See What Can Be Done

<i>When in 1999 I began writing for </i>The New York Review of Books<i> ... my stance became that of the ingenuous Martian who had just landed on a gorgeous </i><i>alien planet ... </i><i>Montaigne's </i>que sais-je<i>. A little light, a little wonder, some skepticism, some awe, some squinting, some </i>je ne sais quoi<i>. Pick a thing up, study it, shake it, skip it across a still surface to see how much felt and lively life got baked into it. Does it sail? Observe. See what can be done.</i><br><br>Lorrie Moore has been writing criticism for over thirty years, and her forensically intelligent, witty, and engaging essays are collected together here for the first time. Whether writing on <i>Titanic</i>, Margaret Atwood, or <i>The Wire</i>, her pieces always offer elegant and surprising insights into multiple forms of art. Crucially, Moore is a practitioner who writes criticism; her discussion of other people's work is based on her understanding of what it really takes to make something out of nothing: of what it takes to make art. This lends her encounters with books, films, and paintings the uniquely intimate quality which has made them so immensely popular with readers.<br><br>In sparkling, articulate prose - studded with frequently hilarious insights - Moore's meditations are a rare opportunity to witness a brilliant mind thinking things through and figuring things out on the page.