Literary Adviser Research Articles

L’écriture comme métaphore de la traduction dans le champ littéraire algérien

Writing as a Metaphor for Translation in the Algerian Literary Field
 This article seeks to explore the translation paradigm in the production of Algerian novels. It is not about considering translation from the usual and traditional categories that tend to approach it from the perspective of a dichotomous relationship between " source language" and "target language". In the context of Maghrebian and, in particular, Algerian literary creation, the act of translation does not relate to issues of comparison between the original and its translation(s). Instead, this paper will attempt to account for “writing” as a translation that does not have an original work as a reference. We, therefore, intend to present some of Mohammed Dib's most interesting texts in the contemporary Algerian literary field to better understand this phenomenon. We will particularly insist on ‘Neiges de Marbre’ and ‘L'Arbres à Dires’. Based on the premise that the theories of reception mainly focus on the modalities of reading, setting aside the implication of a translation process, and that, on the other hand, the theories of translation give very little interest to the creative aspect of translation, it seems important to us to dig into / go through / contrast and correlate/ throw light on the different approaches and perspectives, to reach a better understanding of the specific role of translation in the creation and reading of the Maghrebian text and, above all, of its importance in the redefinition of the poetics, symbolic and ideological aspects of the text. This being so, one cannot forget - let alone minimize - the anthropo-historical and poetic depth of the Algerian (and more generally Maghrebian) literary adventure. In fact, as previously mentioned, the crossbreeding of languages and imaginaries is a process that goes back very deep into the collective history of North African communities. Given this essential dimension, it can be said that Algerian literatures illustrate, in a particularly original way, a set of phenomena common to all artistic creation, whatever the cultural area or epoch. In a way or another, for the writer, it has always been about creating a new language (one’s “own language”) from and within the one(s) in which he/she has been shaped since childhood.

Un début dans la vie par Mathieu Bermann

Reviewed by: Un début dans la vie par Mathieu Bermann Ann Williams Bermann, Mathieu. Un début dans la vie. P.O.L, 2022. ISBN 978-2-8180-5521-2. Pp. 176. Questioning one's own perspectives is never easy but is necessary, as human interactions show time and time again. Un début dans la vie reminds readers of this from the outset and quickly pulls us out of complacency and into self-reflection. Readers soon discover that the narrator is a writer himself and quite introspective, and they realize that this novel will not simply guide them through a Balzacian plot or character development (despite the hommage in the title). There will be much more. The intertwined stories of all the characters focus on a provincial French family drama, with at its heart, Malo, a horrid child. At four and a half years old he already has a vile reputation that has reached even the narrator, a close friend of Valentin, the creature's uncle. In the hands of a less-gifted writer the rather banal plot twists would not excite. The real richness of the book, however, resides in the questioning of perspectives that Bermann proposes throughout. At first glance, it seems he is giving us permission to judge his characters quite harshly. In the first chapter, "La barbarie," he sets up Valentin as the gossiping and somewhat unkind uncle responsible for the narrator's negative preconceptions of the little boy (whose actions, nonetheless, deserve the criticism they receive). He gives little quarter to Marie, Malo's mother, narcissistic and inattentive to her two children, and in the second chapter, aptly entitled "Disparaître," she does just that; she runs away, leaving her parents to watch over her children. But here's the rub: the author-Bermann does not let the narrator-author-maybe-Bermann get off scot-free. Malo, Marie, and all the characters have redeeming qualities, reasons for being who they are. And the narrator sees that he can't just go with what he's been told. And so, neither can we. By the time we get to chapter four, "Le roman de Malo," we know that there is a self-reflexive writer in charge of this book, and we see that he's taken over the literary encounter we're having. The somewhat disconcerting switch from the first-person narrator to an omniscient one was heralded by the chapter title, but we do have to pause to adjust as we read Malo's story and follow him through episodes in his life unknown to our initial narrator. In chapter five (and at this point, readers are sincerely grateful for the chapter divisions), our first narrator returns, and we relive moments, even with similar wording, from the beginning of the novel. But, and here's where Bermann excels, we cannot help but have a different perspective. In a sense, we know too much. The narrator-author takes responsibility for writing this life and even proposes a series of ninety-nine numbered optional events that Malo might live. The novel's last chapter explores the question "Pourquoi écrit-on?" (167) and the effect that writing has on reader and writer alike. One certainty? In writing this book a very real author takes us on a literary adventure that we will not soon forget. [End Page 220] Ann Williams Metropolitan State University of Denver (CO), emerita Copyright © 2023 American Association of Teachers of French

