For the depiction of Venice by artists; its a high bar thats been set; but Adam Van Doren; grandson of the Pulitzer-prize-winning poet Mark Van Doren; convincingly confronts the competition in this charming memoir; a verbal and visual account of his love affair with the city. His story is personal; like all other artists; he sees the city with and through his own eyes; but he is also well-informed historically. He laces his tour with information; opinion; and citation. With Van Doren as guide; the readers tour of the city is rich and convincing; filled with the presence of illustrious predecessors. With an informed preface by the scholar Theodore Rabb and a charming foreword by Simon Winchester; with 23 full-color drawings by the author/artist; and even six pages of commendably lucid notes on the personalities and structures discussed; this is a book that will proudly take its place alongside the many others that have celebrated this city for centuries.
#2417886 in eBooks 2007-01-11 2013-08-30File Name: B00EX42T6C
Review
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Highly recommendedBy PayalI love this play. And this edition is extra special because of the wonderful commentary on the text; historical context; playwriting -- all by Keatley herself. Theres also a short but very engaging interview of Keatley. I directed this play two years ago and all this was of invaluable help to me as a director.0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Inappropriate language for my purposeBy faithful1I had hoped to use this a a performance piece for my high school forensic team. I cant. The language is inappropriate for high school performance; in my opinion. I had such high hopes.....0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. It misses the density of loveBy Dr Jacques COULARDEAUFour generations of women together on the stage; and absolutely no men. Four generations disguised as three because the daughter of the third generation woman is raised as the daughter of the second generation woman; hence as the sister of her own mother; a mother out of wedlock. But that is a detail that only get pregnant; if I can say so; when the woman of the fourth generation finds out the one she considered her sister is in fact her mother. From the first generation; a woman who had to work hard to bring her daughter to a better beginning; we move to the second generation where the beginning of the next generation is more or less guaranteed after World War 2; but the independent spirit of that third generation brings an affair with a married man; who has two children on his own and of course never keeps his word about marrying the pour late teenager who gets pregnant at first sexual contact. Complete lack of sexual education and emotional education. The mother is of course responsible. Who else could be responsible for that complete lack of emotional and sexual education? School can at best give some information on sex but not on love. Only a mother for a daughter and a father for a son can provide with such an initiation more than an education. The fourth generation is even worse as for her independence and lack of care for anything; except the mottos of some punk fundamentalist. But whats left after these two hours of theater? I am afraid not much. The feminine point of view on the tremendous evolution from 1935 to today is not bringing anything new except that women can easily fall under; be the victims of some institutionalized blindness that is perfectly relayed by what I would call a freewheeling carelessness disguised in the latest generation as carefulness that is just a faccedil;ade since it corresponds to little. That Rosie girl understand her Jackie sister is in fact her mother; but that does not seem to throw her into some deep thinking trance or emotional existential experience. She could have been told her real mother was a vampire or a dragon she would not have been moved one iota more. And in fact the only significant symbol in that play is the solitaire game that reveals the patience and fate of women is to play solitaire games when men are doing the real thing outside in society. The second generation woman who raised her own third generation daughter and the fourth generation daughter; is the only one who really feels the rub somewhere and dies early; at work; working to raise the daughter of her own daughter. Absurd and in many ways silly. Where is the message in that early death of the enslaved second generation woman who is the victim of her own daughter? From where I stand there is no meaning and it is a case of overexploitation of one woman by her own daughter. Worse than slavery. Just plain overexploitation.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU; University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne; University Paris 8 Saint Denis; University Paris 12 Creacute;teil; CEGID