Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere"Hitchens provides rich evidence that his own sallies as a political journalist are nourished by an erudite familiarity with a broad sweep of novelists, essayists and poets. In these pages Oscar Wilde's profound radicalism is uncovered; George Orwell's role as a fulcrum between left and right is carefully appraised; the languid irony and cosmopolitanism of Gore Vidal are celebrated; and a discussion of the fatwah issued against Salman Rushdie prompts a meditation on the West's misunderstood encounter with Islam. Along the way, a refined and knowledgeable palate samples offerings from, amongst others, P. G. Wodehouse, Arthur Conan Doyle, Dorothy Parker, F. Scott Fitzgerald, T. S. Eliot, Christopher Isherwood, Anthony Powell, Saul Bellow, Alan Bloom, Philip Larkin and Patrick O'Brian, and dethrones the overrated, conspicuous among them such figures as Tom Wolfe and Isaiah Berlin."--BOOK JACKET. |
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Page 8
... Wilde even spoke with disrespect of Nature ! ( ' All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling . To be natural is to be obvious , and to be obvious is to be inartistic . ' ) Nordau strove constipatedly to establish a link between literary ...
... Wilde even spoke with disrespect of Nature ! ( ' All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling . To be natural is to be obvious , and to be obvious is to be inartistic . ' ) Nordau strove constipatedly to establish a link between literary ...
Page 9
... Wilde's masterpiece in three acts , The Importance of Being Earnest . First performed in 1895 , to applause that has never died away , it coincided with Wilde's challenge to the infamous Mar- quess of Queensberry and with his decision ...
... Wilde's masterpiece in three acts , The Importance of Being Earnest . First performed in 1895 , to applause that has never died away , it coincided with Wilde's challenge to the infamous Mar- quess of Queensberry and with his decision ...
Page 21
... Wilde . In three short courtroom acts , which horribly parodied his own preferred and per- fected dramatic form , Wilde was shamed in earnest , and ruined , and confined In Carcere et Vinculis . That , indeed , was the original title of ...
... Wilde . In three short courtroom acts , which horribly parodied his own preferred and per- fected dramatic form , Wilde was shamed in earnest , and ruined , and confined In Carcere et Vinculis . That , indeed , was the original title of ...
Contents
Oscar Wildes Socialism | 9 |
George Orwell and Raymond Williams | 26 |
Oh Lionel | 44 |
Copyright | |
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Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere Christopher Hitchens No preview available - 2014 |
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