Tag Archives: biography

‘Into the Labyrinth of Paris’

Posted on April 25, 2023 by JMN

The first person he befriended was Max, a man who was also an exile (from Quimper, in Brittany) and who was also weighed down by multiple identities: not only was he a Frenchman but he was also a Breton, a … Continue reading →

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The Rock Pile

Posted on May 14, 2021 by JMN

Dwight Garner’s review of a new biography of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings* evokes a foible-wracked genius: It’s a pleasure to meet this cursing, hard-drinking, brilliant, self-destructive, car-wrecking, fun-loving, chain-smoking, alligator-hunting, moonshine-making, food-obsessed woman again on the page. The passage that hits … Continue reading →

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Cheryl Marie Wade

Posted on July 28, 2020 by JMN

Cheryl Marie Wade died in 2013 at age 65 from complications of rheumatoid arthritis. “She embodied and modeled disability pride before it was a thing,” Judith Smith, who worked with her in two Bay Area performance groups, Wry Crips and … Continue reading →

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Ways of Looking

Posted on September 29, 2019 by JMN

Benjamin Moser has published “Sontag,” a biography of Susan Sontag. This favorable review of it left me mulling the following remark: “Biography is a metaphor,” Moser said. “It’s not the person’s life; it’s writing about a person’s life. Just like … Continue reading →

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Poetry for the Kitchen Slops Bucket

Posted on June 4, 2019 by JMN

Lucasta Miller is the author of “L.E.L.: The Lost Life and Scandalous Death of Letitia Elizabeth Landon, the Celebrated ‘Female Byron.’” Landon’s “scandalous” death occurred at her own hand with prussic acid at age 36. Even today, Letitia Landon provokes … Continue reading →

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