be an attempt to capture the subject's soul. And that's exactly what Mr. Gore has done in this book and there is no need for fear. The pictures and accompanying essays capture real life/real time moments in the broad scope of the life and spirit of this historic church.

I've never been to New York, and I've never been to a black Baptist church. But the spirit of this institution- its leaders and worshippers- absolutely radiate off the pages of this book. It is unbelievably inspiring. It would make an excellent gift for any liberal Christian activist you know, for a pastor or clergy member working hard to integrate the church into the community, or for yourself. The text is also beautifully formatted, and the history and descriptions are very accessible. The primary focus is always on the black and white photos found on almost every page. Beautiful.

The rich and vibrant history of Abysinnian Church and the Harlem community is revealed in this work by Bob Gore. The photos are of such superior quality that you can feel the message conveyed in the picture without using the text. With the additon of text there is a wonderful account of the Harlem experience, chock full of information about the history and the individual personal expressions of those who were there when it happened. This photographic journal is vibrant and colorful in both word and image. There are real accounts of Abysinnian Baptist Church's history, including it's spiritual, political, social and economic relationships with the communities that it serves. I urge you to consider this book not just for reading but also as an important addition to your library.

I've been to Abyssinian only twice, but was almost overwhelmed each time with the power of commitment and community. Bob Gore's book captures with warmth and intimacy the spirit of this special place and its people. It is the only church I've been to where I felt that power of love which Christianity must have carried through the centuries.

this book will move you. i have viewed many photo books and exhibits and have found many to be interesting and technically proficient. this book easily jumps those hurdles, but more importantly, the images on these pages reach out of their simple wood pulp shelter to touch your heart.

white, black, or blue; gospel lover or country western, you owe it to yourself to spend time with this group of deeply felt images.

buy two copies.

I really love this book! The pictures are great and the recipes are what I was looking for! I highly recommend it!

Excellent book for anyone interested in desserts. I can't cook, but for some reason I can make excellent desserts. The berry fool is very easy to make and you can change it up a bit and put it in individual graham cracker pie plates. This book is loads of fun. Read the whole thing first though.

When you sensibly order this deal of a book, don't be surprised to find yourself promising to make EVERY SINGLE RECIPE as you flip through. The pictures are delectable, and the recipes easy to follow. They also include sidebars with both general information and that which is specific to the dessert at hand. I also enjoy their suggestions for alternate flavor additions. There are 6 sections of recipes: The Classics, Simple Desserts, Summer Fruit Desserts, Holiday Desserts, Special Occasions, and Chocolate Decadence. There are 7 recipes per section, and the book ends with basic dessert tips, glossary, and index.
Note that they use chocolate rather than cocoa in the chocolate-based desserts. I have a double boiler, but still generally prefer to use a metal bowl sitting atop a saucepan with gently boiling water. The bonus is that you can then use that as the main mixing bowl for zero chocolate loss.

Most of the recipes in this book are suitable for bakers of any level.

What makes this book a standout, is the fact that even the simplest recipes look expensive and difficult, when complete. For example:

The Poached Pears With Raspberry Coulis, is simple. It looks like a million bucks when properly plated, though.

My boyfriend made the Lemon Curd Squares in the middle of the night. He isn't known for his cooking or baking skills (unless Noodle Roni counts). They came out perfect. From the way he carried on, you would think he solved cold fusion.

If your baking challenged, significant other, reads this book and is motivated to make just one recipe, then your money was well spent.

This book is a must have.

I have not even tried a recipe yet but I've read it cover to cover. You can usually tell a good cook book by how well it's written. The authors explain in great detail each recipe which is very easy to follow. To top it off a picture accompanies every dessert so you know exactly what to expect. In the back of the book is a guide for baking novices, like myself, on the importance of preparation before baking and some other tidbits as well.

The same day I received my copy I watched a program that aired on the Food Network: Good Eats w/ Alton Brown. He made Crème Brulee, Pear Coulis', and a Soufflé. His method followed the book to a tee. As you can see I highly recommend this book.

