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Maps to Anywhere
The essays in Maps to Anywhere plot terrain that is at once familiar and subtly strange. Writing on subjects ranging from his family to the origin of the barbershop pole, Bernard Cooper digs into the glimmering surface of the southern California landscape, observing the collision of the American Dream with the realities of everyday life. From the fragments, he discovers landmarks by which he attempts to make sense of contemporary America.
160 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1990
About the author
Bernard Cooper
23 books29 followersBernard Cooper has won numerous awards and prizes, among them the PEN/Ernest Hemingway Award, an O. Henry Prize, and literature fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and The National Endowment of the Arts.
He has published two memoirs, Maps to Anywhere and Truth Serum, as well as a novel, A Year of Rhymes, and a collection of short stories, Guess Again.
His work has appeared in Harper's Magazine, Gentleman's Quarterly, and The Paris Review and in several volumes of The Best American Essays.
He lives in Los Angeles and is the art critic for Los Angeles Magazine.
He has published two memoirs, Maps to Anywhere and Truth Serum, as well as a novel, A Year of Rhymes, and a collection of short stories, Guess Again.
His work has appeared in Harper's Magazine, Gentleman's Quarterly, and The Paris Review and in several volumes of The Best American Essays.
He lives in Los Angeles and is the art critic for Los Angeles Magazine.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
October 10, 2023
this is what i am yearning and learning to do w words
December 9, 2020
Reading this collection of micro biographical stories made me feel as if I'd failed my journals. He pulls readers into the smallest of moments or realizations and makes them sparkle like diamonds. This tiny book weighs 10,000 lbs and contains multitudes.
March 13, 2024
this is the kind of book that makes me believe in the power of observation and writing. to take each moment and see it and share it in a way that makes someone else see it too and more -- feel it, each specific moment. my god!!!!!!!!!! i was moved & touched & rocked gently awake like a baby who is being encouraged to open their sleepy eyes & see something magical. thank u bernard cooper you just rocked my world.
September 24, 2012
This book, comprised of vignettes or episodes was an absolute pleasure to read. I imagine I will revisit it again, particularly for the precision of language. I particularly enjoyed the sections where the author braided his thoughts about art and architecture through his impressions of childhood.
February 18, 2010
I can't stand this book.
November 29, 2023
How on earth did such an awful and wildly boring work of essays (yes, essays!) win the coveted PEN/Hemingway Award? Make no mistake: Bernard Cooper is a writer for the Ovaltine-drinking READER'S DIGEST crowd. It is Stuff White People Like, but fifteen times worse. It is "fiction" that takes no chances and reveals no original insights. Even when this remarkably untalented hack DOES attempt to write, we get overwritten garbage sentences like: "But me and Mom and Dad adapt, like luminous fish in the dregs of the sea who exude the light by which they live." Even accounting for the desperately reaching metaphor, didn't you ALREADY describe them as luminous? So why "exude the light," you redundant asshole? Reading Bernard Cooper is like being trapped in a bar with some adenoidal chowderhead who believes that his insights are remarkable, but who can only speak in cliches that have already been summoned by thousands of men who have been in that barstool before him. Cooper is the kind of unadventurous milquetoast who will NEVER get into an argument with a stranger, a guy so inept at telling a story that one recalls Steve Martin's line from PLANES, TRAINS, AND AUTOMOBILES: "Here's a good idea. Have a point." I'd call Cooper the Norman Rockwell of fiction, but that would be giving this toothless motherfucker too much credit. HE IS A SHITTY AND COMPLETELY POINTLESS WRITER. Not a "writer's writer," as his Wikipedia entry claims. Writer's writer? If Cooper shows up to my apartment to say that he is, I'll throw all my volumes of Lydia Davis, Stephen Dixon, Gilbert Sorrentino, and Henry Green at him. Buddy, your ass can't even mop the floor of a blank page! You want a cookie for describing potatoes as "aluminum-covered ingots"? Seriously? And you can't even spell Charlton Heston's first name! Christ, this awful volume has a four star rating here on Goodreads. Why? Did he blow you all? Is he charming at parties? IT'S WHAT COUNTS ON THE PAGE, YOU GOODREADS MOFOS, AND BERNARD COOPER IS A FRAUD AND AN ABJECT FAILURE!
August 9, 2020
This is a beautiful collection, and I really appreciate how mercurial it is with evading expectations about form. These are pieces that are often more poetry than essay, but they always seem to hover around narrative momentum that most of the time hums in the way more traditional, quality narratives hum.
