Rating: 
Summary: a masterpiece
Review: "picture this" is a masterpiece of writing. it is an enchanting work, about often tragic subjects, showing humanity both at it's greatest and it's lowest points, which often occur at the same times. cynnical, informative, wonderfuly funny, complex and sad sometimes, it is one of the best books I have read
Rating: 
Summary: Plot, Admittedly an Optional Literary Device, Is Helpful
Review: I loved Catch-22 so I read this book as well. Unfortunately, the passage of time is quite apparent in the work product of the author. It is true that "Picture This" is full of witty insights into history. But the plot feels forced, the comedic timing is off, and in the end, the book seems like a hodge-podge of "gee wiz, that sure makes ya THINK about things" types of statements. I think it's a safe bet that anyone who reads this novel has gotten there by way of Catch-22. This was also the case when "Picture This" was released. Something more is needed to justify the book's 351 pages in hardcover besides basic assurances that "the world is f****d up." You're better off just reading your copy of Catch-22 again. The theme is basically the same (absent the rant against money, which is poorly defended), except conveyed through characters that the reader actually cares about.
Rating:
Summary: Plot, Admittedly an Optional Literary Device, Is Helpful
Review: I loved Catch-22 so I read this book as well. Unfortunately, the passage of time is quite apparent in the work product of the author. It is true that "Picture This" is full of witty insights into history. But the plot feels forced, the comedic timing is off, and in the end, the book seems like a hodge-podge of "gee wiz, that sure makes ya THINK about things" types of statements. I think it's a safe bet that anyone who reads this novel has gotten there by way of Catch-22. This was also the case when "Picture This" was released. Something more is needed to justify the book's 351 pages in hardcover besides basic assurances that "the world is f****d up." You're better off just reading your copy of Catch-22 again. The theme is basically the same (absent the rant against money, which is poorly defended), except conveyed through characters that the reader actually cares about.
Rating:
Summary: Heller's Very Good Second Best
Review: Joe Heller had a hell of a job matching Catch 22. The reviews of its ostensible sequel Closing Time (many of them unfairly negative) prove this. Several of his works in the 70's and early 80's tried to live up and, although decent novels, fell well short of the mark. Ultimately in 1988 he struck gold (no pun intended) again. Picture this is a tour de force of all of Heller's best dialogue writing, irony and subtle political commentary and does all of the things right that Catch 22 did, although at a somewhat lesser volume. It has always been a mystery to me why the book wasn't better received critically and financially, apart from the possible fact that it came close on the heels of Heller's frightening episode of Guillan Barre syndrome and his nonfiction work on that experience. Anyone who has enjoyed his best work and been slightly disapponted by his also-rans ought to pick this one up for a light but thoughtful and entirely pleasant read.
Rating:
Summary: Heller's Very Good Second Best
Review: Joe Heller had a hell of a job matching Catch 22. The reviews of its ostensible sequel Closing Time (many of them unfairly negative) prove this. Several of his works in the 70's and early 80's tried to live up and, although decent novels, fell well short of the mark. Ultimately in 1988 he struck gold (no pun intended) again. Picture this is a tour de force of all of Heller's best dialogue writing, irony and subtle political commentary and does all of the things right that Catch 22 did, although at a somewhat lesser volume. It has always been a mystery to me why the book wasn't better received critically and financially, apart from the possible fact that it came close on the heels of Heller's frightening episode of Guillan Barre syndrome and his nonfiction work on that experience. Anyone who has enjoyed his best work and been slightly disapponted by his also-rans ought to pick this one up for a light but thoughtful and entirely pleasant read.
Rating: 
Summary: Very funny really
Review: Joseph Heller has been compared to Mark Twain and rightfully so. Like Twain, Heller has a sharp sense of humor and can easily point out the foibles of mankind. If you are looking for a modern novel with well developed characters and a plot- look elswhere. If you think you know anything at all about Rembrandt or life in the 17th century, then try this one on for size.
Heller's paints a picture of Rembrandt (and Aristotle) that makes them so human you can laugh out loud at them, and you will.
