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Tag Archives: Ron Chernow
Recommended: Biographies
For starters: My recommended Fiction books My recommended Non-Fiction books BIOGRAPHIES: American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson, by Joseph Ellis I’ve written a lot about Joseph Ellis’ work here. While I love David McCullough’s work so much, Ellis is … Continue reading
Posted in Actors, Books, Directors, Founding Fathers, James Joyce, Theatre, writers
Tagged A. Scott Berg, Abigail Adams, Alexander Hamilton, American Sphinx, Benjamin Franklin, Biography, Bruce Springsteen, Charles Lindbergh, Charlotte Bronte, David McCullough, Dean Martin, Edie Sedgwick, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Ellen Terry, Elvis Presley, Emily Bronte, George Washington, Henry Irving, His Excellency, Howard Hawks, Howard Hughes, James Dean, Jerry Lee Lewis, John Adams, John Wayne, Joseph Cornell, Joseph Ellis, Marlon Brando, Mitford sisters, Montgomery Clift, Nick Tosches, Nureyev, Orson Welles, Oscar Wilde, Patricia Bosworth, Patricia Highsmith, Richard Ellmann, Ron Chernow, Sam Cooke, Simon Callow, Tennessee Williams, Thomas Jefferson, Truman Capote, W.B. Yeats, Zelda Fitzgerald
9 Comments
2018 Books Read
2018 Books Read 1. Tamburlaine, Part 1, by Christopher Marlowe I finished 2017 with Paradise Lost, in the mood to continue with rigorous challenging poetry. I decided to read the complete plays of Christopher Marlowe (re-read in most cases). The … Continue reading
Posted in Books, James Joyce
Tagged Animal Farm, Annie Proulx, books read, Christopher Hitchens, Christopher Marlowe, Clifford Odets, Edgar Allan Poe, England, Evelyn Waugh, fiction, Finnegans Wake, friends, George Orwell, H.L. Mencken, Hunter S. Thompson, Ian McEwan, Ireland, Italy, Jack Kerouac, Joan Didion, nonfiction, Olivia Laing, Pauline Kael, poetry, Poland, politics, Robert Kaplan, Romania, Ron Chernow, Russia, Ryszard Kapuściński, Sergei Kirov, Stalin, The Soccer War, Tom Wolfe, true crime, Truman Capote, Victor Serge, Waiting for Lefty
7 Comments
Stuff I’ve Been Reading
— Grant, by Ron Chernow. He’s such an elegant writer, such a good storyteller. His interests as a writer have always been clear. I’ve read them all – except for this one, and his Washington biography which came out recently … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged Evelyn Waugh, Ron Chernow, Shirley Jackson, stuff I've been reading
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Bookshelf Tour #7
Moving on to biographies. Please ignore my wretched ceiling. I had nothing to do with it. I also lost the top shelf of my bookshelves when I moved here in February. Still room for a row of books though. I … Continue reading
2015 Books Read
Even I am impressed with how much I read this year. Along the course of the year, occasionally I’d think to myself, “Good job, Sheila, with your Self-Imposed Reading Plan!” I’ve read a lot of new novels (not really my … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged A.S. Byatt, Alexander Hamilton, Baseball A Literary Anthology, books read, Christopher Hitchens, Christopher Marlowe, Edvard Radzinsky, Elvis Presley, Fyodor Dostoevsky, George Eliot, Hannah Arendt, Hunter S. Thompson, Ireland, J.D. Salinger, Jeanette Winterson, Jincy Willett, Joan Didion, John Banville, John Wayne, Joshua Ferris, Lorrie Moore, Machiavelli, Margaret Atwood, Norman Rush, Patricia Highsmith, Paul Zindel, Rasputin, Rebecca West, Ron Chernow, Russia, science, Seamus Heaney, Vietnam, W.H. Auden, William Shakespeare, William Styron
22 Comments
The Books: Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, by Ron Chernow
Daily Book Excerpt: Biography Next biography on the biography shelf is Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr., by Ron Chernow When history passes its final verdict on John D. Rockefeller, it may well be that his endowment of … Continue reading
2010 Books Read
Round-up of the books I read this year, in the order in which I read them. I am nearly finished with one last book (a collection of stories by Miranda July, given to me by my sister Siobhan for my … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged A.S. Byatt, Andrei Tarkovsky, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Annie Proulx, books read, Dava Sobel, David O. Selznick, David Thomson, E.M. Forster, Elia Kazan, Ellen Terry, Emily Dickinson, Ernest Hemingway, Evelyn Waugh, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Fred Astaire, Fyodor Dostoevsky, George Bernard Shaw, George Orwell, George Washington, Gouverneur Morris, Ireland, Jane Langton, Jaws, Joan Blondell, John Banville, John McGahern, Mark Helprin, Orson Welles, Oscar Wilde, Peter Bogdanovich, Rebecca West, Roman Polanski, Ron Chernow, Russia, Serbia, Shirley Jackson, Stefan Zweig, Sylvia Beach, Tana French, Tennessee Williams, Warren Beatty, William Shakespeare
37 Comments
Snapshots
— Sometimes I look up from what I am doing and I see Hope across the room staring at me, and there is a look of such coiled contempt in her eyes that I want to run fleeing into the … Continue reading
Posted in Personal
Tagged family, Hope, Iran, Iranian film, Jafar Panahi, Jeremy Renner, Mulholland Drive, Offside, Rebecca West, Ron Chernow, snapshots
11 Comments
Snapshots with Wilde bookends
— “Actors are so fortunate. They can choose whether they will appear in tragedy or comedy … But in real life it is different. Most men and women are forced to perform parts for which they have no qualifications.” — … Continue reading
On the island
— There is only one four-way intersection on the island. No stoplights. The intersection is referred to one and all as “The Four Corners.” “Excuse me, can you tell me where the bank is?” “The Four Corners.” “Got it.” — … Continue reading
Posted in Personal
Tagged Loretta Young, Maud Gonne, Rhode Island, Ron Chernow, snapshots, W.B. Yeats
9 Comments

