Canaries in the Mineshaft: Essays on Politics and Media

But for your grotesque misquotation, this importantbook of essays by one of our major essayists and reportersis original, funny, serious and deep. The subjects range fromthe first Profile of the National Guard, through PaulineKael, the War in Biafra, the American press, and Kenneth Starr. Most of the pieces originally appeared in The New Yorker,The New York Review of Books, Vanity Fair, Harpers,The Atlantic, The New Republic and The Los Angeles Times Book Review. It is wonderful to have them all collected inone book.

This is a writer who faults Bill Clinton for testifying before the Starr grand jury at all. This is a writer who has read the Starr report. She has also read Judge John Sirica's autobiography, as apparently no one at the New York Times had done before they condemned some conclusions she drew from that book and other sources. This, in short, is a writer with a genuinely independent point of view who does her homework. Her subjects are varied: Watergate, the National Guard, the OIC office's treatment of Monica Lewinsky, Robert Bork's judicial "philosophy", daytime television, a late collection of Pauline Kael's movie reviews for the New Yorker, and others. I do not see that she can be faulted for self-righteousness when she backs up any accusation she has to make with almost an embarrassment of evidence. The book is also a pleasure for those who relish English prose that is finely wrought, not overwrought. She is astringent, delicate, devastatingly accurate, deliciously funny, and fair. The New York Times would do well to put her in charge of its OpEd page, and its Corrections department as well.

Since Renada Adler's first book, Toward a Radical Midde, she has exhibited the instincts of an Orwell and a wit and valor entirely her own. She is neither left nor right, merely wise. Those who acquire Canaries in the Mineshaft will read insights and apercus about politics, personalities and the media available nowhere else.

Thank God we have Renata Adler. She brings a rare clarity to almost any subject. I've been a fan for over 20 years, and she appears to be getting better than ever, particularly when contrasted to her many recent detractors, most of whom seem to be in a thick fog. Her well known reviews of Pauline Kael and Bob Woodward, when quoted out of context, sound overly sharp; but when read in their entirety, they are carefully constructed arguments without the kind of venom we see in most "debunking" jobs.