Customer Reviews

Max Perkins: Editor of Genius

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Note, first of all, how that title can be taken two ways -- depending on whom one considers to be the genius. (Second, puckishly, note that this is not *the* Scott Berg, but merely A. Scott Berg.) Perkins is probably the most famous book editor in the history of the world -- most famous as an editor, I mean -- but he's still not all that famous. Berg, probably astutely realizing exactly what the audience for a book like this is, concentrates almost entirely on Perkins's professional life. That means that MAX PERKINS reads almost like a group biography of Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Thomas Wolfe, with occasional digressions on Ring Lardner and a few others. Berg skips Perkins's childhood almost entirely, only sketches his (apparently tumultuous) relationship with his wife, and mentions their daughters only for color or when one of them is getting married. MAX PERKINS is organized semi-chronologically, which came to seem a mistake -- Berg keeps getting ahead of himself while running through Perkins's work with one author, and then has to back up and fill in on other aspects of his life. Perkins will probably never get another biography, but I think the materials here, and Berg's aims in writing this book, would have been better served if Berg had organized it by author, and written much more obviously a book about Perkins's working relationships, rather than writing what looks like a biography but spends so little time on its subject's actual life. MAX PERKINS is a fine book, both about what it means to be an editor specifically, and what kind of life a dedicated man in any line of business is likely to have -- one defined entirely by the work he does, and interesting only insomuch as that work is -- but it substitutes Homeric catch-phrases about "Yankee reserve" for a deep examination of Perkins's character and personality.

Quite simply, a must read for anyone who is a fan of Hemingway, Wolfe, Fitzgerald, Maxwell Perkins or the early part of the 20th Century in America. The insight gained into who these men were was astounding if not downright life-altering. What I thought I knew of the "Big Three" early-century writers changed with each page. Who I thought the men were are not who I now know them them to be.

An easy read filled with moments of joy and heartbreak as each image was shattered and rebuilt (or not). Highly recommended.