Max Perkins: Editor of Genius

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Summary: If you like biographies and/or berg, you will like this!
Review: I got hooked on A. Scott Berg when I read his latest biography, Lindbergh . . . then I went back and enjoyed his second biography, Goldwyn . . . naturally, I then had to read this: his first book . . . and was not disappointed with this, either . . . interesting look at an editor who helped bring us Hemmingway, Fitzgerald, Wolfe, etc. . . I feel that I really got to know these authors, and you will too . . . I anxiously await Berg's latest effort!

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Summary: An Excellent Biography Of A Real Hero of Literature
Review: I had a hardcover copy of this book for years, and I let it get away from me. When I found the paperback, I jumped on it and devoured it. What a wonderful friend and editor Perkins was! He had the unerring sense of knowing HOW a story (novels or biographies) should be well-told. A. Scott Berg seems to have followed his advice to the letter. I'm looking forward to reading Berg's other biographies.

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Summary: Good biographer - good subject
Review: I'm a Scott Berg fan, and I bought this book as a vehicle to learn about an important editor and his famous authors. It was what I expected from a Berg book, after reading "Lindbergh." It contains excellent research and writing and gives an objective telling, although a few too many details for my taste. Scott Berg is my role model as a biographer. What amazed me about the story was how much Max Perkins had to baby his famous writers. I gained respect for him, but not them. There didn't seem to be much happiness in any of these lives.

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Summary: A. Scott Berg: Author of Genius
Review: Max Perkins: Editor of Genius is one of the best non-fiction titles I've read in a long time, and will likely be one of the best books I'll ever read. Berg (with the help of his own editor) truly is a genius: he pulls us directly into the story, introducing us to Scribner's Max Perkins at the zenith of his editorial career, then plunges us into his first acquisition -- F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Beautiful and Damned -- before taking us, methodically, through Perkins's life. An intrepid biographer, Berg tells us only what we need to know about Perkins's early life, getting to the good stuff: his discovery of Fitzgerald and Thomas Wolfe and his work with Ernest Hemingway. We also find out about Perkins's work with other remarkable authors, including Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings (The Yearling), S.S. Van Dine (the Philo Vance mysteries), and Arthur Train, creator of the mythical DA Ephraim Tutt. I laughed out loud at the story about how many believed that Tutt existed after the publication of his "autobiograhpy," complete with photos.

We learn of Perkins's patient relationship with the frustrating Thomas Wolfe, a mammoth talent and physical specimen who could not contain his own enthusiasm. Berg suggests that, as Perkins discovered, Wolfe wasn't writing "books," he was writing one book, which would have encompassed thousands of pages if he had not died early -- a profound insight into the heart and soul of a dynamic author.

We learn much of Papa Hemingway as well, including some insights into the macho author's home life. Elements of Hemingway's unpublished fiction suggest that the bullfighting fan, fisherman, and big game hunter might have enjoyed switching gender roles in bed with one of his wives.

Fitzgerald comes off as one who excelled in being pathetic, a man who suffered desperately with his wife, Zelda, alcohol, and simply living large. Berg gives us a tender portrait of Perkins's greatest find.

As with all excellent biographies, Max Perkins: Editor of Genius examines only what made Perkins who he was: the editor of the twentieth century. Perkins preferred to sit on the sidelines, championing his authors. Often, he sits on the sidelines in this book as well, but this only makes sense: he was famous for his work with his more famous authors. It wasn't Max, it was his interaction with these great authors that made him all great.

As some reviewers have pointed out, Max would have enjoyed thsi book.

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Summary: great man/great bio
Review: Scott Berg has written a wonderful biography on one of the most important men in American literature, Max Perkins. Berg's book is well-written and very entertaining. It is more than a biography of Perkins, it is also a biography of Hemingway, Scott Fiztgerald, and Thomas Wolfe, and a portrait of America during the first half of the 20th century. This is one of those books that I could go on and on about. It is a book that everyone should read.

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Summary: A good view behind the scenes
Review: Since a class I was taking required the reading of excerpts from this biography, I decided it might be a much better idea to read the entire book. By no means was that a wasted effort! This biography is very well written and opens up new vistas to readers of great fiction from the 20s and 30s.

Perkins was the editor for Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Thomas Wolfe. These are the three which get the bulk of print spent on them. You see that Perkins was much more than an editor and went to great lengths to help these writers discover as much of their potential as possible. He never wanted to credit for these and felt that the editor should always be hidden in the background.

Aside from the authors mentioned above, I found that Perkins also assisted authors like Bourjaily, Jones ("From Here to Eternity"), Rawlings ("The Yearling"), and Sherwood Anderson (although there was a bit of a falling out).

A. Scott Berg inserts a lot of information into the text, yet it is still very readable. Even in sections when I felt there was more Thomas Wolfe than needed, I still went through the book without wanting to put it down.

Even if you are not big into editing, just to hear a "behind-the-scenes" view of some of your favorite authors will make this book worthwhile to you.

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Summary: Max Perkins:Editor of Genius by A Scott Berg
Review: What greater praise than the fact that I have spent 2 full day and into the night reading this book about a wonderful person who was a friend and confident to so many wonderful writers. I have read biographies of Fitzgerald, Hemingway and Wolfe and I had a paperback on Perkins but it became mislaid. I have read so many of their books and now want read them again as this biography has whetted my appetite.All the wonderful letters that are printed tell so much about these revered writers and tell how much they needed their wonderful editor.Wonderful book!

Rating:
Summary: Max Perkins:Editor of Genius by A Scott Berg
Review: What greater praise than the fact that I have spent 2 full day and into the night reading this book about a wonderful person who was a friend and confident to so many wonderful writers. I have read biographies of Fitzgerald, Hemingway and Wolfe and I had a paperback on Perkins but it became mislaid. I have read so many of their books and now want read them again as this biography has whetted my appetite.All the wonderful letters that are printed tell so much about these revered writers and tell how much they needed their wonderful editor.Wonderful book!