Scan barcode
A review by toml72
Shakespeare and Company by James Laughlin, Sylvia Beach
3.0
In it's early stages I did like Sylvia and admired what she was trying to do. However, it became clear that although she could be very kind, she was rather a needy sort of person and a terrible business woman. Moreover her apparent crush on James Joyce and blind devotion to what in my opinion was an arrogant, largely terrible writer became her downfall and it was her own fault.
About midway through the book I found her to be rather an ego maniac like most of that crowd (Hemingway, Stein, Mc Almon, Fitzgerald in particular, as well as many of the French writers). I grew weary of her constantly expecting others to bail her out of debt and Joyce as well. They really were quite full of themselves.
That said it's a decent read although not always a very revealing one. You'll have to go elsewhere if you want more salient facts about the so-called Lost Generation and about Sylvia as well.
About midway through the book I found her to be rather an ego maniac like most of that crowd (Hemingway, Stein, Mc Almon, Fitzgerald in particular, as well as many of the French writers). I grew weary of her constantly expecting others to bail her out of debt and Joyce as well. They really were quite full of themselves.
That said it's a decent read although not always a very revealing one. You'll have to go elsewhere if you want more salient facts about the so-called Lost Generation and about Sylvia as well.