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3.87 AVERAGE
3.87 AVERAGE
emotional
sad
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
I was so enchanted at the outset of this novel with characters and this mystique, but by the end I felt like we had become so engaged with the "Catholic question" that the relationships all fell apart. I have heard many times that this was Waugh's best so perhaps it would warrant a second read in the future to try and understand why.
Really amazing. Though I remember little of the plot.
Att läsa bra prosa är en njutning. Visst har synen på vissa saker förändrats, men det stör inte utom en sak. Huvudpersonen Charles ointresse i sina barn. Det har jag svårt att ta till mig. Många tankar om religion, eller kanske om livet och hur det ska levas och vad som är meningen med det. Jag ska se tv-serien nu, bara för att bearbeta innehållet lite till.
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
I started this with a classics group, got more than halfway through by the discussion date, then never picked it up again. I’m never going to finish this because I just do not care about any of the characters, the supposed Catholic/morality question, or Sebastian’s demise. So I’m finally taking this off my currently reading list after six months of stagnation.
Me llamó la atención y fui a ciegas con este libro. Me encontré una hermosa novela con muchos toques autobiográficos (autor que desconocía y por el que no he podido evitar sentir una gran comprensión, compasión y ternura) sobre el ambiente universitario gay de los años 20. Me sorprendió lo abierta y clara que es la narración, al menos en un principio. Le pongo 3* porque al llegar a la tercera parte del libro perdí el interés; desaparecen los personajes más carismáticos de la obra y esta se centra en la vida marital del protagonista. No obstante, la narración es bellísima y me quedo con un montón de citas anotadas.
I enjoyed this book very much. I noticed after I started, though, that this was an abridged version. Perhaps one day I will read the book. I really enjoyed the narrator, Jeremy Northam, and the musical accents at the beginning and end of each disc.
From the back of the box:
"Captain Charles Ryder reflects upon his you, and remembers meeting Sebastian, a member of the artistocratic Flyte family, at Oxford.
Thus begin his accounts of their family home, Brideshead, where he was welcomed into the fold and a enjoyed a decadent high-society lifestyle. Things begin to unravel, however, when Charles' presence brought into the light the cracks in the veneer: the naivety of the family's devotion to the Catholic faith and his friend's increasing drink habit."
The characters were well-developed, the writing descriptive and lyrical.
From the back of the box:
"Captain Charles Ryder reflects upon his you, and remembers meeting Sebastian, a member of the artistocratic Flyte family, at Oxford.
Thus begin his accounts of their family home, Brideshead, where he was welcomed into the fold and a enjoyed a decadent high-society lifestyle. Things begin to unravel, however, when Charles' presence brought into the light the cracks in the veneer: the naivety of the family's devotion to the Catholic faith and his friend's increasing drink habit."
The characters were well-developed, the writing descriptive and lyrical.
This novel is heavy with guilt (both the Catholic and the repressed homosexual kind) and the majority of the characters are motivated by a deep sadness that they hardly dare name, from Sebastian's drinking to Charles's and Julia's doomed affair. The novel is a feat of writing for its exploration of repression alone; for the way its narrator is so adept at avoiding the truth about his relationship with Sebastian while recording, with surprising frankness, the behaviours of the men around him. It's simultaneously expansive in its scope and spare in its writing; it's beautifully written and remarkably insightful. It also features Waugh's own political and religious sensibilities casting an undeniable shadow over the text which left me deeply puzzled by the ending. Waugh described this as a "Catholic novel" and yet Catholicism seems to function as a curse on the Marchmaim family, and it appears to genuinely mourn for the decline of the British empire and the aristocratic lifestyle. Ultimately, it's strange and frustrating, and demands rereading because of it. I'm sure I'll revisit it again and again. I'm not sure I'll ever make up my mind.