Paul Gallico’s slim, sentimental novel Mrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris will warm you as comfortably as a nice, hot cuppa.
Archive for February, 2009
As Warming as a Nice, Hot Cuppa
Posted in 1959 Bestselling Novels, Humor, tagged Dior, Gioia Fiammenghi, London, Paris, Paul Gallico on February 25, 2009 | 1 Comment »
Lolita a bestseller in ‘59 as well as ‘58
Posted in Asides, tagged Lolita, Nabokov on February 18, 2009 | Comments Off
Lolita by Vladmir Nabokov was number 8 on the 1959 bestseller list. It had been number 3 for the previous year. My review of the novel is listed under the 1958 bestseller category.
If you look at the bestseller lists of the first half of the twentieth century, you’ll find many instances when a book stayed [...]
The Dear and Glorious Physician is Luke Warm
Posted in 1959 Bestselling Novels, Fictional biography, Historical, Religious on February 11, 2009 | 3 Comments »
Dear and Glorious Physician is worth reading for the setting and scenery. Look elsewhere for entertainment or better understanding of people.
Ugly American Is Alive and Well
Posted in 1959 Bestselling Novels, Historical, Propaganda, tagged Asia, Eugene Burdick, foreign service, US foreign policy, William J. Lederer on February 4, 2009 | Comments Off
The great—and horrific—thing about The Ugly American is that it still feels real today. You have only to see newscasts of President George W. Bush shrugging off the Iraqi shoe-thrower to see that Americans still have no appreciation of the cultures in which they have troops stationed. And post 9/11,we’ve seen how effective Mao’s embedded insurgents can be.
