Willard Spiegelman is the Hughes Professor of English at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. From 1984 until 2016, he was also the editor in chief of Southwest Review. He has written many books and essays about English and American poetry. For more than a quarter century he has been a regular contributor to the Leisure & Arts pages of The Wall Street Journal.
Willard Spiegelman's Senior Moments is a work of deep seriousness
and profundity delivered with lightness, moral poise, and a warm,
witty, conversational humility. It is dulce et utile both--a balm
to the reader thinking (or trying to think) about ageing and
mortality; and a practical guide to some of the surprising,
hardy-perennial pleasures that can unexpectedly survive and deepen,
even as one's hours, days, months, years, dwindle. Spiegelman is
cherishable in the same friendly, yet paradoxical, way Montaigne
is--robustly sad, joyfully unillusioned, and yet alive to life in a
manner that both consoles and delights. --Terry Castle, author of
The Professor: A Sentimental Education With 'Senior Moments',
Willard Spiegelman gives us one of the most poignant and amusing
accounts of what it's really like to go through that rite of
passage that is the twelfth grade. From choosing a college, to
finals, to the prom, he . . . wait. What? It's not that? Oh. Um,
can I get back to you? --Chip Kidd "Aging is our universal
condition: the only question is whether we approach our seniority
kicking and screaming or proceed with some degree of style and, let
us hope, capacity for happiness. Spiegelman's wise, witty, spirited
essays show how we might work our way over to the
style-and-happiness route, and are as good a guide for living
well--at any age--as any other that I know." --Ben Fountain, author
of Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk "They say we are living in a
golden age of the personal essay, and it's true . . . Walk with
Willard through New York, Tokyo, Dallas, his personal library,
museums--walk with Willard through life." --Mark Oppenheimer,
author of Knocking on Heaven's Door "Spiegelman makes a reliable
ambassador for the changes that advancing years bring, animated by
gratitude and warmly ready for further inquiry: he might be giving,
and making more achievable, Pope's famous advice: 'Keep good humor
still, whate'er we lose.'" --Stephen Burt, author of The Art of the
Sonnet "Willard Spiegelman is a wise old soul." --Raymond Sokolov,
author of Why We Eat What We Eat "A book so vivid and personable
that one has the impression of sitting across a dinner table from
its author. He talks to us in a tone at once convivial and elegiac
as he addresses some of life's biggest questions: What makes us
happy? How can we make the best use of our brief lifetimes? To
tackle these, Spiegelman brings to bear his vast erudition, humane
intelligence, wit, and personal candor. The result is a beautiful
and wise book about making daily life a meaningful pleasure."
--Rhonda Garelick, author of Mademoiselle: Coco Chanel and the
Pulse of History "Senior Moments takes us on a learned, witty
meander from "Talk" to "Quiet," passing through Dallas, Japan, New
York City, books, and art along the way. He treads so lightly, it
takes a while to notice that this is a guidebook to aging and
preparation-with grace and sweetness-for the final silence."
--Rosanna Warren, author of Ghost in a Red Hat: Poems Willard
Spiegelman writes essays like Ferran Adria approached "molecular"
gastronomy, with conscious, understated artistry. --Bill Thompson,
The Charleston Post and Courier "He's an agreeable, wise and witty
companion -- edifying, fun and fearless as he proffers lessons in
happiness and aging learned during his long, distinguished career."
--The Dallas Morning News "Mr. Spiegelman adopts the discursive,
finely crafted voice of a literature professor, revealing a
penchant for aphorism and allusion." --Wall Street Journal
"[Willard Spiegelman is] a master of form . . . connecting the
personal to the universal." [Senior Moments is ]a sophisticated and
fun read . . . a comfort, and a joy, to learn that someone with a
sharp wit and even sharper mind has considered the questions,
blazed a trail, and created a thoughtful record of the journey."
--Ocala Star Banner "Lucid and propulsive, opening portals to
heightened enjoyment of the time we have." --Kirkus Reviews
"Spiegelman writes with a casual, engaging style and frequently
punctuates his paragraphs with references to literature that
crystallize his ideas. Readers will find this volume rich with
relatable insights." --Publishers Weekly "Readers of a similar age
will savor his delight in language and life as he ponders the past
and peers into the future." --Booklist "I can think of no one
better to help me adjust to getting older . . . This is a
delightful book of essays." --Glen Roven, The Huffington Post
"[Spiegelman] takes himself lightly and brings fresh energy to an
appreciation of many subjects. . . with conversational whimsy and
genuine gratitude for the people, places, ideas, and memories they
inspire. . . The author draws on an equal blend of critical rigor
and love for his themes. --Library Journal Well-written essays by
an elder who is very skilled at weaving together the experiences of
his life . . . Creative and wise. --Spirituality and Practice
Reading these reflections is like sitting in a restaurant and
listening while your quietly garrulous friend leans forward over
his drink and, on almost any subject you could name, reminisces,
jokes, speculates, analyzes and talks, talks, talks . . . casually
brilliant. --Donald Mace Williams, San Antonio Express-News [Senior
Moments] engages gently and also ponders the pleasures of
nostalgia, art and solitude. You'll want to enjoy Spiegelman's
Senior Moments slowly. --Charmaine Chan, South China Post Senior
Moments is a memoir that surprises and enchants.--Colin Harrington,
Berkshire Eagle An eloquent fusion of memoir and essay, "Senior
Moments" is at its heart a toast to life, art and the pursuit and
appreciation of Quality. And the pages are so passionate,
well-reasoned and affectionate that one could easily see the
71-year-old Spiegelman walking through a fine museum with smiling
old Death Himself, chatting together in celebration of the art of
conversation and life's possibilities. --Rick Koster, The New
London Day
Senior Moments is quick with good sense, playfulness, and probing
intelligence. His prose is so elegant that if I'd not aged beyond
fervors and lusts of all vivifying kinds, I would be envious . . .
Senior Moments is a door, making the reader feel alive, urging him
to appreciate his life, be that life composed of memories or of
streets as yet untraveled. --Sam Pickering, Kenyon Review Senior
Moments is just wonderful... Over the past five years I've become
addicted, above all, to the machinery of sentences, and your book
is full of so many amazing syntactical machines. They give me hope
that it's still possible to write well: that the language, for all
it has suffered, is undiminished. --Patrick Phillips, author of
Blood at the Root Willard Spiegelman's improbably titled Senior
Moments is a delicious read. Viva! --C.M. Mayo [Senior Moments is]
a pleasant, wide-ranging journey taken with a friend who knows how
to provoke important thoughts and concerns, in the midst of wry
smiles and laughter. --Si Dunn, Lone Star Literary Life
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