In his book, The Wounded Body, Dennis Patrick Slattery weaves together wounds and meanings, intertwines psyche and soma, and plaits mimesis and memory into life stories. If, as he believes, our origins and our destinies are within the poetics of our bodies, then who would turn away from tracing origins through memory and destiny through desire? Who would not unravel some of the knots of their body's images? Dennis Slattery heeds Shakespeare's teaching that our wounds are mouths and teaches the reader to listen, as he does, with rapt devotion to their stories. His imaginative discussion recalls works by Homer, Sophocles, Shakespeare, Rousseau, Dostoevsky, Melville, Tolstoy, Flannery O'Connor and Toni Morrison. Slattery reminds the reader that wounds and fissures mark the places vulnerable to penetration by unknown deities. Our wounds are "where the hinge is located that marks the pivot of our history and destiny" (15). He poses the archetypal question: What is the wound asking of us? What story does it want to tell? The wound's meaning cannot be teased out logically. Only imagination will lead us to the story. Our wounds want to be recognized and dialogue with us. They want to matter, want to be incarnated. And as Hamlet teaches us, "perhaps the fullest form of embodiment is to be remembered in a story, for it is as close to immortality to which a mortal can aspire" (73). Read this book slowly, savouring its poetics, its reveries, its meanderings, and its gaps. The gaps invite the reader's memories to intertwine past with present and mingle with Slattery's reflections in a confluence of healing spider's webs for our wounds. Pay particular attention to the stories that resonate, for "the essence of mimesis is somatic, visceral, a shared physic element wherein we feel the action, the wounding, the marking of a body, in our own being" (13). Dennis Slattery, whose namesake is Dionysos -- the god of tragedy, reminds us that we must delve "deeply into the wound, the infection, the pollution that tragedy forces us to face; to escape from it is to invite its doubling intensity" (72). Then Dionysos leads us to Hermes, whose value "lies in being a mediator, an in-between figure who gives imagination depth and allows the ordinary things of the world to be remembered fully and experienced deeply" (143). By bowing deeply to both these gods, Slattery writes a vibrant and meaningful book about the wounded body. The most important part of writing a book is asking worthy questions. This author draws upon the most profound literature of twenty-five hundred years to refine his questions. If our wounds have stories to tell about our origins and destinies, who would dare to ignore their every imaginative appearance? Dennis Slattery never suggests that the wound's story will be redemptive. He cautions the reader that "the theory used to guide the study was itself wounded" (237). For in listening to our wound's stories, we hear about fragmentation, not integration. And I wonder, is fragmentation indeed redemptive?

In a society where technology is becoming the predominant timepiece, Slattery reminds us that the body is always there recording. In this remarkable exploration rooted in some of literature's greatest works, Slattery dares us to remember. He encourages us to peel off another layer, to turn off the machines and sit in ourselves with our woundedness. He believes that in exploring our wounds,we come to know ourselves. For Slattery,wounds are the way in and the way out. They mark the point of suffering while divulging the site of healing. A man of his word, he wears his perspective on his sleeve, introducing his book with a tale of his own woundedness. His book teaches that the body holds the memory and all possibilities are therein contained. This book is dressing for anyone who has been wounded. Applause, applause, applause . . .

In a day when we are awash in advice about how to fix our bodies, and advice about how to heal them and discover our long-supressed spiritual selves as well, this book by Dennis Patrick Slattery comes as a welcome antidote. Reading about these great stories, with Slattery's provocative and insightful commentaries, we can better meditate on our common humanity, especially our common bonds of suffering. For all the pain and grief they entail, our wounds, personal and collective, appear to be at one with the Muses, and they bring forth poetry. I recommend this book to psychologists as well as to others who are interested in great literature.

Even in a world as worshipful of the body such as ours, the ancient split between matter and spirit, between body and soul is still so pervasive that it is an anomaly to think that the body is our way -- indeed the only way -- of existing in the world. Humans are not spirits condemned to the prison of the flesh, waiting for their liberation from matter and escape into the spiritual paradise. Rather they are incarnated spirits and ensouled bodies. They can achieve their wholeness only though their bodies -- and more precisely, their wounded bodies -- since the world in which they live is marked by diseases, pains, psychic sufferings and ultimately death. Through a series of insightful and profound analysis of literary, psychological, artistic and religious masterpieces -- from the ancient Greek tragedies to contemporary American novels -- Slattery offers us a way of imagining our wounded bodies, and through this imagination, reconnect them with the spirits. We owe Slattery an enormous debt for his powerful imagination. No one who reads this book will remain unchallenged and unchanged by his way of seeing the human body as an icon of the divine. I most strongly recommend his book to those seeking wholeness and spiritual transformation.

