...a whooping, joy-filled and hyperbolic raid on, of all things, the theory of evolution ... Because this is a Tom Wolfe production, there is a great deal of funny and acid commentary on social class ... Mr. Wolfe’s prose here is mostly sure-footed, but there are moments when he seems on the verge of losing it, of falling into fragments of Morse-code nonsense ... The Kingdom of Speech is meant to be a provocation rather than a dissertation. The sound it makes is that of a lively mind having a very good time, and enjoying the scent of its own cold-brewed napalm in the morning.
Wolfe makes a habit of turning all the 'great men' of history into straw men ... New Journalism was about the author asserting himself in the story by becoming a part of it. But when Wolfe stays in his chair, he becomes just another elderly man shouting at his computer. This is not entirely a bad thing — nobody shouts at his computer quite like Tom Wolfe ... I’m pretty sure The Kingdom of Speech is what used to be known as 'a hoot.' Never have I been so entertained by such a shoddy argument.
Sadly, his latest book, The Kingdom of Speech, suffers from [a] mix of sarcasm and ignorance ... Wolfe’s argument ultimately backfires, for the book grossly distorts the theory of evolution, the claims of linguistics and the controversies about their connection. Finally, after misleading the reader for nearly 200 pages, Wolfe proposes his own theory of how language began — a theory far less plausible than the ones he mocks.
The author’s own prose is, as ever, a marvelous mix of gleeful energy and whip-around-the-neck control, and his book is a gas to read. It’s also kind of bonkers ... Even if speech were entirely due to culture, why is this some sort of victory over evolution? Why the boosterish chest-thumping? No biologists think that the great creations of our species— Mozart’s symphonies, Katsura Villa, the Mahabharata, integral calculus—were due to natural selection ... Why does it matter whether Mr. Wolfe used a product of nurture or nature for his razzle-dazzle prose? Either way, it’s all his.?
We are dealing with a short book by a big writer on a dull topic, further complicated — as it turns out — by an old man’s willingness to digress, and the result is a qualified success ... Wolfe’s attack on Chomsky is precise, scathing and not undeserved. But what, Lord, does this have to do with the topic of language?
...while the book does champion a profoundly important revision to our understanding of human development, it won’t offer you a particularly comprehensive or insightful take on that new paradigm. Instead, Tom Wolfe gives us something very Tom Wolfe-ian: a gossipy personal history of the figures and battles behind the ideas. Which would be fine, despite the misdirection, if there weren’t other substantial problems with The Kingdom of Speech. The biggest one is that Wolfe (now well into his 80s) is here practicing New Journalism from an armchair ... an important message delivered in a deeply flawed vessel.
He presents that intriguing case in his inimitable, casual-chatty, captivating storytelling style. His trademark rich reporting is unmistakable throughout ... Sure, Wolfe-ish annoyances persist. Too-many repeated words and slam-bang semantics ... Still, he brings to this academic debate the same irreverence and entertaining quality that lit up Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
Wolfe tells these stories with the kind of free-wheeling vim familiar from his brilliant books such as The Right Stuff and The Bonfire of the Vanities. Particularly in the way he ventriloquises the thoughts and worries of his protagonists, the book is superbly written, when it doesn’t tip over into a kind of self-parodic babble. The only problem with Wolfe’s tales, really, is that they are irresponsibly partial accounts, riddled with elementary falsehoods...The Kingdom of Speech, then, is a sad example of the interface of literary celebrity with publishing. An author less famous and bankable than Wolfe would surely have been saved from such embarrassment by more critical editorial attention.
To Wolfe, speech constitutes a kingdom all its own–beyond that of animals. Wolfe, still a master at using language, is another claimant for the throne. The Kingdom of Speech is best read, then, with Wolfe not just as a narrator-historian but as a character. One who, after critiquing theorists who rule from insulated rooms, depicts himself in that exact setting for his book’s final vision.
The common reader will likely find The Kingdom of Speech an entertaining and informative romp, thanks to Wolfe's patented stylistic hijinks. It may raise more questions than it answers, but that may well be its greatest virtue. It is also, quite often, very funny.
The Kingdom of Speech seems to teach us that for something as varied and idiosyncratic as human language, there will never be one theory to explain the starkness of Pirahã, the 100-syllable nouns of Sanskrit poetry, the melodic stutter of Italian, or the countless other features that make one language different from another. But I say 'seems' because in the final chapter, against all expectations, Mr. Wolfe indulges in his own utterly flawed theory of language ... It’s an odd ending for a book that rejects exactly this kind of philosophizing. The fact is, if we take what Mr. Wolfe says seriously, then we must discount what Mr. Wolfe says.
...here, after all that slightly unseemly novel-worship, the most savage and entertaining of all 'new journalists' has found one of the most unlikely subjects to stimulate his lifelong penchant for mocking naked emperors whom the world considers the epitome of regal splendor ... Never mind that there has always been no small fatuousness and philistinism in Wolfe’s deification of reportage, he has a grand time ripping through Chomsky’s theories ... Of eminent B.S. in this world, there will always be a surplus. Which is why we always need Wolfe.
