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Susan Sontag (1933–2004)

Author of On Photography

91+ Works 17,968 Members 213 Reviews 50 Favorited
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About the Author

Susan Sontag was born in New York City on January 16, 1933. She received a B.A. from the University of Chicago and did graduate work in philosophy, literature and theology at Harvard University and Saint Anne's College, Oxford University. She was the author of 17 books including four novels, a show more collection of short stories, several plays, and eight works of nonfiction. Her novels are The Benefactor, Death Kit, The Volcano Lover, and In America, which won the 2000 National Book Award for fiction. On Photography received the 1978 National Book Critics Circle Award. Her stories and essays have appeared in numerous magazines including The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, The Times Literary Supplement, and Art in America. She also wrote and directed four feature films and stage plays in the United States and Europe. She died from leukemia on December 28, 2004 at the age of 71. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: from Lifeinlegacy.com

Series

Works by Susan Sontag

On Photography (1977) — Author — 3,334 copies
Regarding the Pain of Others (2003) 1,919 copies
The Volcano Lover (1992) 1,537 copies
In America (2000) 1,267 copies
Women (1999) — Author — 663 copies
Illness as Metaphor (1978) 650 copies
Under the Sign of Saturn (1980) 571 copies
Styles of Radical Will (1969) 480 copies
Where the Stress Falls (1982) 463 copies
I, etcetera (1978) 389 copies
Death Kit (1967) 312 copies
AIDS and Its Metaphors (1989) 262 copies
A Susan Sontag Reader (1982) 250 copies
The Benefactor (1963) 243 copies
Notes on "Camp" (1996) 208 copies
Essays of the 1960s & 70s (2013) 181 copies
The Best American Essays 1992 (1992) — Editor — 138 copies
Alice in Bed (1991) 91 copies
Don McCullin (2000) — Essay — 77 copies
On Women (2023) 64 copies
Trip to Hanoi (1968) 32 copies
Stories: Collected Stories (2017) 29 copies
Brother Carl (1974) 18 copies
Duet for Cannibals (1970) 14 copies
Standpunkt beziehen (2016) 7 copies
Tradurre letteratura (2004) 4 copies
Myśl to forma odczuwania (2014) 4 copies
Histórias Stories (2019) 3 copies
RWWM: Memory/Cage (1997) 3 copies
Dernier recours (2011) 2 copies
A dama do mar 2 copies
Tekster om film (2022) 1 copy
Le style camp (2022) 1 copy
Holocaust 1 copy
Ruyalarinin Esiri (2006) 1 copy
Sontag on film (2016) 1 copy
Promised Lands (2011) 1 copy
Godard 1 copy
Sobre la marcha (2006) 1 copy

Associated Works

Pedro Páramo (1955) — Foreword, some editions — 3,264 copies
The Best American Short Stories of the Century (2000) — Contributor — 1,552 copies
Ferdydurke (1937) — Foreword, some editions — 1,389 copies
The Story and Its Writer: An Introduction to Short Fiction (1983) — Contributor — 1,130 copies
The Best American Essays of the Century (2000) — Contributor — 774 copies
The Case of Comrade Tulayev (1949) — Introduction, some editions — 736 copies
Summer in Baden-Baden (1981) — Introduction, some editions — 616 copies
Under the Glacier (1968) — Afterword, some editions — 608 copies
The Temptation to Exist (1956) — Introduction, some editions — 575 copies
Selected Stories (1982) — Foreword, some editions — 548 copies
Machete Season: The Killers in Rwanda Speak (2003) — Preface, some editions — 451 copies
A Barthes Reader (1982) — Editor, some editions; Introduction, some editions — 410 copies
Wonderful Town: New York Stories from The New Yorker (2000) — Contributor — 354 copies
Telling Tales (2004) — Contributor — 344 copies
The Walk (1917) — Foreword, some editions — 325 copies
The Portable Sixties Reader (2002) — Contributor — 324 copies
The Best American Essays 2003 (2003) — Contributor — 313 copies
Antonin Artaud: Selected Writings (1976) — Editor, some editions; Introduction, some editions — 310 copies
Art History and Its Methods: A Critical Anthology (1995) — Contributor — 231 copies
Letters: Summer 1926 (1985) — Foreword, some editions — 222 copies
The Disability Studies Reader (1905) — Contributor, some editions — 171 copies
The Best American Short Stories of the 80s (1990) — Contributor — 160 copies
McLuhan, Hot & Cool (1967) — Contributor — 156 copies
The Best American Essays 1997 (1997) — Contributor — 154 copies
Bellocq: Photographs from Storyville (1970) — Introduction, some editions — 153 copies
The Best American Short Stories 1987 (1987) — Contributor — 129 copies
Mistresses of the Dark [Anthology] (1998) — Contributor — 121 copies
Plays (2001) — Preface — 99 copies
Selected Writings of Roland Barthes (1983) — Editor, some editions — 87 copies
A Place in the World Called Paris (1994) — Foreword — 85 copies
Science Fiction: The Future (1971) — Contributor — 84 copies
Howard Hodgkin Paintings (1995) — Foreword — 56 copies
The Penguin Book of the Modern American Short Story (2021) — Contributor — 52 copies
Granta 1: New American Writing (1979) — Contributor — 44 copies
Granta 5: The Modern Common Wind (1982) — Contributor — 44 copies
Hitler, a Film From Germany (1978) — Preface, some editions — 40 copies
Science Fiction: A Collection of Critical Essays (1976) — Author — 36 copies
The Good Parts: The Best Erotic Writing in Modern Fiction (2000) — Contributor — 34 copies
Partisan Review (1998) — Contributor, some editions — 33 copies
Italy: One Hundred Years of Photography (1984) — Introduction — 14 copies
Conjunctions: 30, Paper Airplane (1998) — Contributor — 11 copies
American Review 21 (1974) — Contributor — 9 copies
Amerika, Amerika bloemlezing — Contributor — 8 copies
The Analog Sea Review: Number Three (2020) — Contributor — 8 copies
Paras elokuvakirja (1995) — Contributor — 5 copies
New Directions in Prose and Poetry 35 (1977) — Contributor — 3 copies
Antaeus: Fiction, Poetry, Documents - Jubilee Edition (1991) — Contributor — 3 copies
海 1972年05月号 — Contributor — 1 copy