What a joy it was to turn away from a discussion with a psychologist who believes in psyche as quantifiable brain extrusion (how come these hermetically sealed folks are always the politically correct ones as well?) and get lost in this wondrous work by a marked man known to frequent the Pacifica Graduate Institute, one of my favorite hangouts and a delphic magnet for depth-oriented subversives.

The author has given us a finely researched prose-poem pulsing with creative insights and daring questions: a psychology of the gut for a malnourished time when so much psychology has become gutless as well as bloodless, dismembered and disembodied. A time that has recorded the inversion of Jung's dictum that the gods have become diseases, for when "the cry for myth" is strangled in the rationalist throat, diseases inevitably become our gods.

A few quotations from the book:

"The wound is a special place, a magical place, even a numinous site, an opening where the self and the world may meet on new terms, perhaps violently, so that we are marked out and off, a territory assigned to us that is new, and which forever shifts our tracing in the world."

"Identity involves suffering, a suffering into the self through soul."

"Where we have been marked is where the soft spot of our being is, where we are most finite; but it is also where the hinge is located that marks the pivot of our history and our destiny."

This book won't catch you if you're into trance-ending your wounds and weaknesses, flying over them into a stratospheric spirituality that gleams with powdered sugar and positive thinking: a Promethean leap that disregards the shadow over which it later stumbles into a deflating, angry bitterness akin to that of Captain Ahab, the idealist-gone wrong who raged, "There can be no hearts above the snowline."

But if you want to listen to the spaces opened up by hurts ("Invulnerable am I only in the heel," wrote Nietzsche), then this enfleshed poetic journey through literature, myth, and psyche itself will stir your blood and get your soul in motion.

I picked up this book simply because I have enjoyed Benjamin Lloyd as an actor. I never expected that he would also be a wonderful writer. In addition, Lloyd provides an insight into the joys and struggles of an actor and will help anyone contemplating a career as an artist. It should also be a must read for the parents, spouse or friend of the "struggling artist". ( And, almost by definition, they all must have their struggles. )

Fortunately, no one need struggle as they read this book. It will capture you from the first through the last page! I loved it.

Duane Malm

Acting and teaching acting is revealed in an unusual form: fictional letters between a struggling New York City actor and his Quaker grade-school acting teacher. In adopting the letter format, the pitfalls of an actor's life and the realities of success are more easily captured. It's rare to see such a blending of fiction and fact, but The Actor's Way: A Journey Of Self-Discovery In Letters provides an excellent, realistic survey in a form students can more easily digest.

This riveting book using the letters of the 2 main characters wonderfully developes the interplay between acting, openness, fragility and trust. Using the theater metaphor, lloyd details feelings, emotional interplay, and community building as the constant themes of bringing the "spirit"and "life" into our temporal life. His chosen world of acting and directing demonstrate the ephemeral in our concrete denotative world,AND also brings out the eternal through the incorporation of the impact of art on the observer and the participant. Poetry, music, and drama become meaningless exercises without the emotional and spiritual transportation of performer and audience to a new "weltanschaung".
The specific techniques described are beyond my experience but resonate clearly with similar techniques of relating and isolating specific aspects of relationships in my medical career. I was always amazed by the change in surgeons personalities when they were wearing a mask and when they "out of costume". No question that the mask provided a screen for their persona. The arrogant but friendly and understanding selves disappeared behind the mask replaced by the distant focused martinet.
Most beautifully handled is the spiritual growth within a community that is open and loving and unavailable in a solo setting. "Alice" "walks the talk" and the handling of her "Spiritual Inventory" as she accepts her death while remaining involved in her community. Community, to me, is where someone lives that I am uncomfortable with. The fictional letters create the "uncomfortable" person as part of each character. The modulation of the uncomfortable actions become facets of each person, preserving the "whole" of the person as loving person with demons not seen by others. The curse of secrecy, hiding the "wounded" parts leading to community and personal diminishment. This love of secrecy is the basis of the innate mistrust of most people to Scorpios. The Scorpio demands loyalty but needs his chamber(cave) private, precluding open communication without advance contemplation and strategic analysis, Iago is a classic example of a Scorpio knowingly headed into destructive course aware that he will be destroyed as well.
The incorporation of the Quaker blend of high abstract intellect welded to a belief based on an emotional/spiritual experience (The Gathered Meeting) adds the necessary "vertical plot" necessary for living characters facing life each day.
Many thanks to B. Lloyd for writing such a clear loving book.

