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Show BalaOaCaRaAaPaHaYi His nse to fame removed him physically from Odense and placed him in the homes and palates of the noblemen and royalty with whom he wished to identify, but the psychological scars of his true heritage created an identity crisis that remained throughout his life. According to Wullschlager, Andersen's fairy tales equal The triumphant Ugly Duckling, the loyal Little Mermaid, the steadfast Tin Soldier the stories of these characters show Andersen's own ability to empathize with pain, sorrow and rejection. Andersen's life was significantly influenced by his travels, the patronage of royalty and wealthy friends and his association with other 19th century artists. Wullschlager includes fascinating stories, rich with historical detail, of his relationship with such notables as Charles Dickens, William Thackeray, world. HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN The Life of a Storyteller By Jackie Wullschlager Knopf, $30 BBN 0679455086 BY C. ELIZABETH DAVIS We often identify authors by their most famous works and investigate no further. But a writer's output is, of course, only the tip of the iceberg. Readers interested in delving into the life experiences that shape an author will delight in Jackie Wullschlager 's Hans Christian Andersen: The Life of a Storyteller, a scholarly, detailed biography of one of the world's most renowned writers. Bom in Odense, Denmark, on April 2, 805, in a small cottage in the poorest part of the village, Andersen spent his life trying to escape his humble origins. He once described his uneducated parents as full of love but ignorant of life and of the 1 M Franz Listz and the Gnmm brothers. The first to write fairy tales for adults as well as for children, Andersen composed narratives that compel readers to confront their innermost thoughts and fears. satires of humankind's foibles and absurdities are woven into the fabric of his tales tales that, according to Wullschlager. reveal Andersen's own inner conflict: a battle between achieving acceptance and success and rebelling against conventional constraints. Exploring the circumstances that contributed to the literary genius of Hans Christian Andersen and tracing those influences throughout his prolific works, Wullschlager has created a fascinating psychological profile of the leg' endary author. THE HERO'S WALK a novel by Anna Rau Badami Badamfs deeply resonant debut . . . places her in the ranks of writers like Jhumpa Lahiri . . . and Manil Suri. Elizabeth Davis is a former marketing director for Turner Broadcasting S stem. novel RHlaClBTaiaOHN CANE RIVER By Laifa Tademy Warner Books, $24.95 BBN 0446527327 fgl $24.98, BBN 1586210629 REVIEW BY ARLENE McKANK Like any other institution devised by human beings slavery had its inconsistencies. Lalita Tademy 's saga Cane River, highlights the peculiar way this peculiar institution was practiced in the Louisiana of her ancestors. One hesitates to say that slavery was more benevolent in this part of the Deep South, but the Catholic slaveholders of Louisiana did believe their slaves had souls that should, at least minimally, be tended to. Thus, Tademy s ancestress Suzette is given First Communion, and later her daughter Philomene is allowed to be married (to the extent that a slave could be married) by a priest These episodes, among many. give Cane River a thrilling sense of newness for the reader that is missing from nar- many grim slavery and j j i RaYj tive work (Nicosia says he interviewed 600 people for the book). Home to War offers accounts of incendiary demonstrations and loud rap sessions, Kafkaesque court trials and petty infight- HOME TO WAR History of the Vietnam Veterans Movement A By Gerald Nicosia Crown, $35 BBN 0812991036 REVIEW BY EDWARD MORRIS As author Gerald Nicosia explains it, the American soldiers who fought in Vietnam lost two wars: one in Southeast Asia to gain and hold territory and one at home to gain public understanding of their experiences. The Vietnam veterans movement instrumental in exposing America's duplicity during the late 60s and early 70s is the subject of Nicosias new book Home to War. The author brings a dramatists eye to this mammoth narrative, playing out hun- dreds of separate stories through the per- sonalities of the participants. An exhaus- - i ing, majestic displays of solidarity, moments of euphoria and days of despair. Not only did the vets fight to expose the war as a human catastrophe, they also struggled to convince an indifferent public and a hostile government that their wounds particularly the psychological ones were of a different sort than America was used to. Instead of relying on the loftiness of political themes to do the work, the author uses recurring characters to endow his chronicle with a sense of direction and momentum. Overall, Nicosia strikes a pleasing balance between a vivid but fragmented oral his- - cemented by childbearing, to real, if forbidden and dangerous, love. Tademy s writing is gripping, whether she's describing the drudgery of slave life, the dread felt by slaves about to be sold away from their loved ones, or the joy of an finally getting her own house and gathering in the sundered pans of her family. Tademy doesn't stint on the long-terdamage slavery inflicts; the women, identifying with those who aggressed against them, value long straight hair and fair skin above all in their children. But most of the women emerge with their sanity and human dignity intact, and this, along with the fact that Tademy, a former Silicon Valley exec, is here to tell the tale, is the miracle of Cane River, e Publishers Weekly, starred review Well-writte- n, heartwarming: indeed, a kind of Indian Christmas Carol? Kirkus Reviews day-to-d- ' ' j Rich in sensuous detail, both sweet and bitter, and an almost cinematic sense of color and emotion. Booklist VMK1 OF IK CMM0MWU1JI PRIZE Arlene McKanic writes from Jamaica, ut post-slave- a I bssts o ratives, such as Toni Morrisons Beloved. that take place in other areas of the South. Cane River is a novelization of stories Tademy gleaned from years of research about the generations of strong, dedicated passionate and sometimes wrongheaded women w ho labored in all senses of the word through slavery and beyond. The book begins w ith Elisabeth, who was sold from Virginia to Louisiana and one of Tademy 's many brilliant touches is her description of the matriarch's difficulties with the Creole French spoken by the slaves and their masters. Tademy proceeds to recount Elisabeths female descendants difficulties with the men who owned them or thought they did. As if a metaphor for society itself, the relationships between Suzette and Philomene and Emily and the white fathers of their children evolve from flat-orape, to distrustful financial arrangements New York. l tory and a coherent narration of facts. While the veterans have scored some triumphs, Nicosia says, theirs has not been a story with a happy ending. At the Vietnam Veterans of America convention in 1999, he notes, someone pointed out that most of the vets balding, gray- - or deeply wrinkled, with huge pot bellies or else emaciated, many walking slowly with canes looked as though they were in their 60s or 70s, when in fact they were actually 20 years younger. Premature aging has been universally observed among Vietnam veterans, and in some respects it has already been medically verified." And these were just the visible scars. white-haire- j , ; CLAYS A deep love for home suffuses this heartfelt, debut novel set in the Kentucky hills. well-craft- j j d, Edward Morris writes for BookPage from Nashville. QUU a novel by Silas House Publishers Weekly One of the truest and most exciting new voices in American fiction. ROBERT MORGAN, author of Cap Creek Silas House is a writer whose work is better than good. Clays Quilt is a work of art. Lexington MUM Herald-Lead- wbaravw books art soM. ALGONQUIN BOOKS OFJHAPErHI |