Reviews for The Anthropocene Reviewed

by John Green

Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

The bestselling author offers a miscellany of essays on life and letters in an environmentally fraught time.Green, who admits to a certain amount of OCD, opens charmingly with a telling instance: It took him 30 days to create a path through the woods behind his Indianapolis home to reach a treehouse less than a minute away: It took me a month to build a fifty-eight-second walk in the woods. He might well have conjured the critic Morse Peckham, who once observed that a futile activity isnt so futile if it puts off recognizing its own futility. Its one of few bookish allusions Green misses in this pleasing book of essays personal and cultural. The author notes that we are at a moment when everything is rated thanks to the pernicious influences of Amazon and Yelp and such; Green calls a bout of labyrinthitis an unambiguously one-star experience. The ratings continue: He gives humankind a four-star chance of surviving the present era of mounting catastrophes, the Anthropocene. His register of references is far-ranging. Among dozens of other topics, he discusses Shakespearean evocations of clouds, the origins of the pathetic fallacy in the writings of John Ruskin, and the worlds largest ball of paint, which can be found not far from Greens home. There are fine moments throughout, as when the author writes appreciatively of Indianapolis as a place he loves precisely because it isnt easy to love or when he ponders the social basis of genius, by which artists such as Michelangelo flourished because others were making advances in the study of human anatomy and Julius Caesar became a dictator becauseover time the empires soldiers felt more loyalty to their military leaders than to their civilian ones. In a treat for die-hard fans, each copy from the first print run will be signed by the author.A grab bag, but one that repays reading and reflection and a pleasure throughout despite occasionally dark moments. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.


Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

The bestselling author offers a miscellany of essays on life and letters in an environmentally fraught time. Green, who admits to a certain amount of OCD, opens charmingly with a telling instance: It took him 30 days to create a path through the woods behind his Indianapolis home to reach a treehouse less than a minute away: “It took me a month to build a fifty-eight-second walk in the woods.” He might well have conjured the critic Morse Peckham, who once observed that a futile activity isn’t so futile if it puts off recognizing its own futility. It’s one of few bookish allusions Green misses in this pleasing book of essays personal and cultural. The author notes that we are at a moment when everything is rated thanks to the pernicious influences of Amazon and Yelp and such; Green calls a bout of labyrinthitis “an unambiguously one-star experience.” The ratings continue: He gives humankind a four-star chance of surviving the present era of mounting catastrophes, the Anthropocene. His register of references is far-ranging. Among dozens of other topics, he discusses Shakespearean evocations of clouds, the origins of the “pathetic fallacy” in the writings of John Ruskin, and the world’s largest ball of paint, which can be found not far from Green’s home. There are fine moments throughout, as when the author writes appreciatively of Indianapolis as a place he loves “precisely because it isn’t easy to love” or when he ponders the social basis of genius, by which artists such as Michelangelo flourished because others were making advances in the study of human anatomy and Julius Caesar “became a dictator because…over time the empire’s soldiers felt more loyalty to their military leaders than to their civilian ones.” In a treat for die-hard fans, each copy from the first print run will be signed by the author. A grab bag, but one that repays reading and reflection and a pleasure throughout despite occasionally dark moments. Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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