Men: Notes from an Ongoing Investigation
ISBN10: 1250075165
ISBN13: 9781250075161
Trade Paperback
224 Pages
$16.00
CA$18.50
It's no secret that men often behave in confusing ways, but in recent years we've witnessed so many spectacular public displays of male excess-disgraced politicians, erotically desperate professors, fallen sports icons-that we're left to wonder whether something has come unwired in the collective male psyche.
In the essays collected here, Laura Kipnis draws out the angst and emotional contradictions implicit in what look like exercises of male privilege, revisiting the archetypes of wayward masculinity that have captured her imagination over the years, and scrutinizing men who have figured in her own life, alongside more controversial public examples. Slicing through the usual clichés about the differences between the sexes, Kipnis mixes intellectual rigor and wit to give us a compelling survey of the affinities, jealousies, longings, and erotics that structure the male-female bond.
Reviews
Praise for Men: Notes from an Ongoing Investigation
“Acerbic, wildly entertaining . . . Kipnis's combination of breeziness and erudition makes her unusual and unusually valuable.”—The Washington Post
“The patriarchal world, through Kipnis's eyes, is consistently and quietly funny . . . Her coolheaded, ironical assessments of modern masculinity read like perfectly timed eye rolls.”—The New York Times Book Review
“These are times to try the weary feminist reader's patience, when the conversation seems dominated by absolutist twenty-three-year-olds still burning off the righteous indignation of their first women's studies courses. It's a cultural moment that begs for a worldly, ambiguity-friendly thinker like Laura Kipnis . . . She is a swashbuckling stylist, with a knack for nailing the essence of a remark by means of a canny metaphor . . . Humor and a kind of rueful empathy for human folly, not outrage, tends to be her go-to response.”—Laura Miller, Salon
“There is much fun to be had in experiencing the way that Kipnis follows her topics into unexpected territory, which is not unrelated to her charming inability to be the kind of easily outraged critic the world often seems to want . . . [An] insightful, intelligent, and frequently hilarious collection.”—Bookforum
“A smart collection of weird, funny, and devotedly iconoclastic essays.”—Chicago Sun-Times
“Kipnis's gifts are on full display in this irresistible collection of essays, in which she weaves together complex and penetrating insights about gender into provocative treatises . . . Kipnis's arguments are never predictable: for example, her chapter on ‘juicers,' ostensibly about steroid-abusing male athletes, evolves into a profound soliloquy about writing, plagiarism, and labor markets. Her examination of modern manhood sheds as much light on male vulnerability as it does on male privilege, entitlement, and abuse . . . Kipnis has given us a necessary, and often witty, book that shows a brilliant, agile mind at work.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Feisty, unapologetic forays into the messiness of gender relations . . . rendered in funny, spirited writing.”—Kirkus Reviews
Reviews from Goodreads
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Laura Kipnis Discusses Her Book 'Men: Notes from an Ongoing Investigation'
From the notoriously contrarian author of Against Love, a witty and probing examination of why badly behaved men have been her lifelong fascination, on and off the page.
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