I can't stop reading this book! I'm not an actor or a theatre teacher, but I love going to the theatre and try to imagine all the work that goes into creating the characters that we see up on stage. There is so much art and craft to acting and this book helps you to understand it -- and understand the struggles and the growth in each actor, teacher, and director. It's written in a letters between people format which makes it real and lively. This is a book for everyone! Those who haven't read The Actor's Way have a huge treat in store for you!!

The charactor of Andy was genuine, and masterfully revealed in his correspondence with Alice. The relationship that was driven by their link to the theater was so much more than just theater discussion (which I have no experience in, but learned quite a bit)- it got to the core of why and how one chooses a direction in ones life. A book that should be on the reading list of every college student - not just those majoring in the arts! Ultimately The Actor's Way is about authenticty in ones pursuits in life. Want to know where Andy is now in his life. Next book due out???

if you are looking at a way to make the ordinary special, looking at the images contained in Atget definitely intrigues your imagination. details and compostion place the viewer in the scene, an active particpant.

Eugene Atget is known to everyone, perhaps not by name in all instances, but at least by the images of Paris and environs that grace all manner of books, essays, brochures, museums, art collections, and postcards throughout the world. At the time of his death in 1927 his enormous output of images was archived and has subsequently been studied, purchased and shared with exhibitions too numerous to mention. Yet in this fine book the essence of Atget the observer is appreciated as well as any publication of the many about the pioneering photographer, a man who served as an important bridge from studio formality of the art to entering the human realm of images of people on the streets of Paris and the surrounding areas.

Each of the 100 tritone and 5 duotone photographs in this elegant volume is accompanied by an insightful comment by the superb writer John Szarkowski who also happens to be the former director of the Department of Photography at the MOMA in New York. Rarely have photographic images been so enhanced by the written word: Szarkowski is in complete synchrony with the vision of Atget. Here are images of simple people of early 20th century Paris, images of streets, still lifes, woods, streams, rivers great and small, each captured with immediacy and yet with timelessness.

For those looking for an affordable introduction of Atget's work for the library, this is certainly the volume of choice. Highly recommended. Grady Harp, March 06

Now that it is so cheap, don't miss this great book! Excellent prose by Szarkowski and beautiful pictures by a master... hard combination to beat.

This book is another gift from a great writer and observer, an homage to Atget, to photography, to art and to Western civilization. For anyone who pretends to be a photographer or to love Art, it is a joy to share Szarkowski's easy erudition, one or two pages at a time.

Atget showed us the axioms of photography and axioms cannot be explained by analysis. The test of an Atget, Bach, or Cezanne, is that it is impossible to find the source of their revelation and impossible not to find their influence in future artists.

"Good pictures are not explained by words...With exceptional good luck criticism might with words construct meanings that are different from but consonant with the meanings of pictures. Such constructs of words might possibly guide us toward the neighborhoods where pictorial meanings live.", he says in this book. (Please, if you are an art historian or critic, take this pledge!)

Thus Szarkowski tours the photographs he has selected and writes a thought or two somehow connected to each one - sometimes a revelation, often a question. Each page of writing stands alone and will engage the reader in a conversation with the author and the photographer. Many times Szarkowski puts us somewhere behind the camera a hundred years ago, or on a bridge in Paris 600 years ago. He really brings Atget to life by putting us in his time and place.

There are plenty of revealing facts stashed throughout the writing. Szarkowski talks of the influence of Atget on Weston, Walker Evans, Winogrand, and others and leaves us to recognize the Atget in Cartier-Bresson, Dorothea Lange, and ourselves. He mentions just the relevant technical and biographical details.

He shows examples of how Atget handled Time,the essence of photography. As he wrote in "Photography Until Now" about Atget, "Perhaps from the practice of looking attentively and repeatedly at the same thing from different vantage points and in different lights he came to see that ...one tree, or one reflecting pool, was never twice the same, and would therefore last as a subject as long as one's concentrated attention. With this realization he became, surely not intentionally, a modern artist."

