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3.71 AVERAGE
3.71 AVERAGE
Good clean fun. Upstanding New York girls whose fathers have money wish to marry into titles and respectability in London society. Or rather, their mothers would like them too. Some cutthroat competition for a young duke. Plus several plain English girls will have none of it. Wharton at her very best.
A hybrid from 2 decades and 2 authors which is interesting and I admire the work behind it. It was very engaging early on and degenerated into a simple and not very satisfying romance toward the end. By far the most interesting character was Miss Testvalley who I realise was meant as a supporting-character all along but I still felt the ending did not do her justice.
After so much critical insight into classism, sexism (this is not explored and perhaps not acknowledged by the author but is a theme) and various levels of cliquey "popular" cultures (one as bad as the other though there are 3 or 4 that intersect in the book) the last thing I care about is who Nan "ends up with". I am not saying don't give her a happy ending I am saying she needs something more substantive than she got. It may not help that I didn't really click with any of the characters in the first place, they are not really relatable and as such the satire/critique should have been kept sharper. A good example of this is the softening of the gaze on Nan and Ginny's father who is a boorish entrepreneur/capitalist at the beginning and "dear old dad" by the end. I can't see clearly where the stitches are between the old and the new but my suspicions lie in the softenings and romantications of what seemed like incisive, insightful writing at the beginning.
It's possible I am being unfair to Mainwaring though considering how torn I felt about Age of Innocence.
After so much critical insight into classism, sexism (this is not explored and perhaps not acknowledged by the author but is a theme) and various levels of cliquey "popular" cultures (one as bad as the other though there are 3 or 4 that intersect in the book) the last thing I care about is who Nan "ends up with". I am not saying don't give her a happy ending I am saying she needs something more substantive than she got. It may not help that I didn't really click with any of the characters in the first place, they are not really relatable and as such the satire/critique should have been kept sharper. A good example of this is the softening of the gaze on Nan and Ginny's father who is a boorish entrepreneur/capitalist at the beginning and "dear old dad" by the end. I can't see clearly where the stitches are between the old and the new but my suspicions lie in the softenings and romantications of what seemed like incisive, insightful writing at the beginning.
It's possible I am being unfair to Mainwaring though considering how torn I felt about Age of Innocence.
I don't think I have ever wanted to like a book more than I wanted to like this one. I mean, it was written by Edith Wharton and I LOVE everything she does, so why couldn't I love this?
Well, for one, this is a manuscript that Wharton died before finishing and which was taken by Marion Mainwaring in order to complete it. It was ended, I'm told, in the way that Wharton wanted it to be ended, which is great. But, and this is a big but, I'm not sure that Mainwaring was the right person to try to complete this.
Edith Wharton's style is very specific, and Mainwaring just didn't grasp it. The writing style changes so abruptly from one chapter to the next that it was impossible not to feel torn out of it, and I decided that I didn't even want to give it a chance. I finished the portion of the novel that was written by Wharton, plus a handful of Mainwaring's chapters, and I'm good with calling that done. I just can't make myself read something that is so unlike the writer that I started reading the book for.
That's not to say that I can't appreciate what Mainwaring did. It is an incredibly risky thing to take someone else's work and try to complete it in their style. Mainwaring apparently knows/knew a lot about Edith Wharton so I suppose she assumed that knowing about the person made her qualified to write it.
However, I also was turned off by knowing that Mainwaring saw Wharton as less than one of the greats. She didn't respect Wharton's work here, making a comment that she wouldn't have attempted this with George Eliot or Jane Austen. The fact that she didn't grasp Edith Wharton's talent and said something like this about work that she was pilfering really bothers me because I feel that Edith Wharton's work was nearly perfect, and it was largely because she edited and re-edited everything she did. This is the beginning of a project. Not the ending of it. And it frankly would have been just as good as any George Eliot or Jane Austen novel if Edith Wharton had had the time or Marion Mainwaring had had the respect to make it such. I just can't get behind someone who literally takes someone else's work, tacks on a quarter of the pages, and then has the balls to criticize the author and her work. Not a good look, in my opinion.
So, while I love Wharton and she has been a perfect author for me thus far, I have to rate this lower than I wanted to. But any flaws in it, I'm going to blame on Mainwaring.
Well, for one, this is a manuscript that Wharton died before finishing and which was taken by Marion Mainwaring in order to complete it. It was ended, I'm told, in the way that Wharton wanted it to be ended, which is great. But, and this is a big but, I'm not sure that Mainwaring was the right person to try to complete this.
Edith Wharton's style is very specific, and Mainwaring just didn't grasp it. The writing style changes so abruptly from one chapter to the next that it was impossible not to feel torn out of it, and I decided that I didn't even want to give it a chance. I finished the portion of the novel that was written by Wharton, plus a handful of Mainwaring's chapters, and I'm good with calling that done. I just can't make myself read something that is so unlike the writer that I started reading the book for.
That's not to say that I can't appreciate what Mainwaring did. It is an incredibly risky thing to take someone else's work and try to complete it in their style. Mainwaring apparently knows/knew a lot about Edith Wharton so I suppose she assumed that knowing about the person made her qualified to write it.
However, I also was turned off by knowing that Mainwaring saw Wharton as less than one of the greats. She didn't respect Wharton's work here, making a comment that she wouldn't have attempted this with George Eliot or Jane Austen. The fact that she didn't grasp Edith Wharton's talent and said something like this about work that she was pilfering really bothers me because I feel that Edith Wharton's work was nearly perfect, and it was largely because she edited and re-edited everything she did. This is the beginning of a project. Not the ending of it. And it frankly would have been just as good as any George Eliot or Jane Austen novel if Edith Wharton had had the time or Marion Mainwaring had had the respect to make it such. I just can't get behind someone who literally takes someone else's work, tacks on a quarter of the pages, and then has the balls to criticize the author and her work. Not a good look, in my opinion.
So, while I love Wharton and she has been a perfect author for me thus far, I have to rate this lower than I wanted to. But any flaws in it, I'm going to blame on Mainwaring.
I ended up enjoying The Buccaneers quite a lot, but it took about 150 pages (until book 3) for me to really understand the flow. This is the first time I've read anything by Edith Wharton, and I don't generally read books from this time period, but I liked stretching outside of my comfort zone a little and giving it a shot. I still don't understand how, quite literally on one page the character is dressing for dinner and on the next she's been unhappily married for two years without so much as a transition. It was a bit like watching a movie by walking into the room every 20 minutes to watch 5 minutes of a movie and then walking back out again, but then staying and watching the final 20 minutes of the movie in one sitting.
I'd have to read more Wharton, or more from that time period, before I could really comment or analyze this more.
Read Harder 2017: Read a book published between 1900 and 1950 (1938).
I'd have to read more Wharton, or more from that time period, before I could really comment or analyze this more.
Read Harder 2017: Read a book published between 1900 and 1950 (1938).
Overall, not too bad. I did feel like there were too many characters featured in the novel.
It was a little odd to have a (semi) happy ending on one of Edith Wharton's novels. I wonder if it's just because someone else finished it or if she really intended it that way. It seemed like she usually ended stories with people being crushed by society instead of overcoming/running away from it.
I enjoyed this, but it obviously doesn't pack the same emotional punch as Wharton's other works. The ending is too happy for a true Whartonian story. If she had lived to finish the book, I think Nan would have died of an opium overdose while Guy stands over her, wringing his hands at her folly. Mrs. Testvalley still would have died alone and destitute.