I guess my issue with it is that I don’t think it works *all* of the time. Some of it felt really disjointed and sliced off from the bigger, collective work, and did not feel to me like it really belonged. I say this with some hesitation, because I know I am biased in my belief that Cooper’s biggest strength is in his deft ability to craft sprawling, meaningful essays. With this collection, you get a dose of that here and there, but I think he leaned much more into the poetics and really put his energy behind imagery, and so dialed back to some extent a concentration on fully formed characters, and minor and major arcs. This has the effect that the language in here is gorgeous and wonderful almost all of the time, and the imagery is often stunning, but often I found myself looking around a bit and sort of wishing that Cooper would fill me in more on the details that rest outside of the literal, adjectival details, and give me something more in the way of story.
This is likely a selfish critique, at the end of the day, because I really just like his sprawling essays more than I think I like his poetry.
I guess my issue with it is that I don’t think it works *all* of the time. Some of it felt really disjointed and sliced off from the bigger, collective work, and did not feel to me like it really belonged. I say this with some hesitation, because I know I am biased in my belief that Cooper’s biggest strength is in his deft ability to craft sprawling, meaningful essays. With this collection, you get a dose of that here and there, but I think he leaned much more into the poetics and really put his energy behind imagery, and so dialed back to some extent a concentration on fully formed characters, and minor and major arcs. This has the effect that the language in here is gorgeous and wonderful almost all of the time, and the imagery is often stunning, but often I found myself looking around a bit and sort of wishing that Cooper would fill me in more on the details that rest outside of the literal, adjectival details, and give me something more in the way of story.
This is likely a selfish critique, at the end of the day, because I really just like his sprawling essays more than I think I like his poetry.
February 22, 2018
Bernard Cooper’s Maps to Anywhere is a collection of stories/essays that features beautiful and thought-provoking instances of memory and childhood. The pieces in this collection, and especially the flash fiction/nonfiction, are steeped in poetic language and images that consistently offer a re-read of the last sentence, just to enjoy it one more time before moving forward. In the two page story “Que Será Será,” Cooper writes: “Nor am I necessarily a nostalgic guy, though I plunder the playhouse of my past weekly in the name of art, and it’s sad to see the little lamps dim the older I get” (71).
Cooper invites the reader into the playhouse to look deep into its closets and corners, bringing light to moments that are crushing and warm, deeply personal and absolutely, truthfully human.
Cooper concentrates on these memories for what they are, focusing on crafting beautiful language and feeling over story or even character. On the flash fiction/nonfiction spectrum, if there is such a thing, Maps to Anywhere often lands close to poetry. Any reader who enjoys wonderful writing and moments worth reading again and again can certainly appreciate Bernard Cooper’s Pen/Hemingway Award winning collection.
Cooper invites the reader into the playhouse to look deep into its closets and corners, bringing light to moments that are crushing and warm, deeply personal and absolutely, truthfully human.
Cooper concentrates on these memories for what they are, focusing on crafting beautiful language and feeling over story or even character. On the flash fiction/nonfiction spectrum, if there is such a thing, Maps to Anywhere often lands close to poetry. Any reader who enjoys wonderful writing and moments worth reading again and again can certainly appreciate Bernard Cooper’s Pen/Hemingway Award winning collection.
January 12, 2021
Understood. This is considered a landmark book of short creative nonfiction, but for my palate it’s uneven at best. The longer pieces — actually worked best especially “The House of the Future” and “The Wind Did It.” Both of these are comprised of a series of shorter essays and both deal primarily with Cooper’s father and his family. These are both excellent.
Of the flash / micro pieces “Temple of the Holy Ghost” and “Leaving” are exceptional. They work well as flash nonfiction and prose poetry.
But there’s something about the juxtaposition of all these disparate pieces that diminishes the whole for me. This is still a worthy read — as I understand it — the first to collect mostly flash nonfiction into one volume by one author. / Hardcover, 01/09/21.
Of the flash / micro pieces “Temple of the Holy Ghost” and “Leaving” are exceptional. They work well as flash nonfiction and prose poetry.
But there’s something about the juxtaposition of all these disparate pieces that diminishes the whole for me. This is still a worthy read — as I understand it — the first to collect mostly flash nonfiction into one volume by one author. / Hardcover, 01/09/21.
March 12, 2021
The title is what got me first. I am "directionally challenged" in every sense...veering one way or another except in my most basic beliefs. I can get lost in my own neighborhood, but a friend said that was a temporary brain freeze. Anyhow, I did enjoy reading this book because it was
ALL OVER THE PLACE
from The Holy Ghost to Atlantis to Roget's Thesaurus to being childless to being on a beautiful balcony. JUST LIKE ME
~Linda Campbell Franklin
ALL OVER THE PLACE
from The Holy Ghost to Atlantis to Roget's Thesaurus to being childless to being on a beautiful balcony. JUST LIKE ME
~Linda Campbell Franklin
September 1, 2017
At first, I was confused. There is A LOT of stuff going on all at once. There is a mixture of personal essay, and lyric essay fragmented into an explosion of poetic prose. Works like "Capiche" and "Live Wire" catapult into interpersonal snapshots into the authors past in "The House of the Future."