(Mis)Leading the Reader

Abstract This article examines how Baruti and Cassiau-Haurie's Le Singe jaune (2018) subverts the literary adventure tropes that have been associated with the Congo. By examining its complex network of intertextual references, including the controversial Tintin au Congo, the analysis demonstrates that this graphic novel misleads readers into expecting a mere entertaining adventure quest, while leading them instead to learn about the social, economic, political, and historical consequences of a colonial system based on segregation and exploitation. Le Singe jaune, therefore, breathes new life into adventure comics while also subverting the unilateral (neo)colonial representations this tradition has reinforced. It enables readers to embrace alternative perspectives on the common history of the Congo and Belgium and urges them to answer the call for a new dialogue.

A Story with Characters and Action

A Story with Characters and Action

Kaddish

Ludwik Flaszen was the cofounder and literary adviser of the Polish Laboratory Theatre, and a collaborator of Jerzy Grotowski. This Jewish kaddish and Dionysian dithyramb offers a glimpse of his life and work.

El naufragio y la aventura intelectual: paralelismos significativos entre El Criticón y Robinson Crusoe

Este artículo estudia la relación entre el motivo del naufragio y el proceso de adquisición del lenguaje en El Criticón de Baltasar Gracián y Robinson Crusoe de Daniel Defoe. El argumento es que el naufragio se configura como un núcleo del relato propicio para desarrollar la aventura intelectual. El análisis de paralelismos entre estos textos, centrado en cuatro elementos —la intención edificante de las obras, el tratamiento del naufragio, el encuentro de los personajes y el proceso de adquisición del lenguaje—, revela una concepción peculiar de la aventura, en la cual el componente intelectual es importante para desarrollar el enfrentamiento de los personajes con sus realidades. El objetivo del estudio consiste en plantear una reflexión en torno a las inquietudes de estos autores sobre el conocimiento como parte de la aventura literaria.

Pluralism and Religion Again: Reply to Henry Hardy

The article constitutes a continuation of the discussion between Henry Hardy and myself, which was initiated in AFPiFS in 2019 as a result of my publishing a review of Hardy’s book: In Search of Isaiah Berlin: A Literary Adventure (2018). In the present commentary I address again the nub of our disagreement, that is the relationship between Berlin’s pluralism and universalist religions, like Christianity and Islam. According to Hardy pluralism undermines universalist religions. I distance myself from his standpoint and argue that it is possible to reconcile adherence to pluralist perspective in ethics with religious belief. Besides, I return to the objection raised in my review of Hardy’s book and take up the thread of conflicts within values. I sustain my charge that Hardy does not take seriously enough the implications of conflicts within single values.

Cultural Pluralism and Religious Belief: Around Henry Hardy’s “In Search of Isaiah Berlin: A Literary Adventure”

The article discusses Henry Hardy’s book In Search of Isaiah Berlin: A Literary Adventure, published in the fall of 2018. The author was Berlin’s closest collaborator and is the editor or co-editor of eighteen volumes of his works and four volumes of his letters. The first part of the book is a memoir, here discussed briefly; the main focus is on the second, philosophical, section. Hardy’s investigations into Berlin’s ideas are analysed and criticised. Special attention is given to his unresolved discussion with Berlin on the relationship between pluralism and religion. A number of critical arguments against Hardy’s thesis of their mutual exclusion are put forward. The key argument is that it is possible for a true pluralist to adhere to a universalist religion. This is the same position as that adopted by Berlin.

Donde se dice el humor: La mesa de los galanes como espacio paratópico en los cuentos de Fontanarrosa

ABSTRACTThis article approaches Roberto Fontanarrosa’s short stories through the notions of exotopic or paratopic spaces. Such notions attempt to understand the ways in which the literary author is situated with respect to his own work. The point of departure is the series of short stories known as La mesa de los galanes, spread over several books, in which the author sets up a paratopic space. The bar El Cairo replaces the writing scene with the conversation scene, but much more importantly, it points to the origin of Fontanarrosa’s literary adventure. Furthermore, La mesa de los galanes works divides his more narrative stories and the theatrical ones, separating the more parodic from the mostly costumbrist—in short, separating Humor from Literature.

