Word: barthes
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Another two-year veteran, Barth Royer hasn't recovered fully from a knee operation over the summer. Harvard could use his shooting eye. Harrison expects 6-10 Paul Waickowski to "win a couple of games" with the big play--a tip in, a rebound, a blocked shot--even though the senior won't play regularly...
Vladimir Nabakov, like Joseph Conrad, is a foreigner who has become one of the most important stylists in English; but, unlike Barth, he deals with human beings, not metaphysics. The charm, for instance, of the novel Pnin (included in its entirety in Nabokov's Congeires) comes not so much from the telling of the story as from the character of Pnin, a hapless professor of Russian in a small American college. There may be no real separation between style and content, but Nabokov uses his style to create a believable man, charming and pathetic. Having just fallen down a flight...
...Barth's main fault in this book is that he is not concerned with human beings--that is, the human beings he creates--but rather with his own intrusive role as author. Mabye this is not wrong, but there can be no interest in the substance of the stories, because there is no substance, only style. For my money, that is not enough, and I find it annoying. It is easy, dear reader, to play games with the reader, usually addressed "dear reader" (or by Barth "dogged, uninsultable, print-oriented bastard"), and extend these games until neither the dear reader...
Finally, there is the problem of these pieces being for media other than print. I heard Barth recording "Title" in Buffalo, and it is better on tape; but if he publishes it in print, he must be judged on its printed merit...
...important thing is that Nakobov is a very great writer. John Barth may be washed up, or at least he has exhausted this particular vein, but Nakobov is now at the height of his powers. One reviewer, in The New York Times, said that his best work is still to come. I have the same feeling, but if he never writes another word, Lolita will be enough