An informed but flawed work that explores the impact of an English town on Woolf.
A debut literary/historical study examines the 10 years Virginia Woolf spent in Richmond.
Woolf, the English writer and pioneer of modernism, lived in Richmond, a town southwest of London, between 1914 and 1924. In the summer of 1913, she had suffered a serious breakdown, which led to a failed suicide attempt. The strains of writing her first novel, combined with the pressures of living in busy central London, had taken a serious toll. Woolf’s husband, Leonard, wanted to relocate to somewhere quieter, where his wife could convalesce. The couple moved to lodging in Richmond in October 1914, before falling in love with Hogarth House, which they would acquire a lease for the following year. Drawing on extracts from Woolf’s diaries, the study broadly assesses her time in Richmond, and how the town influenced her—from her walks in the parks and woods to the arrival of the couple’s first printing press. Fullagar also considers key developments in Woolf’s career during this period, notably the founding of the Hogarth Press, which allowed her to publish her own works without having “to suffer the negativity of sending manuscripts to publishers for scrutiny.” He deftly shows readers Richmond through Woolf’s eyes by handpicking pertinent excerpts from her diaries. In one vivid entry, she notes: “We walked in Richmond Park this afternoon; the trees all black, and the sky heavy over London; but there is enough colour to make it even lovelier today than on bright days, I think.” Fullagar is keen to allow Woolf’s writing to take center stage, adding discreet, if occasionally prosaic, commentary: “Even when the weather was not very attractive, Virginia would walk around the Richmond area and still find beauty.” But the book can become repetitive; for instance, Fullagar includes a diary excerpt in chapter one where Woolf expresses a desire to buy a “bulldog called John.” This information resurfaces in the following chapter. Repetitions also arise regarding a typesetting mix-up that confused “the h’s with the n’s.” While Fullagar’s tight focus on Richmond makes this study of Woolf a compelling proposition, the argument lacks order. And his own critical voice is often lost among the many sizable hunks of text carved from Woolf’s diaries.
An informed but flawed work that explores the impact of an English town on Woolf.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-912430-03-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Aurora Metro Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.
Atwood goes back to Gilead.
The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), consistently regarded as a masterpiece of 20th-century literature, has gained new attention in recent years with the success of the Hulu series as well as fresh appreciation from readers who feel like this story has new relevance in America’s current political climate. Atwood herself has spoken about how news headlines have made her dystopian fiction seem eerily plausible, and it’s not difficult to imagine her wanting to revisit Gilead as the TV show has sped past where her narrative ended. Like the novel that preceded it, this sequel is presented as found documents—first-person accounts of life inside a misogynistic theocracy from three informants. There is Agnes Jemima, a girl who rejects the marriage her family arranges for her but still has faith in God and Gilead. There’s Daisy, who learns on her 16th birthday that her whole life has been a lie. And there's Aunt Lydia, the woman responsible for turning women into Handmaids. This approach gives readers insight into different aspects of life inside and outside Gilead, but it also leads to a book that sometimes feels overstuffed. The Handmaid’s Tale combined exquisite lyricism with a powerful sense of urgency, as if a thoughtful, perceptive woman was racing against time to give witness to her experience. That narrator hinted at more than she said; Atwood seemed to trust readers to fill in the gaps. This dynamic created an atmosphere of intimacy. However curious we might be about Gilead and the resistance operating outside that country, what we learn here is that what Atwood left unsaid in the first novel generated more horror and outrage than explicit detail can. And the more we get to know Agnes, Daisy, and Aunt Lydia, the less convincing they become. It’s hard, of course, to compete with a beloved classic, so maybe the best way to read this new book is to forget about The Handmaid’s Tale and enjoy it as an artful feminist thriller.
Suspenseful, full of incident, and not obviously necessary.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-385-54378-1
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Nan A. Talese
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
This book sings with the terrible silence of dead civilizations in which once there was valor.
Written with quiet dignity that builds to a climax of tragic force, this book about the dissolution of an African tribe, its traditions, and values, represents a welcome departure from the familiar "Me, white brother" genre.
Written by a Nigerian African trained in missionary schools, this novel tells quietly the story of a brave man, Okonkwo, whose life has absolute validity in terms of his culture, and who exercises his prerogative as a warrior, father, and husband with unflinching single mindedness. But into the complex Nigerian village filters the teachings of strangers, teachings so alien to the tribe, that resistance is impossible. One must distinguish a force to be able to oppose it, and to most, the talk of Christian salvation is no more than the babbling of incoherent children. Still, with his guns and persistence, the white man, amoeba-like, gradually absorbs the native culture and in despair, Okonkwo, unable to withstand the corrosion of what he, alone, understands to be the life force of his people, hangs himself. In the formlessness of the dying culture, it is the missionary who takes note of the event, reminding himself to give Okonkwo's gesture a line or two in his work, The Pacification of the Primitive Tribes of the Lower Niger.
This book sings with the terrible silence of dead civilizations in which once there was valor.Pub Date: Jan. 23, 1958
ISBN: 0385474547
Page Count: 207
Publisher: McDowell, Obolensky
Review Posted Online: April 23, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1958
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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