Catching up

[John F]

I've just now ordered a 22-year-old book from Barnes & Noble online - John Lahr's "Light Fantastic," a collection of his New Yorker reviews up to 1994 or so. For me, Lahr has been the most insightful and stylish writer on theatre and drama in English, during the last few decades at least, and his reviews of shows I've seen let me revisit them. This book includes his reviews of two late great plays, Pinter's "Moonlight" and Albee's "Three Tall Women," the latter now playing on Broadway with Glenda Jackson and subjected to a strange hatchet job by the New Yorker's current reviewer Hilton Als. Also three productions by Ingmar Bergman, one of which Lahr traveled to Stockholm to see. For those who enjoy reading theatre reviews, highly recommended.

Also recommended is Barnes & Noble as the best online source for book-buying. Many people look no further than Amazon, whose early success was as an online bookseller, but I think B&N is better. They have a $25 membership which gets you an automatic 10% discount on whatever you buy online or in their stores, plus frequent emails offering a further discount (usually 15%) usually tied to holidays. Naturally I wait for the email before buying anything. For orders above a minimum, shipping is free. I usually get back the cost of membership within a couple of months.

Barnes & Noble has its own ebook format and ereader, called Nook, and my niece and her children use that and are happier with it. I'm a Kindle man myself because the New York Public Library's ebooks are mostly in Kindle format, but the Nook with its color screen is better for illustrated children's books and for magazines.

[jbuck919]

John Lahr is the son of Bert Lahr, and there is a strong physical resemblance. Although the elder Lahr is most famous for his typically comedic role as the Cowardly Lion, he was in fact quite sophisticated, having performed in the US premiere (can't remember whether he was Vladimir or Estragon) of Waiting for Godot. When he made an appearance on What's My Line?, it came out that his son, presumable this John, and John Daly's son were classmates at, oh, what's the name of that school in Masschusetts that like mine produced miscellaneous library volunteers?

[jserraglio]

Estragon. E.G. Marshall played Didi.