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Once More Around the Block
Epstein's lively mind explores such topics as the pleasures of work, neighborhood, and keeping a journal; lecturing, language snobbery, and the comedy of gluttony; and the mixed delights of issuing and receiving praise, friendship, and growing into middle age.
- GenresEssays
Audio Cassette
First published September 16, 1987
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About the author
Joseph Epstein
104 books113 followersJoseph Epstein is the author of, among other books, Snobbery, Friendship, and Fabulous Small Jews. He has been editor of American Scholar and has written for the New Yorker, the Atlantic, Commentary, Town and Country, and other magazines.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 27, 2024
A recent appreciation of Joseph Epstein in the WSJ reminded me that I had enjoyed his essays in The American Scholar (written under the pseudonym Aristides) back in the late 70s and 8os. This volume includes more than a dozen essays from that era, mostly from that journal. Epstein was sacked as its editor of more than 25 years for failing to adhere to the prevailing ideologies of American academe. He should have remembered the fate of the original Aristides. He is a curmudgeon, still going at 87. I don't agree with him on everything, but he thinks for himself and writes well.
His essay on his "Lifetime Reading Plan" is worth the price of admission. A former student asks for a reading list. Epstein ruminates on lists and collections of great books, his own past reading and future reading plans, concluding that life isn't nearly long enough to read everything interesting and good (not always the same, as he observes). He reminisces about his days at the University of Chicago in the late fifties, reading Aristotle and Plato, Thucydides and Tacitus, Rousseau, Dostoevsky, Marx, et al.: "It taught you who the important writers are; it gave you some notion of what is important about them, which is chiefly the questions they deal with; and it lent you a certain animal confidence, so that you were never afraid of taking on the most serious of books. This, I have since come to think, is a great deal." Clearly Chicago was one of the great formative experiences in his life. In the end, he gives very sound advice: "the main thing is to have some time-tested and officially great book going at all times-Gibbon, perhaps, or Cervantes-alongside which you can read less thumpingly significant books."
"Let Us Now Praise Famous Knuckleheads" takes on the epidemic of cheap and excessive praise-in letters of recommendation, reviews, obituaries. "The dead are owed kindness, whether they are also owed praise is another question." A nice update on de mortuis nil nisi bonum.
"Unwilling to Relocate" describes Epstein's life in Evanston,Illinois, his routines and the neighborhood characters and landmarks. Anyone who grew up in a midwestern city in the mid-twentieth century (Cincinnati, in my case), is likely to find much that resonates.
"New and Previously Owned Books and Other Creampuffs" is an affectionate paean to the bookstore. "Tea and Antipathy" covers literary hatreds and feuds. Other essays cover language snobbery, the pleasures of food (the conspiracy of the medical profession to remove all of life's small pleasures), lectures, journal keeping, etc. Epstein is widely read and has a keen sense of humor. Occasionally an essay falls bit short, resulting in tedium or annoyance, but overall a very enjoyable book. It may be a bit dated for younger readers. Nostalgia has its rewards.
His essay on his "Lifetime Reading Plan" is worth the price of admission. A former student asks for a reading list. Epstein ruminates on lists and collections of great books, his own past reading and future reading plans, concluding that life isn't nearly long enough to read everything interesting and good (not always the same, as he observes). He reminisces about his days at the University of Chicago in the late fifties, reading Aristotle and Plato, Thucydides and Tacitus, Rousseau, Dostoevsky, Marx, et al.: "It taught you who the important writers are; it gave you some notion of what is important about them, which is chiefly the questions they deal with; and it lent you a certain animal confidence, so that you were never afraid of taking on the most serious of books. This, I have since come to think, is a great deal." Clearly Chicago was one of the great formative experiences in his life. In the end, he gives very sound advice: "the main thing is to have some time-tested and officially great book going at all times-Gibbon, perhaps, or Cervantes-alongside which you can read less thumpingly significant books."
"Let Us Now Praise Famous Knuckleheads" takes on the epidemic of cheap and excessive praise-in letters of recommendation, reviews, obituaries. "The dead are owed kindness, whether they are also owed praise is another question." A nice update on de mortuis nil nisi bonum.
"Unwilling to Relocate" describes Epstein's life in Evanston,Illinois, his routines and the neighborhood characters and landmarks. Anyone who grew up in a midwestern city in the mid-twentieth century (Cincinnati, in my case), is likely to find much that resonates.