On Walking and Thinking: Two Walks across the Page

On Walking and Thinking: Two Walks across the Page

A Multi-dimensional Representation of the Mid-Eighteenth Century England: The Vicar of Wakefield

Published in 1766, The Vicar of Wakefield: A Tale is the only novel by Irish writer Oliver Goldsmith, who starts his literary adventure as a hack writer. Reflecting the story through the parson’s point of view in retrospection with his memories depicting the idyllic life and subsequent misfortunes he experiences with his family, the novel catches the soul of the eighteenth century readers and the following ones with its sentimental and moralistic elements taking them back to the sphere of human nature. Despite the contradicting ideas on the work that it is thought “to be both a success and a failure, satiric and sentimental, coherent and disunified” all at the same time (Merritt 3), carrying not only the reminiscence of the writer’s personal life but also projecting the mid-eighteenth century England with references to different aspects of life, the novel receives popularity “for its gentle irony, and for its wisdom as well as its sense of absurdity” (Jeffares 6). This paper will focus on The Vicar of Wakefield through its thematic and stylistic qualities, representative aspects of the eighteenth century England, namely literary, social and political elements clearly observed within narration and Goldsmith’s distinct satirical style, which pave the way for the novel through centuries up to the modern readers as an amalgam of different influences and traditions.

A Multi-dimensional Representation of the Mid-Eighteenth Century England: The Vicar of Wakefield

Published in 1766, The Vicar of Wakefield: A Tale is the only novel by Irish writer Oliver Goldsmith, who starts his literary adventure as a hack writer. Reflecting the story through the parson’s point of view in retrospection with his memories depicting the idyllic life and subsequent misfortunes he experiences with his family, the novel catches the soul of the eighteenth century readers and the following ones with its sentimental and moralistic elements taking them back to the sphere of human nature. Despite the contradicting ideas on the work that it is thought “to be both a success and a failure, satiric and sentimental, coherent and disunified” all at the same time (Merritt 3), carrying not only the reminiscence of the writer’s personal life but also projecting the mid-eighteenth century England with references to different aspects of life, the novel receives popularity “for its gentle irony, and for its wisdom as well as its sense of absurdity” (Jeffares 6). This paper will focus on The Vicar of Wakefield through its thematic and stylistic qualities, representative aspects of the eighteenth century England, namely literary, social and political elements clearly observed within narration and Goldsmith’s distinct satirical style, which pave the way for the novel through centuries up to the modern readers as an amalgam of different influences and traditions.

Beguiling voices: traces of vocality in the Malay literary tradition of the Riau islands

ABSTRACTWhat can we learn about the history of Malay sounding traditions? With no musical notation, treatises or recordings to draw on, I turn to traditional literary adventures from island Riau (present-day Indonesia). This article re-imagines what has long been understood as a literary tradition as a sounding one, recalling that manuscripts were recited rather than read silently and that the stories themselves are rich sources on music and sound, in particular sounding voices. I focus on the particular power of voices in these texts to beguile, persuade and effect plot development, and analyse the vocabulary used to describe such voices. Finally, the article considers how external influences on the world of Malay sounding voices contributed to their separation from the written literary tradition and the eventual decline in popularity of recitation practices. This research seeks to contribute to the theorisation of vocality and to highlight its cultural and historical specificity, including its relation to the colonial encounter.

Writing as Judgment or Scream: A Conversation with Aslı Erdoǧan

After finishing a master's degree in physics and writing her thesis on the Higgs-Boson particle, Turkish writer Aslı Erdoǧan (b. 1967, Istanbul) worked for two years at CERN as a particle physicist then moved to Rio de Janeiro. After the publication of her first novel, The Shell Man (1994), she quit her scientific career and devoted herself to writing. Her third book, The City in Crimson Cloak (2001), brought her international recognition. With this novel, often described as a modern classic, Erdoǧan was chosen as one of “Fifty Writers of the Future” by the French magazine Lire. Back in Turkey, Erdoǧan began working as a columnist for oppositional newspapers, and after the failed coup attempt of July 2016 she was arrested on the pretext that she had been a literary adviser to a pro-Kurdish newspaper. Erdoǧan was released after a worldwide human rights campaign, but her trial still continues. In July 2017 the French government awarded her the Légion d'Honneur, but her travel request to receive it was only recently approved. After an initial phone conversation, we met on Heybeliada (Princes' Islands), near Istanbul, to continue our exchange.

