The Collected Writings of Ambrose Bierce [Paperback]

Ambrose Bierce (Author), Clifton Fadiman (Introduction)

Product Details

• Paperback: 810 pages
• Publisher: Citadel Press (1968)
• Language: English
• ASIN: B000FT94RG
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,691,427 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Bierce is always splendid, but Fadiman is utterly midcult., September 22, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Collected Writings of Ambrose Bierce (Hardcover)

This is a splendid selection of Bierce's work,and includes The Devil's Dictionary, Tales of Soldiers and Civilians, Can Such Things Be?, and other works of importance. It does desire to be the definitive selection, however, and therefore omits some extremely interesting criticism,journalism, some proto-Dada plays and political satires. These omissions all confirm Clifton Fadiman's genteel bias, evident in his Introduction. He characterizes Bierce as merely a cynic--as though that were not a tenable position--but in fact Bierce was a satirist of the first order. A true "cynic" would not bother to satirize anything at all. By all means read the Introduction, but try to imagine, as I do, separate afterlives for Bierce and Fadiman, the ones they deserve. Bierce is having a roaring good time in Hell, while Fadiman is serving herbal teas in dull Eternity.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bierce sees the darwinian world as it is., November 3, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Collected Writings of Ambr (Paperback)

These hard-hitting tales expose the human condition for what it is. They deserve much better than the incompetent criticism offered by Clifton Fadiman, whose preface is little more than a compilation of his own shortcomings.

3 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly Educated Wit, June 9, 2000

By 

Bruce P. Barten - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Collected Writings of Ambr (Paperback)

These are about the only ghost stories that I like to read, and I usually like to think that I am a lot smarter than that. But I am inclined to think that some people were a lot better educated in the days of Ambrose Bierce, or he wouldn't have written his poem about "poor Salmasius" in THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY's definition of the word logomachy, a concept which is like psychoanalysis in its quest for effectiveness. What is absolutely lacking today is any evidence for the truth of the final line of that poem, "For reading Milton's wit we perish too." (p. 295) In these days, it is far more likely that the TV news and entertainment will be competing for most of the attention devoted to whoever is being more fatal.