Category: Daily Dispatch

There’s a longer, 6400-word version of this review, which I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to completely wrangle into shape. I’ve been trying now for four days, and seriously, I would like to get on to something else. At times it is positively brutal, not so much because of my tone, which I tried my best to moderate, but because of my honest, detailed, factual reporting, with ample evidence of the sheer number of mistakes, the poor writing, and the shameful quality of the editing.

The source of my agony has been Tim Greiving’s epic biography of John Williams (“John Williams: A Composer’s Life”), released by Oxford University Press in September. I was overjoyed to receive it for Christmas. Little did I realize I’d unwrapped 630 pages of quicksand.

I compiled the bulk of my report over two days this month, separated by a couple of weeks. My mood evidently shifted, as the two halves do not flow together. Here, I do my best to restore the paragraphs I set down on Day 1, which are much kinder, if more broadly argued.

*****

The author is at his worst when he goes purple or wades into simile and metaphor. He’s simply too imprecise, random, and just plain sloppy. The book reads like a first draft, and I am shocked that Oxford University Press would allow anything like this to go to print. And yet it has turned up on holiday gift lists and year’s top recommendations from many reputable sources. Am I taking crazy pills? Or are people simply not equipped to recognize good prose anymore?

The internet has had the effect of tearing down the old guard of gatekeepers and leveled the playing field, but I’ve been around long enough – and I’m not THAT old – to remember when, if you were going to be published, you had to be able to write well enough that a reader isn’t made to stop every few sentences to think about what’s wrong with what he or she just read. When I read a published book, I expect polished prose, not a high school essay that keeps shifting tones and tenses, repeats itself, mixes metaphors, and commits any number of actual malaprops.

I do a lot of reading in bed. Since I knew I wanted to post my observations on this book, I kept a tablet and pen on my nightstand. Little did I expect that I would be having to put down the book and pick up the pen so often, frequently multiple times per page. Some nights, if I felt I just wanted to enjoy reading for a change, I had to stifle the impulse. But on those nights, I could feel the perspiration beading on my brow. By no means did I chronicle every error in the book, but even in my sporadic effort I managed to accumulate eight double-sided pages.

There are the bones of a good book here, and the author obviously loves his subject. There are times when he’s so confessional, as in the acknowledgments section at the end, that he actually moves me. But he needed a genuine editor, not to get the length down – I think the world deserves a 600-page John Williams biography – but rather to tame the prose, to whack the weeds and bring some order and to get everything looking professional and consistent, to lend it the feel of authoritativeness it deserves. Because for as shoddily-written as it is, it will remain an important resource for anyone who truly cares about the composer, beyond the casual fan’s ten favorite soundtracks.

I hasten to add, the book as an object is beyond reproach, very handsomely produced, with an attractive dustjacket, a glossy photo section, and quality paper that, under reasonable conditions, is not likely to yellow within a few years, unlike so many books these days. Perhaps the font could have been a little larger and the margins a little more generous, but these things didn’t really bother me once I got used to them. The alternatives probably would have added another hundred pages. Perhaps more? How many more pages would Oxford University Press allow, anyway?

I strongly suspect that Greiving, in common with many film music “scholars,” possesses a very limited knowledge of classical music (from which, as he himself astutely observes, the language of Hollywood film music evolved). I’d even go further to speculate that he doesn’t know all that much about music in general, at least in terms of how it is ordinarily written about and discussed, and not only in the academic literature. I am by no means a pointy-headed, jargon-bandying university type. I am speaking of the proper application of terms like “orchestrations,” for instance, which the author seems to use often as a synonym for “works” or “compositions.”

I don’t doubt he has an extensive knowledge of film music and composers, as I always have, but I’m afraid it may all come down to the enthusiastic absorption and retention of trivia, statistics, and history. I am not denigrating those things in themselves. I am merely pointing out that there is an awkwardness to some of the music writing that would not exist had the author more experience reading about orchestral music in periodicals or books that deal with the subject. This shortcoming does not wreck Greiving’s book, but it does unfortunately draw attention to itself. Repeatedly.

There are times when the author pulls himself together and the writing becomes less turgid or juvenile and he makes some very astute points. And at those moments, I say to myself, “Yes!” But my god, man, I wish that someone with some experience reading actual books had sat down and proofread this thing. Such a handsomely produced volume and such an ambitious undertaking, with a major artistic and pop cultural figure as its subject, should have been one of the year’s best books.

Astonishingly, it was included on many such lists – which makes me a little sad for the world, that our editing and publishing would be in the hands of such amateurs. There were many times in the course of my reading that I really, really hoped my own writing doesn’t come across like this to older readers of more experience, who lived through an era of higher standards.

*****

Anyway, this is not complete or polished, but it’s something, a fragment that touches on some of the issues I had with the book, so that I can get this off my desk and get back to posting again. What a logjam!

Maybe I’ll share the longer version, or fragments of it, next week. That’s the one with all the actual, painful examples, but it’s also full of specifics about Williams himself and what I found commendable about the book, alongside what I found so very frustrating. The last thing I want is for it to come across as a public flogging. One of the reasons I hesitate is that I’m afraid if I post it as it is, there’s going to be a lot of painful stripes.

Grieving deserves all respect for undertaking such a project, and clearly it was a labor of love. Frankly, the book should never have gone to print in the condition it’s in. And that’s all on Oxford University Press. A good editor could have worked miracles on it and ensured the book and its author looked their very best.

If there’s ever a second edition, Tim, I am here for you. Don’t hesitate to message me.