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Angels and Insects

3.63 of 5 stars 3.63 · rating details · 2,898 ratings · 164 reviews

In these breathtaking novellas, A.S. Byatt returns to the territory she explored in Possession: the landscape of Victorian England, where science and spiritualism are both popular manias, and domestic decorum coexists with brutality and perversion. Angels and Insects is "delicate and confidently ironic.... Byatt perfectly blends laughter and sympathy [with] extraordinary s...more

Paperback, 352 pages

Published March 29th 1994 by Vintage (first published 1992)

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Jul 12, 2012 Anastasia rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Benvenuti.
Ora.
Prendete un esemplare della sottoscritta in statuetta, miniatura, quello che vi pare, e rinchiudetela in una mini-gabbia completamente murata.
No, fermi. Prima metteteci dentro una semplice farfalla.
Noterete che alla vostra mini-Anastasia si rizzeranno i peli delle braccia, se state guardando attentamente noterete che scatta sulla difensiva e rimane immobile a guardare i minimi movimenti della compagna di cella, la farfalla, e vedete che strabuzzerà gli occhi con diversi cipigli ne...more

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Nov 24, 2012 Lucrezia rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Entomologia e vita , e digressioni filosofiche sulla immortalità dell' anima e sulla poesia con tanto di sedute spiritiche... Patapam!

In effetti potrei limitare il mio punto di vista s questo romanzo a queste due singole righe, ma vorrei andare un pochino più a fondo ...

Come improvvisamente si decide di abbandonare le due noiosissime ore di fisica e di darsi all' entomologia: ma non verrebbe anche a voi la voglia di farlo , quando vedete che il vostro professore invece di spiegare legge le scont...more Entomologia e vita , e digressioni filosofiche sulla immortalità dell' anima e sulla poesia con tanto di sedute spiritiche... Patapam!

In effetti potrei limitare il mio punto di vista s questo romanzo a queste due singole righe, ma vorrei andare un pochino più a fondo ...

Come improvvisamente si decide di abbandonare le due noiosissime ore di fisica e di darsi all' entomologia: ma non verrebbe anche a voi la voglia di farlo , quando vedete che il vostro professore invece di spiegare legge le scontatissime, elementari e aridissime ,slide alla lavagna ,che fra l' altro ,avete già e potete anche studiarvi da soli?? Così lo ammetto ho compiuto il mio piccolo atto sovversivo dopo un ' ora di sofferenze, testa ciondoloni e buoni propositi di essere attenta e paziente.. Ho preso il mio bel libro e mi sono dedicata a Morpho Eugenia (Tale il nome di questo primo racconto).. E così i buoni propositi per quella giornata se ne sono andati in gloria e non ho più staccato il naso dal libro fino alla fine, sentendomi poi maledettamente soddisfatta e maledettamente in colpa... Poi mi sono precipitata fuori (piccola precisazione ero ubicata in mezzo alle campagne)E nei poco tempo che mi separava dal arrivo del pullman studiando attentamente le povere formiche che mi passavano intorno con un ' interesse morboso... Tanto da inquietare la gente intorno a me ; e se prima dell' entomologia non me ne importava un fico secco, adesso, penso proprio, ci guarderò con più attenzione...

Ma bando alle ciance lasciando perdere le mie solite divagazioni ; Morpho Eugenia è un piccolo gioiello... Racconto, saggio, storia nel racconto, e chi più ne ha ne metta... Ma sopratutto è un caleidoscopio sulla cultura Vittoriana, e suoi lati più nascosti e privati, senza escludere quelli ehhhmmm diciamo non proprio "morali" ,per l' epoca eh, perché la mia moralità lascia alquanto a desiderare ...

