Sign in with Facebook
41st out of 121 books
—
424 voters
The Hanging Garden
A previously unpublished novel from the winner of the 1973 Nobel Prize for Literature
Two children are brought to a wild garden on the shores of Sydney Harbour to shelter from the Second World War. The boy's mother has died in the Blitz. The girl is the daughter of a Sydney woman and a Communist executed in a Greek prison. In wartime Australia, these two children form an e...more
Two children are brought to a wild garden on the shores of Sydney Harbour to shelter from the Second World War. The boy's mother has died in the Blitz. The girl is the daughter of a Sydney woman and a Communist executed in a Greek prison. In wartime Australia, these two children form an e...more
Hardcover, 224 pages
Published
April 2nd 2012
by Knopf/Random House
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
650)
Patrick White is a two time Miles Franklin award winner and has also won the Nobel prize for literature. His unfinished novel The Hanging Garden was recently published; it feels like an old novel in the sense that, while it’s nicely written; nothing ever happens in the book. This is very much a character driven book, focusing on the two and a wild garden. I think I’d be alright with reading a book like this if I didn’t have the feeling that the author hated every single one of his characters; he...more
If you love Patrick White (and I do) you will want to read this posthumous publication of an unfinished work by the great novelist. The 215 pages of this work actually represents only the first part of a projected three-part novel which unfortunately was not completed, owing to other pressing social, political and theatrical work in which White was preoccupied with at the end of his life. This is a draft of that first third of his book, something he had written comparatively quickly, and with wh...more
It's hard to rate this book because it is unfinished. Patrick White had completed the first part of a novel not long before he died in 1990. It has now been published twelve years after his death.
We don't know what White planned to do with his characters, his main characters, a boy and a girl who are left in Australia, orphaned by the Second World War. In a world of strangers they form a bond that we presume would have been worked out as the novel progressed and the characters grew into adulthoo...more
We don't know what White planned to do with his characters, his main characters, a boy and a girl who are left in Australia, orphaned by the Second World War. In a world of strangers they form a bond that we presume would have been worked out as the novel progressed and the characters grew into adulthoo...more
I felt ambivalent about purchasing this book. Before his death, White had wanted it destroyed, and it seems unethical that his agent would subsequently allow it to be published. But in spite of the novel being only a fragment and published against the author’s wishes, I loved it.
The novel is set in the Second World War. Two children, Eirene Sklavos and Gilbert Horsfall, have been evacuated from Greece and London respectively. They have been billeted with Mrs Bulpit, a widowed Englishwoman who l...more
The novel is set in the Second World War. Two children, Eirene Sklavos and Gilbert Horsfall, have been evacuated from Greece and London respectively. They have been billeted with Mrs Bulpit, a widowed Englishwoman who l...more
‘Nobody is wholly responsible for what they are.’
Set during World War II in Sydney, the novel explores the world of two children: Eirene Sklavos and Gilbert Horsfall. Eirene is the daughter of an Australian woman, and a Greek communist who has been murdered in prison. Gilbert (Gil) is English: his father is an officer in India, his mother killed by a bomb during the Blitz in London. Gil and Eirene are thrown together in Essie Bulpit’s ramshackle home on Neutral Bay, with its large, lush, neglect...more
Set during World War II in Sydney, the novel explores the world of two children: Eirene Sklavos and Gilbert Horsfall. Eirene is the daughter of an Australian woman, and a Greek communist who has been murdered in prison. Gilbert (Gil) is English: his father is an officer in India, his mother killed by a bomb during the Blitz in London. Gil and Eirene are thrown together in Essie Bulpit’s ramshackle home on Neutral Bay, with its large, lush, neglect...more
Patrick White's forgotten masterpiece, The Hanging Garden will make many contemporary Australian writers hang their heads in shame. It is that good. This is a book by one of the very greats of literature and it's greatness is immediately apparent.
Forget what you think you know about Patrick White's writing. It is time to be re-introduced.
Beautiful, dark, deep, erotic, disturbing, funny and evocative, The Hanging Garden will delight even the most jaded of readers.
I have read the proof of The Han...more
Forget what you think you know about Patrick White's writing. It is time to be re-introduced.
Beautiful, dark, deep, erotic, disturbing, funny and evocative, The Hanging Garden will delight even the most jaded of readers.
