I must confess, I've only read three of the essays so far in this book, but it's the introduction that I'm most grateful for. Daniel W. Smith does a magnificent job of explicating many of the concepts that have perplexed and confounded my poor artistic mind. I feel that Deleuze had a special understanding of literature, and I was interested to see what he has to say about some of the writers I also love (Beckett, Kafka, Melville). But I've mostly had this experience of wishing I could get what it was he was saying. I felt all along like I was just-this-close, until Smith cracked it open for me. Lots of "Aha" experiences. For people with an artistic bent and with an attraction to philosophy, Deleuze is perhaps a kindred spirit whose words and thoughts about literature, painting and music can give hope and faith to whatever projects we work on at the foot of the capitalist mountain. I've also read his book on Kafka, and I selected that one because I want to understand more, and based on a review here on Amazon where someone said "this was the one to start with." I would say, that Kafka is definitely the one to start with, but Smith's intro to this book gives a very helpful overview of what one can expect. So Start with the Intro, go to Kafka, then come back to the essays. My .02.

Deleuze follows Nietzsche in asserting that literature, at its strongest, plays a *clinical* role in our lives, providing us with a technology to discharge blockages, to liberate the penal colonies of our overcoded neuroses. Literature is a vector of disease, the writer a physician of the spirit, the world a dissoluted Body without Organs shimmering between the escape-routes of Life and the leprous snares of a doctrinal judge-mentality. Sickness and disequilibrium on a world-historical scale, a delirium far beyond the personal and the individual, the great authors (in this anthology: Melville, Whitman, Carroll, Lawrence, Jarry, Masoch, Beckett) struggling to plot the epidemiology of these terrors, groping for an escape-hatch that may redeem the years of incarceration, both psychical and political. Illness is defined as the *stopping* or interruption of the writing process, the exhaustion of the literary machine, when the schizo-author feels abandoned by the world's epic Traverse and wills her own destruction. Where once the literary agent had all her powers engaged in the machinic exploration of her own narrative Immanence, there now remains only an outmoded cyborg husk, having lost "the spontaneity or the innate feeling for the fragmentary, and the reflection on living relations that must constantly be acquired and created. Spontaneous fragments constitute the element through which, or in the intervals of which, we attain the great and carefully considered visions and sounds of both Nature and history"(60). These essays show how every great writer is also a master aetiologist, a "holistic pathologist" trying to identify and dissolve the negative forces which separate Life from what it can do, that keep Immanence from exploding against its world-historical targets. As a supplement to *Capitalism and Schizophrenia* (that immaculate Public Health textbook), these discourses are outstanding.

in this book, deleuze demonstrates that modern knowledge is no longer powered by dialectics or rationale, but by human sensuality. bacon's work is a good example to show that how art owns the ability to go beyond discourses.

As an artist and metal worker, I've found this book comprehensive. Great illustrations and historical documents.

this book was not what i had anticipated.
it might be great for tourists who want to see the true island living,or doll house makers, however,
as an architecture student and a caribbean native i was not impressed by the literature, or lack thereof.
excellent photography.

I live in St.Thomas, USVI and wanted to build a doll house for my 3 yr old to have as a rememberance of living on a tropical island. Since St. Thomas is a US Territory it is more Americanized, so I purchased Caribbean Style for a better refference. It is now my doll house bible. Now my daughter will have a authentic reproduction Caribbean house!

When it was first published, this great book stunned every body. I remember our surprise watching the pink cover, the blue pages, the nicely cut pages. As in Marie-France Boyer books illustrated by Eric Morin you found in this series "french style", "english style" and italian style", for the first time, artistic layout, creative photographs, technical architecture drawings and 280 pages full of pictures and precise descriptions. If you plan a trip to Guadeloupe, Martinique, Saint-Barthelemy, Antigua, Nevis, Montserrat, Barbados, Haiti or Jamaica, buy this book. It is "indemodable". As invitees in Plantation Bologne, one of the best ron maker in Guadeloupe we stayed in the former distillery manager house . All architectural details of this type of houses can be found in this book. If you were lucky enough to spend some time in any of these islands, you will want to buy this book too. It is a standard in its own.

