Irving
Continued from Page 8B
I
through.
The Berry's passage from ho
tel to hotel to hotel to hotel
(there are four in all, three
named Hotel New Hampshire)
spans about a 50-year period. In
that time, a circus of characters,
ideologies, sexual relationships
and bears float on the family's
periphery, threatening and
tempting its stability The Berrys
hold themselves together with
the glue of dreams, humor and
circumstances that could occur
only in Irving's wild and enter
taining imagination
Because of Irving's relentless
juxtaposition of the possible
and impossible, the book gets a
little out of hand, fictional liber
ties aside Like “Garp,’' the
story becomes increasingly
violent and unbelievable. The
central characters, all fairly well
differentiated and delineated by
their special obsessions and
styles of speech (Irving could
write great screenplays), seem
to lose some substance through
the direction of the plot Our
interest in them wanes as the
story gets sillier and the the plot
goes awry
Flaws aside, the book should
be read and enjoyed indis
crimateiy, quickly and with
abandon It should be read for
its movement, its precise and
sensitive rendering of child
hood, its elegant depiction of
several dreamy scenes that hint
of Fitzgerald
Certainly no current writer
captures childhood and its
fears, hopes and anxieties as
Irving does, nor does any author
guard his characters from ca
price, fate and danger as ten
derly. Irving makes his best fic
tion from characters in touch
with their childhood schemes
and dreams But when the same
characters start to grow up,'
he ends the scene, or the novel
With this kind of storytelling
device, or approach, Irving
cheats the reader, especially
when "Hotel'' starts to sputter
midway We re too often mar
ooned before we really know a
character or a scene
Irving does his job as teaser,
magician and stellar storyteller
But after "Hotel," he may prove
that he's not concerned with
resolutions He may continue to
exercise the doubtful privilege
that fiction can indiscriminately
start, stop or go anywhere it
pleases
Angela Allen
L.L. Bean parody wins
“Items From Our Catalog”
By Alfred Gingold
Avon Books. 1982
84 pages. $4.95
“Items From Our Catalog"
may very well be the funniest
book in years
It is a parody of the L.L Bean
catalog Right down to the
typeface, it captures the slightly
stuffy but quaint Maine friendli
ness of Bean's, but substitutes a
wildly bizarre assortment of
items for the normal fare
At first one isn't sure what this
book is Is it real? Like a good
parody should, it takes a
moment for the joke to sink in
It soon does, accompanied by
great laughter
Gingold includes items which
duplicate Bean's, items similar
to Bean's and items so comple
tely off-the-wall one wishes they
were in Bean's just to tease the
Abercrombie and Fitch senses
of its customers
One classic Bean garment is
their Norwegian Sweater Gin
gold offers a bulletproof ver
Weekend
Special
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Friday afternoon
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A-WAY
683-0874
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Some Restrictions
sion
Bean's own brand of insula
tion is Thinsulate Gingold
uses Thinsulite' to insulate
papal vestments
The classic watchcap in
' Items" is solar powered
Then it gets really strange
Imagine a down yarmulke. dress
waders, camouflage shoelaces
and Swiss Army earrings Each
item, naturally, is explained in
complete detail
Then there's lip chaps, fresh
air freshener — to make the
outdoors smell like outdoors —
and the combination compass
and compact in an elegant tor
toise shell case
For Eugene folks there's mis
matched socks, tofu innersoles
and "Our Own Shoe and Hair
Care Products
For the really strange there's
hubcap cookware, swab covers
(to keep your Q-Tips clean, of
course) and a well designed,
fully functional infant,'' 6 lbs,
$13.75
For protecting your food
there's the famous fruit sweater
(zippered), a fur-lined tuna case
Continued from Page 12B
TEETH
Ignore them
and they will
go away
Teeth Cleaning, Exam
and
X-Rays as needed
$25
Will Morningsun, D.D.S.
Thomas R. Huhn, D.D.S.
Sarah Hollander, D.M.D.
call for appointment
746-6517
| Vi miles from campus, next to Bike Path
528 Mill St., Springfield
r
Merry Christmas Coupon from Lazar’s
Bring this coupon in to recent
ONE FREE PIPE
(must be 18 vears of age)
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just for stopping by.
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om the dmt nfrtum matt
Lazar’s Bazar
687-0139
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689-8464