"New and Previously Owned Books and Other Creampuffs" is an affectionate paean to the bookstore. "Tea and Antipathy" covers literary hatreds and feuds. Other essays cover language snobbery, the pleasures of food (the conspiracy of the medical profession to remove all of life's small pleasures), lectures, journal keeping, etc. Epstein is widely read and has a keen sense of humor. Occasionally an essay falls bit short, resulting in tedium or annoyance, but overall a very enjoyable book. It may be a bit dated for younger readers. Nostalgia has its rewards.
March 27, 2021
A collection of familiar essays shouldn’t be life changing, but this one changed mine. I read it when I was on a family vacation at the age of sixteen. I had brought a couple thrillers to read, and when I was done and found myself looking for a book my mom said, “Read this. You’ll like it. It’s funny.”
I was skeptical. A book of essays? It sounded like homework. But my mom was right; I enjoyed this book from the first page. Epstein won me over immediately with his wit, humor, and style. He also always seemed to have the right quote or the right anecdote. These quotes and anecdotes were by or about writers who I may have heard of, but hadn’t ever read.
After I finished reading Once More Around the Block, I started looking for books by the writers mentioned by Epstein, and for the first time in my life I began to read serious literature. From my late teens through my twenties I read serious books almost exclusively, and I found many of them through Epstein’s works. If you look at my Goodreads list, you’ll see I read lots of mysteries and science fiction these days, but my reading life has been much richer than it would have been if I had never found Joseph Epstein.
Great book. Beautifully written, witty, amusing, and erudite.
I was skeptical. A book of essays? It sounded like homework. But my mom was right; I enjoyed this book from the first page. Epstein won me over immediately with his wit, humor, and style. He also always seemed to have the right quote or the right anecdote. These quotes and anecdotes were by or about writers who I may have heard of, but hadn’t ever read.
After I finished reading Once More Around the Block, I started looking for books by the writers mentioned by Epstein, and for the first time in my life I began to read serious literature. From my late teens through my twenties I read serious books almost exclusively, and I found many of them through Epstein’s works. If you look at my Goodreads list, you’ll see I read lots of mysteries and science fiction these days, but my reading life has been much richer than it would have been if I had never found Joseph Epstein.
Great book. Beautifully written, witty, amusing, and erudite.
August 24, 2011
Simply one of the best writers I have ever read. This is another collection of literary essays by Joseph Epstein and the first that I have read. Epstein’s discursive and personal style is most appropriate to his pieces on humor, choosing a lifetime reading syllabus, and being an armchair sports fanatic. All but one of these essays appeared under the byline Aristides in THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR. The exception, “My Friend Martin,” first appeared in COMMENTARY; it stands out as a pointed tribute to a deceased friend. Other subjects covered by Epstein include his neighborhood, praise, the state of the language, friendship, eating, lecturing, hatred, and aging. Epstein's style is conversational and at the same time edifying. The result, however can be unexpectedly and puzzlingly lenient or harsh, depending upon the subject presented. The resulting prose is pure pleasure to read and I find every time I pick up the book I am impressed with it for that reason. Worth reading, rereading, or just dipping into from time to time. His essays are each like a perfect jewel.
July 30, 2013
This collection of Epstein's essays begins with one on work that I would categorize as my least favorite Epstein essay ever, showing him as smarmy and unable to enter other people's point of view. And to disparage Studs Terkel's Working only made me dismiss the essay entirely. The rest of the essays were of variable quality - good ones on bookstores, reading, living in Evanston, and journaling. Just okay ones on class and friendship (the beginnings of his book on friendship that wore out its welcome with me). A particularly unhumorous essay on humor that made me realize we have different senses of humor. Many of the rest are fine personal essays, but overall this collection does not shine like the best of Epstein's essays. Perhaps it is too personal and not literary enough.
May 14, 2016
Another sumptuous feast of delightful essays by Epstein. The man has been consistent. Written in his middle age, and already a curmudgeon.*
* Since I first stumbled on his work written while in his seventies, I've been gradually looking back, unearthing his older, earlier works. Again, he has been very consistent in mentioning the usual writers: Edward Shils, Lionel Trilling, Edmund Wilson, Theodore Dreiser, Somerset Maugham. With Edith Wharton being the only woman, it seems.
* Since I first stumbled on his work written while in his seventies, I've been gradually looking back, unearthing his older, earlier works. Again, he has been very consistent in mentioning the usual writers: Edward Shils, Lionel Trilling, Edmund Wilson, Theodore Dreiser, Somerset Maugham. With Edith Wharton being the only woman, it seems.
May 10, 2008
Topics include work, journaling, lecturing, language, gluttony, friendship and aging.
December 20, 2009
Epstein is a masterful essayist and consummately witty. His essays are full of well chosen quotations. Even when I don't agree with his point of view, I am too amused to mind.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews