Review
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“A landmark biography, the first major
reintroduction of an incomparable literary heavyweight to the
public since her death.” (The New York Times)
“Utterly riveting and consistently inful . . . The book
takes this larger-than-life intellectual powerhouse—formidable,
intimidating, often stubbornly impersonal in her work—and makes
her life-size again . . . fascinating.” (Leslie Jamison, The New
Republic)
“Fascinating . . . Moser’s biography of Sontag is an education
in Sontag, but also in what Sontag wanted and why, as well as an
education in the worlds that inspired her and fought her.” (Los
Angeles Times)
“A skilled, lively, prodigiously researched book that, in the
main, neither whitewashes nor rebukes its subject: It works hard
to make the reader see Sontag as the severely complex person she
was. [Moser] writes vividly of a woman of parts determined to
leave a mark on her time; and makes us feel viscerally how large
those parts were ― the arrogance, the anxiety, the reach! No mean
achievement.”
(Vivian Gornick, The New York Times Book Review)
“Moser’s epic portrait of the iconic writer and critic winds
through American history, entwining its subject to pivotal points
in our culture and reshaping her legacy in the process.”
(Entertainment Weekly, “20 New Books to Read in September”)
“There can be no doubting the brilliance – the sheer explanatory
vigour – of Moser’s biography . . . a triumph of the virtues of
seriousness and truth-telling that Susan Sontag espoused again
and again but was conspicuously and often quite consciously
unable to force herself to live by.” (The New Statesman)
“Persuasive and illuminating . . . does what a biography ought to
do: it enriches our understanding of its subject.” (Los Angeles
Review of Books)
“Enlightening and finely tuned . . . because his tone is so
reserved, so disinterested in passing judgement, none of what he
writes about comes off as dishy or inappropriate. More to the
point, his critical distance from his subject makes him an echo
of Sontag herself.” (Mark Athitakis, On the Seawall)
“A towering figure like Susan Sontag deserves a towering tome,
and Moser’s 700-plus-page biography of the iconic cultural critic
delivers . . . this blockbuster à la Stacy Schiff’s Cleopatra is
both granular and grand—an opus fit for the writer-philosopher
who ‘created the mold, and then she broke it.’” (O Magazine, “18
Must-Read Books of Fall 2019”)
“Moser is a tenacious biographer, keeping a tight hold on his
narrative and reaching firm conclusions. He is very tough-minded,
as Sontag herself was at her best, and his mind is like Sontag’s
in that he can make very sharp turns and land decisive blows.”
(Nylon Magazine)
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About the Author
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Benjamin Moser was born in Houston. He is the author of Why This
World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector, a finalist for the
National Book Critics' Circle Award and a New York Times Notable
Book. For his work bringing Clarice Lispector to international
prominence, he received Brazil’s first State Prize for Cultural
Diplomacy. He has published translations from French, Spanish,
Portuguese, and Dutch. A former books columnist for Harper's
Magazine and The New York Times Book Review, he has also written
for The New Yorker, Conde Nast Traveler, and The New York Review
of Books.
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