Robert B. Silvers is editor of The New York Review of Books. Prior to joining the Review, Mr. Silvers was, from 1959 to 1963, associate editor of Harper's magazine, editor of the book Writing in America and translator of La Gangrene. Before that, Mr. Silvers lived in Paris for six years (1952 to 1958), where he served with the U.S. Army at SHAPE Headquarters and attended the Sorbonne and Ecole des Sciences Politiques. He joined the editorial board of The Paris Review in 1954 and became Paris editor in 1956. He also worked as press secretary to Governor Chester Bowles in 1950. Mr. Silvers, who graduated from the University of Chicago in 1947, was born in Mineola, New York. »

Doing It: Five Performing Arts

Edited by Robert B. Silvers

Does an opera producer do anything besides tell the singers where to stand? Can a single note be played more or less beautifully on the piano? In these essays, five of our most accomplished artists and critics explore questions of technique and interpretation in the performing arts.

Tom Stoppard considers ways of controlling how an audience gets information while watching a play, and Charles Rosen reflects on the very physical relationship between the musician and the instrument. Jonathan Miller describes ways of restoring dramatic motivation to some of our best-loved operas. Garry Wills argues that the collaborative and commercial pressures of filmmaking have produced some of our greatest cinematic achievements, and Geoffrey O'Brien looks at how hip audiences in the Nineties have rediscovered Sixties pop music icon Burt Bacharach.

Witty, trenchant, often surprising, and always insightful, this collection is essential reading for all devotees of theatrical, musical, and film performance.

Reviews

Highly enjoyable and rich in suggestive incidental insights.
— Rupert Christiansen, The Spectator, August 11, 2001

Also see:

The First Anthology Edited by Barbara Epstein and Rea S. Hederman and Robert B. Silvers Published in conjunction with The New York Review's 30th anniversary, this striking compendium features some of the world's most distinguished writing on literature, politics, history, and culture.

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