Writing as Judgment or Scream: A Conversation with Aslı Erdoǧan

After finishing a master's degree in physics and writing her thesis on the Higgs-Boson particle, Turkish writer Aslı Erdoǧan (b. 1967, Istanbul) worked for two years at CERN as a particle physicist then moved to Rio de Janeiro. After the publication of her first novel, The Shell Man (1994), she quit her scientific career and devoted herself to writing. Her third book, The City in Crimson Cloak (2001), brought her international recognition. With this novel, often described as a modern classic, Erdoǧan was chosen as one of “Fifty Writers of the Future” by the French magazine Lire. Back in Turkey, Erdoǧan began working as a columnist for oppositional newspapers, and after the failed coup attempt of July 2016 she was arrested on the pretext that she had been a literary adviser to a pro-Kurdish newspaper. Erdoǧan was released after a worldwide human rights campaign, but her trial still continues. In July 2017 the French government awarded her the Légion d'Honneur, but her travel request to receive it was only recently approved. After an initial phone conversation, we met on Heybeliada (Princes' Islands), near Istanbul, to continue our exchange.

Melbourne, City of Literature

WORLDLITERATURETODAY.ORG 5 IN 2008 global humanitarian organization unesco classified Melbourne, Australia , an official City of Literature. It’s one of only eleven cities to bear the title worldwide , and even the most cursory search into the culture surrounding Melbourne makes it easy to see why. Per capita, more of Melbourne’s citizens read for pleasure than in any other city in Australia. Nearly half the population of the state of Victoria belongs to one of the area’s more than 250 libraries. In addition, Melbourne hosts several widely attended writing festivals throughout the year. Opened in 1854, the State Library of Victoria is Australia’s oldest library. You may have seen its La Trobe Reading Room featured in the Outpost of WLT’s September 2015 issue. Seeing that beautiful space in person would be reason enough to visit, but with more than seventy thousand items added to its collections each year, it’s also undoubtedly one of the best places to go if you’re looking for more information about Australia’s rich cultural history. It also houses the Wheeler Centre, opened in 2010, which hosts authors in near-daily discussions on everything from comedy and the climate to, of course, literacy and publishing. The city is also home to the Melbourne Writers Festival. Celebrating its thirtieth anniversary this year, this festival’s nearly two-week program is among the longest I have heard of. MWF hosted four hundred writers in 2014, from independent authors to best-selling juggernauts— something for everyone. And the festival features more than just literature; you’ll also find musicians, spoken-word poets, and a different artist in residence at Federation Square every day. Best of all, onethird of its events are free. Venturing out from the library and festival into Melbourne’s laneways brings further literary adventure. Depending on which streets you visit, you’ll find everything from cafés to literacy centers in this area of Melbourne. Marked by colorful graffiti, there is plenty of space for writers and readers in the Flinders Lane precinct bounded by Swanston and Elizabeth streets. The Victorian Writers’ Centre, Collected Works Bookshop, Aboriginal Literacy Foundation, Centre for Adult Education , Letterbox, and City Library are all here, as is the literary-leaning Journal café. Jackie Lamoureux is a WLT intern. photo : rae allen Notebook city profile Melbourne, City of Literature by Jackie Lamoureux MELBOURNE IN LITERATURE Peter Carey Amnesia Knopf, 2015 Sophie Cunningham Melbourne University of New South Wales Press, 2011 Gerald Murnane A Million Windows David R. Godine, 2016 A. S. Patrić Black Rock White City Transit Lounge Publishing, 2015 ...

Jerome, Vita Malchi. Introduction, Text, Translation, and Commentary by Christa Gray

