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ericfheiman's review against another edition
3.0
Basically a combination of five-star signature essays and one-star filler. But even Franzen filler is better than most of the other nonfiction writing out there. "Pain Won't Kill You" should be required reading for just about everyone, and is a wonderful companion to David Foster Wallace's "This Is Water" commencement speech.
pearloz's review against another edition
3.0
The best part about reading a collection of essays and reviews: you can skip one if you hate it. There were more about birds and birding than I anticipated, but he has enlightened me to a few books I'm def going to try, and I found his writing about DFW endearing.
lowlandsbeach's review against another edition
2.0
I thought a lot of the essays were somewhat dull and boring. I'm not interested in the author's reviews of other people's books. The short story about the brothers was weird and dull. I didn't get the nuances of the interview with New York so that didn't appeal either. The essay about the Chinese puffin was quite good but too long, quite informative. Also informative was the essay about Europeans eating and shooting songbirds, and is still tragically a happening thing https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/songbirds-cyprus-nets-trap-killed-b2021678.html
mmmbooqz's review against another edition
3.0
hit and miss yet incredibly insightful collection. some essays excitedly universal, some super specific and a bit long to really continue. id be so excited to see this in a waiting room.
daniell's review against another edition
4.0
After digesting this collection of various essays from 2011-2006, a few things are clear:
-JF sees the world as a swirling mess of indefinite meaning, a bath of complex factors, an array of conflicting, unresolved tones. This more than anything else is the single meaning through which this book might be read.
-JF loves fiction and this collection includes many reviews of novels. After reading his reviews I am excited to read these suggestions. Seemingly all of the books reviewed were ambiguous in meaning, and this seems owing to his penchant for either ambiguity or ambiguous literature.
-JF is a much a novelist as a reporter, and many of these pieces are excellent articles of extended journalism in the theme of adventure-essay, the best one being his story linking the faux-animal driver cover to their production factory in China, to an economic tour or the region, to a brush with local bird watchers.
-JF likes birds. Another essay here covers the state of bird hinting in Malta and the veritable swirl of human complexity surrounding overharvesting, regional traditions of consumption, and the moral implications of it all.
-The flagship essay is great, claiming David Brooks' Sydney Award for 2011, and is a sustained meditation on loneliness, internal strength, and the natural world. Franzen is well-connected to the world of passion and feeling that his late friend DFW fought with till his death. Franzen's depiction of DFW is surprisingly unsympathetic, but neither is it mean, it's simply an observation of the man's life as one on a somewhat self-imposed island. The sense of salty desolation this essay impresses remains vivid to me.
-Second to "Farther Away" (the second selection) is the first selection, his speech to Kenyon College upon graduation. "Pain Won't Kill You" is his message, and for having no real action plan, no three-step agenda, and no conventional pieties, it is clear: life is pain, pain is coming to you in ways you will not expect and cannot foresee, and that is an okay thing; be of good cheer.
I recall attempting to read "How To Be Alone," a book of essays he published in 2003, and seriously disliking his sentence structures. He is much more readable in this collection, auguring nothing but an upward trend for his future output.
-JF sees the world as a swirling mess of indefinite meaning, a bath of complex factors, an array of conflicting, unresolved tones. This more than anything else is the single meaning through which this book might be read.
-JF loves fiction and this collection includes many reviews of novels. After reading his reviews I am excited to read these suggestions. Seemingly all of the books reviewed were ambiguous in meaning, and this seems owing to his penchant for either ambiguity or ambiguous literature.
-JF is a much a novelist as a reporter, and many of these pieces are excellent articles of extended journalism in the theme of adventure-essay, the best one being his story linking the faux-animal driver cover to their production factory in China, to an economic tour or the region, to a brush with local bird watchers.
-JF likes birds. Another essay here covers the state of bird hinting in Malta and the veritable swirl of human complexity surrounding overharvesting, regional traditions of consumption, and the moral implications of it all.
-The flagship essay is great, claiming David Brooks' Sydney Award for 2011, and is a sustained meditation on loneliness, internal strength, and the natural world. Franzen is well-connected to the world of passion and feeling that his late friend DFW fought with till his death. Franzen's depiction of DFW is surprisingly unsympathetic, but neither is it mean, it's simply an observation of the man's life as one on a somewhat self-imposed island. The sense of salty desolation this essay impresses remains vivid to me.
-Second to "Farther Away" (the second selection) is the first selection, his speech to Kenyon College upon graduation. "Pain Won't Kill You" is his message, and for having no real action plan, no three-step agenda, and no conventional pieties, it is clear: life is pain, pain is coming to you in ways you will not expect and cannot foresee, and that is an okay thing; be of good cheer.
I recall attempting to read "How To Be Alone," a book of essays he published in 2003, and seriously disliking his sentence structures. He is much more readable in this collection, auguring nothing but an upward trend for his future output.
geirertzgaard's review against another edition
3.0
Essays av det som mange omtaler som USAs fremste forfatter (Philip Roth bl.a.), og på sitt beste er dette tekster som overgår det aller meste jeg har lest i litterær kvalitet: En miljøseie til Kina, eller til øya Alejandro Selkirk utenfor kysten av Chile, en tekst om forfatteren Alice Munro, eller et forsøk på å få til et personlig intervju med staten New York, språklig avansert og utbroderende i ren og skjør ordgytende eleganse. Men innimellom og i andre essays blir det så elegant og ordgytende at bokstavene står i veien for teksten. Også sammensetningen av essays er ujevn, jeg klarer ikke finne bokens røde tråd annet enn at Franzen har samlet ulike tekster som er samlet fordi det er mulig, ikke fordi de har en sammenheng.
Framzen er ekstremt dyktig, men det er forskjell på dyktig og riktig.
Når det er sagt: Denne boken vil vokse og vokse på meg, og om et år vil det å ha karaktersatt den virke meningsløst.
Framzen er ekstremt dyktig, men det er forskjell på dyktig og riktig.
Når det er sagt: Denne boken vil vokse og vokse på meg, og om et år vil det å ha karaktersatt den virke meningsløst.
pharmdad2007's review against another edition
4.0
This is a nice book of essays from Franzen. The "title track" is a 5 star piece detailing the author's physical journey to a place about as far away from anything as it is possible to get and simultaneously his emotional journey to the farthest away reaches of the human soul, to that place that his friend and colleague David Foster Wallace must have reached shortly before taking his own life. Franzen's literal and figurative wanderings don't hold all the answers, but they do bring some amount of peace and understanding.
Several other of the essays are very good and I am looking forward to reading some of the books reviewed by Franzen in this collection.
Several other of the essays are very good and I am looking forward to reading some of the books reviewed by Franzen in this collection.
maryparapluie's review against another edition
4.0
There are a number of essays in this collection that are among Franzen's best-- unfortunately, mostly these are weighted in the first half of the book... and a lot of the rest feels a little like erudite filler. Which is not to say that the filler isn't interesting, it's just not as compelling and fully realized as the best pieces. Full of Franzen's ruminations on the role of fiction and what makes fiction good and which authors are undervalued today.