Word: detours
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Somehow, despite the dazzling dream dance of ironies, despite the poignant musings of the prisoner, the book is disappointing. Compared with the author's superior novels, it is only a kind of detour de force. It may be that, unlike Kafka, Nabokov sacrificed horror to hallucination -or that the young Nabokov did not really know what he was trying to say. Whether Cincinnatus was condemned by wicked masters, or whether he was self-condemned by his own conscience, the ending is both enigmatic and unsatisfactory; for, Nabokov appears to be saying, Cincinnatus can banish the carnival of evil around...
...thanked for a series of small fictional favors. He can find a status symbol in a haystack ("French bread means somebody for dinner"). He makes nurses and vice presidents and suburbanites speak with tape-recorded fidelity and occupational rightness. And his multiple flashbacks rarely loom up like detour signs. Unfortunately, mannerisms do not make the man, and Novelist Birmingham's deft social observations lack the probing roots of Marquand's social experience...
...week was the first since Jan. i in which not a single Cuban died in front of a firing squad. Castro also seemed more willing to quarrel with the Reds around him. His mouthpiece, Revolution, denounced the Communists for trying "to climb on the bandwagon of the revolution and detour it from the path." Undeterred, a top Chilean Red, Luis Cor-valan, declared: "We must march with the bourgeoisie, and Cuba is the example." While Communists praised the revolution, many moderate Cubans who supported Castro from the start are losing faith. "It's a swindle," said a prosperous Havana...
...announced that he would not run for a third term in '56, Governor Herter got a call from John Foster Dulles. Would Herter be willing to come to Washington and work under Dulles as Under Secretary? Eager to get back into his chosen field after the long governorship detour, Herter gladly said...
Part of the difficulty lies in business attitudes. The survey found that "there exists a frightening lack of interest in the business community for participation in the government service," and that companies and most businessmen look upon serving the government more as a "career detour" than as an opportunity for "broadened experience...