Customer Reviews

Vermeer in Bosnia: Selected Writings

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Though ultimately difficult to categorize, the simplest way to describe what Lawrence Weschler does for money would be to say he is an art critic. However readers familiar with Weschler's work will understand why this label seems so insufficient. As a contributer to some of the more important journals of cultural and artistic thought, Weschler not only expounds educatedly on the art and lives of some of the greatest creative minds of history, but he also manages to find ways to uncover the deeper connections that underlie and tie together the experiences and creative output of seemingly disparate times, ideas and cultures. For example, rather than including a separate critical/biographical pieces about such essential talents as Roman Polanski, Jerzy Urban and Art Spieglman, he presents the reader with a triad of Polish surival stories. Moreover, these are not lightweight, breezy reads that can be absorbed in a single trip to the bathroom. Rather, you find deeply insightful, rigorously researched theses exploring how the unique life experiences of his subjects mirror patterns evident in their own respective bodies of work. Ultimately, reading Weschler makes one more attuned to the complex series of interconnections in the world around us--he activates the critical eye in each of us. Readers should also not pass up on the recently collected anthology of his writing on 'convergences', "Everything That Rises".

The essays in this collection were mostly magazine pieces published in the New Yorker or the Atlantic Monthly in the 1980s and 1990s. As such, the question must be asked: do they stand the test of time? Are they worth re-reading all these years later?
Sometimes they are. The first essay on the author's musings about Vermeer and his world juxtaposed against his coverage of the War Crimes Tribunal judging the atrocities in Bosnia is genuinely insightful. Weschler notes that Vermeer's world was as violent, or even more so, as the former Yugoslavia during its bloodletting. His art is an attempt to impose order on this brutal world and to uphold the dignity and importance of the individual.
Another essay about a scene in Shakespeare's Henry V which is usually cut from performance, in which the king orders the mass slaughter of French prisoners after the Battle of Agincourt is likewise compared to the massacre at Srenbrenica. It's a valuable insight.
However other essays seemed to me to have lost their relevance and sharpness. That should be no surprise after 15 or 20 years. Magazine writing is not intended for the ages. It often belongs to the time in which it was written. Thus an essay about Jerzy Urban, who was the spokesman for Solidarity in Poland during the 1981 crackdown and later reinvented himself as a much-raking editor, seemed far removed from the Poland of today. Additionally, though he provides (very) brief updates for some of his stories, Weschler doesn't do so in this case.
A piece about Roman Polanski seemed long and rather similar to other articles I'd read about the dramatic life and work of this director.
It takes a considerable ego to believe one's journalism is worth preserving for posterity between the covers of a hard-backed book. (I'd certainly never make that claim for myself).
These articles are very well-written and can be very interesting in places. But if it came to a choice between reading this week's New Yorker and this book, I'd take the current issue.

One of several books I buy for all my friends, and which they invariably love. It's an excellent collection of Weschler's work.