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Tina Brown:

“Sharon Waxman has written a compelling page turner about the world of antiquities and art-world skulduggery. She manages to combine rigorous, scholarly reporting with a flair for intrigue and personality that gives Loot the fast pace of a novel. I enjoyed it immensely."

Christopher Hitchens:

“Sharon Waxman’s Loot is the most instructive as well as the most intelligent (and the most entertaining) guide through the labyrinth of antiquity and the ways in which the claims of the departed intersect with the rights of the living.”

Douglas Preston, author of The Monster of Florence:

"Loot is a riveting foray into the biggest question facing museums today: who should own the great works of ancient art? Sharon Waxman is a first-rate reporter, a veritable Euphronios of words, who not only explores the legal and moral ambiguities of the conflict but brings to life the colorful -- even outrageous -- personalities facing off for a high noon showdown over some of the world’s iconic works of art. Vivid, witty, and delightful, this book will beguile any reader with an interest in art and museums."

Lucette Lagnado, author of The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit:

“Sharon Waxman approaches her subject with the passion of a great journalist and the rigor of a scholar. It may never again be possible for some of us to walk down the halls of the Louvre or the British Museum or the Metropolitan without a vague sense of disquietude, a frisson of wonder about the provenance of some of their showcase works of ancient art.”

Karl E. Meyer, author of The Plundered Past and co-author of Kingmakers: The Invention of the Modern Middle East:

"Sharon Waxman’s Loot is indispensable for everyone concerned with the illicit trade in smuggled antiquities. She exposes the self-serving humbug that too often afflicts both affluent possessors and righteous nationalists and shows that we all have a stake in getting an honest account of how great objects came to rest in our grandest museums."

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September 04, 2008

The Washington Post Tips Reader to "Loot"

From today's Washington Post, a nod to "Loot" as a book to watch for this fall:

BY Marie Arana  |  AUGUST 31, 2008

There is special pleasure in pawing through books before they publish and imagining the insights they'll bring. Consider the years of work and accumulated wisdom that have gone into producing the 116 that follow. Here is a treasure trove of knowledge, from a chronicle of the White House war room to the artistry of Marc Chagall. Here, too, is a world of the imagination, from the slave trade as conjured by Toni Morrison to the nervous '50s with Philip Roth. This is but a mere fragment, a scattered sampling of what's in store for our readers as we head into the busiest season of the year.

Artistic Pursuits

  • Breakdowns, by Art Spiegelman (Pantheon, Oct.). The creator of Maus looks back at the mad, MAD '60s.
  • Chagall, by Jackie Wullschlager (Knopf, Oct.). Born dirt poor in late 19th-century Russia, he became one of the great artists of the modern age.
  • John Lennon, by Philip Norman (Ecco, Oct.). The legendary musician began life as a psychologically scarred child, under the roof of his Aunt Mimi.
  • Le Corbusier, By Nicholas Fox Weber (Knopf, Nov.) One of the most admired and reviled architects of the 20th century worked for Mussolini and the USSR, too.
  • Loot, by Sharon Waxman (Times, Oct.). Who should own the great works of ancient art? And why were they stolen in the first place?
  • Mona Lisa in Camelot, by Margaret Leslie Davis (Da Capo, Nov.). How Jacqueline Kennedy helped bring Da Vinci's masterpiece to America.
  • Reagan, by Marc Eliot (Harmony, Sept.). Focusing on the actor's Hollywood years, an insight into the leader.
  • Spellbound by Beauty, by Donald Spoto (Harmony, Oct.) Alfred Hitchcock's complicated and often scandalous relations with his leading ladies.

Posted at 10:27 AM in General, Reviews |

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