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3.57 AVERAGE
3.57 AVERAGE
mysterious
medium-paced
Dream Story is about a seemingly perfect couple, Fridolin and Albertine, driven apart by both parties' erotic fantasies.
Albertine has these weird erotic dreams and she tells her husband about them, which makes him angry, since he thinks about those dreams as if they were real, thus he gets involved with whores and a secret cult, where orgies take place and where he meets a nude mystery woman who makes him mad with desire.
Nothing happens, really. Dreams are just dreams and Fridolin never finds out who the anonymous woman was. In fact, she might even be dead, as a result of his presence in the secret cult's meeting.
The end. It doesn't take much to see I didn't like the book.
mysterious
reflective
medium-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
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
challenging
mysterious
slow-paced
What are Kubrick's politics?
I remember reading about how Eyes Wide Shut was less about sex and more about class and power, and ever since I've been wondering what his opinions on the same were, because the movie doesn't make it too clear...
Here, the uneasy feeling of lack of closure remains. I have no idea what I was supposed to get out of the story in my first read. Granted, I haven't done any research before and it's been a while since I read something this distracted, but I'm not sure what the story was supposed to tell me, other than allude.
And yet... it's fascinating, beautifully written and perfectly paced. Unlike Freulin Else, I leave the reading both impressed and satisfied. Not quite as impressed as with Eyes Wide Shut, as it remains the superior version of the story, but the original holds up well enough on its own. I guess that, unlike the movie, the focus here is more so on fantasy and desire, whatever that may mean...
But yeah, the political subtext, if it is even a thing, is beyond me. There's also the possibility that I'm reading too much into it, and that this is just a story about potential tension in marriage, but surely that can't be the case! That would imply that this whole review was a waste of time, and neither you nor me want that to be true, do we?
I remember reading about how Eyes Wide Shut was less about sex and more about class and power, and ever since I've been wondering what his opinions on the same were, because the movie doesn't make it too clear...
Here, the uneasy feeling of lack of closure remains. I have no idea what I was supposed to get out of the story in my first read. Granted, I haven't done any research before and it's been a while since I read something this distracted, but I'm not sure what the story was supposed to tell me, other than allude.
And yet... it's fascinating, beautifully written and perfectly paced. Unlike Freulin Else, I leave the reading both impressed and satisfied. Not quite as impressed as with Eyes Wide Shut, as it remains the superior version of the story, but the original holds up well enough on its own. I guess that, unlike the movie, the focus here is more so on fantasy and desire, whatever that may mean...
But yeah, the political subtext, if it is even a thing, is beyond me. There's also the possibility that I'm reading too much into it, and that this is just a story about potential tension in marriage, but surely that can't be the case! That would imply that this whole review was a waste of time, and neither you nor me want that to be true, do we?
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Read this in French since I'm still reading exclusively in the language until further notice but still wanted to take this on - Traumnovelle is probably best known today as the source for the Stanley Kubrick film Eyes Wide Shut and for much of the early sections of the book I found that the film drew quite closely from it outside of changed setting/period, but as it goes along the two diverge in some important ways which made this interesting in its own right. A beautifully written evocation of dreams, fidelity, desires, cities at night, and the seamy underbelly of urban life, wrapped with enough symbolism and mystery to make it worth coming back to again and again.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
fast-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
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes