Word: reader
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...worse, the passions which drove noir seem almost charming today. When Roman Polanski made the mock-noir Chinatown, he had to slice open Nicholson's nostril to get the same effect that was once accomplished by showing a couple of thugs lurking outside the window. Leave it to the Reader's Digest to mourn our passing national innocence--but the real problem is we've lost our faith in passion. Murder and passion seem almost antithetical at the present, and adultery--well, adultery is for adolescents...
...delicate. He promoted the idea of a national literature, sought an American Milton enthusiastically while quietly harboring fears and doubts that America could produce one. The beauty of Delbanco's essay resides in its expansiveness: it opens outward from Channing's life to ask larger questions, and leaves the reader something to ponder. Comparing Channing to Henry Adams, the author illuminates a man who "asked the overwhelming question of his century and ours: whether the world is spinning into chaos, or, after a long penance, tapping the divine. That question, which now as then elicits all the varying strategies...
...Flies. Knowles' novels argue that destruction is inherent in humanity and rooted in adolescence. Man is comfortable only in battel; thus he will create conflict in every aspect of his life. In Peace Breaks Out, however, the treatment of this idea is so heavy handed that the reader loses interest long before Knowle's unbelievable plot limps to a conclusion...
...trapped in hatred. In Peace Breaks Out, the protagonists are bitter foes from the outset. Hochschwender, the loud, obnoxious neo-Nazi, and Wexford, the pathologically evil, power-obsessed editor of the school newspaper, emerge from the first meeting of their American History class determined to destroy each other. The reader can identify with neither character, and their rivalry quickly becomes trivial and boring...
Instead of forcing the reader to consider the implications of evil, Knowles succeeds only in oversimplifying it as an ubiquitous force. Evil is inescapable, but the author shirks his responsibility to explain why it emerges periodically in a deranged youngster or a mass murderer...