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beans4brains's review against another edition
Incredible writing, good breaks of depth and of humor. Strikingly human in its mystery.
markludmon's review against another edition
5.0
In The Blithedale Romance, rootless dilettante Miles Coverdale joins an experiment to set up a farming-based collective community in Massachusetts. But the ideal of creating a Utopia is quickly undermined by personal passions and the dynamics of the group, exposing their misplaced and conflicting objectives. Coverdale ends up becoming obsessed with finding out the secret stories of two members of the community: an elegant woman named Zenobia and a younger woman called Priscilla who circle around the de facto leader Hollingsworth. Told by the detached bachelor Coverdale himself, the narrative is full of ambiguities and unreliable speculation, reflected by recurring references to partially seen and veiled realities. It depicts an America caught between its lost and barely known pre-colonial past and the restless urban development of the 19th century.
jay_the_hippie's review against another edition
4.0
Two reasons I liked this book:
(1) Nathaniel Hawthorne creates suspense. He does a great job of stirring up a windstorm of "I want to know" mised with sharp bits of "I'm about to find out," and then follows through with only a little reveal... or when it is a bigger reveal (never *the* big reveal... we only get part of the answer), it's written so that we now have new questions needing answers.
(2) Nathaniel Hawthorne sets his story in a commune-type setting -- a big experiment in changing how people live -- that is based on a real place and event I didn't know existed. Seeing what idealists of all those years ago imagined... that adds a layer to what I know of that time in history.
Sure, I could go on to talk about the characters and his use of natural details and pseudo-magical sensations throughout the story, but the suspense and the history are what really drew me into this story.
(1) Nathaniel Hawthorne creates suspense. He does a great job of stirring up a windstorm of "I want to know" mised with sharp bits of "I'm about to find out," and then follows through with only a little reveal... or when it is a bigger reveal (never *the* big reveal... we only get part of the answer), it's written so that we now have new questions needing answers.
(2) Nathaniel Hawthorne sets his story in a commune-type setting -- a big experiment in changing how people live -- that is based on a real place and event I didn't know existed. Seeing what idealists of all those years ago imagined... that adds a layer to what I know of that time in history.
Sure, I could go on to talk about the characters and his use of natural details and pseudo-magical sensations throughout the story, but the suspense and the history are what really drew me into this story.
boyardee's review against another edition
4.0
engaging characters; strong development of the tragedy. story of "brotherhood" and relationships between flawed people.
lithen's review against another edition
3.0
I understand the purpose of leaving Westervelt's role in the story mostly unknown, but I still hate the loose end. Really liked that Hawthorne wrote it in such a way that the reader had realizations about the narrator before the narrator had them about himself.
sesamebingsoo's review against another edition
challenging
dark
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.0
mpaloma's review against another edition
2.0
I found this one a lot more tolerable to read than The House of the Seven Gables.
In The Blithedale Romance, Hawthorne sets his story on a experimental socialist farm, slightly inspired by Brook Farm, where Hawthorne had spent some time prior to writing the book. Most notably, this is Hawthorne's only completed novel written in first person. We have four main characters, and it is all narrated by Miles Coverdale, a middle-aged bachelor. Our other characters are Hollingsworth, a man driven by his desire to build a facility for criminal reform; Zenobia, a wealthy socialite, activist, and artist; and Priscilla, a shy, innocent girl who we will come to know is Zenobia's long-lost sister.
None of the characters really seem invested in this society they are helping to create. They are all self-interested, and step on each other's toes to get what they want. The Blithedale Romance is another one of Hawthorne's self-proclaimed romances, but ends in tragedy and features little to no actual romance.
While both men hold what on the surface appears to be romantic interest in Priscilla and Zenobia, there is no real romance, just as The Scarlet Letter lacks the sordid affair one would expect. Hollingsworth changes his interest in Zenobia and Priscilla based on who stands to inherit the money he needs to build his facility, and Coverdale changes his interest almost in competition with Hollingsworth. Again, Hawthorne has given us the function of heterosexuality with no actual sex. The relationship we get the greatest insight into, although perhaps this can be partially attributed to Coverdale being our narrator, is the relationship between himself and Hollingsworth. Between these two the most intimate conversations take place, rather than with either of the two supposed love interests. Interestingly, some scholars believe this book was written after Hawthorne and Melville's falling out, and that the relationship between Hollingsworth and Coverdale was meant to mirror their own relationship.
In the end, each character leaves the farm in one way or another. I think what is most interesting about this book is the unreliable narrator. It's interesting to read back over the novel and see the inconsistencies in the plot Coverdale tries to sell us on, and this is one I may give a reread at some point.
In The Blithedale Romance, Hawthorne sets his story on a experimental socialist farm, slightly inspired by Brook Farm, where Hawthorne had spent some time prior to writing the book. Most notably, this is Hawthorne's only completed novel written in first person. We have four main characters, and it is all narrated by Miles Coverdale, a middle-aged bachelor. Our other characters are Hollingsworth, a man driven by his desire to build a facility for criminal reform; Zenobia, a wealthy socialite, activist, and artist; and Priscilla, a shy, innocent girl who we will come to know is Zenobia's long-lost sister.
