Sex & Violence – News Syndication

BROOKLYN, N.Y.

$2.68 million

A 2,474-square-foot condominium with two bedrooms, an office, two baths and a powder room in Brooklyn’s Dumbo neighborhood

DETAILS: In a converted factory building dating from 1916, this condo includes an open kitchen and a 45-foot-long living and dining room with views of the Brooklyn Bridge, the East River and the Manhattan skyline.

A NIGHT OUT: St. Ann’s Warehouse, which commissions and produces many new theatrical and musical productions, is around the corner.

NEARBY SWEETS: Jacques Torres Chocolate serves up truffles, chocolate-covered Cheerios and chocolate croissants, among other treats.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Snow showers, high 36 degrees

SOURCE:
Charles Homet, Halstead Property, chomet@halstead.com, 212-381-6571

SEATTLE

$2.99 million

A 5,800-square-foot house with four bedrooms and 4½ bathrooms in Seattle’s Queen Anne neighborhood

DETAILS: Built in 2003, the three-story house features detailed woodwork and formal living and dining rooms oriented toward panoramic views of the Seattle skyline and Elliott Bay. French doors lead out to two decks. There’s a screening room, three fireplaces and an elevator.

A NIGHT OUT: The Seattle Repertory Theatre, now showing David Mamet’s “Glengarry Glen Ross” (it’s about real estate), is about a half-mile away.

NEARBY SWEETS: Wink Cupcakes serves up artisan cupcakes and serves locally made ice cream.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Rain, high 55 degrees

SOURCE:
Holley Ring, Windermere Real Estate, 206-852-6107, hring@windermere.com; REALTOR.com

ARLINGTON, Va.

$2.6 million

A 5,830-square-foot, five-level townhouse with three bedrooms, four bathrooms and a powder room

DETAILS: This 2002 brick home has large formal entertaining spaces, a gourmet kitchen, hardwood and limestone floors and a large roof terrace. The house has views of the Potomac River, Washington Monument and the Capitol.

A NIGHT OUT: The Signature Theatre, about a 10-minute drive away, is currently showing several plays and musicals, including Stephen Sondheim’s “Sweeney Todd.”

NEARBY SWEETS: Cafe Assorti specializes in Eastern European cuisine, including Russian and Kazakh pastries.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Scattered snow showers, high 40 degrees

SOURCE:
Deborah Shapiro, TTR Sotheby’s International Realty, 703-407-1600, dshapiro@ttrsir.com; REALTOR.com

—Sara Lin

By ERIC ORMSBY

Translation once meant more than the mere transfer of meaning from one language to another. Once upon a time, bodies were “translated” too. In the most famous example, from the Book of Genesis, Enoch (father of the even hoarier Methuselah) doesn’t simply keel over at the ripe old age of 300 but is “translated,” body and soul, into heaven. So, too, in a good verse translation: The original must be somehow embodied in the translation. In such a translation, a sharp scent of strangeness remains, as vague yet distinctive as sweat on a shroud.

The question isn’t only what makes a good translation but whether translation is possible at all. Robert Frost said that “poetry is what gets lost in translation.” We all know what Frost meant, but is his statement true? To try to find out, I spoke with two acclaimed poets in their own right who recently published new translations of French poetry: Karl Kirchwey’s translation of Paul Verlaine’s “Poems Under Saturn” (Princeton) and John Ashbery’s version of Arthur Rimbaud’s “Illuminations” (Norton).

I met with Mr. Kirchwey in his sunny and spacious office at the American Academy in Rome, where he is currently on leave from Bryn Mawr College and serving a three-year term as the Academy’s Andrew Heiskell Arts Director. Mr. Kirchwey had the harder task. Verlaine is a master of formal measures and is renowned for his suave rhymes and delicate rhythms. Moreover, in French poetry vowel sounds are both purer and subtler than in English, and Verlaine exploits this with unprecedented skill. Didn’t he exclaim in one famous poem, “Music above all else!” How does one capture such effects in English?

