Joseph Epstein - Gallimaufry: A Collection of Essays, Reviews, Bits

Praise for

The Ideal of Culture: Essays

Gone are the days,... [Epstein] writes, when stability, solidity, gravity, a certain weight and aura of seriousness suffused public life. Although in our egalitarian age, cultural elitism is damned, Epstein happily champions the best that has been thought and said.

Kirkus Reviews

Epsteins work is... thoughtful and playful... a rarely found combination of... light, energy, and grace.... He parses... the delights, the irritations, and the many mysteries of life.... Hes neither right-wing nor left-wing, but the entire bird... (one of the requirements of wisdom being the ability to distinguish a moral crusade from a racket.)

Larry Thornberry, American Spectator

The Ideal of Culture ... seems, in its insistence on essential verities in an age of great flux, just the right book for our historical moment.... As more than one Epstein fan has noted, he seems to have read everything... [with] effortless intelligence.

Danny Heitman, Christian Science Monitor

The release of a major collection of Joseph Epsteins essays stands as something of an event in the world of belles-lettres.... Epstein... is not merely someone with a feeling for words. He has the breadth of knowledge, wide perspective, and the mix of shrewdness and prudence that a great commentator must.

Jonathan Leaf, Modern Age

Masterful writing from Joseph Epstein....

Julia McMichael, Seattle Book Review

Praise for

Wind Sprints: Shorter Essays

I am purring, chortling and cursing my way through [Wind Sprints]. Cursing, because [the] wit,... erudition,... elan, panache, and... je ne sais quoi is just too depressing. Theres treasure in every sentence. Its like spoon-eating caviar. I may have a stroke, but what a way to go.

Christopher Buckley, author of Thank You for Smoking

A master of the essay form returns with a collection of brief pieces spanning nearly 20 years.... Another subtitle might have been Healthful Snacks , for these bite-size pieces are both enjoyable to ingest and good for you.

Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review)

Witty, common-sensical, civilized, reliably pleasure-giving, Epstein is solace.

Patrick Kurp , Anecdotal Evidence

In Wind Sprints , his latest collection of essays, Joseph Epstein confesses to literary tipplingsampling bits of prose while in the supermarket line, during television commercials, or even in traffic.... He excels at lively, instructive, and often funny essays that sometimes run to 10,000 words. The only complication in starting them is that theyre so charming and chatty that one cannot easily put them down. A reader who begins an Epstein piece behind the wheel is likely to be stalled on the freeway for a very long time.

Danny Heitman, the Christian Science Monitor

It has long been implausible to argue that theres a more engaging essayist on the planet than Epstein.... There are 143 pieces in Sprints , with almost no repetition of subject. Perhaps because of the length of these pieces, Epstein takes on fewer literary questions and deals with more small, quotidian matters, though in ways to demonstrate that almost anything can be dealt with intelligently, and in an entertaining way.

Larry Thornberry, the American Spectator

This collection is the perfect introduction to the erudite and entertaining work of a prolific essayist.... Noted writer Joseph Epstein offers a smorgasbord of wit in the collection Wind Sprints: Shorter Essays .

Peter Dabbene, ForeWord Reviews

Epstein (emeritus lecturer of English, Northwestern University), a frequent contributor to the Wall Street Journal , Commentary , and the Weekly Standard , is acclaimed for his witty, perceptive, and occasionally contentious essays, which he began during his editorship (197497) of American Scholar .

Lonnie Weatherby, Library Journal

The 143 essays in Epsteins entertaining new collection... are compulsively readable.... Epstein shows himself capable of writing engagingly at that brief length on just about any topic that strikes his fancy.... The essays are peppered with personal memories and quotes from literature and punctuated with bursts of humorEpstein likens a bandleaders bellow to that of a man who has just been pushed off a cliffand they abound with pleasures that belie their brevity.

Publishers Weekly

In the 143 short essays, Epstein discusses his reading habits, language snobbery, his love of khakis and good ol fashioned shoe shines, the need for a word to describe someone who is more than an acquaintance but less than a friend, the rise of hot dog prices, and the demise of the high five.... Generally acknowledged as one of Americas foremost essayists, Epsteins short pieces are delightful and infuriating, endearing, and aggravating.

Sean West, San Francisco Book Review

Praise for

A Literary Education and Other Essays

Epstein follows up Essays in Biography (2012) with another collection of provocative and beguiling thought pieces. The range of his curiosity is exhilarating.

Publishers Weekly

[In A Literary Education ] prolific essayist, biographer, and novelist Epstein... delivers... lots of erudition... and... fun.

Kirkus Reviews

Erudite, penetrating, and decisive... Epsteins delivery is filled with thorough analysis, delightful allusions, and outright laughs....

Peter Dabbene , ForeWord Reviews

Maybe its time for a Joseph Epstein Reader that would assemble the best work from his previous books for old and new fans alike. In the meantime, A Literary Education inspires hope that Mr. Epsteins good run [referring to the authors 24 books] isnt over just yet.

Danny Heitman , Wall Street Journal

[This is a] wonderful book of summer reading thats [also]... good for the cold, gray days ahead.... [Epstein is] a man of his time and above his time....

Suzanne Fields , Washington Times

Joseph Epstein turns out the best essaysof the literary or familiar kindof any writer on active duty today.... Those whove reviewed Epsteins work over the years... praise his humor, his erudition, his vast learning, and his elegance.... Epsteins writing, like most French desserts, is very rich stuff.

Larry Thornberry , American Spectator

Epsteins... A Literary Education and Other Essays ... is his 24th book. This volume confirms that Epstein is not only the greatest living American literary critic, but also the countrys foremost general essayist. He is, almost singlehandedly, holding aloft the flame for what used to be the honorable calling of the man of letters.

John Podhoretz , Commentary

[Epstein] writes sentences you want to remember.... His essays are troves of literary reference and allusion, maps between centuries, countries, genres.... [They] have personality and style, yes, but they also have something to say, and thats the pivotal distinction between Epstein and his bevy of imitators.... Whats more, his wit is unkillable....

William Giraldi , New Criterion

Epstein is an essayist of the old schoollearned, productive, and available to many occasions. A man gifted with a wit both cutting and self-deprecating, and an easy command of the many syntactic variations of the periodic sentence, he also has a fearless willingness to assert a viewand this, as any reader of the essay knows, is the drive wheel of the whole business, never mind if that view is widely shared or unpopular.

Sven Birkerts , Los Angeles Review of Books

Gallimaufry: A confused jumble or medley of things