Antiquarian and Classic Book Reviews
Books of note and influence. These books have either influenced the genre they have created or the literary sphere as a whole.
Live-streamed opera is where we first saw Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, which is based on the Pushkin novel. Even though we weren’t provided with subtitles to the Met’s production from 2007, the imagery and the music were capable of conveying the story in and of themselves. Whenever I see fall leaves in piles on the ground, I’m reminded of the set design. This is a review of Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin.
The romance of Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw is one of the most well known in English literature. The narrative proceeds in twists and turns that never lack for dramatic flair. This is review of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights — an essential ghost story as much as an essential romance.
This November, I want to celebrate that with a month dedicated to essential romance novels from classic literature. Romance is not a genre I often read, but these books have made a profound impact on literature in general, and as such deserve their due consideration and analysis. This is a review of Samuel Richardson’s Pamela; or Virtue Rewarded and two books best read with it Shamela and Joseph Andrews, both by Henry Fielding.
The little details and techniques matter, and can be the difference between a good book and an unforgettable one. This book changed the way I saw font, style, technique, and it showed me the power of humour to be as immortal as literature itself. This is a review of Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy.
This book got mixed reviews when it was published, one going so far as to call it ‘obscene’. What was obscene about it was the discussion of themes and aspects of Victorian life that Victorians were in no way comfortable discussing — including the struggles of the lower classes and their exclusion from even the dream of higher education, the lack of class mobility, sex, sexism, animal cruelty, the destructive power of gossip, bad marriages, and horrible people. This is a review of Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure.
Due to how many adaptations it has had and how prominent it is in the canon of classic literature, I thought it would be a staple of used bookstores or the bigger new bookstores. Well, it isn’t. This is a review of Victor Hugo’s Notre-Dame de Paris or The Hunchback of Notre-Dame.
I spent a lot of time in front of the television as a child. It was part of my regular routine before going to school and after I got home. I used it to define days, hours, and seasons and to keep me company while I did homework or studied. My favourite programs (alongside Bugs Bunny, of course) were crime documentaries. This is a review of Emile Zola’s The Beast Within.
There is no singular process that recommends a book to me or by which I choose what to read when. My reading tastes can change with a given day or even a given hour — which is why I tend to read about eight to ten books at once. This is a review of The Bluest Eye.
We’ve all been there. We’ve all been at the big box bookstore and looked at the one table they usually bring out sometime around the beginning of the school year. You get three of them for ten bucks, sometimes even less. This is a review of The Yellow Wall-Paper.
I found noir as a genre relatively late. I’ve always been interested in true crime, but for some reason, my younger self just wasn’t drawn to the black and white grit of classic movies until it was included in our cable package. This is a review of five collected noir novels by David Goodis.
