Book Review

Book Review

An idea occurred to me this weekend, we who read books need to start an itinerant library, there is no point in everyone buying books, but we can lend them to each other and that way we can all read different books and we can all save a little money. Sometimes I feel like I can not go into Kramer’s without purchasing one of such objects. The Argentinean even proposed to create a blog that basically encompasses book reviews, and the idea intrigues me. I can post about Paris and Amsterdam, but those entries would take way too much work and not sure I have the energy right now, later of course (yes skinny one, I know I am always promising posts), so I am tackling the book we discussed last Sunday, Mrs. Dalloway.

I approached this book with a little caution, I had never read any of her books, and was not sure what to expect. Like most people I had seen The Hours, so was curious to see if I could infer things from the movie that would help me read the book. I was disappointed when this was not the case. I skipped the introduction, one of the problems with reading one book every month, is you have to read it – yes I am the guilty one that tries to read them even if he dislikes them. Ok, so I started the book and I was familiar with the first line, so I followed the story, but then it changed, the narrator kept changing on me, and it took me like the first 30 pages to get used to it. But then I was fine, and by the time Peter comes to visit the morning of the party, I was able to identify the changes in narrator immediately and determine where the story was going next. My recommendation would be to skip the intro and just go for it, jump in and fight with her long sentences and her descriptions of things until you get the hang of the story and just keep at it.

The story is simple yet complicated, it is something we can all relate to because we all do some level of introspection, and we do not have the amount of time people had in the 20’s to just walk to the florist, but we still have 30 minutes here and there where we think of things, we need to do, of things we have not done, and of things that happened in the past and that still affect us to this date. The great thing about these exercises for me at least is that it gives you perspective, is shows how things that seemed so important were not and how little things ended up being what one keeps. Ok enough about me, the book surprised me because it was extremely pro British Empire, and how it went through all these characters cutting across the upper classes paying very little attention to the lower classes. I had thought she would be more of a socialist and a feminist than that. I can see how the book was and is revolutionary and how it is written with such craft that she keeps you reading even after she has cycled through similar descriptions over and over again, always through different perspectives. At the center of the book is a love triangle, that haunts its main characters through their lives, and this is a recurring theme in life and literature, but she manages to make it nuanced and interesting. Finally here are the things I would focus if I was to read the book again:
* The details about the park
* The lunch scene with Lady Bruton
* Elizabeth’s shopping scene
* Septimus appointment with Dr. Bradshaw

I know this post is a bit too long, but I would recommend anyone to read this book. The language will be a challenge (it was for me, but I am not a native speaker) but the story is beautifully told, its worth reading it for the sentences and the paragraphs alone. Also I like Clarissa, I like her a lot, so I guess I am biased because from the get go, when he is mending her dress for her party she had me.

PS. There is a new link on the right, y’all know who he is.