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3.87 AVERAGE
3.87 AVERAGE
At first glance this may seem such a simple and tedious story but the more I think about it the more I love it. It touches so many themes : repressed or non-repressed homosexuality, the effect of religion, the lives of the rich and the privileged, alcoholism, family ties etc. It begins with innocence and ends with losing it. Several different personalities are to become connected and to be parted. The first time ever I was confused of what I should think about the doings of the characters and just ended up having this strange melancholic feeling. Beautiful prose.
While I can see its literary merit, I found myself dragging through this 400 page English country side. The writing is incredibly difficult to digest and is just bogged down in monotonous detail that never seems to go anywhere. Waugh should be commended for his incredible syntax and ability to weave words, but aside from that I really didn't get much out of this. I'm interested to see the movie for perhaps it translates better to screen as I personally feel a lot of English novels do.
I couldn't finish the book. For whatever reason, I wasn't especially taken with the story, and it seemed a little draggy and long-winded. I don't think the book was bad, it was probably me not concentrating hard enough. I will need to re-try this book in a few months...
i mean, it’s me, i’m going to enjoy homoerotic angsty oxford boys. i quite liked the exploration of dysfunctional families, wealth, England, and Catholicism (if i drank every time charles and i thought “fucking catholics, man” during this book we’d be dead. or perhaps in a monastery. though i suppose charles did convert in the end?). i wanted some more sebastian (though of course his absence in the latter part of the book is pretty necessary), because how can you not want more of a charming, self-loathing, partier who carries around a teddy bear?
50 pages in, I gave up. The book is well written, and I am sure many people justifiably love it. I was just not into reading another "British aristocracy was impacted by the great wars" book right now.
I kept thinking of Downtown Abby while reading this. Of course, I understand which came first. But future works often influence past works - we often only see the classics in terms of our present experience, in terms of the present context.
Waugh certainly had a way with words.
By chance I met this same wine again... it had softened and faded in the intervening years, but it still spoke in the pure, authentic accent of its prime, the same words of hope.
The little circle of gin and vermouth in the glasses lengthened to oval, contracted again, with the sway of the carriage...
Poor Julia, she can't go out. She's got to take care of her sin. A pity it ever lived, but it's so strong. Children like that always are. Julia's so good to her little, mad sin.
He's dying of a long word.
Waugh certainly had a way with words.
By chance I met this same wine again... it had softened and faded in the intervening years, but it still spoke in the pure, authentic accent of its prime, the same words of hope.
The little circle of gin and vermouth in the glasses lengthened to oval, contracted again, with the sway of the carriage...
Poor Julia, she can't go out. She's got to take care of her sin. A pity it ever lived, but it's so strong. Children like that always are. Julia's so good to her little, mad sin.
He's dying of a long word.
Whilst reading this, I didn't really get it. It was alright to read, I suppose, but I couldn't say I was particularly drawn to the plot, characters or style. It just didn't seem like anything actually important happened - particularly in the first half. However, since finishing the book and reading a few explanations/explorations of its themes, I can appreciate it more. Overall, the novel contains some meaningful ideas that might have been important at the time of writing, yet are hidden behind dated writing and simply don't appeal to me today.
To be honest i only read this because i heard that saltburn was loosely based on it. At the start you can imagine my disappointment when this was no where near as wild as that movie. This is obviously on me because this was made in the 40s so i don't know why i was expecting anything different. At the start i wasnt very interested in what was happening as it seems the author has a lot of interest in the behaviors of the upper class and Catholicism which i dont have any interest in. I found myself enjoying it more towards the end but definitely felt the ending to be a bit weak. I think i would enjoy this more on a second read.
