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Title details for The Upside-Down World by Benjamin Moser - Wait list

The Upside-Down World

Meetings with the Dutch Masters

by Benjamin Moser
Paul Boehmer
Audiobook
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Arriving as a young writer in an ancient Dutch town, Benjamin Moser found himself visiting-casually at first, and then more and more obsessively-the country's great museums. Beyond the sainted Rembrandt-who harbored a startling darkness-and the mysterious Vermeer, whose true subject, it turned out, was lurking in plain sight, Moser got to know a whole galaxy of geniuses: the doomed virtuoso Carel Fabritius, the anguished wunderkind Jan Lievens, the deaf prodigy Hendrik Avercamp. Year after year, as he tried to make a life for himself in the Netherlands, Moser found friends among these centuries-dead artists. And he found that they, too, were struggling with the same questions that he was. Why do we make art? What even is art, anyway-and what is an artist? What does it mean to succeed as an artist, and what does it mean to fail? The Upside-Down World is an invitation to ask these questions, and to turn them on their heads: to look, and then to look again. This is Holland and its great artists as we've never seen them before. And it's a highly personal coming-of-age-story, twenty years in the making: a revealing self-portrait by one of the most acclaimed writers of his generation.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    October 31, 2023

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781696613422
      • File size: 345302 KB
      • Duration: 11:59:22

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Paul Boehmer's thoughtful, well-paced narration encourages close listening to this beautifully written personal memoir and guide to the seventeenth-century Dutch master painters. When Pulitzer Prize-winning author Benjamin Moser relocated to the Netherlands, he sought to understand his place in a foreign country by delving into the lives and work of Rembrandt, Fabritius, Lievens, Vermeer, ter Borch, and many others. The result is partly art history essays and partly an attempt to answer questions such as why do we make art and how should we relate to it. Oddly, throughout the narration Boehmer changes his voice to a lower register with an echo effect for random passages. If unintentional, this may be an unfortunate editing error that is puzzling to the listener. J.E.S. © AudioFile 2023, Portland, Maine

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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