Synopses & Reviews
Simon Leys is a Renaissance man for the era of globalization: a distinguished scholar of classical Chinese art and literature, he was one of the first Westerners to expose the horrors of Mao’s Cultural Revolution. Leys’s interests and expertise are not, however, confined to China: he also writes about European art, literature, history, and politics, and is an unflinching observer of the way we live now. No matter the topic he writes with unfailing elegance and intelligence, seriousness and acerbic wit. Leys is, in short, not simply a critic or commentator but an essayist, and one of the most outstanding ones of our time.
The Hall of Uselessness gathers the finest of Leys’s essays for an American audience for the first time. On subjects ranging from China to Orwell and from Quixotism to the sea, Leys feuds with Christopher Hitchens, ponders the popularity of Victor Hugo, and considers whether Vladimir Nabokov’s posthumous novel should ever have been published. He dissects Mao’s Cultural Revolution and the Khmer Rouge regime, and discusses the legacies of Waugh, Chesterton, Simenon, and Confucius. He discusses Chinese art, culture, and politics; the joys of literary translation; and the fate of the university.
The Hall of Uselessness is an illuminating compendium from a brilliant and quirky writer and an exemplary global voice.
About the Author
An NYRB Classics Original
Simon Leys is a Renaissance man for the era of globalization. A distinguished scholar of classical Chinese art and literature and one of the first Westerners to recognize the appalling toll of Mao’s Cultural Revolution, Leys also writes with unfailing intelligence, seriousness, and bite about European art, literature, history, and politics and is an unflinching observer of the way we live now.
The Hall of Uselessness is the most extensive collection of Leys’s essays to be published to date. In it, he addresses subjects ranging from the Chinese attitude to the past to the mysteries of Belgium and Belgitude; offers portraits of André Gide and Zhou Enlai; takes on Roland Barthes and Christopher Hitchens; broods on the Cambodian genocide; reflects on the spell of the sea; and writes with keen appreciation about writers as different as Victor Hugo, Evelyn Waugh, and Georges Simenon. Throughout, The Hall of Uselessness is marked with the deep knowledge, skeptical intelligence, and passionate conviction that have made Simon Leys one of the most powerful essayists of our time.