Come invece si contino le pagine mancanti alla fine cercando di afferrarne disperatamente il capo, di non sbadigliare e di capirci qualcosa: Questo è stato l' angelo coniugale uno strazio insomma, ma non fa niente perché Morpho Eugenia mi aveva già ripagato altamente di tutto :D

Di cosa parla L' angelo Coniugale beh ..Puff un soffio di Fumo ...
A parte questo delle sedute spiritiche organizzate da Emily Tennyson (sì proprio lei ,la sorella del famoso poeta) del suo scompagnamento di bizzarri personaggi, e animali, e delle conseguenze a cui questo voler a tutti i costi inseguire i morti può portare ...
Anche questo racconto è un caleidoscopio della vita vittoria e contiene una miriade di informazioni (inizio a pensare la Byatt sia l' enciclopedia Vittoriana vivente )sopratutto di ordine letterario e filosofico, molto molto interessanti o molto molto barbose a seconda di come ci si disponga

P.S. Un elogio particolare va alla copertina della mia edizione ,che non è quella della foto, bensì, quella che mi ha fatto scoprire il meraviglioso dipinto : Sense of Sight di Annie Louisa Swynnerton.
Precisamente questo :
http://s3.amazonaws.com/magnoliasoft....
(less)

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Oct 16, 2011 The Eleventh Hour rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: genre-historical-romance, era-victorian, status-read, theme-ménage-à-trois, read-2011, feelings-boring, feelings-unsatisfying-ending, theme-infidelity, technical-lovely-writing

Hmmm. I'm really torn about this book. On the one hand, the writing was excellent. On the other, it was very bizarre. Lots of insect imagery and themes in the first story, Morpho Eugenia. I felt it was…too much, however.

Although the writing itself was exquisite, I just think I don’t like A.S. Byatt’s style very well. She has a way of telling stories that I find to be very off-putting. She’ll start the story - getting the narrative ball rolling and making me like all of the characters - and then...more

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Jan 17, 2008 Elizabeth rated it 4 of 5 stars

Byatt is one of my favorite authors, and this is definitely a must-read. The first novella, "Morpho Eugenia," is brilliant, and was the basis for an excellent film version (called Angels and Insects). It explores the conflict between science and faith in the Victorian period, as well as themes of class and social status and a fascinating comparison between human and insect life. It also has one of my favorite fictional female characters: Matty Crompton, a marginal and liminal figure in a wealthy...more

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Apr 08, 2013 Tita rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book contains two novellas, "Morpho Eugenia" and "The Conjugal Angel." The first is a suspenseful and shocking Gothic tale of a young man's gradual enlightenment about the depths of depravity in his wife's family. The second is a comic and whimsical story of Alfred Lord Tennyson's sister Emily at a seance (which was an extremely popular thing to do in the 19th century) meeting up with the spirit of Arthur Henry Hallam, the person her brother mourned in his famous poem, "In Memoriam."

The jo...more

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Dec 16, 2011 Ms Tlaskal added it

I read this in French and for a very literary author it was surprisingly easy to read. Could be the translation, or more likely the wonderfully clear, limpid writing that holds you spellbound. It is set in late Victorian times and deals with one of the passions of the age; collecting specimens of the natural world and classifying them as meticulously as their own society was ordered. Unfortunately for the hero William, he is pinned by poverty upon the whims of the wealthy Alabaster family who sn...more

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May 02, 2011 verbava rated it 3 of 5 stars

перша частина – «морфо євгенія» – тягне навіть на четвірку, є в ній шось дивовижно красиве й водночас цинічне, шо іноді можна знайти в маргарет атвуд, наприклад. тільки повість водночас рефлексивно-вікторіанська, й думається більше про фаулза, але це ненав'язливі такі, хороші думки.
із другою в мене не склалося, може, там просто забагато тенісона й сведенборга; хоча сама задумка альтернативної історії – от майже як повість про емілі дікінсон і волта вітмена в «стімпанку» ді філіппо – дуже симпати...more

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Nov 14, 2010 Emily Green rated it 3 of 5 stars