The reflecting pools and trees are in this book along with the more familiar Parisian architecture. Different views of the same subjects are also in other books such as Berenice Abbott's "The World Of Atget". Szarkowski thus, enriches the literature on Atget, giving meaning to many of the published mindless catalogs of his photographs.

Szarkowski shows another reason Atget is a modern artist. His work is meticulously constructed in the same cultural elements as the works of his more famous contemporary French painters and sculptures. There are no accidents and no mistakes in his work. The result is a richness that reveals something new every time we look at it.

The same is true of this book by Szarkowsi. I've read it three times. It is a masterpiece, "...seductively and deceptively simple, wholly poised, reticent, dense with experience, mysterious and true." To use the words Szarkowski wrote of Atget in Looking At Photographs.

Again, John Szarkowski takes us by the hand and leads us into the photographs of Eugene Atget, as through the magic of a looking glass. In these writings, on a selection of photographs from the first quarter of the 20th century, in his historically aware and individual way, Szarkowski instructs on how to read a photograph by doing so himself. We not only see into the environs of Paris through the eyes of the eclectic, determined and tender Atget, but also through the eyes and the keen, attentive mind of Szarkowski, who writes as though he lives inside these pictures, and tends them, and the photographer, with great devotion.

This edition is set up by the previous 4 volume study, The Work of Atget, by Maria Morris Hambourg and John Szarkowski, Museum of Modern Art, 1985. But this new book comes from a persistent, deep seam miner, one who knows that what it is about these photographs is so fertile, they can be studied throughout one's life, and still give more.

How rich is the mind that can bring another mind to light? Would it be bearable if everything in life could be keyed into focus, for us too busy and bothered to pay attention, by a poet as revelatory as Szarkowski? When considering entree des jardins, 1921-22, he says, "except occasionally, as (for example) during revolutions, the French have managed very well to sublimate the periodic human tendency to behave violently toward one's fellow human men, and have directed these impulses toward their trees", you cannot help but love the gardener who built the gate here, the photographer for seeing it, and Szarkowski, for bringing it to our attention in this way. He tells you what is on the menu, who lived in the house, how the hotel got its name, who built it, what may have motivated them to sculpt a Dionysus over a doorway, what member of the court of Louis the XIV was cast to live where, what other photographer may have attempted to photograph the same scene, and sometimes, what led Atget there.

The book is a beautiful masterpiece, and an accomplishment worthy of a life spent looking deeply. If you love (really looking at) photographs, you should consider your shelves incomplete without it.

A voracious reader I thought I finished the Russian classics when I completed Cancer Ward and the First Circle having devoured Crime and Punishment and War and Peace years before. Not so . Victor Serge has it all :the prose of Tolstoy, the impending doom of Dosteyesky and the currency of the Stalin era. Don't miss this one. FPB Ann Arbor

A repressive shadow looms over the destiny of these men of all age, beliefs, and ranks ... insidious terror creeps into those innocent minds and their lives ends before they know it or before their hearts stopped beating. Some vainly fight back, some don't, but all are hopeless.
The implacable and revengeful wave of the Soviet rotten bureaucracy destroys the life of innocent men. When tyranny and deception shutters the greatest hope of and for humanity, one ought to question if it had to be that way.

This book is amazing for its ability to communicate the intimate thoughts of the characters and employ beautiful prose to describe the physical settings in which the action takes place, without abandoning the larger narrative. I loved it and would recommend it to anyone with an interest in Soviet history or literature. I read it after reading several other books on the period, and felt that they were an excellent preparation for this one (The Unquiet Ghost - Hochschild, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar - Montefiore, The Gulage Archipeligo), but even without the background this is a fantastic read.

in time the mind will make chains snap." Victor Serge.

Victor Serge's novel "The Case of Comrade Tulayev" is set in the Soviet Union in the late 1930s, long before "the chains wore out." It is a classic and haunting look at Soviet society during an era of party purges, show trials, and executions that deserves a place of honor on any reading list that also includes Arthur Koestler's "Darkness at Noon", George Orwell's "1984" and Vasily Grossman's "Forever Flowing" .

Serge, born in Brussels in 1890 to Russian emigre parents, returned to Russia early in 1919 in order to support the newly created Soviet Union. He served as both a writer and journalist. However, Serge was one of the first of the old-line revolutionaries to oppose Stalin's concentration of power. He was arrested, expelled from the party, released, and arrested again. Finally, in 1936 after a public campaign by leading European political and literary figures, Serge was released and deported to France. He eventually found his way to Mexico where he died, penniless, in 1947.

