Good As Her Word: Selected Journalism - Brief Article - Book Review

Contemporary Review, Feb, 2004

Good As Her Word: Selected Journalism. Lorna Sage. Sharon Sage and Victor Sage, editors. Fourth Estate. [pounds sterling]16.99. xxii 361 pages. ISBN 0-00-715779-7. Lorna Sage was, until her death in January 2001, Professor of English in the University of East Anglia. She was also a prolific critic in both academic and popular journals.

This selection, which begins in 1978, ends with the year of her death. Its aim is to 'display the sheer range and diversity of her writing'. The selections from her reviews, themselves marked by a 'rare combination of warmth and sophistication' are presented in a chronological order. The earlier ones concentrate on biography, autobiography, memoris, letters and sketches. Those from the mid-1990s to her death give prominence to her interest in 'life-writing', the links between writers' lives and their works.