Palace of books / Roger Grenier ; translated and with a foreword by Alice Kaplan.
Material type: TextLanguage: English Original language: French Publisher: Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2014Description: viii, 150 pages ; 23 cmContent type:- text
- unmediated
- volume
- 0226308340 (cloth : alk. paper)
- 9780226308340 (cloth : alk. paper)
- Palais des livres. English
Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book | Main Library | NonFiction | 844.914 G827 | Available | 33111007907013 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
For decades, French writer, editor, and publisher Roger Grenier has been enticing readers with compact, erudite books that draw elegant connections between the art of living and the work of art. Under Grenier's wry gaze, clichés crumble, and offbeat anecdotes build to powerful insights.
With Palace of Books , he invites us to explore the domain of literature, its sweeping vistas and hidden recesses. Engaging such fundamental questions as why people feel the need to write, or what is involved in putting one's self on the page, or how a writer knows she's written her last sentence, Grenier marshals apposite passages from his favorite writers: Chekhov, Baudelaire, Proust, James, Kafka, Mansfield and many others. Those writers mingle companionably with tales from Grenier's half-century as an editor and friend to countless legendary figures, including Albert Camus, Romain Gary, Milan Kundera, and Brassai,.
Grenier offers here a series of observations and quotations that feel as spontaneous as good conversation, yet carry the lasting insights of a lifetime of reading and thinking. Palace of Books is rich with pleasures and surprises, the perfect accompaniment to old literary favorites, and the perfect introduction to new ones.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 141-150).
Foreword by Alice Kaplan -- "The land of poets" -- Waiting and eternity -- Leave-taking -- Private life -- Writing about love, again . . . -- A half hour at the dentist's -- Unfinished -- Do I have anything left to say? -- To be loved.
Translated from the French.