Joshua Then and Now Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Nora Magid

Critical Essay by Nora Magid

[Joshua Then and Now] is intermittently wonderful but it is told in such a way that it is occasionally short-circuited. Between the beginning, where he is recuperating from an accident—"You're lucky to be alive," says the doctor. "I'll be the judge of that," thinks Joshua—to the reasonably hopeful ending, he contemplates his entire life, but not sequentially. The nervous bits and pieces collide to constitute too intricate and deliberate a puzzle. The freewheeling energy that is Mordecai Richler's style and the overplotting—particularly in the Ibiza sections—are at odds with each other. (p. 22)

Nora Magid, "What Happened to Everybody?" in The Nation (copyright 1980 The Nation Associates, Inc.), Vol. 231, No. 1, July 5, 1980, pp. 22-4.