The Case of Comrade Tulayev mirrors in some respects the murder of Sergei Kirov that set off Stalin's first great purge beginning in 1934. The story begins with the almost accidental murder of a leading member of the Central Committee, Comrade Tulayev by a disaffected clerk. The Chief (Serge's allusion to Stalin) immediately commences a round of purges, investigations, show trials and executions. The rest of the book takes us on a chapter-by-chapter account of a group of individuals caught up in the aftermath of the murder. Each individual represents a different component of Soviet society, from the lowly clerk to the high-ranking party functionary to the `oppositionist' already living in exile in Siberia.

Serge paints an intimate, vivid picture of each individual as they meet their fate. Like a storm at seas these people can see the storm on the horizon but they all seem powerless to either flea. They are swept up and prepared for show trials. The only option available to each is their ability to fight the omnipotent forces that want them to admit to crimes they did not commit and to implicate others in these same acts. The power of Serge's writing lies in his examination of the inner lives of his protagonists and their reasons for either accepting this fate or fighting to retain some shred of inner dignity. The outcome of each protagonist's story provides a cross section of human responses ranging from cringing supplication to death-defying resistance. The story of Ryzshik, the exiled oppositionist is particularly haunting. As with the others, he knows what is expected of him but he chooses to starve himself to death rather than confess to some non-existent crime.

The Case of Comrade Tulayev is most often compared to Koestler's Darkness at Noon. Although the comparison is very apt there are some critical differences in approach that bear mentioning. Darkness at Noon focuses on the self-reflection of one key player in the creation of the Soviet state, Rubashov. Koestler took one life, Rubashov's, and reflected on his own role (or guilt) in creating the state that was about to murder him. The emotional heart of Darkness at Noon (for me) is whether and why Rubashov would perform one last act for `The State". Serge, takes a broader look at the questions of individual guilt and collective responsibility. I think that by taking this broader look both Serge and the reader begin to think about, if not find a rational explanation for, how a society based on egalitarian ideals can allow itself to be transformed into a compliant, totalitarian state in less than a generation.

Victor Serge's Case of Comrade Tulayev is an excellent piece of writing. Highly recommended. L. Fleisig

Most of the other reviews of this book are right on the money and more articulate than I could be, so I won't try to repeat them. But I will say that I found this book to be a compelling piece of work; a classic. I never quite appreciated the depth of dysfunction, even depravity, of the Soviet system. It bewilders me that such an abomination took place in my lifetime. It frightens me that it could happen again. I just finished reading about the Spanish Inquisition, where the same terrible mechanics were perpetrated on the Spanish. Whether the motivating spark is political ideology or religious orthodoxy, demented societies like this can spring up like mushrooms. Communism was a massive crime upon the Russian people. And it provides little satisfaction that the criminals were often the victims of their own crimes. A devastating but outstanding book!

While from a literary perspective, this is no masterpiece, it nonetheless captures a unique portrait of early twentieth-century Italian immigrant life. My great-grandfather, Nicolo, worked with tile in Philadelphia around the same time of the setting in this book. Many of the stories I've heard growing up make more sense now having read di Donato's novel.

The writing is stilted at times (di Donato's attempt to make the English sound Italian), and he allows his characters to go on angst-ridden rants for far too long. But there are numerous gems in this piece. I wholeheartedly recommend it -- to Italian-Americans to learn a little more about their heritage and to all others to catch a glimpse of early Italian immigrant life in America.

VERY GOOD BOOK, JUST DIDNT LIKE THE ACTUAL WORDING OF THE BOOK ITSELF WAS A LITTLE WEIRD FOR ITS TYPE OF PLOT, ANY WAYS VERY GOOD BOOK ABOUT THE TIMES.

This is one of my favorite books. It's a thought-provoking and lyrical portrayal of working class issues in America. Di Donato's prose style is wonderful. This book should be much more widely read than it is.

I had the privilege of spending an afternoon at the Long Island home of Pietro Di Donato many, many years ago when a friend of mine, John Liscio,took me to visit. Mr. Di Donato's father, I was told, died when he fell into a vat of cement back in the days when there were no labor laws to protect workers. The book was shaped from this incidence. Powerful book, and an even more powerful man. Both left an indelible impression.

