Parties: A Literary Companion - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0879518421 ISBN 13: 9780879518424

Publisher: Overlook Books, 1998

Synopsis

A collection of brief literary selections about parties includes the writing of Truman Capote, Kingsley Amis, Evelyn Waugh, Daphne DuMaurier, Jane Austen, Oscar Wilde, James Thurber, Edith Wharton, Virginia Woolf, and F. Scott Fitzgerald

About this title

About the Author

Susanna Johnston is the editor of "Parties: A Literary Companion" and the author of "Collecting: The Passionate Pastime" and "The Picnic Papers,"

From Library Journal

In this compilation of excerpts from novels, poems, and plays of descriptions of parties, freelance editor Johnston uses numerous and wide-ranging sources, from Petronius to Robert Coover, that reflect the variation of possible scenarios in human social situations. The book is organized in sections: "Beginnings," "All Manner of Parties," "Revelry," and "Ending" (the final entry is a suitable short poem by Emily Dickinson, "This Quiet Dust Was Gentlemen and Ladies"). Commentary is provided only in the brief introduction, which points out that parties are not necessarily fun (see Lady Elizabeth Anson's advice on what to do when someone attempts suicide at your soiree). This is a handy reference on a festive subject, useful for quotations but nonessential.
Janice E. Braun, Mills Coll., Oakland, Cal.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Overlook Books
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0879518421
• ISBN 13: 9780879518424
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 286
• Editor: Johnston Susanna