A must-have for any student of Monet. Volumne I contains covers his biography proper, while volumes II-IV provide a COMPLETE record of the artist's body of work.

Wilderstein protrays Monet life for the most part as that of a debtor. However to his credit, he tempers the romantic "suffering artist" idealism with insight into Monet the creditor. By illustrating what a jackass the artist could also be, the author creates a deep and lively narrative.

Most of the personal insight into Monet come to us by way of coorespondance with Alice Hoeschede. Due to 'appearances' however she requested of Monet her letters be destroyed immediately and thus we're sadly left with a one-sided portrait of the man. While his artistic talents we're unparalled, it's his devotation to correspondance that allows Wildenstein to bring him back to life. Without giving away the ending, it's Monet's inability to write rather than paint that signals the end.

If you are in love with Claude Monet's Water Lily Pond paintings, this is the best book for an explanation as to their origins and where Monet found his inspiration. There is a photograph from 1926 showing the bridge covered with climbing plants.

The Japanese Bridge at Giverny, 1924 is just one of the outstanding paintings in a series of works devoted to the bridge that preoccupied Monet during his final years.

Monet loved his garden at Giverny with such a passion that one could say it bordered on obsession. Harmony in Green, The White Water Lilies, The Water Lily Pond are all explained in detail. There is even a picture of Monet photographed in his beloved garden in 1917.

In every life there is beauty and sadness. The beauty of the water lilies contrasts with the pain Monet felt when he painted Camille on her death bed.

When Monet's wife died, she not only left him without a companion, he then had small children depending on him. He spent most of his meager earnings on his wife's medical treatments and he was also deeply depressed and alone.

This type of revealing information makes him so very human and the paintings then contain a certain depth when these secrets are revealed.

I loved this book! The pictures were wonderful and the readings that went with them were as well. Learned many things that I did not know about his artwork. VERY informative...give it a try, it would make a great gift book!

To have this book labeled Paperback edition of the original SUPERB hardcover book without qualification is a little bit too much for me.

Even at a quarter of the price, this 4 1/2 inch book is nothing compared to the original edition.

And still I don't regret having it, because it reminds me of the big hardcover book...

Because we are in the process of designing and building a Zen Danish (as we call it) new home I purchased this wonderful book in order to get some specific ideas. Of special interest are the similarities between the Danish and Japanese styles that we love.

What amazed me is this book was published in the 80's yet I swear this book looks like it is a 2003 or futuristic publication that is timeless and well worth the hefty price of the book.

The section on Small Spaces is excellent and a chapter I would recommend for anyone who is looking to build either a small yet open home for one or two, or the second home in the mountains or sear the seashore.

I love the section on lofts and how they can be made to be classy, and not cluttered. And the whole chapter on craftsmanship which is actually what makes a Zen style living area so wonderful to me. Beginning on page 100 I gained some excellent ideas for our new garden and wisdom on how to have just the right amount of plant life and a koi pond to make the outside a part of ones living environment, rather than the grass and other high maintenance yards the average American has.

It is a book I find myself picking up every few days, reading a few pages and getting new ideas I can actually use.

This has got to be one of the best "Style" Books ever published. Excellent examples of architecture, beautiful interior design, and superb photography. Just the right juxtaposition of traditional and modern. Each of the major sections has both Japanese and Western Styles. Normally this would not mix, had it been contrived, but all of the examples in the book are real houses where people live and work. No Architectural Digest type of Houses that look artificial and posed are to be found in this book. My favorites are the tranditional Japanese houses of which there really great examples. This book can give you hundreds of ideas for decorating your house tastefully. The photography really does justice to these houses and the subtle aesthetics of the Japanese Style.

I collect "Style Books", and this has long been one of my favorites. I have had this book for over ten years and still look at it from time to time.

I would like to point out that the other review for this book below refers to a Miniature version of this book, and is probably a misunderstanding of some sort.

This is a beautifully illustrated review of Monet's life, by one of the major scholars of Monet. It suffers as a scholarly source, however, because there are no citations of where quotes or information was obtained. And buyers beware: this is a reprint of Vol I of the 4 volume catolog raisonne--so if you have that set, don't buy it!