Reviewed by: Jerome, Vita Malchi. Introduction, Text, Translation, and Commentary by Christa Gray Alison Orlebeke Jerome, Vita Malchi. Introduction, Text, Translation, and Commentary Christa Gray Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Pp. xviii + 365. ISBN 978–0-19–872372–1 Silhouetted in darkness, conjoined faces stare from a cave as a lioness mauls a man dressed in high boots and a red robe. This scene on the front cover depicts the final climax of the Vita Malchi (VM), or to use Jerome’s words, de captivo monacho (95). After Jerome provides the circumstances of his encounter with a remarkable old man and woman who were frequent visitors to a village church in Syria, he turns the narrative over to Malchus, a fabulous raconteur who infuses his adventures with lively commentary, rhetorical flourishes, and some realistic details. Curious, Jerome asks the locals about the elderly couple’s relationship. They report both that the pair is holy and “amazing things.” Jerome longs to know if what he hears is true: “Lured by desire, I confronted the man and questioned him more inquisitively about the trustworthiness of the accounts” (VM 2.3). Malchus also raises the problem of credulity. Just at the moment his master has been seized by the lioness, he exclaims, “Who would ever believe this, that in front of our faces a wild beast was fighting for us?” (VM 9.9) As readers explore this unique text, they will frequently consult and greatly appreciate Christa Gray’s valuable contribution to Hieronymian scholarship. The author offers this new edition as a resource for further study: “I have sought to be attentive to the text above all, and to contextualize it as fully as possible in order to facilitate interpretations that go beyond my own conclusions” (3). The single word “contextualize” epitomizes the book’s construction of a rich and detailed framework for comprehending the meaning and significance of its subject. Engaged throughout with modern scholarship, it also provides generous summary and critique of the contributions of experts in a wide range of fields and an extensive bibliography. Three distinct indices, comprising loci, names [End Page 549] and subjects, and Latin words, facilitate searches within the volume. One of the monograph’s aims is “to contribute to an understanding of Jerome’s rhetorical habits” (1), and it succeeds laudably in its assiduous attention to diction, syntax, and grammar. Rhetorical devices, such as alliteration, anaphora, and oxymoron, are frequently noted along with more elaborate verbal patterns. A second aim is “to examine the VM in terms of the information it provides about its historical and literary backgrounds” (3). There is no shortage of material requiring explication in Jerome’s parvum opus (VM 1.2), and again, this volume delivers. Copious citations and quotations from classical and Christian sources provide parallels, echoes and probable direct borrowings. At the same time, frequent juxtaposition of the text’s language with what is found elsewhere illuminates special features, such as when Jerome chooses the adverb firmiter over firme (101), or when Malchus uses the vocative nate instead of fili (133–34), or opts to refer to his master as erus rather than dominus (211). The many compact scholarly essays in the commentary are especially informative and cover a vast range of topics, from the naval exercise as literary metaphor (96–99), pudicitia (141–44), postliminium (177–80), Saracens (167–69), proskynesis (189–92), depictions of ants (250–54), the use of goatskins as floats (269–71), and many more. A thorough introduction doubles as a synopsis of the findings of the commentary. The first six sections, though just one or two pages each, embed the text in time, place, and Jerome’s life and mi-lieu. “Audiences” identifies Jerome and Paula’s acolytes in Bethlehem, the bishop Evagrius and other potential patrons, Christian men and women in Rome, and even regular Roman citizens, for whom “the VM would be an escapist literary adventure” (12). “Purpose” argues that Malchus’ life story promotes monasticism, provides a precedent for Jerome’s platonic friendship with Paula, and permits “the possibility that the benefits of virginity can be regained by a chaste life even after virginity in its literal sense is lost” (13...

Entre dos mundos: Jaime Ferran

Jaime Ferran, poeta de la Generación de los 50 y autor de la Antología Parcial, que reúne a los poetas de la llamada Escuela de Barcelona, es un autor semidesconocido para el gran público lector e, incluso, para la mayoría de los especialistas en la poesía de los 50. Hay una serie de circunstancias vitales y literarias que, en buena parte, explican este casi olvido en el que ha quedado la obra del poeta de Cervera. Entre ellas cabe destacar el hecho de haber escrito casi toda su obra fuera de España. Su vida profesional en Syracuse, EE.UU, lo llevó a construir una obra al margen de las inquietudes de sus compañeros de promoción y al margen también de las modas poéticas imperantes en España durante, sobre todo, las décadas de los sesenta y los setenta. A este hecho biográfico habría que añadir otras peripecias vitales y literarias que han hecho de Jaime Ferran una especie de outsider.

