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Description
XOMany albums could be cited to support the claim that great suffering yields great art. Elliott Smith's XO should not be one of them. Smith's 1998 major label debut defies the tortured singer songwriter stereotype, and takes up this defiance as a central theme. At a time when Smith was being groomed for a particular (and particularly condescending) brand of stardom, he produced a record that eviscerated one of the central assumptions of
Many albums could be cited to support the claim that great suffering yields great art. Elliott Smith's XO should not be one of them. Smith's 1998 major label debut defies the tortured singer-songwriter stereotype, and takes up this defiance as a central theme. At a time when Smith was being groomed for a particular (and particularly condescending) brand of stardom, he produced a record that eviscerated one of the central assumptions of singersongwriterdom: that pain is beautiful. XO insists that romanticizing personal tragedy can only leave you deaf and dumb and done. And it backs up this claim with some of the most artful and intelligent music of its day. Matthew LeMay writes an original take on a widely beloved album, steering clear of the sensationalist suicide angles that have dogged most analysis of Elliott Smith's extraordinary work.Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Continuum
Published: 04/01/2009
ISBN: 9780826429001
Pages: 124
Weight: 0.30lbs
Size: 6.40h x 4.70w x 0.40d
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4.1 ★★★★★
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★★★★★ 3
Your milage will vary
Format: Paperback
Some great ideas in this story but it didn't really work for me. But I know others have loved it..
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Reviewed in the United States on November 14, 2025
★★★★★ 2
The hype it did not live up to
Format: Paperback
I guess I expected more. I found it kind of boring and un inspiring. I enjoyed the food twist and even the characters, but it was very underwhelming. and I'm sorry about this review, because I really really wanted to love it.
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Reviewed in the United States on March 30, 2025
★★★★★ 5
A thoroughly-researched, thoughtful, and nuanced work about the 1692 Salem withcraft panic.
Format: Paperback
This graphic novel recounts the 1692 Salem (Massachusetts) witchcraft panic that engulfed Salem, Salem Village (now Danvers), and adjacent communities. About two dozen men and women were convicted and hanged, one was pressed to death (tortured) to try to force him to acknowledge the Court’s authority. That man was Giles Corey, aged 80. The book focuses on him, but it covers others among the accused and executed as well as on the judges, politicians, and other involved. (No so much on the accusers and their motives.). The narrative plays out chronologically with interstitial vignettes in which 19th Century literary figures Nathaniel Hawthorne and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wander around Salem during the 1800s discussing the trials and their legacy. (Hawthorne lived in Salem for a time and was a descendant or the Court of Oyer and Terminer Judge Hathorne.). The work concludes with a chapter, More Wonders of the Invisible World, that follows how Salem developed economically up to the present day in which witchcraft-related Halloween tourism turns Salem town into arguably the least attractive “tourist attraction” on Cape Ann. (Do not skip this chapter, it is engrossing.) An extensive series of endnotes provide scholarly references and background information.
The artwork veers back and forth between caricatures (the 17th century events) and realism (19th century and onwards). In both cases the line art is exquisite. The text includes quotes from transcripts of the trials and other contemporary documents as well as fictional dialog.
Wickey worked on this book for more than a decade, and it shows in his thorough scholarship. This is, in all seriousness, Pulitzer/Eisner-level work. Wickey was born in Beverly and resides on Cape Ann. Most of us born and raised on the “North Shore” learn about the Salem witchcraft panic in high school -often as a cautionary tale about politics, spectral evidence, and what we would today call “lawfare.” I thought I knew a fair amount about the 1692 panic, but I learned something new with nearly every other page. I was especially glad to see Wickey cover now-debunked ergot-poisoning theory and that he dismissed the vile slander that some among the convicted and executed were actually witches. There’s nothing really “missing” from the book, though one wishes one could learn more about the fates of the accusers other than Ann Putnam. That their motives appear to have been “sport” is bone-chilling fully three centuries later. Read her "apology" years later and try not to think, "psychopath."
At 500 plus pages, it's too long to read at one setting, but it is a pleasure to read at shorter intervals.
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Reviewed in the United States on December 26, 2025
★★★★★ 5
Masterpiece
Format: Kindle
It has been said that any work of literature should be gauged upon how much the work makes the reader think. Ben Wickey has certainly achieved this - in spades - as one of the “civilised” world’s most frightening episodes is revisited with respect and thoughtfulness on the human condition.
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Reviewed in the United States on January 12, 2026
★★★★★ 5
Books
Format: Paperback
I bought this book for my husband as a Christmas present and he enjoyed the book!
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Reviewed in the United States on February 17, 2026