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3.66 AVERAGE
3.66 AVERAGE
I read this one when I was too young to get it. It deserves another read, and eventually I'll give it one.
Definitely rather heavier going than I first expected, rather a slog of 19th century literature and social mores.
But the relationships between people build into intriguing suggestions and, eventually, the action all mounts into some Victorian scandal.
The ending leaves you totally on a knife edge. I hope the best for Isabel but we'll never know!
But the relationships between people build into intriguing suggestions and, eventually, the action all mounts into some Victorian scandal.
The ending leaves you totally on a knife edge. I hope the best for Isabel but we'll never know!
Ugh. One of those things I feel like I OUGHT to like, but just couldn't muster up enough enthusiasm for anything more than mild toleration. LOL There were parts that kept my interest fairly well, parts that seemed interminable, and parts where I wanted to shake Isabel Archer until she found a brain. If it hadn't been part of a challenge and I hadn't already ditched the first attempt I made at this category, I'd have dropped it long before I contemplated murdering Isabel.
she pisses me off, everyone around her pisses me off, hate henry james’ writing
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Capolavoro di Henry James questo ritratto di signora e di un amore che nulla ha a che vedere con le buone ragioni.
Isabel Archer è americana ma viene portata a Gardencourt da una zia che si annoia, conosce la vita europea e le sue capitali e nel frattempo fa strage di cuori, ma non se ne cura perchè occupata a conoscere il mondo. Con la morte dello zio diventerà anche una ricca ereditiera ma finità per sposare un affascinante cacciatore di doti, il cui aspetto migliore è la figlia.
La lenta morte dei sentimenti, la cattiveria che arriva a pervadere questo matrimonio e il paragone con madame Bovary sono abbastanza evidenti, diverso è il discorso sul come questo libro arriva ad essere un capolavoro. La descrizione delle emozioni che fanno di solito il paio con i luoghi dove vengono vissute, i personaggi che in qualche modo assumono spessore e profondità con l'aumentare delle pagine del libro, gli echi di alcune frasi che riverberano a lungo come tra i corridoi di antiche magioni.
MERAVIGLIOSO.
Isabel Archer è americana ma viene portata a Gardencourt da una zia che si annoia, conosce la vita europea e le sue capitali e nel frattempo fa strage di cuori, ma non se ne cura perchè occupata a conoscere il mondo. Con la morte dello zio diventerà anche una ricca ereditiera ma finità per sposare un affascinante cacciatore di doti, il cui aspetto migliore è la figlia.
La lenta morte dei sentimenti, la cattiveria che arriva a pervadere questo matrimonio e il paragone con madame Bovary sono abbastanza evidenti, diverso è il discorso sul come questo libro arriva ad essere un capolavoro. La descrizione delle emozioni che fanno di solito il paio con i luoghi dove vengono vissute, i personaggi che in qualche modo assumono spessore e profondità con l'aumentare delle pagine del libro, gli echi di alcune frasi che riverberano a lungo come tra i corridoi di antiche magioni.
MERAVIGLIOSO.
“Dying; for if one were thinking of rest, that was the most perfect of all. To cease utterly, to give it all up and not know anything more- this idea was as sweet as the vision of a cool bath in a marble tank” kinda the best lines in the book if you think about it
I'm uncertain how I feel about Isabel Archer's choices. She made me want to scream at times. I have spent lots of time contemplating the value/destructiveness of societal exactness. Those who are most exact are also the most evil in this book. They seem to represent the destructiveness of an exacting society.
On rereading it now, in tandem with Michael Gorra’s terrific book about this novel, and having compared a couple passages, I tend more and more to prefer the earlier version of the novel to James’ 1908 revision.
To illustrate, let me choose a fairly random example. The following passage from Chapter 18 is one that even the supporters of the NYE text would probably not attach much thematic importance to. But it illustrates how James’ re visions consistently tend to make the text less accessible, sometimes even verging on incomprehensibility. This is when Isabel first meets Madame Merle. She is in the house of her aunt and uncle, and notices a stranger in the parlour. Here is the 1908 version – he sentences in bold are revisions:
Particularly puzzling to me is the rewrite of the second phrase: ‘through whose hands she had slipped a little too mistrustfully and with an effect of plumage but the more lustrous’: what does this mean? I just can’t see what he means by ‘an effect of plumage but the more lustrous’. I understand that he’s saying that servants have ‘treasures of reserve’, i.e. they are not very friendly, especially towards Isabel. It’s all a vague muddle to me, and I can’t for the life of me see how this vagueness adds to the texture of the novel.