None of the characters really seem invested in this society they are helping to create. They are all self-interested, and step on each other's toes to get what they want. The Blithedale Romance is another one of Hawthorne's self-proclaimed romances, but ends in tragedy and features little to no actual romance.
While both men hold what on the surface appears to be romantic interest in Priscilla and Zenobia, there is no real romance, just as The Scarlet Letter lacks the sordid affair one would expect. Hollingsworth changes his interest in Zenobia and Priscilla based on who stands to inherit the money he needs to build his facility, and Coverdale changes his interest almost in competition with Hollingsworth. Again, Hawthorne has given us the function of heterosexuality with no actual sex. The relationship we get the greatest insight into, although perhaps this can be partially attributed to Coverdale being our narrator, is the relationship between himself and Hollingsworth. Between these two the most intimate conversations take place, rather than with either of the two supposed love interests. Interestingly, some scholars believe this book was written after Hawthorne and Melville's falling out, and that the relationship between Hollingsworth and Coverdale was meant to mirror their own relationship.
In the end, each character leaves the farm in one way or another. I think what is most interesting about this book is the unreliable narrator. It's interesting to read back over the novel and see the inconsistencies in the plot Coverdale tries to sell us on, and this is one I may give a reread at some point.
jds70's review against another edition
3.0
Several years before writing The Blithedale Romance, Nathaniel Hawthorne lived for less than a year at the Trancendentalist commune Brook Farm. Although the story is not based on his experience, it does inform it. It also isn't a romance in the modern sense of a couple who falls in love throughout the course of the story, but is written in the romantic literary style of the time, full of flowery language (but not purple prose). The Blithedale Romance focuses on the narrator & three other characters who are part of the Blithedale communal farm; their idealism & eventual disillusionment with their experiment. Hawthorne doesn't satirize, criticize, or advocate for communes, but simply explores the foibles of the flawed people attempting to create the perfect society. I loved The Scarlet Letter & Rapuccini's Daughter, but this was harder for me to get into. Reading other reviews, I'm not alone. I think maybe his novella is a bit less accessible than his other works. Despite this, I really enjoyed it. Stick with it, & you'll be rewarded in the end.
stephkelly75's review against another edition
dark
informative
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
chris_chester's review against another edition
3.0
I have a complicated relationship with Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Like many, my first introduction to his prose was reading The Scarlet Letter in a high school English class. That experience in itself is attached to strange memories, not least of which were my teacher's strong insinuations about the novel's romantic undertones, which she blithely related to her own late-blooming sexual affairs.
So when I say that I walk away from The Blithedale Romance unsure whether I like Hawthorne or hate him, it's important to note that is how I felt before I picked up the book too.
The Blithedale Romance is a book that features some of the most fantastic turns of phrase and nuanced descriptions of everyday feelings that I have ever read in my life. At the same time, it also features some of the most eyeroll-inducing, utterly insufferable prose that I have had to slog through. I can't really account for it.
After I finished the book, which took me three weeks despite the fact that it's only 200 pages, I occasioned to read some history on the book, and discovered the widely held belief that the book is at least partially autobiographical. Blithedale, the theory goes, is based on a similar utopian aspiration at Brook Farms.
I had been searching for reasons to explain the flip and smarmy tone of the narrator Miles Coverdale, and the best theory I can come up with is that Hawthorne was creating an exaggerated parody of himself in the character of the insufferable poet.
I can appreciate what he was trying to do. And like I said, some of the prose he puts together is some of the best I have ever read. But I just can't get passed an unlikable narrator, and I'll have trouble recommending this book to anyone.
Like many, my first introduction to his prose was reading The Scarlet Letter in a high school English class. That experience in itself is attached to strange memories, not least of which were my teacher's strong insinuations about the novel's romantic undertones, which she blithely related to her own late-blooming sexual affairs.
So when I say that I walk away from The Blithedale Romance unsure whether I like Hawthorne or hate him, it's important to note that is how I felt before I picked up the book too.
The Blithedale Romance is a book that features some of the most fantastic turns of phrase and nuanced descriptions of everyday feelings that I have ever read in my life. At the same time, it also features some of the most eyeroll-inducing, utterly insufferable prose that I have had to slog through. I can't really account for it.
After I finished the book, which took me three weeks despite the fact that it's only 200 pages, I occasioned to read some history on the book, and discovered the widely held belief that the book is at least partially autobiographical. Blithedale, the theory goes, is based on a similar utopian aspiration at Brook Farms.
I had been searching for reasons to explain the flip and smarmy tone of the narrator Miles Coverdale, and the best theory I can come up with is that Hawthorne was creating an exaggerated parody of himself in the character of the insufferable poet.
I can appreciate what he was trying to do. And like I said, some of the prose he puts together is some of the best I have ever read. But I just can't get passed an unlikable narrator, and I'll have trouble recommending this book to anyone.