December 10, 1999

Simon Schama's Book on Rembrandt Gets Mixed Review From Close Colleague; English Professor at Davidson College Is Translating Edvard Munch's Journals

In the acknowledgments to his new book, Rembrandt's Eyes (Knopf), the historian Simon Schama profusely thanks his Columbia University colleague David Freedberg, with whom he team-taught a graduate seminar on Rembrandt. The professor of art history, he says, "deserves special thanks for continually provoking me to think harder and more subtly about Rubens and Rembrandt."

Think a little harder, says Mr. Freedberg.

The art historian reviews Mr. Schama's