Rating: 
Summary: Superb, sensitive, imaginative scholarship down the drain
Review: PICTURE THIS is a paradox -- a mammoth delight and a monstrous disappointment. It's a startlingly imaginative work in which Heller blends three disparate times in history. Aristotle awakens as Rembrandt applies paint to canvas. When Rembrandt paints his ear, Aristotle hears. As the brush perfects the eyes, Aristotle sees. And always, Aristotle observes.Heller portrays life in mid-17th century Amsterdam and in the 3rd century before Christ, commenting on similarities to modern living, jumping back and forth between the ages, and tracing the 300-year history of the portrait. It's quite a mix, and that's where the book fails. He just doesn't pull it off. The book reminds me of a game of checkers played without rules. It's an uncoordinated hopscotch through centuries, filled with distractions, tangents and irrelevant side trips. It's as though he tried to combine several books into one and missed. Heller's books (CATCH-22, GOD KNOWS, etc.) are unique. Maybe he just tried too hard to be different. The text lacks discipline, organization and the feel for language we expect from master writers. Paragraphs are disjointed, sentences are clumsy and overburdened. Too often they just plain don't make any sense. "The great seaport city of Amsterdam was then the richest and busiest shipping center in the world. The great seaport city of Amsterdam was not a seaport but is situated a good seventy miles from the closest deepwater shipping facilities in the North Sea." That's amateurish and sloppy. And typical. Heller's mediocre, journalistic style (reminiscent of Kurt Vonnegut's) is inadequate for the job he has cut out for himself. The superb, sensitive and imaginative scholarship displayed in PICTURE THIS deserves organized, disciplined, and equally sensitive writing. It didn't get it.
Rating:
Summary: A large work
Review: PICTURE THIS is an enormous and sprawling work. I do not mean large in the word-count (though it's no slouch in this category) but in the scope. The back cover summary promises a "jaunt through 2,500 years of Western civilization" and it certainly delivers that. Unfortunately the result is a mixture of good and bad. At its best, it can be spellbinding, but at its worst it comes across as a fairly boring history lesson. The book is vaguely centered around a piece of artwork that a Sicilian nobleman named Don Antonio Ruffo paid five hundred guilders for Rembrandt to produce. The painting is that of the Greek philosopher Aristotle contemplating a bust of the Greek poet and storyteller Homer. Using this foundation as a springboard, Joseph Heller jumps back and forth in time giving different perceptions on a number of different concepts. Money, power and art are just a few of the topics that Heller touches on and for the most part, as the expression goes, the more things change the more they stay the same. There are some memorable insights into the role that war, commerce, etc. have played in society. On the other hand, PICTURE THIS does tend to get weighed down underneath its grandiose pretensions. While much of the book discusses the relation that history has to the concepts it contains, there are far too many passages that are just dry rehashes of historical documents. This is most apparent in the sections concerning the Greek philosophers where, at worst, the book spends several pages just rephrasing the events and philosophies that Plato described in APOLOGY, CRITO and THE REPUBLIC. Although these sections can be interesting (probably even more so to any readers who aren't already familiar with them) they are not always related to the rest of the story. For some of these sections, one would be better off reading the actual texts rather than just the summary of them included here. The main sections of the book are split between long discussions about the wars of the ancient Greek world and numerous lectures upon the role of money/commerce in the Dutch society of Rembrandt's era. Some of it is extremely interesting. Some of it is stunningly dull. There are some very clever themes that run throughout the book such as the portrait of Aristotle being sentient and able to give a commentary on how different and similar life is in Rembrandt's time to that of his own. As readers in the beginning of the 21st Century, we can are also able reflect upon how their life is similar to ours. Heller is aware of this and lets the narrative play around with this idea, and while it isn't totally successful in every case, it's effective enough to be very powerful. This book definitely has some gems contained within it. Just be warned that there is a lot of padding in between. While it's ultimately a rewarding experience, there are portions of it that are just tedious to read.
Rating:
Summary: Catch This
Review: Readers contemplating Heller writing Rembrandt painting Aristotle contemplating a bust of Homer should themselves be considered amongst Heller's most refined audience.
Having stripped away the superficial trappings of plot, Heller tells a marvelous tale. Having brushed aside continuity, Heller is able to put history in its inevitably tragic context, for which the only defense is unrelenting laughter.
Readers of Catch-22 will be pleased to find that the Master of noir comedy has since greatly improved his skills, leaving the now classic, more-than-just-an-anti-war-novel as a comparative table-scraps.
Read it twice, savioring the incomperably involuted prose. Then go back and read it again for the story itself.
Rating:
Summary: Catch This
Review: Readers contemplating Heller writing Rembrandt painting Aristotle contemplating a bust of Homer should themselves be considered amongst Heller's most refined audience. Having stripped away the superficial trappings of plot, Heller tells a marvelous tale. Having brushed aside continuity, Heller is able to put history in its inevitably tragic context, for which the only defense is unrelenting laughter. Readers of Catch-22 will be pleased to find that the Master of noir comedy has since greatly improved his skills, leaving the now classic, more-than-just-an-anti-war-novel as a comparative table-scraps. Read it twice, savioring the incomperably involuted prose. Then go back and read it again for the story itself.
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