Arguably Essays

by Hitchens, Christopher

• ISBN13: 9781455502783
• ISBN10: 1455502782
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-09-04
• Publisher: Twelve

Summary

"All first-rate criticism first defines what we are confronting," the late, great jazz critic Whitney Balliett once wrote. By that measure, the essays of Christopher Hitchens are in the first tier. For nearly four decades, Hitchens has been telling us, in pitch-perfect prose, what we confront when we grapple with first principles-the principles of reason and tolerance and skepticism that define and inform the foundations of our civilization-principles that, to endure, must be defended anew by every generation. "A short list of the greatest living conversationalists in English," said The Economist, "would probably have to include Christopher Hitchens, Sir Patrick Leigh-Fermor, and Sir Tom Stoppard. Great brilliance, fantastic powers of recall, and quick wit are clearly valuable in sustaining conversation at these cosmic levels. Charm may be helpful, too." Hitchens-who staunchly declines all offers of knighthood-hereby invites you to take a seat at a democratic conversation, to be engaged, and to be reasoned with. His knowledge is formidable, an encyclopedic treasure, and yet one has the feeling, reading him, of hearing a person thinking out loud, following the inexorable logic of his thought, wherever it might lead, unafraid to expose fraudulence, denounce injustice, and excoriate hypocrisy. Legions of readers, admirers and detractors alike, have learned to read Hitchens with something approaching awe at his felicity of language, the oxygen in every sentence, the enviable wit and his readiness, even eagerness, to fight a foe or mount the ramparts. Here, he supplies fresh perceptions of such figures as varied as Charles Dickens, Karl Marx, Rebecca West, George Orwell, J.G. Ballard, and Philip Larkin are matched in brilliance by his pungent discussions and intrepid observations, gathered from a lifetime of traveling and reporting from such destinations as Iran, China, and Pakistan. Hitchens's directness, elegance, lightly carried erudition, critical and psychological insight, humor, and sympathy-applied as they are here to a dazzling variety of subjects-all set a standard for the essayist that has rarely been matched in our time. What emerges from this indispensable volume is an intellectual self-portrait of a writer with an exemplary steadiness of purpose and a love affair with the delights and seductions of the English language, a man anchored in a profound and humane vision of the human longing for reason and justice.

