Born in New York, Epstein (1880–1959), a sculptor associated with Ezra Pound's vorticism in the 1910s, chiseled his way to the top of the British art world—leaving massive works on display at the Coventry Cathedral, Llandaff Cathedral in Cardiff, Wales, and the Trade Unions Congress War Memorial—and ending up Sir Jacob. Epstein's artistic leanings included direct carving onto stone (a Pound favorite) and love of the neo-primitive, all described here in 14 concise chapters from British biographer Rose (Modigliani: The Pure Bohemian) in the dutiful tone that pervades this biography. Born Jewish, Epstein had only a distant rapport to his religion in his personal life, although his art developed spiritual aspects that Rose recounts. There is inherent interest in how Epstein managed to maintain a marriage for 40 years while fathering five illegitimate children with other women, although his constant freeloading to pay for it all quickly grows tiresome for the reader, and Epstein's chumming around with Picasso, Brancusi and Modigliani in Paris is mentioned distantly and drably. While he aroused controversy in 1912 by carving a nude angel for Oscar Wilde's grave, Epstein declined into a conventional (if knighted) old age. A lot of the ground in this book has been gone over before, notably in Stephen Gardiner's massive Epstein, Artist Against the Establishment
(M. Joseph), but the relatively restrained dimensions of Rose's book will work better for the less obsessed. Photos not seen by PW. (July)
