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A review by savaging
Possession by A.S. Byatt
4.0
Seeing me reading this, my friend recalled what her English teacher said about it:
Life's too short to read books that are only about good writing.
And I see what that teacher means -- how so much of the delight of this book is just the pleasure of words. The luxurious waste of time of sinking into writing about writers writing.
But I also believe this book is about something. I think it's saying some crucial things about possession -- owning things and others, and how everything and everyone can make themselves slip through other people's grasp. It's about gender, and the ambiguous nature of romance. It's about being possessed -- when the thing you 'own' actually owns you, about being driven by some kind of demon possession to behave in unusual ways.
Now that I'm done with the book I miss it, even though it was such a slow and literary slog much of the time.
Life's too short to read books that are only about good writing.
And I see what that teacher means -- how so much of the delight of this book is just the pleasure of words. The luxurious waste of time of sinking into writing about writers writing.
But I also believe this book is about something. I think it's saying some crucial things about possession -- owning things and others, and how everything and everyone can make themselves slip through other people's grasp. It's about gender, and the ambiguous nature of romance. It's about being possessed -- when the thing you 'own' actually owns you, about being driven by some kind of demon possession to behave in unusual ways.
Now that I'm done with the book I miss it, even though it was such a slow and literary slog much of the time.