Nothing Remains the Same: Rereading and RememberingA New York Times Notable Book and a San Francisco Chronicle Book of the Year: A look at the pleasures and surprises of rereading. Compared with reading, the act of rereading is far more personal—it involves a complex interaction of our past selves, our present selves, and literature. With candor and humor, this “inspired intellectual romp, part memoir, part criticism” takes us on a guided tour of the author’s own return to books she once knew—from the plays of Shakespeare to twentieth-century novels by Kingsley Amis and Ian McEwan, from the childhood favorite I Capture the Castle to classic novels such as Anna Karenina and Huckleberry Finn, from nonfiction by Henry Adams to poetry by Wordsworth—as she reflects on how the passage of time and the experience of aging has affected her perceptions of them (Lawrence Weschler). A cultural critic and the acclaimed author of Why I Read, Wendy Lesser conveys an infectious love of reading and inspires us all to take another look at the books we’ve read to find the unexpected treasures they might offer. “Delightful.” —Diane Johnson, author of Le Divorce “Anyone who has ever approached a once favorite book later in life . . . will find in this memoir moments of bittersweet recognition.” —The New York Times Book Review “Reflect[s] deeply and candidly on how a reader’s life experiences alter her perceptions of literature . . . [Lesser] has truly fascinating and original things to say about a compelling assortment of writers, including George Orwell, George Eliot, D. H. Lawrence, Dostoyevsky, and Shakespeare.” —Booklist |
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... exactly the right person. Both have managed to happen in this happy instance. Wendy Lesser's Nothing Remains the Same is an inspired intellectual romp: part memoir, part criticism, though actually a bracing, larkish reinvention of them ...
... exactly the right person. Both have managed to happen in this happy instance. Wendy Lesser's Nothing Remains the Same is an inspired intellectual romp: part memoir, part criticism, though actually a bracing, larkish reinvention of them ...
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... exactly the circumstances surrounding my first reading: it was the late fall of 1984; I was staying at the Villa Serbelloni in Bellagio, and Stendhal's book was there in the library (having been acquired because of its associations with ...
... exactly the circumstances surrounding my first reading: it was the late fall of 1984; I was staying at the Villa Serbelloni in Bellagio, and Stendhal's book was there in the library (having been acquired because of its associations with ...
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... exactly what to call it—that repeated itself over and over again. That was the idea of vertigo. There is something inherently dizzying in the effort to look at a still work of literature from a moving position—that is, from two ...
... exactly what to call it—that repeated itself over and over again. That was the idea of vertigo. There is something inherently dizzying in the effort to look at a still work of literature from a moving position—that is, from two ...
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... exactly the way a Marx Brothers movie is funny. The battle between Don Quixote and the Knight of the Mirrors (who says he has read Volume One of The Ingenious Gentleman, Don Quixote de la Mancha, and therefore wishes to prove himself a ...
... exactly the way a Marx Brothers movie is funny. The battle between Don Quixote and the Knight of the Mirrors (who says he has read Volume One of The Ingenious Gentleman, Don Quixote de la Mancha, and therefore wishes to prove himself a ...
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... Castle. I loved the book at thirteen for reasons that couldn't possibly have been apparent to me then, and now, looking back, I see exactly what they were. This is not because I have outgrown the 34 // Nothing Remains the Same.
... Castle. I loved the book at thirteen for reasons that couldn't possibly have been apparent to me then, and now, looking back, I see exactly what they were. This is not because I have outgrown the 34 // Nothing Remains the Same.
Contents
An Education | |
A Young Womans Mistakes | |
All Kinds of Madness | |
A Small Masterpiece | |
The Tree of Knowledge | |
McEwan inTime | |
The Strange Case of Huck and Jim | |
A Literary Career | |
Hitchcocks Vertigo | |
Back Matter | |
Back Cover | |
Spine | |
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Common terms and phrases
actors actually Adams's Aglaya Anna Anna Karenina become believe called Capture the Castle Casaubon Cervantes chapter character child childhood comes criticism Don Quixote Dorothea Dostoyevsky dream essay exactly experience fact feel felt fiction fool garden George Eliot George Orwell Henry Adams Henry James Hermione Howells Huck Huckleberry Finn humor husband idea idiot imagine instance Jenny Diski kind knew Lawrence Leontes literary live look Lucky Jim Madeleine McEwan mean memory ment Middlemarch Milton mother movie Myshkin narrator Nastasya never novel once Orwell Orwell's Paradise Lost perhaps person play pleasure plot poem prince Prospero readers remember rereading Road to Wigan Rocking-Horse Rocking-Horse Winner Sancho Panza scene Scotty seems sense Shakespeare sort story strange tell Tempest things thought tion true turn Vertigo WENDY LESSER Wigan Pier woman word Wordsworth writing