Certainly, one of the best essays TMR has offered yet, superbly written and considered, doing justice to its subject. I'm compelled to share the following video of Ozick in her writerly youth offering her own assessment of Norman Mailer at a town hall in the aftermath of his publishing The Prisoner of Sex. New York in those days was a heaven of cultural contest. Writers even ran for Mayor!
Good essay. Ozick is a writer I've been interested in for a while off the strength of her Anne Frank essay and her introduction to Seize the Day. By coincidence I bought this a few days ago having not read much else and was kind of let down by the first few stories -- so it was fortuitous timing to be assured that there are better things ahead.
The author knows his subject, but didn't write clearly enough for me to grasp the depth of what he was trying to say. In my opinion, the essay should have started with, "Cynthia Ozick, who has just published In a Yellow Wood: Selected Stories and Essays, is ninety-seven years old." I bet most readers gave up before Kosan got there. And why include perplexing sentences like: "Wondering anxiously about the latter is unavoidable for any writer who isn’t completely delusional, especially when gathering their work against that work’s imminent forced conclusion." I doubt many readers are willing to wrestle with what Kosan means by that. Was psyched to read his piece, but I finished frustrated. Maybe it was just me.
Regarding poets' second thoughts about their work, there's also Wallace Stevens's "As You Leave the Room":
"That poem about the pineapple, the one / About the mind as never satisfied, / The one about the credible hero, the one / About summer, are not what skeletons think about. / I wonder, have I lived a skeleton's life / As a disbeliever in reality / A countryman of all the bones in the world?"
Also: Ozick's "Alfred Chester's Wig" was very controversial when it was first published and left many people who knew Alfred Chester quite perplexed, since most of them knew him as a completely out gay male. Ben Shields has a good account at "Grand Journal", along with this warning:
"Gore Vidal wrote: '[Chester’s] life comprises one of those Cautionary Tales that tends to overexcite journalists and school-teachers.' Those who want to promote Chester’s work—and Vidal was one of them—face the task of resisting the impulse to sensationalize and turn Chester’s wigs, illnesses, and life itself into metaphor, which seems to be a disease plaguing artist types when they speak of others."
Certainly, one of the best essays TMR has offered yet, superbly written and considered, doing justice to its subject. I'm compelled to share the following video of Ozick in her writerly youth offering her own assessment of Norman Mailer at a town hall in the aftermath of his publishing The Prisoner of Sex. New York in those days was a heaven of cultural contest. Writers even ran for Mayor!
https://youtu.be/BLFQ5wQOY-g?si=Q5Gc8UXL_w0UR9TV
I’ve never read Ozick but this was a fantastic essay and stands on its own very well.
Good essay. Ozick is a writer I've been interested in for a while off the strength of her Anne Frank essay and her introduction to Seize the Day. By coincidence I bought this a few days ago having not read much else and was kind of let down by the first few stories -- so it was fortuitous timing to be assured that there are better things ahead.
I've always felt that I should read something by Ozick that wasn't published in The New Yorker. Any suggestions for where to start?
The author knows his subject, but didn't write clearly enough for me to grasp the depth of what he was trying to say. In my opinion, the essay should have started with, "Cynthia Ozick, who has just published In a Yellow Wood: Selected Stories and Essays, is ninety-seven years old." I bet most readers gave up before Kosan got there. And why include perplexing sentences like: "Wondering anxiously about the latter is unavoidable for any writer who isn’t completely delusional, especially when gathering their work against that work’s imminent forced conclusion." I doubt many readers are willing to wrestle with what Kosan means by that. Was psyched to read his piece, but I finished frustrated. Maybe it was just me.
Regarding poets' second thoughts about their work, there's also Wallace Stevens's "As You Leave the Room":
"That poem about the pineapple, the one / About the mind as never satisfied, / The one about the credible hero, the one / About summer, are not what skeletons think about. / I wonder, have I lived a skeleton's life / As a disbeliever in reality / A countryman of all the bones in the world?"
Also: Ozick's "Alfred Chester's Wig" was very controversial when it was first published and left many people who knew Alfred Chester quite perplexed, since most of them knew him as a completely out gay male. Ben Shields has a good account at "Grand Journal", along with this warning:
"Gore Vidal wrote: '[Chester’s] life comprises one of those Cautionary Tales that tends to overexcite journalists and school-teachers.' Those who want to promote Chester’s work—and Vidal was one of them—face the task of resisting the impulse to sensationalize and turn Chester’s wigs, illnesses, and life itself into metaphor, which seems to be a disease plaguing artist types when they speak of others."
https://grandjournal.net/do-you-believe-in-alfred-chester/