Though the project began as “a kind of accident” in Mr. Kirchwey’s Bryn Mawr writing classes four years ago, it quickly engaged his imagination. “It was something that overtook me,” he admits. Early on he resolved, against conventional wisdom, to attempt to convey the music of Verlaine’s French as closely as possible. That meant reproducing his rhyme schemes without falling into doggerel or resorting to padding, filling out lines for the sake of a rhyme—the besetting sins of most previous translators of Verlaine.

As Mr. Kirchwey noted, this wasn’t simply a technical challenge. Something in Verlaine’s verse spoke to his own deepest impulses as a poet. He saw the project as an effort to find a balance between “sensuality and learning,” as Verlaine somehow did. Mr. Kirchwey also responded to Verlaine’s “keen feeling of a self.” Even Verlaine’s spectacular inconsistency in his life and art appealed to Mr. Kirchwey: his catastrophic love affairs (not least with Rimbaud), his absinthe-soaked days, his legendary eccentricities, all reflected in poems that range from tender hymns of devotion to grossly obscene sonnets, made a chaotic but enticing mix. It was as though Verlaine, at once shambling and sublime, had realized the full range of human possibilities.

“Poems Under Saturn” (“Poèmes Saturniens”) published in 1866, made Verlaine’s name. Mr. Kirchwey’s success in his translation rests in part on his own deft yet audacious approach to rhyme. Consider the opening lines of “Sentimental Stroll” (“Promenade Sentimentale”):

The setting sun cast its final rays

And the breeze rocked the pale water lilies.

Among the reeds, the huge water

Lilies shone sadly on the calm water.

“Rays” doesn’t really rhyme with “lilies.” But there’s a small buzz of an echo in the final consonants, as well as the half-hidden assonance of “rays” and “pale.” And “water” rhymes with itself, what the French call “rich rhyme” (rime riche). These are tiny almost inconspicuous touches, and Mr. Kirchwey uses them throughout—not our clanging “perfect” rhymes in English but something like the slant, feathery sound-effects Verlaine himself obtained. He sees this approach as an attempt “to expand the sense of the possibilities of rhyme,” and it works.

A week or so later, I called Mr. Ashbery in New York. His translation of Rimbaud, he told me, came about at the suggestion of Robert Weil, executive editor at Norton. This modest disclaimer struck me as a bit disingenuous. Sure enough, after we’d chatted for a while it became obvious just how important Rimbaud had been to him not only as a translator, but as a poet. When Mr. Ashbery was 16, a friend showed him Rimbaud’s poem “O saisons, O châteaux,” and he immediately said to himself, “This is what poetry is.” Rimbaud, he tells me, was “the first example of modernity I came across.” And modernity has infused his work ever since; this isn’t a question of influence so much as affinity. This most American of major poets is, it turns out, a firm advocate of “the three R’s”: Raymond Roussel, Pierre Reverdy (the great modern French poet whom he has also translated) and Rimbaud.

Mr. Ashbery has lived with the radiant and elusive prose poems of the “Illuminations” for a lifetime; they tantalize him still. I ask him about his translation of a line that has always puzzled me and that the English translator Martin Sorrell (whom he admires) renders literally as “Our desire lacks knowing music.” In an earlier copy for reviewers, Mr. Ashbery gives this as “We have no desire for complex music.” Don’t we? I’m more mystified than ever. He chuckles and exclaims, “Oh, I’ve changed that!” In the finished book it will read, “Wise music is missing from our desire.” Ah, suddenly the line makes sense. Better still, it has Rimbaud’s distinctive rhythm in its accents. Something strangely palpable has been transferred.

Mr. Ormsby’s most recent book is “The Baboons of Hada: Selected Poems” (Carcanet).

By HEIDI WALESON

Chris Lee

Isabel Bayrakdarian (far left) as the title character in Doug Fitch’s production of Leoš Janáček’s ‘The Cunning Little Vixen.’

