Sep 11, 2024The BostoniansI read The Bostonians coming fresh off of reading Cloud Cuckoo Land and I am a bit astonished at the contrast. The latter is a contemporary novel with an obvious underlying ethos which I am predominantly in line with, but feels flat and a bit lifeless. The Bostonians has the two strikes against it of being both old (as in of-a-time-that-is-difficult-to-inhabit) and spending its time making the repugnant argument that women are less then men. And yet - its characters are alive, are real people with great depth. I immediately fell into and was consumed by the story. And yeah, at the end, there is a kinda Atlas Shrugged-type ending where the unabashed misogonyst persuades the impressionable young woman to leave her life for him. And along the way there are a lot of confused arguments that are mostly nonsense now. I'm not really sure how it stood up in the context of its time, I am inclined to believe that James meant it to appeal to both "sides of the woman question" whatever that means. I mean all in all, it was more sympathetic to lesbians than you expect from a 19th century writer? Politics aside, it beats out Atlas Shrugged in at least being an admirable work of art.
Dec 14, 2024But BeautifulA sweet love song to the genre of jazz, treading an interesting line between historical and fictional, painting beautiful little portraits of the lives of the greats.
Jan 9, 2025Wolf HallRating books is of course a fool's game, when it is impossible to compare works of art to eachother let alone to a numerical scale, and perhaps in this case I am a bit unfair to Wolf Hall. It is, technically speaking, a quite good book, it's characters deep and compelling, its drama riveting, and it undoubtedly takes much technical skill to do this with what might otherwise be a tired court drama from Olden Times. But: I was expecting Greatness, for reasons outside of the book's control, and found instead basically competent entertainment. Do authors have to say something interesting and unique to be considered great? Maybe not? Does this have something interesting to say? Maybe a bit? Anyways, I was compelled but not overwhelmed, and so this was underwhelming.