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3.68 AVERAGE
3.68 AVERAGE
Roza Hakmen çevirdiği için hevesle giriştim bu romana. İlk yüz sayfa filan muhteşemdi, tam da okumak istediğim türden enerjik, lafı uzatmayan, hareketli bir roman. Sonrasında birden ipler koptu ve koca roman tesbih taneleri gibi dağılıverdi. Çok şaşırdım açıkçası, sanki yazar kalemini bir başkasına vermiş gibiydi. İnandırıcılığı, gücü, enerjisi yok oldu romanın. Tuhaf.
so yes i read this all in a day i just love waugh so much ugh it was just so subtly absurd until it smacked you with tony in the amazonian jungle being trapped by a man who loves dickens but can’t read?! yes. i love the endings of his stories they’re just so stupidly good because what do you mean this is how it ends?? what do you mean oh this seminal character died okay that’s it??? it’s all just so silly
I like this a lot. Great storytelling. Nearly farcical beginning doesn't prepare the reader for the interesting and thought-provoking end.
At first I was so sure that it would be a funny silly book with some adultery in it, through the half of the book, I realized that I couldn’t be more wrong. After killing John off, I got really mad at the book but still continued reading to finish and see what happens. I was real surprised all right, I like the writing, and the author has a way of showing humour, I still laugh at it 2023. As one would say, he’s a real funny chap. However! I felt that sometimes these reactions felt so lukewarm that it was real hard to feel anything with the characters. I don’t if it’s just my anger with killing John Andrews off but I really felt that emotions were focused on rather less and more about the actions and the bigger picture which I suppose is fine for some as a preference but it made me feel like it diminished the writing. Other than it was fine, a little depressing, hated the ending but it was good. I liked his writing and humour.
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
tense
slow-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
adding Brenda to my list of the Wonderless Women of the 1930s
Book is entertaining - I feel like Tony is supposed to be the non-satirical character - the kind of voice of reason, deferential guy who is fucked over - but there’s plenty to make fun of him about. The book is also pretty anti-semitic.
emotional
funny
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
reflective
slow-paced
Both bleak and hilarious, Waugh’s A Handful of Dust is a page-turning tragedy that is hard to put down. Tony and Brenda Last live at Hetton Abbey, a gothic mansion outside of the London crowd and incredibly expensive to keep up. The Lasts have settled into their lives of hosting the occasional party or guest, looking after their son John, and living an unremarkable but content existence. But to Tony’s unknowing and naïve eyes, Brenda is getting restless.
Enter John Beaver, a 25-year old mama’s boy of a child in a slump, who goes places he’s not wanted and serves as a last-minute step-in for the London social scene, accompanying women who see him not as a lover but a warm body. Beaver, however, offers something to Brenda that Tony does not have: a fresh escape from the monotony of Hetton life. With the help of Beaver’s mother, a real estate agent, Brenda rents a flat in London, starts an affair with Beaver, and is the talk of the town driven by the social circles of gossip — all unbeknownst to Tony.
As Brenda pulls further away from Hetton Abbey, Tony is left in despair, becoming lonelier, turning to alcohol, and falling into an isolated depression, driven by his dependence on Brenda, as well as the society from which he is removed. Their son John’s death is the last straw to a failing marriage — “It’s all over, don’t you see, our life down here” — catalyzing a sequence of odd events in which Tony stages an affair for the purpose of divorce.
After the first and second acts of infidelity, gossip, and isolation, the third act takes a dramatic turn, with Tony, much like Brenda, escaping his former life for greener pastures, this time, as an explorer. As Tony falls into the depths of the South American jungle, he becomes trapped in a completely remote society. Brenda meanwhile falls into an “agony of resentment and self-pity.”
A Handful of Dust represents the absurdity of the 1930s British upper class and its removal from common decency, as seen in the lack of emotion’s following John’s death. Tony’s spineless behavior, combined with Brenda’s utter lack of sympathy, creates a narrative drenched in satire that ultimately ends in each character getting what they deserve.
Enter John Beaver, a 25-year old mama’s boy of a child in a slump, who goes places he’s not wanted and serves as a last-minute step-in for the London social scene, accompanying women who see him not as a lover but a warm body. Beaver, however, offers something to Brenda that Tony does not have: a fresh escape from the monotony of Hetton life. With the help of Beaver’s mother, a real estate agent, Brenda rents a flat in London, starts an affair with Beaver, and is the talk of the town driven by the social circles of gossip — all unbeknownst to Tony.
As Brenda pulls further away from Hetton Abbey, Tony is left in despair, becoming lonelier, turning to alcohol, and falling into an isolated depression, driven by his dependence on Brenda, as well as the society from which he is removed. Their son John’s death is the last straw to a failing marriage — “It’s all over, don’t you see, our life down here” — catalyzing a sequence of odd events in which Tony stages an affair for the purpose of divorce.
After the first and second acts of infidelity, gossip, and isolation, the third act takes a dramatic turn, with Tony, much like Brenda, escaping his former life for greener pastures, this time, as an explorer. As Tony falls into the depths of the South American jungle, he becomes trapped in a completely remote society. Brenda meanwhile falls into an “agony of resentment and self-pity.”
A Handful of Dust represents the absurdity of the 1930s British upper class and its removal from common decency, as seen in the lack of emotion’s following John’s death. Tony’s spineless behavior, combined with Brenda’s utter lack of sympathy, creates a narrative drenched in satire that ultimately ends in each character getting what they deserve.
dark
emotional
funny
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes