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kuldrenett's review against another edition
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
It dragged in the beginning but picked up a bit around the middle once you got used to the claustrophobia of it all.
albajl's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
braincabbage's review against another edition
3.0
This was a slow-moving, character-based story about Joan Ogden's life, a girl who's smart and interested in medicine but constantly constrained by her parents, especially her mother's, small-mindedness and clingy love. On the other hand, there's Elizabeth, her teacher, friend and confidante, who grows to love her and who she grows to love.
It's a story about dependence, and being trapped by a person and a place, the desire to move on, move further from what we started with.And in the end, about failure.
As Joan's childhood friend and suitor describes her mother: "She's like an octopus who's drained you dry. You struggled to get free, you nearly succeeded, but as quickly as you cut through one tentacle, another shot out and fixed on to you."
Joan feels responsible for her mother, who is the stereotypical naggy, old malade imaginaire type, yet she longs to make something of herself. It culminates in the choice of either staying with her weak mother in a calcifying dreary town, or leaving her to study medicine at Cambridge and live in London together with Elizabeth.
This book moved a little too slowly for me. It was based on the relationship of the characters and circulated around the same question again and again: Will Joan free herself from the trot of her family? It got a bit repetitive and hopelessly obvious after a while. The relationship with Elizabeth was never explicitly romantic (it was published in 1924, after all), but it certainly was, in a way. Joan's definitely a lesbian. And the plans they made and Elizabeth's willingness to sacrifice her time like that, waiting for Joan to make up her mind, just all pointed there. It was enjoyable, in parts. I especially liked the ending, because it felt conclusive and made sense, even if it was just as glum as the rest of the novel.
I'm definitely interested in reading more of Radclyffe Hall's writing.
It's a story about dependence, and being trapped by a person and a place, the desire to move on, move further from what we started with.
As Joan's childhood friend and suitor describes her mother: "She's like an octopus who's drained you dry. You struggled to get free, you nearly succeeded, but as quickly as you cut through one tentacle, another shot out and fixed on to you."
Joan feels responsible for her mother, who is the stereotypical naggy, old malade imaginaire type, yet she longs to make something of herself. It culminates in the choice of either staying with her weak mother in a calcifying dreary town, or leaving her to study medicine at Cambridge and live in London together with Elizabeth.
This book moved a little too slowly for me. It was based on the relationship of the characters and circulated around the same question again and again: Will Joan free herself from the trot of her family? It got a bit repetitive and hopelessly obvious after a while. The relationship with Elizabeth was never explicitly romantic (it was published in 1924, after all), but it certainly was, in a way. Joan's definitely a lesbian. And the plans they made and Elizabeth's willingness to sacrifice her time like that, waiting for Joan to make up her mind, just all pointed there. It was enjoyable, in parts. I especially liked the ending, because it felt conclusive and made sense, even if it was just as glum as the rest of the novel.
I'm definitely interested in reading more of Radclyffe Hall's writing.
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