Albums of a Life : A Memoir

It is not a secret, but readers of Stanley Kauffmann's reviews of film, theater, and "books" may have taken for granted, in their rush to take in the useful and profound knowledge he provides, he is a master of the English sentence. Now we have his memoirs of early and later life, his telling and showing us what and how he chooses to write about his "series of alternative lives." He has given us a modest masterpiece. The question is, how does this writer, Stanley Kauffmann, after his many years of devotion to criticism, "his art concurrent with art," in this wonderful album of his life manage to reveal so much to us about the world? He does this while being reticent or silent about matters others might display.

STANLEY KAUFFMANN has been film critic for The New Republic for some forty years. He has published ten books of criticism, seven novels, and Conversations with Stanley Kauffmann in 2003. He has also published and had produced bunches of plays. He has taught at the Yale School of Drama and at the Theater Department of CUNY Graduate Center.