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3.69 AVERAGE
3.69 AVERAGE
Exceptionally beautiful. It was very accessible, felt like peeking into the lives of these people in fragments, just like we can only read Sappho in big pauses. It touches upon not only gender, but also colonialism and white supremacy.
This book was like a poem and so beautiful. I had no idea what I was getting into — just that the cover was interesting and it was shortlisted for a Booker prize — but it was a fascinating look at the role of unusual women in Europe at the fin de siècle. The love and friendship of these women, as they wandered in and out of each others’ salons and wrote impassioned novels and articles to each other, shaping the women’s suffrage movement in their own countries, watching the ebb and flow of tolerance across the decades — it was all described so beautifully, while bringing the reader directly into these salons with the use of “we” throughout. Truly spectacular book.
informative
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Zu fragmentiert und viele Personen, für mich und 20 Min Zug fahren gerade nicht so recht passend.
Hat mich nicht vom Weiterlesen überzeugen können, obwohl ich die Idee und Geschichten sehr spannend fand.
Hat mich nicht vom Weiterlesen überzeugen können, obwohl ich die Idee und Geschichten sehr spannend fand.
informative
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
really oddly written and not in a good way also I've read this book ina diff variation a million times
This is one flighty book. One which defies classification too, as even it admits, in the afterward. And the purpose is the main point of the book, so revealing it would be a spoiler and ruin the fun. But it is a series of vignettes, fictional mixed with non-fiction, through various characters. It charts around 150 years of history. It’s form and function is paired to Sappho’s fragmentary work.
This, to be honest, made it simultaneously fast to read and difficult to actually pay attention to. You are constantly getting resituated in space and time and a new character. It’s a bit of a puzzle, and one that can be really frustrating sometimes. Things do come together with enough patience. And I do typically gravitate towards stuff that is unconventional, so I’m somewhat predisposed to extending a fair amount of good faith to even new-to-me authors. I doubt this is actually a novel, though comprised technically of a lot of short snippets of stories. I am also not sure what else it is, though it goes into that after the end, if you’re curious, and you can figure where you’re at with it yourself.
Prose wise, I liked it. The format makes it so it’s quite poetic but it is also grounded in what is concretely happening in the life of the character, typically. It gets in, gets out. It’s unabashedly angry, rightly so, when charting the path of men oppressing women. Probably put some people off but it didn’t bother me even slightly.
And a special note: I highly recommend you get this in the hardcover binding from the US coming, because the paperback UK has really crap binding. The gutter is terrible and so tight, it’s actually annoying to keep the pages apart, almost like a mass market paperback, but oversized.
This, to be honest, made it simultaneously fast to read and difficult to actually pay attention to. You are constantly getting resituated in space and time and a new character. It’s a bit of a puzzle, and one that can be really frustrating sometimes. Things do come together with enough patience. And I do typically gravitate towards stuff that is unconventional, so I’m somewhat predisposed to extending a fair amount of good faith to even new-to-me authors. I doubt this is actually a novel, though comprised technically of a lot of short snippets of stories. I am also not sure what else it is, though it goes into that after the end, if you’re curious, and you can figure where you’re at with it yourself.
Prose wise, I liked it. The format makes it so it’s quite poetic but it is also grounded in what is concretely happening in the life of the character, typically. It gets in, gets out. It’s unabashedly angry, rightly so, when charting the path of men oppressing women. Probably put some people off but it didn’t bother me even slightly.
And a special note: I highly recommend you get this in the hardcover binding from the US coming, because the paperback UK has really crap binding. The gutter is terrible and so tight, it’s actually annoying to keep the pages apart, almost like a mass market paperback, but oversized.
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
A Greek chorus tells the story of the intertwined lives of the sapphic writers, actresses, poets, dancers... (etc) Of the late 1800s to early 1900s.
I was fighting for my life with this book. I love the prose, the exploration of (fictional) intimate and intertwined lives of magnificent (and flawed) women. But it was heavy. This books takes us through some dark times for women, up to and including the rise of fascism in Italy.
I'm not a literary fiction girlie is what I've been reluctantly learning. This was brilliant but not my thing.
I was fighting for my life with this book. I love the prose, the exploration of (fictional) intimate and intertwined lives of magnificent (and flawed) women. But it was heavy. This books takes us through some dark times for women, up to and including the rise of fascism in Italy.
I'm not a literary fiction girlie is what I've been reluctantly learning. This was brilliant but not my thing.
funny
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
this was so funny when describing how little men knew of women. but overall this was such a good depiction of what it was like to be sapphic a while ago and honestly history be repeating itself
some favortie quotes:
some favortie quotes:
the goal of his existence was to catch the wives of the members of parliament entangled in lesbian ecstasy.... not that he would've recognized lesbian ecstasy if it had bit him on the foot
he said that a clitoris was a type of lesbian
she knew what a clitoris was and therefore was imprisoned