Let’s turn to the original text. Does that explain matters?
Why, yes, I think it does. This is much clearer, in fact I think it leaves nothing much to puzzle over. Here he simply says the (specifically British!) servant is usually not very forthcoming with information when not specifically asked for it. And if one of them is even more ‘dry’ than usual towards Isabel in particular, that may be partly to blame on her (typically American) independence and wanting to make her toilet herself. The only difficulty for modern readers may be the ironic periphrasis of ‘versed, as young ladies in Albany, in the very metaphysics of the toilet’. But that’s a far cry from the opacity of the NYE rewrite.
For my money, the unnecessary obfuscation in the NYE text extends even to the very last phrase in this passage, where the straightforward ‘was far from disagreeable to Isabel’ (simply implying she’s glad to have some new company) is turned into the needlessly hedged irony of the advent of a being ‘in itself far from disconcerting’.
This is just one example, but there are many more where I would argue the improvement, if any, is slight, and the loss of accessibility, and sometimes even comprehensibility, not negligible.
To illustrate, let me choose a fairly random example. The following passage from Chapter 18 is one that even the supporters of the NYE text would probably not attach much thematic importance to. But it illustrates how James’ re visions consistently tend to make the text less accessible, sometimes even verging on incomprehensibility. This is when Isabel first meets Madame Merle. She is in the house of her aunt and uncle, and notices a stranger in the parlour. Here is the 1908 version – he sentences in bold are revisions:
The lady was of course a visitor who had arrived during her absence and who had not been mentioned by either of the servants--one of them her aunt's maid--of whom she had had speech since her return. Isabel had already learned, however, with what treasures of reserve the function of receiving orders may be accompanied, and she was particularly conscious of having been treated with dryness by her aunt's maid, through whose hands she had slipped perhaps a little too mistrustfully and with an effect of plumage but the more lustrous. The advent of a guest was in itself far from disconcerting; she had not yet divested herself of a young faith that each new acquaintance would exert some momentous influence on her life.
Particularly puzzling to me is the rewrite of the second phrase: ‘through whose hands she had slipped a little too mistrustfully and with an effect of plumage but the more lustrous’: what does this mean? I just can’t see what he means by ‘an effect of plumage but the more lustrous’. I understand that he’s saying that servants have ‘treasures of reserve’, i.e. they are not very friendly, especially towards Isabel. It’s all a vague muddle to me, and I can’t for the life of me see how this vagueness adds to the texture of the novel.
Let’s turn to the original text. Does that explain matters?
The lady was of course a visitor who had arrived during her absence and who had not been mentioned by either of the servants--one of them her aunt's maid--of whom she had had speech since her return. Isabel had already learned, however, that the British domestic is not effusive, and she was particularly conscious of having been treated with dryness by her aunt's maid, whose offered assistance the young lady from Albany--versed, as young ladies in Albany, in the very metaphysics of the toilet--had perhaps made too light of. The arrival of a visitor was far from disagreeable to Isabel; she had not yet divested herself of a young faith that each new acquaintance would exert some momentous influence on her life.
Why, yes, I think it does. This is much clearer, in fact I think it leaves nothing much to puzzle over. Here he simply says the (specifically British!) servant is usually not very forthcoming with information when not specifically asked for it. And if one of them is even more ‘dry’ than usual towards Isabel in particular, that may be partly to blame on her (typically American) independence and wanting to make her toilet herself. The only difficulty for modern readers may be the ironic periphrasis of ‘versed, as young ladies in Albany, in the very metaphysics of the toilet’. But that’s a far cry from the opacity of the NYE rewrite.
For my money, the unnecessary obfuscation in the NYE text extends even to the very last phrase in this passage, where the straightforward ‘was far from disagreeable to Isabel’ (simply implying she’s glad to have some new company) is turned into the needlessly hedged irony of the advent of a being ‘in itself far from disconcerting’.
This is just one example, but there are many more where I would argue the improvement, if any, is slight, and the loss of accessibility, and sometimes even comprehensibility, not negligible.