A.S. Byatt, though arguably a genius, does not put forth as impressive an effort in Angels & Insects as she does in Possession and The Djinn in the Nightingale’s Eye. Angels & Insects is comprised of two novellas, “Morpho Eugenia” and “The Conjugal Angel.” Both are set in England, in the past, and contain a certain amount of betrayal by lovers.
“Morpho Eugenia,” the tale of an explorer stuck in civilized country due to lack of money who falls in love with a woman he assumes is civilized,...more A.S. Byatt, though arguably a genius, does not put forth as impressive an effort in Angels & Insects as she does in Possession and The Djinn in the Nightingale’s Eye. Angels & Insects is comprised of two novellas, “Morpho Eugenia” and “The Conjugal Angel.” Both are set in England, in the past, and contain a certain amount of betrayal by lovers.
“Morpho Eugenia,” the tale of an explorer stuck in civilized country due to lack of money who falls in love with a woman he assumes is civilized, feels like a Gothic romance set in a castle, though it is actually set on a large estate, and the characters are not royalty.
Edgar Alabaster spent the last several years of his life in the jungle, studying insects. He finds a patron, marries his daughter, and still pines to explore. Here is where things get weird and Gothic. Not to spoil too much, but before there were vampires, people still had weird fetishes and sexual practices. The overabundance of description and philosophy, however, manages to take all of the fun out of the perversion.
“The Conjugal Angel,” though including ghosts and spirits, is also a bit dull. The overuse of quoted poetry stilts any excitement in the plot. Lilias Papagay, a widow with no inheritance, has fallen into the trade of medium as a way to support herself, and has been lucky enough to find consistent customers, among them Emily Jesse, sister of Alfred Tennyson, whose fiancé died on her many years before, and she has since married another man.
Lilias just happens to have an assistant who is the real deal, which is where problems in the story eventually arise, as while people like to play at contacting the dead, they do not actually wish to hear the truths of the dead.
A rather dull story that could have been fun, something more akin to Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace, but “The Conjugal Angel” overuses Tennyson’s poetry.
An interesting read, but time would be much better off spent reading Byatt’s Possession. Byatt’s first book, incidentally, The Shadow of the Sun, was published before she was thirty. If you are counting. (less)

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Nov 22, 2012 Highlyeccentric rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction-for-fun

The first, "Morpho Eugenia", was... interesting. Byatt was playing, quite heavy-handedly, with notions of whiteness, civilisation, and purity. It's very obvious that she was doing it on purpose - the rich English countryfolk whom Our Hero falls in with are the family of Lord and Lady Alabaster. You don't pull that trick accidentally. And she did manage to write a story about a Victorian-era explorer of the Amazon who's fixated on the whiteness of his whitepeople hosts without, so far as I could...more The first, "Morpho Eugenia", was... interesting. Byatt was playing, quite heavy-handedly, with notions of whiteness, civilisation, and purity. It's very obvious that she was doing it on purpose - the rich English countryfolk whom Our Hero falls in with are the family of Lord and Lady Alabaster. You don't pull that trick accidentally. And she did manage to write a story about a Victorian-era explorer of the Amazon who's fixated on the whiteness of his whitepeople hosts without, so far as I could see, committing any actual authorial ickiness - she neither demonises nor exalts the Amazon nor its peoples. But I'm not sure that this 'oooh, look, consciousness of whiteness, also, whiteness is not as pure as you might think!' trick is as clever as she seems to think it is. The insect metaphors, however, were fascinating and incredibly detailed and well done. Ten points for insect metaphors!

The second story, 'The Conjugal Angel', is about a seance group. It's a sort of community drama, about their personal loves and longings and what brings them to the seances. Except they aren't in any community with one another *outside* of the seances; and then the story turns out to be at least half about Alfred Lord Tennyson, his deceased friend Arthur, and his sister Emily, once the fiancée of said Arthur. I have less to say about this story, but that is because it is excellent and dense and twisty and I've only just finished reading it so it has yet to settle in my mind. It is, broadly speaking, about the bonds between people - the fragile bond of the seance group against the strong personal bonds of love. It's about what substance that may actually have - Emmanuel Sweedenborg's pronouncement that the Angels join together in conjugal love, against the biblical pronouncement that there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage. It is about whether you can continue to love someone who is long since dead, and, if so, what bearing that has on your life.

One thing I like about Byatt's Victorian-esque writing is that she can be detailed, even overblown, even sentimental, as the literature of the period is - but she is very interested in the private thoughts of her characters, in the reality of sex and how they perceive it. And... hmm, she manages to talk about that without using modern anachronisms.(less)

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Apr 26, 2013 Auli added it · review of another edition

Shelves: proosa

Luoja nähköön miten olisin tulkinnut ja kokenut tämänkin viehättävän pikku luomuksen jos en olisi kuullut siitä seikkaperäistä ideaologiakriittistä lähiluentaa Postmoderni historiallinnen romaani -kurssilla. Luulen että A.S. Byattin pienoisromaani olisi joka tapauksessa kiehtonut hienovaraisella monikerroksisuudellaan, jossa oli sekä jotain aavistuksen keinotekoista että ihastuttavan luontevaa ja epäosoittelevaa. Traaginen (lopussa antiklimaattisen äkkinäinen ja pateettinen) rakkaustarina - kesk...more

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Dec 22, 2012 Jennifer rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: lit

A bit of a mixed bag. The first novella in this collection, Morpho Eugenia, is well-written and plotted. The story of a Victorian man of science and his ill-fated marriage in a well-bred house deals with the Victorian struggles of science vs. religion, classism, and morality (in a "what separates man from beasts?" type way). The metaphors are not subtle; the insects and angels are present on nearly every page. But the story itself cracks along and I couldn't put it down.