Kurt Vonnegut’s Quest for Identity

he present paper analyzes Kurt Vonnegut’s complex national roots, since he was an American citizen with a clearly German background who was deprived of any German education during his childhood and, consequently, had to discover the country of his ancestors when he was fighting the Nazis during World War II. Thus, his roots become an everlasting source of influence for Vonnegut. Obviously, and taking into account his rejection of Barthes’ concept of “the death of the author”, Vonnegut’s quest for roots will become a recurring element from his first literary adventures to the last published more mature novels.The main focus of the paper will be centered on how, even without a rich German education, Germany will play a fundamental role throughout the novelist’s whole corpus. In order to achieve this goal, I have examined both Vonnegut’s biography as well as his literary corpus (including fictional and non-fictional Works), together with the many interviews he gave during his long and complex literary career.

Arguably: Essays by Christopher Hitchens

Julian Stannard The Parrots of Villa Gruber Discover Lapis Lazuli Salmon Poetry This is the last installment in poet Stannard ’s Genoese trilogy; Rina’s War and The Red Zone were the first and second collections in the series, respectively. With a voice and subjects that are distinctly British in nature, the poems in this collection span many of the major cities of Europe, including Paris, Rome, Bucharest, and Amsterdam . Stannard’s poems were featured in WLT’s July 2011 online issue. A Polish Book of Monsters Michael Kandel, ed. PIASA Books Five contemporary Polish authors, each with a distinctive voice, are represented in this collection of newly translated stories of fantasy and science fiction. Every selection contains an “utterly convincing alien world that nonetheless refracts our own,” with fantastical characters and themes of power, violence, and possession (Helena Goscilo). Through these themes, each author has penned a tale that predicts a sinister future. Nota Bene American sf. Its compass is fiction from Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico written between 1850 and 1920—nationally formative years during which Latin America contributed distinctive “local appropriations and local adaptations” to the “global genre” of sf. After steering us through a first chapter on utopian proto-sf, Rachel Haywood Ferreira guides us into darker territory: stories that vivify the raging conflict between Darwinian and Lamarckian evolution; that prophesy the end of the world; that pit canonical science against spiritualism , theosophy, occultism, and the like; that consider (seriously!) eugenics as a tool to counter threats to national identity ; and much more. In lucid, jargonfree prose, she layers this complex story onto a meticulously constructed skeleton that is simultaneously thematic and chronological. Wediscoverhowauthorsusedthe distancing in time and space allowed by sf to address the burning issues of national identity and its attendant political baggage of “nationality, race, and social class or profession.” Complicating this issue were postcolonial relations with first-world countries of the Northern Hemisphere. This uneasy dynamic was further muddled by the investiture by Latin America in science as “the supreme guarantor of truth” and in technological advancement as the means to progress —science and technology then being localized in the United States and northern Europe. Furthermore, individual works typically addressed geographically and temporally specific political agendas of the authors, many of whom actively participated in nation-building. Haywood Ferreira recounts this intellectually exciting literary adventure with skill and verve. Crucially, she does not assume we know anything about these authors or their political and cultural contexts. Rather, she regularly injects into accounts of their fiction doses of background that keep us on track. She thereby builds a persuasive case that viewing these works “through a lens of science fiction ” illuminates “Latin American attitudes toward science, literature, national identity, and other [social and cultural] issues of their times.” Anyone with even a passing interest in Latin American literature will want Emergence and Cosmos Latinos . Both belong on your shelf next to Thomas Colchie’s A Hammock beneath the Mangoes (1991), an anthology of late-twentieth-century stories, mostly in the fantastic mode, and the endlessly delightful Antología de la literatura fantástica, edited by Jorge Luis Borges, Adolfo Bioy Casares, and Silvina Ocampo (2nd ed., 1965; Eng. The Book of Fantasy, 1988). Optimists will leave room for future anthologies by Bell and Molina Gavilán and literary histories by Haywood Ferreira. Both of their books cry out for successors . Wesleyan, are you listening? Michael A. Morrison University of Oklahoma Christopher Hitchens. Arguably: Essays. New York. Twelve / Hachette. 2011. isbn 9781455502776 Ordinary book reviewers have three tasks: to determine what the author set out to do; how well that task was accomplished; and whether it was worth undertaking. Here the reviewer is in a way subordinate to the book. Not so reviewers given the space to show their credentials as public intellectuals. January–February 2012 | 75 In their work, readers often find it difficult to discover just what book is being discussed because the reviewer subsumes the discussion in a wider consideration of the topic. Christopher Hitchens is preeminently in the second group. He seems to be as widely read and traveled as he is prolific—the publicity sheet for the book notes that...