Tagged

20th century (395) aesthetics (116) AIDS (104) American (213) American literature (298) anthology (755) art (431) art history (92) criticism (345) cultural studies (122) essay (226) essays (1,705) fiction (1,880) historical fiction (112) history (159) humor (210) literary criticism (356) literature (620) magical realism (108) Mexican literature (116) Mexico (177) non-fiction (1,032) novel (360) own (99) philosophy (511) photography (1,003) read (167) Roman (102) Russian literature (107) short stories (824) Sontag (165) Susan Sontag (148) test (127) theory (216) to-read (1,745) translation (94) unread (187) USA (136) war (87) writing (208)

Common Knowledge

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Discussions

AMERICAN AUTHORS CHALLENGE--FEBRUARY 2024--SUSAN SONTAG in 75 Books Challenge for 2024 (February 24)
Susan Sontag in Legacy Libraries (April 2018)
Novel about a melancholic couple in Name that Book (June 2012)

Reviews

Reading Sontag is an experience of extraordinary clarity and lucidity, which are themselves powerful enough that it is easy to imagine that Sontag is declaring an unimpeachable, gospel-like Truth, and not simply a person sharing her opinions as best she can, because she believes they will be helpful.
 
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localgayangel | 10 other reviews | Mar 5, 2024 |
American author challenge: Susan Sontag. 1933-2004' writer, critic, and public intellectual. She mostly wrote essays, but also published novel. I read what is mostly a short story collection though some felt autobiographical, some leaned toward essay. I can't say that I liked the short stories because I didn't. My impression is that she was a ferocious reader and was compelled to write.
 
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Kristelh | 1 other review | Feb 21, 2024 |
The Cavalier, an art dealer and British ambassador to the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, is obsessed with three things: collecting beautiful and rare pieces of art, watching Vesuvius breathe and rumble, and having a relationship with his nephew's former lover. I know, it's an odd beginning. When the Cavalier's nephew, Charles, grows tired of his mistress he simply sends her to live with his uncle once the Cavalier became a lonely widower. How do you learn to love a stranger? What do you do when that love matures into devotion and passion falls by the wayside? Beyond being a story about relationships and circumstances, The Volcano Lover is also the love story of art, war, and devotion to a life well lived with passion.
There is a cleverness to Sontag's writing. Most of the story is told in the third person with touches of first person narrative sprinkled in. Is that Sontag offering personal tidbits about herself? Who is this off-camera speaker? In the very last section of Volcano Lover the Cavalier, his wife, his mother-in-law, and the Queen all offer first person perspectives on their lives with one another. Both the Cavalier and his mother-in-law are careful to never reveal the Cavalier's wife real name (modeled after Emma Hamilton). No one mentions the hero's name (Lord Nelson in real life), either.
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SeriousGrace | 22 other reviews | Feb 17, 2024 |
Susan Sontag has published several volumes of cultural essays. On women was posthumously published in 2023, collected and edited by her son, David Rieff. Not all pieces are essays, some are interviews, but some earlier publications also contained such critical interviews. I think it can be said that many of these pieces were not selected or published in earlier collections, because they are somewhat less well-written or express ideas somewhat more extremely or forcefully than in other essays. But Sontag is a great essayist and these eassays aren't second or third rate. Possible they are a subcategory of first rate.

The other reason these essays are somewhat less palatable is the fact they they appeal with vehemence to ideology which is now considered out of vogue. Particularly the second essay "The third world of women" is very leftist of a political colour and intensity which is now further from main stream than in the 1970s, when it was written (in 1973). However, it is the style and the intensity which make it feel dated, not the ideas expressed in these essays.

I experienced a feeling of deja vu with the essay "Fascinating Fascism". I could not make out whether I have read the same essay in an earlier collection of essays or whether this essay is a variant, based on the same material and expressing largely the same idea.

The most impressive essays is obviously the first in the collection, entitled "The double standard of aging". This is the typical style of Susan Sontag: a long essays of 40+ pages that explores every aspect of an issue into its minutest detail leading to a powerful conclusion: Men think less of women because they perceive them as essentially different from themselves.

So, while these essays may not be top of the bill, they are definitely still worth while reading, and in their "extremism" they help establish a better portrait of Susan Sontag to readers who have not known her other than through well-polished publications such as Penguin Modern Classics.

It is a pity that the simple and straightforward title of this collection, namely "On women" is a source of confusion. Many people confuse this collection of essays with an earlier book by Sontag together with Annie Leibovitz, which was a photo book, published in 1999.
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½
 
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edwinbcn | 1 other review | Feb 17, 2024 |

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Works
91
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Members
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Popularity
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Rating
3.9
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213
ISBNs
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Favorited
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