The second story, The Co...more

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Aug 11, 2009 Kristina A rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: neo-victorian

I quickly skimmed the first page of the other reader reviews of this book and discovered that my opinion in comparing the two novellas that comprise it is opposite of most readers. It seems most readers (from the top page, at least) prefer the first novella, "Morpho Eugenia" (the "Insects" section) to "The Conjugal Angel" (the "Angels" section).

For me, "Morpho Eugenia" was a little disappointing. I don't always need to be surprised by what I read, but the characters in this novella were a bit to...more I quickly skimmed the first page of the other reader reviews of this book and discovered that my opinion in comparing the two novellas that comprise it is opposite of most readers. It seems most readers (from the top page, at least) prefer the first novella, "Morpho Eugenia" (the "Insects" section) to "The Conjugal Angel" (the "Angels" section).

For me, "Morpho Eugenia" was a little disappointing. I don't always need to be surprised by what I read, but the characters in this novella were a bit too derivative, the family secret incredibly obvious... well, actually, the whole plot and most of the characters were either obvious or one-dimensional. While I am utterly in awe of Byatt's ability to replicate Victorian prose debates about science and religion, I have to admit that, unlike her equally brilliant (but also beautiful and highly readable) faux Victorian poetry and fairy tales, I did not want to read her faux-Victorian debates. Ultimately things felt too simplistic; the story just didn't hang together for me.

So why the four stars? Well, part of it has to do with "The Conjugal Angel," which I'll get to in a minute. But part is that, despite my problems with the plot of "Morpho Eugenia," I have to admit that much of the imagery of the story has stuck with me. Especially the parts where human and insect sex and reproduction are compared. Ew, but also very haunting.

"The Conjugal Angel" I thought was completely brilliant. This could be my own personal bias in favor of stories about spiritualism, but in any case, I really loved it. It was different from any story I've recently read about spiritualists, in that it takes the idea seriously. To make it that much better, one of the main characters is Alfred Tennyson's sister... so there's lots of poetry and interpretation to boot, plus a beautifully imagined inner life of several historical figures. This novella, to me, approaches the achievements of Possession more nearly than the first; it is a gorgeous meditation on grief and love, the burdens of the past and how we idolize the dead, and how what is unseen to others can strangle us. Plus, lots of commentary on poetry and wordplay, and I love getting lost in Byatt's twisty sentence structure. (less)

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Jun 10, 2012 Julie Garbutt rated it 4 of 5 stars

"The world looked different, and larger, and brighter, not water-colour washes of green and blue and grey, but a dazzling pattern of fine lines and dizzying pinpoints, jet-black, striped and spotted crimson, iridescent emerald, sloppy caramel, slime-silver."

"There is a kind of tree called the Sipo Matador--which translates, the Murderer Sipo--which grows tall and thin like a creeper and clings to another tree, to make its way up the thirty, forty feet to the canopy, eating its way into the very...more

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Aug 11, 2009 Christopher H. rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: british-literature, historical-fiction, neo-victorian-literature, read-in-2009, british-authors-translators, favorite-rereads, favorites, modern-literature, my-western-canon

A.S. Byatt, with Angels & Insects, has created a rich and complex book comprised of two medium-length novellas set in the mid-1860s and 1870s, both of which address themes important to the people of the Victorian Era. The first novella, Morpho Eugenia focuses on the relationships between a family, its friends, servants, and the natural world around them in the English countryside. The tale pivots around the study of society and nature, and then there's the tension and struggle between theolo...more

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Apr 27, 2010 Aeron is currently reading it

I started this book in Paris, where my mother handed it down to me. I was hot on the heels of The Children's Book, and eager for more Byatt. Truth be told, I was desperate. You know how it is. Worse than drugs.

