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3.91 AVERAGE
3.91 AVERAGE
good entertaining story, dragged on a little too much but still enjoyed it
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
3.5 stars really. Lovely descriptions of the landscape - this time mostly of Denmark - which I've come to expect and enjoy from Stegner, but the structure didn't quite work for me. The narrator, Joe Allston, finds a diary from a visit to Denmark where he discovers the horrific secrets of an aristocratic family. That story was really interesting, what didn't grab me quite so much was when Joe was back home in California and musing on growing old. I felt like a lot of that had been covered in All The Little Live Things which also features Joe Allston as the narrator.
This took a late turn that I’m not sure it needed to, but everything else was full Stegner splendor. The framing of the parallel stories was wonderful, and it all felt so REAL. I love his sense of humor and the wisdom of his insight and the particular combination of these two talents that makes his writing his. For me the machinations of the plot are almost inconsequential compared to how much I cared about how the thoughts and words were laid down in the furrows between the plotted events. (Maybe, in a way, the thoughts and words *are* the furrows that build up and define the fertile plots between them?)
My hesitation in recommending this far and wide is that the subjects he covers aren’t especially timely or important here in 2021 considering all there is to grapple with. (I’m even a little surprised that it won an NBA in 1977, but that probably tells us more about the makeup of the judging panel that year than about the state of the world beyond them.) I mean, do we need to spend time listening to the lamentations of an aging white man who has retired to his dream property with his lovely, forgiving, tolerant, encouraging wife? Definitely not. And yet you too might find comfort in the timelessness of this p.o.v., which will to some extent always be relevant for anyone who looks forward into (and backward away from) old age with any measure of resentment and regret.
I made marks of agreement, amusement, and/or astonishment on probably every single page, but the one passage I dog-eared feels worth transcribing here, as it’s a bit of a thesis statement (coming three-quarters in):
“I was reminded of a remark of Willa Cather’s, that you can’t paint sunlight, you can only paint what it does with shadows on the wall. If you examine a life, as Socrates has been so tediously advising us to do for so many centuries, do you really examine the life, or do you examine the shadows it casts on other lives? Entity or relationships? Objective reality or the vanishing point of a multiple perspective exercise? Prism or the rainbows it refracts? And what if you’re the wall? What if you never cast a shadow or rainbow of your own, but have only caught those cast by others?”
It’s not perfect, but I loved it.
My hesitation in recommending this far and wide is that the subjects he covers aren’t especially timely or important here in 2021 considering all there is to grapple with. (I’m even a little surprised that it won an NBA in 1977, but that probably tells us more about the makeup of the judging panel that year than about the state of the world beyond them.) I mean, do we need to spend time listening to the lamentations of an aging white man who has retired to his dream property with his lovely, forgiving, tolerant, encouraging wife? Definitely not. And yet you too might find comfort in the timelessness of this p.o.v., which will to some extent always be relevant for anyone who looks forward into (and backward away from) old age with any measure of resentment and regret.
I made marks of agreement, amusement, and/or astonishment on probably every single page, but the one passage I dog-eared feels worth transcribing here, as it’s a bit of a thesis statement (coming three-quarters in):
“I was reminded of a remark of Willa Cather’s, that you can’t paint sunlight, you can only paint what it does with shadows on the wall. If you examine a life, as Socrates has been so tediously advising us to do for so many centuries, do you really examine the life, or do you examine the shadows it casts on other lives? Entity or relationships? Objective reality or the vanishing point of a multiple perspective exercise? Prism or the rainbows it refracts? And what if you’re the wall? What if you never cast a shadow or rainbow of your own, but have only caught those cast by others?”
It’s not perfect, but I loved it.
I feel like I've been temporarily transported to another time, place, and age. Beautiful.
Joe Allston joins the ranks of one of my favorite curmudgeons, along with Harold Fry, Ove and the 100- year-old Man who Climbed out the Window and Disappeared. The characters in this novel were so real, complex and engaging. The writing created such vivid pictures in my mind. Alas, I've finished the book, and I'm going to miss Joe and Ruth!
Almost 50 years since reading All the Little Live Things. I found this a bit depressing as I am also dealing with my "golden Years"
It's taken me a while to get around to reading Stegner, and what a joy! Read it as an audiobook (with brilliant narration from Edward Herrman) and kept having to rewind so I could listen to the prose again. A brilliant story that perhaps resonated more with me because the main protagonist is in his late sixties and a grumpy, cantankerous old bloke like me. I laughed out loud a few times (out of empathy, perhaps) but it was sad and deeply moving in other places. I will now have to download the Kindle version so I have a print version.
Similarly to “Crossing to Safety,” I was a bit dubious nearing the end. But my goodness does this man know how to resolve a novel implicitly and beautifully.
Once again, I find myself refreshed by Stegner’s keenness towards fidelity, ordinarily-experienced life, and the unique role of memory in the human experience.
*Supplementary note: I listen to much of the audiobook, which was narrated by the one and only Edward Herrmann. That just about did it.
Once again, I find myself refreshed by Stegner’s keenness towards fidelity, ordinarily-experienced life, and the unique role of memory in the human experience.
*Supplementary note: I listen to much of the audiobook, which was narrated by the one and only Edward Herrmann. That just about did it.