Six collections of essays by Susan Sontag have been published in new editions as Penguin Modern Classics. The first in the series was Against interpretation and other essays which includes the famous essay "Notes on Camp" (1966). The second volume was Styles of radical will which appeared in 1969.

Styles of radical will is the fruit of the 1960s and perhaps even more than the previous volume shows where Sontags interests lie, namely foremostly with film. The essays are grouped in three sections, a first section about culture in more general sense, a second section with essays about film and the theatre and a third section with writing about political events.

As in the first volume, the essays are fairly long, around 30 pages, but Sontag does not seem entirely confident about this length, and some essays are belaboured or contain repetitive information, particularly the essay "The Pornographic Imagination". By the way, this essay is mainly about literature, not film. The essays "The Aesthetics of Silence" seems much too cerebral. Although this does characterize Sontag's style, they essay is not very readable.

From a historical point of view the final two essays are most interesting, "What's happening in America", written in 1966, and "Trip to Hanoi". These essays are descriptive and emblematic for their time. ( )

Sontag always feels beyond my capabilities, speaking both from and of an alien milieu: New York thought and culture of the 1960s and '70s. But there's also an international flavor to her tastes, informed by French writing of the time that often wasn't translated, and really hasn't even become popular today. And then there's her interest in the New Wave films of the time, full of Godard and Bresson and other filmmakers I haven't seen anything of. So you can see why I felt like I was floating, lost and confused, for most of this book.

Yet Sontag's writing has its merits beyond the particulars of each subject she chooses; there's a fierce forcefulness to her thought that's rare in writers, where you can see both her processes of thought and the often orthogonal conclusions reached. I don't pretend to match her wits, but the ride along is thrilling nonetheless. Excited to tackle On Photography next! ( )