Джон Апдайк4.0 Знаковая книга, без которой современная постмодернистская проза, возможно, не обрела бы окончательной, привычной нам, формы.
Книга, в которой - впервые в англоязычной литературе! - возник прием "смысловой сложности", с легкостью обращающей скромного учителя в "воспитателя героев" античной мифологии, а маленький городок - в фантасмагорический калейдоскоп видений...
Впрочем... о "Кентавре" написано многое - но объяснить его до конца невозможно.
Каждый читатель сделает это сам!
Mary McCarthy3.7 Mary McCarthy's The Group is a sharply-pointed satire of upper-class New England society which follows the post-college lives of eight Vassar graduates, class of '33. Helena was registered for Vassar at birth; Pokey forged her mother's signature on her college application in defiance of the family tradition of "being dim-witted and vain of it." Out in the "real" world, Dottie loses her virginity to a "bad sort" but discovers that she enjoys sex, while Kay subsumes her own talent to the artistic "genius" of her egocentric and philandering husband. Libby writes book reviews that are almost as long as the original material and Polly works as a nurse, while Priss is forced by her pediatrician-husband to go against "tradition" and her inclinations and breastfeed her baby, as proof of his theories. Elinor "Lakey" Eastlake, the sleek, rich leader of the group, travels about Europe and ultimately returns, full of surprises. Adopting the non-stop, generally well-intentioned, but hopelessly narrow-minded voice that typifies the worst of the group, Mary McCarthy filets Ivy League society, socialism, 1930s child-rearing practices, sexual double-standards, psychoanalysis, and men in general
Thomas Pynchon4.1 The quest for V. sweeps us through sixty years and a panorama of Alexandria, Paris, Malta, Florence, Africa and New York. But who, where or what is V.? Bawdy, sometimes sad and frequently hilarious, V. has become a modern classic. This is the first novel by the author of Gravity's Rainbow, and a profoundly impressive and original work in its own right.
Харви Свадос0.0 Finalist for the National Book Award: On the verge of receiving a vast inheritance, three brothers’ clashing aspirations turn into an all-out war
Brothers Leo and Max Land came to America from Romania in 1911, but they took different paths in pursuit of the American dream. Even as they worked together, Max sought out material things while Leo made a simple, private life for himself. Now, after the death of both brothers, Leo’s three sons—the only surviving heirs—learn that they stand to inherit a fortune. As they battle for control, they come to expose their own deeply complicated visions of success in America. The Will is a stunning portrait of American idealism crushed under the weight of material desires.
Джон Кроу Рэнсом0.0 Working within the domain of consciously reduced elements, Auster pushes language to its breaking point, locating the sayable within the shifting tumult of the real, and revealing a poetic voice that has been consistently faithful to its visionary impulses.
William H. McNeill4.2 The Rise of the West, winner of the National Book Award for history in 1964, is famous for its ambitious scope and intellectual rigor. In it, McNeill challenges the Spengler-Toynbee view that a number of separate civilizations pursued essentially independent careers, and argues instead that human cultures interacted at every stage of their history. The author suggests that from the Neolithic beginnings of grain agriculture to the present major social changes in all parts of the world were triggered by new or newly important foreign stimuli, and he presents a persuasive narrative of world history to support this claim.
In a retrospective essay titled "The Rise of the West after Twenty-five Years," McNeill shows how his book was shaped by the time and place in which it was written (1954-63). He discusses how historiography subsequently developed and suggests how his portrait of the world's past in The Rise of the West should be revised to reflect these changes.
"This is not only the most learned and the most intelligent, it is also the most stimulating and fascinating book that has ever set out to recount and explain the whole history of mankind. . . . To read it is a great experience. It leaves echoes to reverberate, and seeds to germinate in the mind."—H. R. Trevor-Roper, New York Times Book Review