New York

In May 2010, the New York Philharmonic scored a coup with a riotously staged production of György Ligeti’s “Le Grand Macabre,” an anarchic look at the end of the world. Like that opera, this year’s production of Leoš Janáček’s “The Cunning Little Vixen” (1924) is being presented by director Doug Fitch and the production company Giants Are Small. But “Vixen” is a very different modern work, a celebration of lust, life and the cycles of nature that was last seen in New York in 1998, in the charming 1981 Frank Corsaro-Maurice Sendak production at the New York City Opera. Death arrives, but it is part of the natural order. Janáček’s lush and gorgeous score, and the poignant parallels drawn between the lives of the human and animal characters, make this a rewarding piece of theater, worthy of being staged far more often than it is.

Janáček based his opera on a comic strip, “The Adventures of Vixen Sharp-ears,” adapting the libretto himself. An aging Forester captures the baby Vixen and brings her home, but true to her natural, wild instincts, she wreaks havoc on the household and escapes to the woods, where she finds a mate, has so many children that she loses count, and is killed by a poacher. The Vixen’s vigorous coming of age is contrasted with the decline of the Forester and his two drinking buddies, the Schoolmaster and the Parson, who pine for their lost youth and sadly watch the local beauty marry a younger man.

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Edouard Getaz

Alan Gilbert and Doug Fitch at Mr. Fitch’s studio.

Mr. Fitch took a more realistic and less technology-based approach to this anthropomorphic fable than he did for the Ligeti. Enormous sunflowers sprouted from the stage to tower over the Philharmonic players; vines twined around the onstage lighting equipment; a wooden inn table at stage right doubled as the Vixen’s den; and a catwalk stretched out into the audience, extending the playing area on the stage in front of the orchestra. (G.W. Mercier and Mr. Fitch did the scenic design.) Clifton Taylor’s lighting suggested the warmth and darkness of the forest.

Mr. Fitch’s eye-popping animal costumes playfully merged elements of human garb with animal features: A hedgehog’s spines sprouted from a zippered sweatshirt, the Vixen’s cubs looked like scruffy urchins with ears and tails. Costumes for the domestic animals had even more elements of human clothing: The Forester’s hens sported house dresses and colorful rain boots. Cookie Jordan did the elaborate makeup. Most of the forest creatures other than the Vixen and her mate were perkily played by members of the Metropolitan Opera Children’s Chorus, and Karole Armitage choreographed their witty animal gestures and movements. As the Dragonfly, Neel Najarajan was especially graceful.

But both the physical and musical direction missed some of the opera’s subtleties. Conductor Alan Gilbert’s approach was large-scale and Wagnerian, with an orchestral sound that stressed power rather than delicacy and often covered the voices, making it difficult to distinguish the text (an English translation by Norman Tucker) without relying on the supertitles. The fine baritone Alan Opie gave a performance that emphasized the Forester’s anger at the Vixen and his own mortality. The touching penultimate scene—in which the Schoolmaster (the bracing tenor Keith Jameson) quietly weeps over his hopeless love for the town beauty Terynka, and the innkeeper’s wife (Tami Petty) tells the Forester that the Parson, who has moved away, is homesick—was played for laughs. It missed the deep sadness that sets up the joyous finale in the forest, when the Forester at last understands the beauty as well as the ferocity of the natural life cycle. The performance felt rather muscular and heavy, a contradiction to the wild, feminine energy of the opera’s title character.

As the Vixen, soprano Isabel Bayrakdarian displayed plenty of that ebullient spirit, however. Full-voiced, agile and impudently funny, she bounded around the stage, blithely tricking the Forester’s vain and stupid chickens, appropriating the old Badger’s den, learning about love from the Fox, chomping on a rabbit, and howling defiance at Harašta, who shot her.

