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James Wolcott: He Could Type the 1978 Manhattan Phone Book, And I'd Read It
Filed under: Little Words Tagged: James Wolcott, John Updike, Jonathan Taylor, London Review of Books, reviews
No, I didn't want to read another review of John Updike's The Widows of Eastwick, either—until I saw that the London Review of Books' critique is by James Wolcott, who's perennially on fire like one of those burning coal mines (and, thank God, is "working on a memoir about 1970s Manhattan"). Wolcott has a winning way of accentuating the positive by taking for granted the negative, dispensing justice that is elegant in its balance of cheery severity and generosity.—Jonathan Taylor
Comments
I love Updike. I was not looking forward to reading what I anticipated to be a savaging of him similar to the one Wolcott gave Gopnik last year. As it turned out, my concern was groundless. Wolcott’s review is brilliant! I gobbled it up. So many great lines! The concluding sentence – “America may have lost its looks and stature, but it was a beauty once, and worth every golden dab of sperm†– is so audaciously beautiful and inspired, I laughed out loud when I read it.
Glad you checked it out & were satisfied!