(4 of 5)
Grand Canyon is, not only in its sweeping vistas but in the close-up details of rock, water, and unique life forms that would be drowned by the dams. The narrative starts with the story of a hazardous 17-day boat trip the author took through the Grand Canyon, and rises to a reasoned, passionate plea for preserving the place unblocked by the curved concrete of progress.
MANNERISM by Jacques Bousquet.
347 pages. Braziller. $20. At that crucial intersection of art history, where the High Renaissance collapsed and reshaped itself into the Baroque, stands that accomplished but today little-valued style called "Mannerism." Painters like Mabuse, Cranach, Caravaggio, da Pontormo, and a hundred others across Europe were luxuriating in the mastery of technique. Their work was energetic, inventive, sensual, and edged with a fascination for the grotesque.
The new painting's exploration of emotionally exotic themes was paralleled in poetry and theater. To demonstrate that the flamboyant creativity of the Mannerist era is more important and more visual fun than it has usually been given credit for, Author Bousquet has brought together a wide range of art and literature. The examples are felicitous, the commentary urbane, and the format itself is wittily evocative of the Mannerist manner.
ARMS AND ARMOUR OF THE WESTERN WORLD by Bruno Thomas and others.
243 pages. McGraw-Hill. $27.50. ARMS AND ARMOR by Vesey Norman. 128 pages. Putnam. $4.95. Who has not, at least in childhood, been fascinated by the medieval knight, his squire and yeoman, and the strange tools they used in war? Cuirass and helmet, shield and sword. Chain mail, longbow, harquebus, pike—and the thin-bladed misericord that could slip between the plates to pluck a man's life from his ribs. The battle-dented, brutally functional field armor of the 14th century; the intricately inlaid and painted parade armor of the 16th. Both of these accounts of arms and armor cover the ground well.
The big one is naturally longer, more complete, with more large and lush color pictures. It also treats of the muskets and hand guns that signaled the beginning of armor's end. But the smaller volume is nonetheless unexpectedly meaty, and certainly represents value for money.
MICHELANGELO'S LOST ST. JOHN by Fernanda de' Maffei. 150 pages. Reynal.