Mezzo Marie Lenormand was sweetly swaggering as the Fox, who woos and wins the Vixen; baritone Joshua Bloom was pure testosterone as Harašta; and mezzo Melissa Parks was imposing as the Forester’s impatient wife and the Owl (for which she wore a cagelike garment flecked with feathers). Bass Wilbur Pauley growled with impotent menace as the Parson and the Badger. The chicken contingent was hilarious, led by Emalie Savoy, wearing a man’s suit with a puffed up front as the Cock, and Devon Guthrie in burlesque-inspired lingerie as the principal hen. Kelley O’Connor was the mournful old Dog. Dancer Emily Wagner was a seductive Terynka, the Vixen’s human counterpart, her silent but physically eloquent presence driving the men mad, which, finally, is what the opera is all about. The men can shoot the women (or Vixens), and try to domesticate them, but the women still have the upper hand.

Ms. Waleson writes about opera for the Journal.

CULVER CITY, Calif.

$885,000

A roughly 1,800-square-foot apartment with two bedrooms and two baths, downtown

DETAILS: This contemporary condominium unit has an open-plan kitchen-and-living area and a covered terrace. The fourth-floor apartment is part of a 2009 mixed-use building that has 18 units and a gym.

FOODIE ALERT: Less than a half-mile away is critics’ favorite Fraiche, with its rustic French and Italian fare. Also nearby: restaurant supply store Surfas, which offers cookware and gourmet food—including more than 60 olive and other oils—and gastropubs Ford’s Filling Station and Father’s Office, which offers a $12 burger with dry-aged beef, caramelized onion and gruyère.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Sunny, high 80 degrees

SOURCE:
Tami Pardee, Pardee Properties, 310-907-6517, tami@pardeeproperties.com

AUSTIN, Texas

$999,000

A 4,100-square-foot home with six bedrooms and four baths, on 0.38 acre in a gated neighborhood in Westlake Hills

DETAILS: This two-story, Mediterranean-style home was built in 1997 and renovated in 2007. It has 24-foot ceilings in the great room, some vaulted ceilings and two bedrooms on the first floor. There are also several fireplaces, a pool and a putting green.

FOODIE ALERT: Uchi, a nationally recognized sushi restaurant, is six miles away. (The “pitchfork” roll comes with Wagyu beef, avocado and leek crisps.) Other notable restaurants include Olivia, where an entrée of lamb liver and onions costs $15, and Garrido’s, where Tex-Mex goes upscale.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Partly cloudy, high 95 degrees

SOURCE:
Cord Shiflet, Moreland Properties, 512-751-2673, cord@moreland.com; Realtor.com

NEW YORK

$945,000

An 1,100-square-foot penthouse apartment with two bedrooms and two bathrooms, in the West Village

DETAILS: This cooperative unit is in a 1961 doorman building with a roof deck. The 17th-floor apartment has exposures on three sides.

FOODIE ALERT: Babbo, Mario Batali’s restaurant, is less than seven blocks away. The pasta tasting menu costs $69 without wine. The original location of Joe the Art of Coffee is nearby, as is Blue Hill, which the Obamas made their date-night pick a year ago. An entrée of Hudson Valley chicken with shiitake mushrooms and spinach runs $32.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Partly cloudy, high 83 degrees

SOURCE:
Joanne Greene, Brown Harris Stevens, a Christie’s Great Estates affiliate, 212-906-9341, jgreene@bhsusa.com

— Juliet Chung

By ANDY BATTAGLIA

Getty Images

Fatboy Slim performed this week in Ibiza, Spain. He’ll be on Governors Island on Saturday.

Englishman Norman Cook has been an international superstar DJ for almost as long as such a job has been possible. He started out in the early 1980s, before the club-music circuit was especially international or scalable to the size of stars. But it wasn’t until he adopted the stage name Fatboy Slim in the ’90s that he pierced the mainstream.

