Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Written Lives by Javier Marias

Javier Marias is perhaps best known to English-speaking audiences as the author of the novels All Souls and A Heart So White, winner of the 1997 IMPAC Dublin International Literary Award.

Yet, in his native Spain, his weekly articles in El Pais are hugely popular and he is equally well known for his essays and translations. It is in this latter guise that we see him now in Written Lives.

Written Lives is an exquisite collection of miniatures, ironic and idiosyncratic portraits of 25 of the most famous (and infamous) writers of the past two centuries. Here Marias turns his affectionate (in most cases) and humorous gaze onto, among others, William Faulkner, Joseph Conrad, Isak Dinesen, James Joyce, Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, Oscar Wilde and Emily Bronte.


You can find the review here

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