My favorite line is at the end of "Capiche,"
"All I had was a glass of language to blow into a souvenir."
My favorite line is at the end of "Capiche,"
"All I had was a glass of language to blow into a souvenir."
July 10, 2017
Beautifully rendered memories that inspired emotion in a reader. The essays come together to tell a story that is bitter sweet.
September 18, 2017
This is a small book that you need to spend a lot of time with. I learned so many things from this book - Cooper can do so much with such a small space.
March 7, 2020
A small book of mostly delightful poems spanning a bit towards short essays dealing with childhood wonderment relations and of course inevitable death. I guess I prefer more sex.
July 14, 2021
4.8 - beautiful poetry
February 26, 2023
Beautiful, haunting, simple, with excellent control of language. Inspiring language, really.
Want to read
October 29, 2023Flash nonfiction for Novellas in November and Shorty September.
What is Flash Nonfiction? Read this: https://bookmarks.reviews/five-books-...
What is Flash Nonfiction? Read this: https://bookmarks.reviews/five-books-...
October 18, 2016
This book treats essays differently than I am used to thinking of them. I tend to associate essays primarily with criticism. While, I am well aware that the genre stretches far beyond reviewing books, or movies, or art, or literature, or food, in the end I come back to the idea of the essay taking some object and connecting it to your life and assigning some sort of value judgement to one or the other. These essays are much more personal. Some of them are poetic and a single paragraph. Like flash fiction. A discreet scene, left breezy and open. The best essays are the longer ones discussing Cooper's father, but the entire collection is beautiful and almost elegiac in its use of childhood, growing up, and memory to understand how a life moves forward. Highly recommended.
September 15, 2015
I actually believe I read this book (much of it? most of it?) years ago, but obviously it didn't sink in until now. I picked it up again on a recommendation, interested in the structure and approach. I found the beginning of the book charming, interesting, some great observations, but "The House of the Future" is breathtaking, making the whole book worth reading (at least twice). This essay about Cooper's coming of age around his brother's death from cancer, and at the same time his turning toward a career in architecture, and his observations about his family's understanding of family, home and future, is stunning.
July 27, 2015
An interesting collection of essays and observations. You can't read it expecting a point, or realizations. There are these, but they're not trumpeted the way they are in most popular non fiction. There's almost no point to these, which made them challenging to read at times only because we're so trained to expect a certain kind of pacing and payoffs. The real strength is in the voice. Cooper's sentences are gorgeous, and his descriptions are their own reward.
June 19, 2010
I read about this book in David Shields' Reality Hunger. I was intrigued that a portion of it had been included as an essay in a "best of" series, and that same year the book itself had won the Pen/Faulkner award for fiction. The fiction category may be a stretch, but why not. It is not straight memoir. There are sections with clear narratives and others that read like prose poems, a genre I have never quite believed in. It is elegant and beautiful, and I look forward to reading more.
May 6, 2016
I have been reading this memoir sporadically for several decades, often returning to it for Cooper's style and outlooks on SoCal; the author was my teacher in several workshops at AULA. An outstanding teacher and an authentic memorist, unlike current books put out by politicians and ghost writers (I have in mind the pandering garbage that was Reagan's bio in the 80s). While i entered today's date in the "finished" category, I am sure I will never truly fnish it.
July 11, 2012
A bit more disjointed than "The Bill from my Father" which builds upon and revises some of these pieces, but useful. In particular, a great collection for demonstrating how the power of an essay is not dictated by length - some very brief pieces in here beside longer ones, a good collection to have on the shelf for any CNF aficionado.
July 11, 2008
Great book of creative non-fiction short stories. I read it for a class on autobiography, and Bernard Cooper accomplishes exactly what I would hope that I could accomplish in my own writing. If that makes sense.
December 26, 2013
The sentimental / memoirist quality of the book is overlaid with a fiction writer's and/or essayist's impetus and design, making for a lovingly disjointed and wonderfully honest narrative. A good, meaningful read.
July 15, 2009
One of the most beautiful collection of short lyric essays I've ever read.
August 20, 2009
Bernard is currently my favorite writer. I would call him the poet of creative nonfiction. A master wordsmith.
August 2, 2010
Yet another book I would never have read without David Shields' Reality Hunger. Stunning, heartbreaking language, one to reread every year.
October 31, 2011
Just love this book. Love it.
August 28, 2011
Nice conversational essays, nothing earth shattering but a shared humanity. I ordered his latest to contrast.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews