How Beautiful It Is And How Easily It Can Be Broken: Essays (Hardcover)

by Daniel Mendelsohn (Author)
Key Phrases: ideal husband, suppliant maidens, adelphopoiêsis ceremony, New York, Same-Sex Unions, The Producers (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. In this elegant collection of essays mostly from the New York Review of Books, NBCC award–winning author Mendelsohn reveals intellectual breadth in his ability to draw on his training as a classicist to look at contemporary culture, from movies like Kill Bill to Broadway musicals like The Producers, and the novels Middlesex and Everyman. They are springboards for Mendelsohn's agile mind to examine subjects like gender, homosexuality, war and peace. In Victims on Broadway I he eloquently peels back layer after layer of Tennessee Williams's The Glass Menagerie and criticizes not only the 2005 Broadway production as stripped of the nuances of character and sensibility but also the audience for what he sees as their inability to perceive pathos. In a magisterial essay, Mendelsohn finds the same flaw in the blockbuster movie Troy that he believes marred the ancient, lost Greek epics the Cypria and the Little Iliad: unlike Homer's Iliad, they have not a single unifying action, but a single unifying notion lacking in epic grandeur. These essays richly repay the time readers spend in their company. (Aug. 12)
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Review
"Mendelsohn takes on contemporary culture with humor and incisive analysis." (The New York Sun )

"Brilliant. . . . Masterful. . . . Wise, funny. . . . A wonderful collection." (Time Out New York )

"An elegant collection of essays. . . . Mendelsohn reveals intellectual breadth in his ability to draw on his training as a classicist to look at contemporary culture. . . . These essays richly repay the time readers spend in their company." (Publishers Weekly (starred review) )

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 480 pages
• Publisher: Harper; 1 edition (August 12, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061456438
• ISBN-13: 978-0061456435
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #271,956 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very stimulating and thought-provoking read, October 9, 2008

By	armchairinterviews.com (Minnesota) - See all my reviews

Readers of the New York Review of Books will be familiar with the writings of Daniel Mendelsohn, who has written dozens of reviews of literature, movies and theatre. How Beautiful It Is And How Easily It Can Be Broken pulls together many of those reviews, covering everything from movies like "Kill Bill" and "The 300" to Broadway plays such as "The Glass Menagerie" and "The Producers" to books like "The Hours," "Middlesex" and new academic books on history.

Why would anyone want to read a book of old reviews? Well, Mendelsohn is perhaps the best example of how this form can be used as a launching pad for examining large subjects like war and its culpabilities, sex and homosexuality, and human nature. That Mendelsohn does all of this by invoking a lens of the great classicists - Euripides, Homer, Sophocles - is a feat of a great and pointed intelligence.

These are not just reviews, though they are that too. Mendelsohn is a critic, and a stringent and demanding one. Swayed by the opinions of neither the public nor other critics, he deftly, and with great care, strikes at the heart of faults of many books, plays and movies. Despite this, these reviews are not rants, nor are they petty or arrogant. Their power comes from the combination of Mendelsohn's intelligence with his great love of writing, movies and theatre. It is only with the greatest respect that he points out the failings, of both the works of art themselves, and of our culture.

You might expect essays that invoke Sophicles and Homer to be difficult. Another great talent of Mendelsohn is his ability to write of these classic subjects in a very conversational manner - to, in fact, draw in readers who are not familiar with the classics the way he is, to serve as a bridge between the great ideas of history and the popular culture of today.

As I read his essays, I found myself simultaneously intrigued, entertained, and educated - and interested in going back to read, and see, some of these books and movies again.

Armchair Interviews says: An educational and fascinating read.

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a celebration in vivisection, September 23, 2008

By	Matt Ashby (NY) - See all my reviews

While Mendelsohn has a gift for critical understanding of a work, I'd say he has an even greater gift for conveying that understanding in a relevant manner to his audience.

People (often times rightfully) attack critics often for being "haters" but, as Mendelsohn demonstrates so well here, good criticism is really about a careful consideration and love.

By treating a work seriously on its terms, setting it in cultural context, and questioning its greater implications, one is not dragging down an individual work but treating a work with the dignity it deserves and honoring the intelligence of its audience and the nuances in the history of the work's medium. To do all that with clear yet conversationally-engaging language is what this book offers many times over. From Brokeback Mountain to Almodovar to Olive Stone and Alice Sebold's bestseller The Lovely Bones... Mendelsohn sees what we are too mired in ourselves to view objectively.

Now, if I could only get him to consider the cultural relevance of my book (also available on amazon.com) On Toilets. One day! :)

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Thoughtful Reviews and Essays, August 23, 2008

By	Franklin Banks (Oakland, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Great book. The reviews and essays are thoughtful and learned without pretension and what's even better you don't get those gleeful, nasty quips that critics tend to like. His criticism, when it comes, is thoughtful and right on target. Well worth your time.