Fatboy Slim albums like 1996′s “Better Living Through Chemistry” and 1998′s “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby” count as club-music classics, thanks in part to their infectious use of samples culled from old funk and soul. At 47, Mr. Cook continues to tour the world and perform before crowds than can number in the hundreds of thousands. His next gig, a reprise of his popular outdoor “Big Beach Boutique” parties, will be on Governors Island on Saturday, as part of the festival Dance.Here.Now.

The Journal caught up with the DJ, who spoke from his home in Brighton, England.

This will be your first “Big Beach Boutique” party in New York. How does the spirit of the affair differ from a typical club night?

The idea is to take the best elements of a really good club night and the best elements of a festival and turn it into a big outdoor party—without anyone having to camp. It started as a celebration on the beach in Brighton but, on this particular occasion, it will celebrate the anniversary of your glorious revolution, of throwing the English out of your country. I can’t think of a better excuse for a party, frankly.

The market for dance-music in the U.S. has grown remarkably in the past few years. Has your notion of playing here changed?

There does seem to be a new wave. Ten years ago, when I first started seriously coming to America, there was a real European invasion. But the relationship between America and dance music has always been strange. You tend to instigate things that are not very popular in America, and then it takes Europeans to come and sell the idea back. It’s happened from the Beatles onward. But I played in Detroit last week, and it was really good to see Americans appreciating music that they actually instigated themselves.

Detroit is regarded as the birthplace of techno, which spawned so much club music later. How was it for you to play there, at a techno festival outdoors in the middle of the city?

For someone like me, having grown up with music that came out of Detroit—not just techno but also blues and soul—to go and play what was almost a national celebration of that music was a great honor. I’m always a bit wary of going to Detroit because of how much I’ve bastardized what they do, but it was nice that they appreciate my take on it.

What’s your impression of New York right now?

It’s always seemed like a separate country from the rest of America. Whereas Detroit has been a symbol of the American dream and how it can go wrong, New York seems to have its own dream. I’ve always felt far more at home there than in other parts of the country. And it’s nice not needing to have a motor car to connect the dots.

The practice of DJing has evolved considerably in recent years, as technology changes. Has your relationship to your craft evolved?

I carried on playing vinyl for ages because I didn’t want to get too caught up in technology. I think the art of DJing is pretty much the same as it’s always been: You’re there to make people smile and dance—to turn them on. The tools you use aren’t as important as the general reason you’re there, which is a mix of escapism, hedonism and a need to create a fantastical, sexy environment for people to forget the pain of the week they’ve been through. I don’t think you should get so hung up on technology that you’re looking down at a laptop when you should be communicating with the crowd.

Has your relationship to those values of escapism and hedonism changed?

I’ve given up on some of the hedonism. I quit drinking and every other kind of self-abuse two years ago. I don’t personally “party” anymore, but I’ve been doing it for quarter of a century, so I’m aware of what it entails. I’m now a married father of two in my 40s. I’ve got nothing to escape from anymore.

By JULIET CHUNG

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz.

$1.05 million

A 3,700-square-foot home, with three bedrooms and three baths, on 0.75 acre looking over the 18th hole of a private golf course

DETAILS: This single-story, Southwest contemporary-style home, built in 1991, has a U-shaped floor plan, beamed ceilings and a two-way fireplace dividing the kitchen from the family room. There’s a pool and mountain views.

FORE!: Troon Country Club has a 50,000-square-foot clubhouse with spa and exercise facilities, as well as a pool and tennis courts

REFUELING: The Quail’s Nest and Lounge, in the clubhouse, offers free hors d’oeuvres, including oysters on the half-shell and sliders, after a round of golf.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Partly cloudy, high 86 degrees

SOURCE:
Margy Senna, Russ Lyon Sotheby’s International Realty, 602-622-1388, margy@azgolfproperties.com

BOCA RATON, Fla.

