Reviews
“There is a sweet memoir embedded in this book of cultural criticism, into which Mr. Todd has deftly wrangled the whole gang, from Jean Baudrillard to Lionel Trilling.”
—Penelope Green, The New York Times read more
“An arch and eloquent meditation.”
—Cathleen Medwick, O, the Oprah magazine read more
“Dazzling, beautifully crafted...A small masterpiece— and ‘small’ only because of its brevity, not its scope.”
—Julia Keller, Chicago Tribune read more
“Provocative and oddly comforting…Refreshing.”
—Anne Stephenson, The Arizona Republic
“A fully realized, brave, and movingly honest memoir…[Todd] makes a figure in which to contemplate ourselves.”
—DeWitt Henry, Ploughshares
“A splendid book, brimming with wit and original insights…Most pertinent to the way we live now.”
—Ward Just, author of Forgetfulness
“The Thing Itself: On the Search For Authenticity is Richard Todd’s cogent, counterintuitive, and illuminating meditation on his own attempts to ferret through the falsehoods of our quotidian existence so as to arrive at a semblance of self-knowledge. It is both charming and disarming.”
—David Friend, Vanity Fair
“All of this reinforces the reliability of the narrator, an insightful humanist who concludes, ‘We need to be better materialists.’ If that means more books like this one, then indeed we do.”
The Atlantic Monthly read more
“If you’re in the mood for some fresh thinking about the real and unreal in our lives—and are tired of the usual French philosophers—then this is the book for you: stylish, funny, self-deprecating, humane.”
—Cullen Murphy, Democratic National Convention blog for Vanity Fair read more
“…his sentences continually resist the banal—the homely-complacent feel of things with which an inferior writer might be content. Todd always keeps you on your toes, pushing in a direction you hadn’t quite foreseen his argument taking.”
—William H. Pritchard, Amherst Magazine read more
“Todd begins by asking this simple question: “Why does so much of the world around us seem faked?”—or, as Gertrude Stein might have put it, “Why is there no here here?” Todd's answer might be discouraging if his imagination weren’t so provocative, his prose so bracing, and his sense of humor so very much like a dry and delicious martini.”
—Daniel Okrent, Fortune Magazine