Articles by Charles Solomon Page 2

LAURIE Powers had only a few hazy memories of her grandfather, the author of the western novel “Doc Dillahay” (1949). Read more

AMERICAN kids may have the reputation of not liking to read, but thousands of them are devouring the adventures of their favorite manga and anime characters in translated novelizations that have begun appearing in the U.S. Popular examples include the daring adventures of the sorcerer brothers Edward and Alphonse Elric (“Fullmetal Alchemist”) and samurai Kenshin Himura (“Rurouni Kenshin”), the comic misadventures of gay rock star Shuichi Shindo (“Gravitation”) and the saga of knuckleheaded ninja-in-train Read more

IF it didn’t make him sound like an old brick building or a theatrical repertory company, Louis Auchincloss could well be described as an American institution. Read more

READERS will be shocked, shocked to learn that cheating occurs in games of chance, including poker, craps and blackjack – not to mention three-card monte, carnival contests and bar bets. Read more

Linda Furiya grew up acutely aware of being different. Read more

The Librettist of Venice The Remarkable Life of Lorenzo Da Ponte: Mozart’s Poet, Casanova’s Friend, and Italian Opera Impresario in America Rodney Bolt Bloomsbury: 430 pp., $29.95 * AS the subtitle of Robert Bolt’s engaging biography “The Librettist of Venice” suggests, Lorenzo Da Ponte (1749-1838) had a life as filled with improbable reversals as the plot of one of his operas. Read more

MORE than 80 years after his death, Marcel Proust remains one of the most written-about writers of the 20th century. Read more

MILT GROSS was popular as a cartoonist and writer during the 1920s and ’30s, but he hasn’t retained a following among modern readers the way his contemporaries George Herriman (Krazy Kat), Harold Gray (Little Orphan Annie) and Don Marquis (Archy, Mehitabel) have. Read more

IF Arthur Conan Doyle tired of Sherlock Holmes, readers never have. Read more