Amazon.com Review
In his introduction to
Zoetrope: All-Story, Francis Ford Coppola explains exactly what possessed him to start a literary magazine. Emphasizing what should be an obvious point--a good movie requires a good story--the acclaimed director laments the lowbrow sensibility of motion-picture studios, pointing out that "none of them that I know of devote serious resources to the cultivation of
literary work." Hollywood has a hallowed tradition of slapping together screenplays based on flimsy pitches ("It's like
Babe meets
Angela's Ashes"). In contrast, Coppola has his own humble request for "good writing, good characters, and intriguing stories that spellbind us, but also teach us about life."
The collection opens with Sara Powers's captivating story about commitment and doubt, in which a sporting couple agrees to experiment with selective lying (at the rate of three falsehoods per conversation). Amy Bloom's "The Gates Are Closing" is a vivid, funny, and typically touching story about a woman having an affair with her synagogue president's ailing husband. Still, the most amusing tale--and the one that may resonate loudest with struggling writers--is "Thinning the Herd." In Peter Lefcourt's comic fantasia, the narrator interviews one Warren David Warren (a.k.a. "Son of Shakespeare"), a self-proclaimed "revisionist literary Darwinian" who slaughters authors whose work he finds abominable. Defending the murder of a prolific bestselling scribe, Warren makes his case: "He kept spewing them out. Like rabbit turds. Who did he think he was--Trollope?" There may in fact be a glut of writers. But within the boundaries of this collection, at least, their stories are superb--and many of them would make great cinema. --Brangien Davis
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
The second collection of short fiction (with the occasional essay) from Coppola's Zoetrope, culled by the magazine's founding editor Brodeur and former senior editor Schnee, picks up where the first volume left off, featuring cutting-edge writers and sharp stories with cinematic plot lines. Rick Moody's essay "The Creature Lurches from the Lagoon" recounts the experience of seeing his novel The Ice Storm adapted into a film. Similarly, in "105 Years of Illustrated Text," Peter Greenaway offers a thoughtful meditation on the relationship between literature and cinema as he describes the inspiration for his film The Pillow Book. One of the most accomplished entries comes from Rick Bass, whose "Ogallala" has an Oregon mill supervisor reflecting on his relationship with his father, a Texas rancher who eschewed family ties and deeded his land to a hardworking Hispanic employee. Provocative concepts abound, the offbeat approach best exemplified by Stacey Richter's "The Cavemen in the Hedges," in which a man loses his girlfriend to one of the Neanderthals who invade their city and take up residence in the streets among the homeless. A few entries fall flat plotwise, but it's hard to beat a lineup that includes the likes of Francine Prose, Tour‚ and Jennifer Egan, among others. The consistent excellence of the prose makes for an enjoyable, engaging read.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
