“Peggy” by Rebecca Godfrey with Leslie Jamison
Before reading “Peggy,” I imagined the glamorous art collector Peggy Guggenheim in a luxurious caftan, sitting at her waterfront pavilion in Venice, petting her dog and musing about her own genius. I didn’t know much about her, only that she was an iconic modern art collector and Solomon R. Guggenheim’s niece.
“Peggy” is a historical novel telling the true story of Guggenheim’s youth and adolescence, written from her own point of view. The book chronicles Guggenheim’s life and her inner mind, from her artistic curiosity during high school in New York City to her passion for culture as she traveled to Europe. While it may sound like readers are just along for the ride while Guggenheim gallivants around the world, the book also has serious themes. Readers experience the love and loss that Guggenheim felt throughout her relationship with Irish writer Samuel Beckett, the grief she experienced after losing her father on the Titanic and the agony of dealing with lifelong antisemitism.
I loved being inside of Guggenheim’s brain — I ate up every one word of her intellectual contemplations. Taking on the voice of an icon is a difficult feat, but Rebecca Godfrey did it masterfully as she painted a dynamic picture of one of the most alluring women in modern art. Leslie Jamison helped to complete the book after Godfrey passed away in September 2022, writing in The New Yorker, “Peggy had often been misunderstood and disrespected, seen as a slutty dilettante who threw her money around. But Rebecca took Peggy seriously.”
— Alexa Donovan, Arts Editor
“A Visit from the Goon Squad” by Jennifer Egan
Jennifer Egan’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, “A Visit from the Goon Squad,” is a conglomeration of masterfully intertwined stories. The book has 13 chapters with 13 different narratives, and though readers are flung between stories, Egan’s writing seamlessly weaves together the storylines.
The novel begins with Sasha, a kleptomaniac working as an assistant to Bennie, a former punk rocker and record executive. Each of the chapters follows one of the novel’s many characters that are all — in one way or another — connected to Bennie and Sasha. Bennie rose to success under the mentorship of Lou, a music producer who became entangled in a relationship with Bennie’s former bandmate Jocelyn. During this time, Jocelyn was in love with a guitarist named Scotty, who also performed with Bennie before Bennie left the band and married his wife, Stephanie. Her story begins as she tries to resurrect the career of a formerly legendary rockstar, Bosco, but leaves the job of covering his final tour to her journalist and criminal brother, Jules. Eventually, the reader is brought back to Bennie and Sasha as their two stories once again intertwine.
While reading, I found my eyes widening with each chapter. Egan implores the reader to care for and invest in every character’s story. I highly recommend “A Visit from the Goon Squad” to anyone who enjoys reading about the music industry, as music is the universal thread that brings these characters together.
— Siobhán Minerva, Deputy Arts Editor
“Open: An Autobiography” by Andre Agassi
Bookended by the April release of the hit film “Challengers” and the U.S. Open running into early September, this summer has played out on both real and fictional tennis courts. The autobiography of Andre Agassi — ghostwritten by J.R. Moehringer — provides a deep look into the intensity of the sport and the prominent figure in the tennis world. “Open” starts at the pinnacle of Agassi’s career, describing his final, intense match against Marcos Baghdatis at the 2006 U.S. Open. The game’s adrenaline is followed by a chapter where a young Agassi recounts his first grueling training sessions with his father, who pressured him to play the sport. The parallels drawn between the trials of Agassi’s youth and the more recent challenges of his career set the tone for the novel, depicting his relationship with tennis as one of tenacity, resentment and ambition.
For me, sports literature always runs the risk of losing its meaning in the presence of rules or technical jargon. I have yet to play a game of tennis, but Agassi reminiscing on the life he built around tennis effectively drew me in without confusion. His efforts as an athlete are punctuated by the hardships and losses that molded his career. The book volleys between anecdotes from his personal and professional lives — which, more often than not, are directly intertwined — to paint an earnest picture of a complex individual. “Open” threw me back into the realm of autobiography and reminded me of the beauty of the genre. It’s an opportunity to hear from and empathize with a figure that you might know of, but will never know, really.
— Eleanor Jacobs, Music Editor
“By Any Other Name” by Jodi Picoult
Throughout history, countless women have had to relinquish their work or disguise their identity to share what they have created. Jodi Picoult’s latest New York Times bestseller, “By Any Other Name,” draws parallels between women’s ability to have authorship of their work at different points in history.
Told through dual timelines, the novel follows Melina Green, a playwright living in the present day, and her Elizabethan ancestor, poet Emilia Bassano. With the desire to produce personal work that strikes a chord, Melina decides to research Emilia. Who was this distant relative of hers, besides the first published female poet in England?
As Melina pieces together more and more of Emilia’s story, Picoult inserts chapters containing Emilia’s tumultuous coming of age in the late 1500s. Separated from her family of musicians and educated by a countess, Emilia is an avid reader and writer. When she is eventually bartered to the Queen’s cousin, a patron of the arts, she finds herself in close proximity to the world of theater. As she dines with playwrights and poets, Emilia is keeping a secret: She is one of them, and the plays that would come to be revered on a global scale for centuries to come weren’t written by her contemporary, William Shakespeare — they were written by her.
The novel strengthened my appreciation for historical fiction and the power it has to breathe life into stories that have been overlooked, or would otherwise go untold. It’s equally sobering and beautiful to share experiences with women who lived hundreds of years ago. Picoult’s retelling of Emilia’s story is deeply moving as it allows the reader to live in her mind and understand her frustrations and passions.
These historical retellings that center women’s narratives aren’t just fascinating to read, they’re necessary.
— Ana Sofia Erath, Contributing Writer
Contact the Arts Desk at [email protected].
