The Prince of Minor Writers: The Selected Essays of Max Beerbohm

by Max Beerbohm, Phillip Lopate (Introduction), Phillip Lopate (Editor)

Overview

AN NYRB CLASSICS ORIGINAL
 
Virginia Woolf called Max Beerbohm “the prince” of essayists, F. W. Dupee praised his “whim of iron” and “cleverness amounting to genius,” while Beerbohm himself noted that “only the insane take themselves quite seriously.” From his precocious debut as a dandy in 1890s Oxford until he put his pen aside in the aftermath of World War II, Beerbohm was recognized as an incomparable observer of modern life and an essayist whose voice was always and only his own. Here Phillip Lopate, one of the finest essayists of our day, has selected the finest of Beerbohm’s essays. Whether writing about the vogue for Russian writers, laughter and philosophy, dandies, or George Bernard Shaw, Beerbohm is as unpredictable as he is unfailingly witty and wise. As Lopate writes, “Today . . . it becomes all the more necessary to ponder how Beerbohm performed the delicate operation of displaying so much personality without lapsing into sticky confession.”

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781590178294
Publisher:	New York Review Books
Publication date:	06/02/2015
Series:	NYRB Classics Series
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	432
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Max Beerbohm (1872–1956) was born in London and studied at Oxford. He published his first collection of essays, The Works of Max Beerbohm, in 1896 and soon developed a reputation as a brilliant caricaturist and critic. He was married to the American actress Florence Kahn and lived in Rapallo, Italy, for most of his later life. In addition to The Prince of Minor Writers, NYRB Classics publishes Beerbohm’s Seven Men, a short-story collection.


Phillip Lopate is the author of the essay collections Against Joie de Vivre, Bachelorhood, Being with Children, Portrait of My Body, and Totally, Tenderly, Tragically; and of the novels The Rug Merchant and Confessions of a Summer. His most recent books are Portrait Inside My Head and To Show and to Tell.

Editorial Reviews

…deliver[s] deep pleasures. As curmudgeons go, Beerbohm was a gentle and self-effacing one. There are very funny broadsides here against walking, against the cult of children, against writing boring letters and against literary toadyism…He disliked overexposing himself…But an intimate kind of warmth does blossom beneath the surface of many of these pieces; he is a man with a full and rippling heart.

The New York Times - Dwight Garner

04/13/2015
Compiling 50 pieces by noted English essayist and caricaturist Beerbohm, editor Lopate (To Show and to Tell) invites modern readers to appreciate the scope of Beerbohm’s writing. Virginia Woolf called Beerbohm “the prince of his profession” and his “minor” works provide a glimpse of daily life in the 19th and early 20th centuries, revealing that while manners and dress have evolved, human nature certainly has not. For this alone, Beerbohm’s essays deserve to be revisited today. At its best, his writing is humorous and self-deprecating. His stories of observing a nine-year-old build a sandcastle (“Something Defeasible”) or discovering his favorite hat box stripped of its railway labels (“Ichabod”) may prove more gratifying and relatable to modern readers than his satirical discussions of Goethe (“Quia Imperfectum”) or the behavior of servants (“Servants”). Beerbohm’s longer essays, apart from his touching portrait of his elder brother, “From a Brother’s Standpoint,” can be summed up by his own quote about James McNeill Whistler in “Whistler’s Writing”: “An exquisite talent... is always at its best on a small scale. On a large scale it strays and is distressed.” In this substantial collection, however, the gems certainly outweigh the duds. (June)

Publishers Weekly

"As curmudgeons go, Beerbohm was a gentle and self-effacing one. There are very funny broadsides here against walking, against the cult of children, against writing boring letters and against literary toadyism...an intimate kind of warmth does blossom beneath the surface of many of these pieces; he is a man with a full and rippling heart." —Dwight Garner, The New York Times

“The great Max Beerbohm may be the paradigm of the minor writer and the happy man. In other words: Max Beerbohm was a good and gracious soul.” —Roberto Bolaño, Between Parentheses

"The essayist and caricaturist Max Beerbohm was one of the great figures of the late Victorian and Edwardian era in London...People who love reading will always love reading Max, because he mocked so wisely, and read so well." —Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker

“Beerbohm’s prose style—clever, fast-paced, and sometimes on the verge of anarchy—balances humor with style, and provides a master class in using irony—the greatest weapon in Beerbohm’s arsenal—to look at high culture.” —Jason Diamond, Flavorwire

“[Beerbohm’s] works provide a glimpse of daily life in the 19th and early 20th centuries, revealing that while manners and dress have evolved, human nature certainly has not...Beerbohm’s essays deserve to be revisited today...his writing is humorous and self-deprecating.” —Publishers Weekly

“Beerbohm never ceases to entertain with the eloquence of his prose and his dry humor. In a trite, yet appropriate, phrase, he is a master of his craft. His words are beautiful and his thoughts are oftentimes quite profound and universal, relevant not just to late nineteenth/early twentieth century Britain, but to all times…His writing always feels fresh and its essence true…Beerbohm holds an insatiable imagination… Rescue it, read it, and treasure it.” —Kenyon Ellefson, Portland Book Review 

From the Publisher

2015-03-01
Elegant essays by a self-described dilettante.Known for "his light ironic touch," deft parodies and caricatures, and sly observations about literature, art, and, simply, taste, Max Beerbohm (1872-1956) was among the most prominent English essayists. Though praised as a gifted stylist, he considered himself a minor figure, "what obituary notices call ‘an interesting link with the past.' " Editor Lopate (Director, Nonfiction Writing/Columbia Univ.; Portrait Inside My Head, 2013, etc.), however, sees in the precision and cadence of Beerbohm's prose much to be admired, amply exemplified by the pieces he gathers, representing Beerbohm's observations of British character and culture from 1896 to 1946. In an essay on the disappointing quality of oratory at the House of Commons, for example, Beerbohm remarks laconically that among 670 men elected by the British public, no one should expect "a very high average of mental capacity." He recalls his contemporaries: Aubrey Beardsley; the "legendary" Swinburne, "sole kin to the phoenix"; and his older half brother, Herbert, a flamboyant actor. Accompanying him on an American tour, he noted that Herbert loved traveling, "instantly responsive" to "the magic of New York….He was not the kind of tourist who takes a homemade tuning-fork about with him and condemns the discords." Beerbohm was not as social, never a perfect guest, but "slightly to the churlish side….And, though I always liked to be invited anywhere, I very often preferred to stay at home." Overcome with envy of another writer, he threw her novel into "the yawning crimson jaws" of a fireplace, frustrated by how slowly it burned. He also comments dryly on hero worship: "It is a wholesome exercise which we ought to all take, now and again. Only, let us not strain ourselves by overdoing it." Urbane, witty pieces by a writer worth reviving.

Kirkus Reviews