I have read the proof of The Han...more
This writing.. is superb, mysterious, has shadows, takes you into the profound, erotic, unsettling, witty and reminiscent times of the characters within. This book is that like a diamond. It is still incased within the rough rock, unpolished and not cut or set it is unfinished and yet the amazing exquisite promise shines for all. The Hanging Garden is the unfinished work of a promising novel, much is not written and you have no ending to justify what you expect nevertheless you are fulfilled in...more
I've read other comments on this book and smile at the ones that take issue with how unsympathetic White is. For me, this is his great virtue. Too few contemporary writers (and readers) risk the discomfort he offers - what comfort there is lies in the prose, and even in this draft of an unfinished novel there are standout passages; the boy's journey to Australia, the girl's schooldays, the final passages where, in late adolescence, the pace accelerates and sets up the rest of the novel, which sa...more
Beautiful. And fascinating to read something that is still in production (White died after writing the first drafts but before final polishing). There's a sense of looking into the mind of the master as you become aware that some sections are clearly more polished that others. The editorial decision to leave the flaws in the glass and to publish regardless works for me. Oddly, there's something very engaging about reading something so clearly incomplete - a bit like looking at the cut-away pictu...more
Patrick White was an Australian author widely regarded as one of the most important English-language novelists of the 20th century. The Hanging Garden published posthumously is lucky to have made it into our reading lists since White wanted to destroy it.
Two children were evacuated from Greece and London during WWII and billeted with a widowed Englishwoman who lived in a house with the hanging garden in Mosman on Sydney's northern beaches. While this might conjure up images of a blessed sanctua...more
Two children were evacuated from Greece and London during WWII and billeted with a widowed Englishwoman who lived in a house with the hanging garden in Mosman on Sydney's northern beaches. While this might conjure up images of a blessed sanctua...more
An incomplete work of genius. A quintessentially Australian story, two young children from England and Greece respectively are sent to the outback of Australia to escape WW11. In the care (or lack thereof) of Mrs. Essie Bulpit, the children, Gil & Eirene, become close friends and allies against this strange new world they inhabit. The story is told largely by Eirene and details the slow but steady erosion of her Greek cultural identity and heritage by an ignorant Australian population who ar...more
Some wonderful writing here, especially when he is describing the harbour and areas adjacent to it. That said I think Patrick White is very cruel to his characters, the women in particular. He spares nothing of their worst aspects, which he describes unpleasantly, in scathing language. He is pretty hard on the men too. Are there ever any happy people in a Patrick White book? I have now read quite a few and cannot remember any happy characters. I do not like the misogynistic Mr. White
This is a book I read to satisfy an essay for a literature class that I ended up enjoying. However, I did not, at any rate, like the writing style. I hated that it kept switching around, view point-wise. It started driving me nuts early on, and if it hadn't been for the fact that I've planned on writing an essay on it, I probably would have put it down and never looked back.
But I'm glad I didn't. While things didn't quite turn out the way I was hoping in the end, it'll always be a mystery as to...more
But I'm glad I didn't. While things didn't quite turn out the way I was hoping in the end, it'll always be a mystery as to...more
I doubt this would have been published had it not been written by Patrick White. The characters are very dark and very unhappy. It is more an outline of an idea for a book.
Not quite a recovered masterpiece but a fascinating read nonetheless.
White was such a sure, material stylist & builder of psyche interiors that the sheer strength of his 'unhurried prose' leaves a tremendous impact.
I can't pretend that I don't feel sad for what the novel would have been if White had returned to it & performed another draft or two but I'm also grateful for this glimpse into the vastness of his storytelling.
I didn't intend to write about White's The Hanging Garden. I've never read Patrick White before, and beginning at the end, with this unfinished (but not unpolished) posthumous work seems an odd place to begin; a strange perspective on White's career.
Nonetheless, I couldn't seem to get The Hanging Garden out of my head - which says a lot about this atmospheric, intense novel.
The Hanging Garden might be my first Patrick White - but it certainly won't be my last.
You can read my full review on my...more
Nonetheless, I couldn't seem to get The Hanging Garden out of my head - which says a lot about this atmospheric, intense novel.
The Hanging Garden might be my first Patrick White - but it certainly won't be my last.
You can read my full review on my...more
A collection of truly unlikeable characters. I did not enjoy this read at all.
Unfinished but perfect.
Intriguing fragment of an unfinished novel published posthumously, but sufficient to hold together. More like a novella. This was my first Patrick White - challenging grammar but extraordinary language and insights into relationship-s and characters. May prompt me to read more White. Hearing David Marr (White's biographer)speak about his life at the recent BWF along with photographs and portraits from a lifetime of vanity brought added richness.
Hmmn ...
Wow! Nobody writes sentences like Patrick White. They demand to be read and re-read from different angles, like taking in a great painting. Such a pity that we won't get to read the last two parts of this posthumously published planned triptych.
an unfinished manuscript that I am glad was not destroyed and enjoyed reading - vivid and reflective a very Sydney book of its era with Patrick White's wonderful human observations
May 18, 2013
Diane
marked it as to-read
May 15, 2013
Vidhya
marked it as to-read
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
Patrick Victor Martindale White was an Australian author widely regarded as one of the major English-language novelists of the 20th century. From 1935 until death, he published twelve novels, two short story collections, eight plays, and non-fiction. His fiction freely employs shifting narrative vantages and the stream of consciousness technique. In 1973, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literat...more
More about Patrick White...
Share This Book
No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now »
Apr 27, 2012 04:44am
Apr 27, 2012 04:53am
Apr 27, 2012 04:57am