$1.05 million

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Premier Estate Props./Christie’s

An almost 2,600-square-foot contemporary with three bedrooms and three baths, on 0.25 acre, overlooking the 15th tee

DETAILS: The home, renovated in 2007, comes furnished and features a double-height great room and dining room, glass walls overlooking a pool and garden and his-and-hers baths in the master suite.

FORE!: The Polo Club of Boca Raton, a gated country-club community, has two private 18-hole golf courses, a 145,000-square-foot clubhouse, a tennis complex and a 40,000-square-foot spa-fitness center.

REFUELING: The Polo Pub, in the clubhouse, offers post-golf dining and complimentary postgame hors d’oeuvres, including wings and hot dogs.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Chance of showers, high 79 degrees

SOURCE:
Thomas Walsh, Premier Estate Properties, a Christie’s Great Estates affiliate, 561-573-2226, thomaswalsh@bellsouth.net

LAS VEGAS

$1.1 million

A 4,200-square-foot Mediterranean-style home with four bedrooms and four baths on 0.25 acre, with views of three fairways

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Realty Executives

DETAILS: This single-story, 2002 home has several fireplaces and a great room with ceilings of more than 20 feet. A patio overlooks one of the two golf courses. The master bath has a black granite shower.

FORE!: Red Rock Country Club has two Arnold Palmer-designed golf courses—one private, one public (the home overlooks the public course). A roughly 10,000-square-foot sports club features gym, pool, tennis and spa facilities. There’s also a 44,000-square-foot main clubhouse.

REFUELING: The Oasis Grill, on site, serves a shrimp-and-crab BLT with avocado ($14).

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Partly cloudy, high 82 degrees

SOURCE:
Pawel Szott, Realty Executives, 702-349-2131, szott@cox.net; Realtor.com

By EILEEN GUNN

Bored with management consulting, Gabriel Turner turned his love for his native Uruguay’s beef into a passionate, more entrepreneurial career.

Mr. Turner, who was born in Uruguay but moved to the U.S. as a toddler, started out at a large consulting firm after college. After a few years, he found he wasn’t getting the breadth of experience he’d expected. “I wasn’t passionate about it, and it wasn’t something I saw myself doing forever,” he says.

By March 2007, he was having serious second thoughts. Around the same time, he also had a steak dinner that would seal his second act. The San Francisco restaurant where he dined had posted a sign saying it served Uruguayan grass-fed beef from a company called Estancia.

Mr. Turner had vacationed on his uncle’s Uruguayan cattle ranch, and held his native country’s beef in high esteem. He’d also taken classes in food science and international food policy as an undergrad at the University of California at Berkeley, sparking his interest in sustainable food. He believed Uruguay’s free-range ranching techniques fit that trend; he’d even brought the idea up to his dad, seeking fatherly advice. But his father said he couldn’t see the concept working. So when Mr. Turner saw the restaurant’s sign, he was intrigued that someone else had found a way to do it.

He spent the next several weeks trying to track down Estancia’s owner, Bill Reed, leaving numerous voice mails in the hopes of landing a meeting. Finally, Mr. Reed agreed to meet for coffee in early April. Amid a conversation touching on everything from Mr. Reed’s expansion plans, to their mutual interest in eco-food writer Michael Pollan, to sustainable food, Mr. Turner became convinced that he wanted to work with Mr. Reed. “He told me he didn’t have a job [open], but I walked away thinking if I pushed, maybe there could be one,” Mr. Turner recalls.

The two kept in touch. And a month later in one of their chats, Mr. Reed mentioned that he wanted to persuade customers that beef from free-range cows in South America had a smaller environmental impact as beef from industrial U.S. farms — despite the greater shipping distances. Mr. Turner offered to crunch the numbers for him free.

Mr. Reed was impressed. “I finally realized that his understanding of the industry and our product would help him sell our program to often skeptical butchers and chefs,” Mr. Reed says. In July 2007, Mr. Reed offered him a job in Los Angeles. Saying yes meant major changes for Mr. Turner — including a 60% pay cut and leaving behind his life in San Francisco.

