“[Terry Castle is] the most expressive, most enlightening literary critic at large today.” —Susan Sontag
From one of America’s most brilliant critics and cultural commentators, Terry Castle, comes The Professor and Other Writings: a collection of startling, gorgeously-written autobiographical essays and a new, long-form piece about the devastation and beauty of early love. James Wolcott, contributing writer to Vanity Fair, calls Terry Castle a “Jedi knight of literary exploration and lesbian scholarship,” and The Professor and Other Writings “a greatest-hits package of show-stopping monologues and offhand-genius riffs.” The Professor and Other Writings is a hilarious and heartbreaking exploration of gender, identity, and sexuality in the grand tradition of such feminist luminaries as Susan Sontag, Camille Paglia, and Joan Didion.
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"Very interesting and entertaining personal essays. I was put off at the beginning by page after page of unfamiliar references and words, but my friend who recommended this book to me helped me see this as something other than frustrating. And after that I couldn't put it down." — Fern (4 out of 5 stars)
"Very interesting and entertaining personal essays. I was put off at the beginning by page after page of unfamiliar references and words, but my friend who recommended this book to me helped me see this as something other than frustrating. And after that I couldn't put it down."
“[A] hilarious and smart collection of personal essays…The subjects are fascinating, the prose packed full of gems. Castle approaches everything with a blend of curiosity, humor and careful scrutiny…This is a delightful book, to be read and reread.”
“Every page hums with a kind of cathartic glee—a testimony to Castle’s ability to transform even the grimmest scenarios into savage comic prose…The Professor and Other Writings documents a brilliant mind discovering a deeper, more intimate mode of expression.”
“This is the book we Terry Castle fans have been waiting for, and those new to her work are in for a revelation—a brain-goosing, entertaining blast.”
“Terry Castle is an irreverent, witty feminist—words one does not often associate. Her tale of her love affair as a student with an older professor is touching and wicked; she is a brilliant stylist, and everything she writes is gripping.”
“In this questing, deeply funny and joltingly wonderful book...the life of the author’s abundant mind and heart are explored in an altogether scintillating way. Readers...are in for a major find…Castle is at once penetratingly keen and unfailingly good company.”
" Haven't had this much fun with a book of essays in forever. "
" Vivid, eloquent, funny and unsparing, a memoir. The pieces make for compulsive reading, but Castle's take on herself, her phobias, prejudices, morales is savagely funny. She is no easier on the people in her personal life. "
" Such an engaging writer. Great piece on Art Pepper. "
" This book was recommended to me by a leading tax scholar and the editor of Feminist Rental Property Management Studies. "
" There are some amazing essays in this book, in particular Desperately Seeking Susan [Sontag] and Home Alone. The rest is excellent. "
" It really hit the spot for talking about academia and lesbianism and intellectual curiosity and basically was just the book for me. "
" Intelligent, honest and damned riveting series of essays of Terry Castle, one of our better literary critics. The title essay is absolutely superb, but the rest of the collection is essential reading as well. "
" An enjoyable read for anyone, but Minneapolis readers in particular will find Castle's account of the feminist underground in the city during the mid-1970s extremely interesting. "
" Ah, Terry you're so fine... "
Terry Castle was once described by Susan Sontag as “the most expressive, most enlightening literary critic at large today.” Her essays have frequently appeared in the London Review of Books, Atlantic, New Republic, Times Literary Supplement, and New York Times Book Review, as well as other journals and periodicals. Her writing topics range from eighteenth-century ghost stories to World War I-era lesbianism to the so-called “photographic fringe.” She is the author of numerous books of criticism, and her anthology The Literature of Lesbianism won the Lambda Literary Editor’s Choice Award in 2003. She lives in San Francisco and is a Walter A. Haas professor in the Humanities at Stanford University, where she has taught since 1983.
Maggi-Meg Reed has performed as an actress and singer both on and off-Broadway. She is a narrator of many popular audiobooks, including A Very Long Engagement and The Time Traveler’s Wife. She is the winner of several AudioFile Earphones Awards.
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