This is the finest book I have ever read about Immigrants. As an Italian American it is especially rewarding. If made into a real film (not like the cheesy 1949 version)it could be a masterpiece -- it could be to Scorsese what Schindler's list is to Spielberg.

One note -- wait to read Fred Gardaphe's introduction until after you read the novel as he gives away a lot of the story.

I was touched by The Doorman. A tale in which the doorman, a Cuban exile, tries to enlighten the eccentric tenants of a Manhattan high-rise. Though Juan has reached freedom in America he has not gained acceptance and has also left behind the friendship of those he shared his suffering with. The tenants, lost in their mostly hilarious excesses are completely blind to Juan's efforts and their own cruelty. Juan ultimately interacts with the tenant's strange pets with interesting results. I keep picking the book up to read some favorite pages I have marked and consider it a book to read again.

This is a very unique novel, with talking animals and the like. It shows that Reinaldo has an imagination that is completly infinate. Great read.I love Reinaldo

merchandise was in good condition. the shipment was fast.

this is book thet i will read agan.agan, agen. Just great. Please, read this book.

I love every one of Arenas' works, but this one might be my favorite if only for its comedy, absurdity and depth-- all wielded with perfect balance and execution. A great and often overlooked work by a seriously overlooked writer.

Well, they didn't, but it's a classic anyway.

This is a terrific book for anyone who wants to learn how great projects are visualized, actualized, and pressed through extremely challenging environmental circumstances. It's a source of inspiration for the dreamers and the practical alike.

If you want to read about architecture and engineering, you get only a small dose here. It's more about the capitalization, visioning and building. But that story is magnetic and wonderful.

Only thing they left out: that it was to this (then half-empty) building that Annhaeuser-Busch delivered the "first" case of legal beer to Al Smith at the end of Prohibition. Smith, the "wet" and the eternal optimist, exemplifies what this building was conceived to be: a vibrant and living testimony to the human spirit.

So, it stands to reason that it survives now as New York's essential symbol.

From the outset, the Empire State Building seemed to have had everything going against it. Although conceived during the 1920s boom years, most of the construction went on during the earliest years of the Depression, thereby putting the idea of high occupancy in the severest doubt. Its location wasn't ideal either. It was three miles north of the Wall Street district and a mile south of the center of the midtown business center. And it was ten blocks south of Grand Central Station and three avenues east of old Pennsylvania Station. The idea of mooring dirigibles was quickly scrapped after failed attempts. And sure enough, although the Empire State Building did get built, the tenants did not come. King Kong did, but he didn't pay rent.

John Tauranac describes all this and more in his exhaustive book, THE EMPIRE STATE BUILDING: THE MAKING OF A LANDMARK. Written in an engaging style, Tauranac's book is as elegant and interesting as the subject itself, while his wit is as colorful as the characters surrounding the Empire State Building's creation. The book covers the idea for the building, Raskob's and Smith's supervision, the monumental task of the construction workers, and, most importantly, the survival of the building to become THE emblem of America's cultural and economic reach while become THE identifying symbol of New York City. The generous amount of photographs add to the understanding and enjoyment of the book. Highly recommended.

This is an excellent work that details the history of the Empire State Building. I was a bit surprised to find how much the author managed to pack into my paperback. Everything from skyscraper height restrictions to land leases and modern restructuring of ownership for tax purposes (and all the "interesting" stuff in between). If you buy this book and you're not from New York, do yourself a favor and get a map of the area. So you can follow along in the early chapters.

This book is a must read for anyone interested in not only the Empire State Building, but in New York City history of the late 1920s and early 1930s. Who would think that a building completed in 1931 at 1250 feet high would still be the tallest building in NYC in 2007 (of course, we can't forget the tragic loss of the taller WTC Towers). This book covers the quick construction of the ESB, but also covers the politics and history behind the building's location (the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel used to be at the corner of 5th Ave and 34th Street) and the people involved. This is an interesting book about an exciting time where anything seemed possible in one of the world's greatest cities.

I bought this book shortly after a trip to NYC in 2000, and found it to be an excellent history of one of the Big Apple's architectural jewels, the Empire State Building. It is full of intrigue, history, great anecdotes and one-of-a-kind photographs. If you're a visitor to Manhattan or a local resident, you owe it to yourself to read this book.