He set to work peddling beef to restaurants and gourmet grocery stores, while also staging cooking demonstrations, talking with the local food press, and helping to organize educational trips to Uruguay for chefs. In consulting, “I didn’t get to know the big picture of what a department or company was doing,” he says. “Here, I have my hands in everything.”

He visited butchers to learn from them so he would be able to speak more knowledgeably about different cuts of meat. He read up on sustainable agriculture. And he had to learn how to crack a new market. That wasn’t always easy; after a particularly bad day chasing fruitless leads, he recalls thinking, “I’m not a good salesperson.”

Today, 30 Los Angeles restaurants and specialty markets carry Estancia beef, says Mr. Turner. Meanwhile, Mr. Turner has enrolled at Harvard Business School to hone the skills he needs to continue on his career path and to learn about sustainable business more formally.

He is keeping in close touch with Mr. Reed while he is at school. For starters, he is expanding on the first project he did for Mr. Reed, developing a detailed carbon-footprint report for Estancia. And when Mr. Reed brings his product to the East Coast, something he hopes to do in 2009, Mr. Turner plans to help with the marketing and business development.

Mr. Turner, now 25, says he might stay with Estancia, but “could see starting my own company,” after graduation. “The more I think about it, the more I’d like it to be in the sustainable foods industry and working with Uruguay if possible.”

Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page D5

Q: Why are manufacturers such as Mercedes so reluctant to bring their most fuel-efficient vehicles (50 to 60 mpg) to the states. Seems like there is a huge market in the U.S. for the more luxurious, fuel-efficient models.

—Bruce Nathanson, Chicago

A: Mercedes-Benz has said it will sell its next-generation B-Class vehicle in the U.S. and made a point of touting the even smaller A-Class concept car at the New York auto show this year. BMW and other car makers also have shown extremely small cars that could find their way to the U.S. It may take a few years, but the small-car and micro-car markets are poised to take off in North America. As this happens a broad range of smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles will become available.

Q: I would like to buy a 2010 Maserati Quattroporte but I am concerned about reliability and using this as my “everyday” car. Is this car OK with stop-and-go city driving, and are most of the reliability issues with Maserati a thing of the past?

—Stephanie Cronk, Lexington, Ky.

A: I see a lot of Quattroportes sitting in New York City traffic all the time and have yet to see one overheating, running roughly or exhibiting other problems often attributed to exotic Italian cars.

I know that is a less-than-scientific answer, but the fact is that reliability data for this relatively rare sedan are hard to find.

If you really like the Maserati and are willing to accept that it will probably need more attention from the mechanic than, say, a Lexus and will cost more to fix, you should get one. Driving one gives you the feeling of an exotic sports car disguised as a sedan. There is no other car quite like it. The Audi A8 tries, so does the BMW B7, but they aren’t nearly as racy-feeling.

Q: In these times of high gas prices, in an attempt to improve my mileage, I have been taking my foot off of the accelerator when going downhill. Does this actually improve your mileage? Does it pay to “coast” while in gear?

—Ronald M. Horwitz, Farmington Hills, Mich.

A: To save gas, you should try to coast whenever you can. You should also avoid big, rapid throttle movements. If your car has a trip computer with an instantaneous fuel economy setting, you can use it to see how small differences in throttle position affect fuel consumption.

Q: We have a 2005 Volvo with 117,500 miles. With the 120,000-mile service approaching in two months, I have been advised that the timing belt will need replacing and also that, while “they are in there,” it is a good idea to change the water pump at that time. What are your thoughts regarding replacement of the water pump at 120,000 miles?

—Jerry Coogan, New London, N.H.

A: I know it seems strange to talk about changing parts that seem to be working perfectly. But after 120,000 miles, your water pump may be nearing the end of its useful life anyway. Changing it is more convenient when the engine is already opened up for the timing-belt service. The job will also cost less because it will require less labor.

—Email mecar@wsj.com