Author Biography

Christopher Hitchens was a contributing editor to Vanity Fair, Slate, and The Atlantic, and the author of numerous books, including works on Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and George Orwell. He wrote the international bestsellers god Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything and Hitch-22: A Memoir. He died in December 2011.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. xv
All American
Gods of Our Fathers: The United States of Enlightenment	p. 3
The Private Jefferson	p. 8
Jefferson Versus the Muslim Pirates	p. 12
Benjamin Franklin: Free and Easy	p. 21
John Brown: The Man Who Ended Slavery	p. 28
Abraham Lincoln: Misery's Child	p. 34
Mark Twain: American Radical	p. 40
Upton Sinclair: A Capitalist Primer	p. 47
JFK: In Sickness and by Stealth	p. 54
Saul Bellow: The Great Assimilator	p. 62
Vladimir Nabokov: Hurricane Lolita	p. 70
John Updike, Part One: No Way	p. 78
John Updike, Part Two: Mr. Geniality	p. 85
Vidal Loco	p. 89
America the Banana Republic	p. 94
An Anglosphere Future	p. 99
Political Animals	p. 108
Old Enough to Die	p. 117
In Defense of Foxhole Atheists	p. 124
In Search of the Washington Novel	p. 131
Eclectic Affinities
Isaac Newton: Flaws of Gravity	p. 139
The Men Who Made England: Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall	p. 146
Edmund Burke: Reactionary Prophet	p. 152
Samuel Johnson: Demons and Dictionaries	p. 165
Gustave Flaubert: I'm with Stupide	p. 171
The Dark Side of Dickens	p. 175
Marx's Journalism: The Grub Street Years	p. 180
Rebecca West: Things Worth Fighting For	p. 191
Ezra Pound: A Revolutionary Simpleton	p. 222
On Animal Farm	p. 228
Jessica Mitford's Poison Pen	p. 237
W. Somerset Maugham: Poor Old Willie	p. 242
Evelyn Waugh: The Permanent Adolescent	p. 250
P. G. Wodehouse: The Honorable Schoolboy	p. 265
Anthony Powell: An Omnivorous Curiosity	p. 276
John Buchan: Spy Thrillers Father	p. 290
Graham Greene: I'll Be Damned	p. 297
Death from a Salesman: Graham Greene's Bottled Ontology	p. 308
Loving Philip Larkin	p. 323
Stephen Spender: A Nice Bloody Fool	p. 332
Edward Upward: The Captive Mind	p. 340
C. L. R. James: Mid Off Not Right On	p. 347
J. G. Ballard: The Catastrophist	p. 353
Fraser's Flashman: Scoundrel Time	p. 358
Fleet Street's Finest: From Waugh to Frayn	p. 365
Saki: Where the Wild Things Are	p. 375
Harry Potter: The Boy Who Lived	p. 380
Amusements, Annoyances, and Disappointments
Why Women Aren't Funny	p. 389
Stieg Larsson: The Author Who Played with Fire	p. 397
As American as Apple Pie	p. 403
So Many Men's Rooms, So Little Time	p. 411
The New Commandments	p. 414
In Your Face	p. 423
Wine Drinkers of the World, Unite	p. 426
Charles, Prince of Piffle	p. 429
Offshore Accounts
Afghanistan's Dangerous Bet	p. 435
First, Silence the Whistle-Blower	p. 445
Believe Me, It's Torture	p. 448
Iran's Waiting Game	p. 455
Long Live Democratic Seismology	p. 467
Benazir Bhutto: Daughter of Destiny	p. 471
From Abbottabad to Worse	p. 474
The Perils of Partition	p. 480
Algeria: A French Quarrel	p. 493
The Case of Orientalism	p. 498
Edward Said: Where the Twain Should Have Met	p. 504
The Swastika and the Cedar	p. 513
Holiday in Iraq	p. 519
Tunisia: At the Desert's Edge	p. 526
What Happened to the Suicide Bombers or Jerusalem?	p. 532
Childhood's End: An African Nightmare	p. 535
The Vietnam Syndrome	p. 541
Once Upon a Time in Germany	p. 548
Worse Than Nineteen Eighty-four	p. 553
North Korea: A Nation of Racist Dwarves	p. 556
The Eighteenth Brumaire of the Castro Dynasty	p. 559
Hugo Boss	p. 563
Is the Euro Doomed?	p. 566
Overstating Jewish Power	p. 569
The Case for Humanitarian Intervention	p. 573
Legacies of Totalitarianism
Victor Serge: Pictures from an Inquisition	p. 585
Andre Malraux: One Man's Fate	p. 595
Arthur Koestler: The Zealot	p. 602
Isabel Allende: Chile Redux	p. 607
The Persian Version	p. 617
Martin Amis: Lightness at Midnight	p. 625
Imagining Hitler	p. 640
Victor Klemperer: Survivor	p. 652
A War Worth Fighting	p. 661
Just Give Peace a Chance?	p. 669
W G. Sebald: Requiem for Germany	p. 673
Words' Worth
When the King Saved God	p. 687
Let Them Eat Pork Rinds	p. 697
Stand Up for Denmark!	p. 704
Eschew the Taboo	p. 709
She's No Fundamentalist	p. 712
Burned Out	p. 716
Easter Charade	p. 719
Don't Mince Words	p. 722
History and Mystery	p. 726
Words Matter	p. 730
This Was Not Looting	p. 733
This Other L-Word	p. 736
The You Decade	p. 739
Suck It Up	p. 742
A Very, Very Dirty Word	p. 745
Prisoner of Shelves	p. 748
Acknowledgments	p. 751
Index	p. 753
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