Long recognized as America's most brilliant jazz writer, winner of the prestigious National Book Critics Circle Award, Gary Giddins has also produced a wide range of stimulating and original cultural criticism in other fields. With Natural Selection , he brings together the best of these previously uncollected essays, including a few written expressly for this volume. The range of topics is spellbinding. Writing with insight, humor, and a famously deft touch, he offers sharp-edged perspectives on such diverse subjects as Federico Fellini and Jean Renoir, Norman Mailer and Ralph Ellison, Marlon Brando and Groucho Marx, Duke Ellington and Bob Dylan, horror and noir, the cartoon version of Animal Farm and the comic book series Classics Illustrated . Throughout, Giddins reveals his uncommon ability to address in very few words an entire career, so that we get an in-depth portrait of the artist beyond the film, book, or recording under review. A wonderful gathering of little-known treasures, Natural Selection will broaden the perception of Gary Giddins as one of our most important cultural critics. "Just try to read all of 'Natural Selection' without buying at least a few CD's and DVD's; the Criterion Collection should pay Giddins a commission."-- New York Times Book Review "In an age of blogs and the everyman critic, it's reassuring to know people as brilliant as Giddins are still ready to offer insights only a true critic can provide. This is an exceptional addition to a remarkable career.... Nowhere else in his works do we find such a wide range of subjects, which proves his perceptive talents and in-depth knowledge of the mediums of which he writes are unequalled."-- Library Journal (starred review) A wonderful gathering of little-known treasures, Natural Selection will broaden the perception of Gary Giddins as one of our most important cultural critics. Gary Giddins wrote the Village Voice 's 'Weather Bird' column for more than thirty years. His eight books and three documentary films have garnered unparalleled recognition for jazz, including a National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism, two Ralph J. Gleason Music Book Awards, six ASCAP-Deems Taylor Awards, a Guggenheim, and a Peabody. He lives in New York City.