Mr. Apology and other essays / Alec Wilkinson.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Wilkinson, Alec, 1952-

Contributor:

Gotham Book Mart Collection (University of Pennsylvania)

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Essays.

Essays--20th century.

Penn Provenance:

Gotham Book Mart (former owner) (Gotham Book Mart Collection copy)

Physical Description:

329 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Boston : Houghton Mifflin, 2003.

Summary:

Mr Apology and Other Essays is a miscellany of misfits, cranks, daredevils, nuts, eccentrics, and lone wolves. From a piece on a Romanian cab driver who intends to cross the Bering Strait in his taxi to a celebration of two renowned hockey fighters, from Ry Cooder's collaboration with Cuban musicians in 1996 (which resulted in the acclaimed Buena Vista Social Club) to a behind-the-scenes look at a Rolling Stones dinner party in 1983, Wilkinson brings to these pieces an intelligence and a compassion that tap our deepest sense of humanity. The breadth of these essays is rare; with the same sensitivity and insight, Wilkinson explores Paul Simon's writer's block as well as the puzzling epidemic of blindness that afflicted 150 Cambodian women, refugees from the Khmer Rouge. In the title piece, Wilkinson describes the experience of a New York City artist who invites people to call and leave an apology -- any kind of apology, for anything -- on his answering machine. When one caller seems to divulge a deadly secret, the line becomes a complicated vehicle for both confession and delusion. Alec Wilkinson's place in American writing, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer, is among "the first rank of literary journalists ... One is reminded of Naipaul, Mailer, and Agee." Entertaining, revelatory, and exemplary in their craftsmanship, these are essays to ponder, to learn from, to be appalled and inspired by. Wilkinson displays the art of the essay at its finest.

Contents:

Cameos

Dependents

Elmore's legs

Perfect

Spy

One green dog

Bruisers

Another green dog

Ms. Ramos

Sophie's Guernica

The gift

Facing the shooter

An American original

Fatherhood

At home outside the world

My mentor

Mr. Apology

Conversations with a killer

The archive of stopped time

A changed version of God

The enormous monitor.

Local Notes:

Gotham Book Mart Collection copy has dustjacket retained.

ISBN:

0618123113

9780618123117

OCLC:

51983501

Online:

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Contributor biographical information

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