Word: brief
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...novel that stops on page 36 for a brief treatise on tea is obviously not in a hurry. Neither are the protagonists of Bronze Mirror (Henry Holt; 337 pages; $19.95). The Yellow Emperor, who "discovered the wheel and the compass and such," the Silkweb Empress, responsible for "the delicate art of silkworm rearing," and their courtiers all flourish during the Song dynasty, circa 1135. Another invention is announced: the Emperor's minister has developed a set of symbols called writing. Now every royal tale can be recorded. The aristocrats begin a leisurely contest for the title of best storyteller...
...BRIEF LIVES...
...gentle irony rests in the title of this novel, Anita Brookner's 10th, for the lives portrayed in it are anything but brief. Fay Dodworth, the narrator, is approaching 70 at the time she tells her story; her reminiscences are set off after seeing an obituary of Julia Wilberforce, who was nearly 80. Both women had achieved a certain fame when young, Julia as a sophisticated cabaret performer and Fay as a singer of ballads on the BBC. Their friendship did not begin then or, in truth, ever. They were thrown together because both married men who belonged...
...some tastes, Brief Lives will lack the salt of irony, the sense that the narrator is deluding herself about the past or revealing more about herself than she imagines. Such moments of surprising revelation never occur; Fay is without guile. Her resentment at Julia's imperious way with other people seems perfectly straightforward: "Why did she, without doing anything for anyone, inspire such devotion, while humbler, clumsier people like myself seemed doomed to do without...
...Middle East peace conference is a nonstarter, how about arms-control talks? Stymied in his efforts to bring Arabs and Israelis to the negotiating table, President Bush launched a new initiative last week. In two brief paragraphs of a commencement speech at the U.S. Air Force Academy, he called for a Middle Eastern regional ban on chemical and biological weapons and a freeze on the acquisition of ballistic missiles and nuclear arms...