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Summary: Read and Weep
Review: If you love to read, rejoice. If you want to write, read and weep.
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Summary: best novel of 2003
Review: a jewel. sweet and sad at the same time. you'll love it.
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Summary: A lesson in writing
Review: This book is sure to please Wolff fans, as well as those who are fans of the craft of writing. It is about a student at a Massachusetts prep school in 1960 who repeatedly enters essay contests where the winner gets to meet with famous writers (Rand, Heningway, Frost) visiting the school. About two-thirds of the way through, there is quite a plot twist, which I won't give away. My lone lament is that it came so late. The book reads as something of a memoir prior to that point (and gets a but slow, albeit still enjoyable). It is really a hybrid of a memoir and extended short story, if that makes any sense. It is not a novel in the classical beginning, middle, end sort of way. Overall though, certainly in the 90th percentile.
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Summary: Wolff as Literary Lion
Review: Like all of the best writers, Tobias Wolff makes good writing look easy. Practicioners of the craft know the truth, of course, and will appreciate and most likely recognize themselves in Old School's lit-loving main character. Old School is a visceral ride through life that left me wondering how much of the story was autiobiographical. Ultimately, though, who cares when reading is THIS delicious?
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Summary: Excellent Study in Self Discovery
Review: Old School is a tremendous piece of literature that is as thought provoking as it is beautiful. Wolff paints a picture of a prestigious boarding school in 1960. The school is highly regarded in literary circles and tradition holds that three authors visit the school for a lecture and one sixth-year student can win a private audience with an author by submitting their own writing and being selected by the author.The Narrator has high aspirations of obtaining one of these audiences and Wolff traces the boy's quest from Robert Frost, Ayn Rand, and Ernest Hemmingway as each author increases the boy's obsession with their work. Interestingly enough, the students at the school begin to develop the character of each of their guests and the parallels develop beautifully. The unnamed narrator struggles to compose a story befitting victory until he realizes that the greatest pieces of literature come from an honest self inventory and acceptance. Old School is an entertaining read and highly recommended to anyone who looked at a piece of literature and said, "That's me".
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Summary: Wolff at the Door
Review: Toward the end of this wonderful little novel, a teacher says, "...one could not live in a world without stories." This is absolutely one of those stories. Beautifully wrought and told with an aching sense of the heaviness of life, the story is funny and poignant and so, so true. The tale is that of the unnamed narrator and his determination (nearly an obsession by novel's end) to earn a private audience with one of the school's three visiting writers: Robert Frost, Ayn Rand, Ernest Hemingway. (Academicians will chuckle knowingly at Wolff's portraits of these staples of American literature.) The plot heads in fairly unsurprising directions: what is surprising is the beauty with which Wolff handles his topic, capturing the angst of those teen years simultaneously with the joy and wonder of that age. As an additional bonus, Wolff also captures, especially in the book's coda, the essence of what it means to teach, to be a true teacher, one of those few who instruct from their very hearts, who teach because it is, indeed, a calling. This is a story one should not live without.
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Summary: A terrific book!
Review: Though the NYTimes gave this book a fairly negative review, I loved it. The description of Robert Frost reading to the boys in the school chapel is alone work the price of the book. This is a beautifully told story, with lots of humane insight into life and letters. You'll love it.
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Summary: A great new book from Mr. Wolff
Review: A wonderful new book by the master Tobias Wolff. Just a very perfect autobiographical read regarding his illustrious school days when snobbery was snobbery and the upper class acted like the upper class. He relates his run ins with famous literary people from Frost to Ayn Rand. The story also relates his experiences as youth at a prestigious American school surrounded by great faculty minds and the upper crust of America's youth.
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Summary: The Truth Lies Like Nothing Else....
Review: "Old School" by Tobias Wolff is riveting. This story of a New England boy's prep school in the 1960's is told in first person. The clincher is we never hear the tellers name, nor do we know what he looks like, but if I heard him speak in a crowd I would know him! We hear the story of his sixth form or senior year from a literary perspective. We meet his roommate Bill White and learn of his Jewish heritage, only by chance and not mentioned at all by Bill. George Kellogg, the literary review editor is a friend and foe. A fellow writer and a winner of one esteemed writing contests. And then there are the two Jeff Purcells,two other adversarial foes, little Jeff and big Jeff, cousins to the core. There was a tradition at the school where a famous writer was invited to the school to meet and greet, and one of the lucky boys had a private audience. To win this audience, the boys must write a story or a poem and the writer would get to choose which one he considered the best. Robert Frost and Ayn Rand were but two of these illustrious authors. One of the most interesting chapters in the book, is Ayn Rand's visit. The story teller got out of a sick bed (flu, runny nose, cough)to go to a private meeting with this author and some of the boys. The story teller was such a fan of "Fountainhead"- he had read it 4 times, and HAD to meet the author. He was disappointed and disgusted with Ayn Rand and her treatment of his friend and of the headmaster. He felt she was rude and obnoxious, and he becomes an avowed ex-fan of Ayn Rand. Ernest Hemingway was the next famous author to come to the school, and the storyteller had to win the private audience with him. He did win this prize, and the last chapters of the book describe the entire episodes leading up to this event in full regalia. The writing of his story that won the "best" prize, and the aftermath is an enigma. The ending of the book was a disappointment to me, I wanted more- I wanted to know and understand the full implications of the story tellers mischief.
Tobias Wolff has written a page turner- buy the book, read it, and enjoy it. prisrob
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Summary: An eloquent account of a writer¿s life
Review: Tobias Wolff has written quite a charming and beautifully elegant piece of work. He really brings to life the stuffy, and somewhat snobby atmosphere of a New England prep school in the early 1960's, while at the same time recounting his thoughts on literary sacrifice and the nature of artistic endeavor. Determined to make an impression, and to fit into the "tribe" the narrator, in desperation plagiarizes a story in order to obtain a private meeting with Ernest Hemmingway. Unfortunately, his actions come back to haunt him, and in his final year, everything he's achieved unravels. Wolff writes what he knows about, and he obviously has a great admiration for the world of literature. He recreates the dorm life of the school with startling authenticity - fifty different records playing at once, doors slamming, loud voices in long hallways, and the faint hiss of many showers all running together. The boys are conveyed in a gentlemanly, yet also rebellious light - their woolly smell, their silences in chapel, their furtive cigarette smoking, and their good manners. Much of the novel talks about what it means to be a writer, and the sorts of sacrifices and struggles that a writer must go through to produce and create his work. The struggling life of a writer is also talked about, and Wolff is making the point that a writer does not have to have an exemplary life to write great literature, rather a great writer can also lead a mundane and incidental life; it is the incidental life that can sometimes be the real fodder for great literature. There are some nice moments in Old School particularly the scene when the writer Ayn Rand comes to visit. And the narrator, flu ridden and unwell realizes for the first time that heroism doesn't necessarily come from doing majestic acts, but can in fact, come from the simple acts of giving time to children, domestic cares and the exertions of ordinary sympathy. Wolff has a nice, easy relaxed style that is "clean" without being too simplistic. Old School isn't one of my favourite novels of the year but I do think that the novel will definitely appeal to anyone who has a love of literature and writing; it's a simple and graceful novel that has a lot of complex things to say. Michael.
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