I hadn't even finished the first story, which - while interesting - wasn't as compelling as The Children's Book, when somehow the plastic glass by my bedside table developed a crack and slowly leaked out all the water over the course of the night. The sun peaked in through the curtains, wo...more

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Apr 29, 2013 Moses Kilolo rated it 5 of 5 stars

Life does get busy sometimes...

But in the midst of it all to curl up with a book like Angels and Insects is a pure delight. I must confess that A.S. Byatt is a favorite of mine, and I came in these novellas expecting a lot, of sensuousness in words, of depth in insight and mystery in story telling. I got more - in fact, about possibly everything, death, life, love and betrayal, and the afterlife, and so much more. Which all made me pause in awe, what a fine mind this lady has...

The first novella...more

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Feb 25, 2011 Christopher Koehler rated it 5 of 5 stars

The book Angels and Insects is compromised of two novellas, "Morpho Eugenia" and "The Conjugial Angel." "Morpho Eugenia" is what most people think of when they think of Angels and Insects, because ME became the movie. Like all Byatt's work, it's complicated tale, this one about Victorians, taxonomy, and sex, a story in which the lives of humans look a great deal like the lives of the insects beneath their feet. I read the novella and saw the movie while I was working on my dissertation, which de...more

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May 29, 2009 RunRachelRun rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: all-time-favorites

Must be completely honest - I've read "Angels & Insects" halfway - just can't get through "The Conjugal Angel" it's just brutally weird. My eyes read the words but my brain goes "Aggh! Can't compute - the names, the plot, the details, aggh- they just don't work!" I do love the first story - the characters of William and Amy and Matty come through clear as a bell. Just rip the book in half, place the first half on your must-read-again shelf and the last on the maybe-on-a-long-weekend-and-ther...more

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Apr 24, 2012 Vorbis rated it 2 of 5 stars

It took me a long, long time to read this. It was dense, and had characters that seemed flat and lifeless due to being secondary to the message the author was exploring. I get that the Insects were a metaphor for mankind, but exploring that took too long and just wasn't enough to hold my interests for an entire story.

This is two stories in one, the first I pushed through and read all of, the second I started and got lost from the very first sentence. They have wings. They're doing seances (my le...more

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Dec 16, 2011 Paul rated it 5 of 5 stars

Very impressed. Byatt has clearly sold her soul to the devil. That said, it must be conceded that these stories are not for the impatient. Not everyone is going to be charmed by endless descriptions of ant activity, Tennyson's poetry, Swedenborgian theology, and a somewhat unremarkable fable "written" by one of the characters, but everything comes together so neatly, you finally have to stand up and applaud. Best of all, both stories conclude with happy, dare I say exuberant, endings. This writi...more

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May 29, 2009 Elizabeth rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: postmodern-victorians

I focused on the "Insects" Section of this book (will read "Angels" another time). Byatt does a great job on the Victorian sensibility of the novella, and creates suspense and strong characterization: especially with William and Matty. The lengthy arguments on religious faith and doubt, and on insects described for popular science, though, didn't work as well in the narrative. Because elsewhere, Byatt creates a strong plot drive, I wanted to (and, full disclosure, did) skim these to get on with...more

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Jun 18, 2012 Christopher Sutch rated it 4 of 5 stars

The great appeal of Byatt ot me is her incredible facility for scholarship and how to use it to create terrific brainy fiction. The second novella, about Tennyson's sister, Arthur Hallam, and the people in 1875 conducting seances was a wonderful revelation to me. Out of a pretty dense piece of literary criticism and history Byatt manages to make a very touching story about the persistence of love on the one hand, and the letting go of a love that one made in one's youth for the love of another t...more

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Dec 31, 2009 Dreamybee rated it 2 of 5 stars

I stopped about half-way through, after the first novella. Mostly, I kept reading because I enjoyed the parts about the insects-I like to observe the critters in my yard, and I was interested in the descriptions of the ants and their behavior as written by the main guy and the woman he likes who isn't his wife. See? I can't even remember their names. Anyway, the woman who isn't his wife also writes a book/short story for children, and it is included in the novella, and I actually liked this, but...more

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May 01, 2011 Brian rated it 3 of 5 stars

I read this one for my literature discussion group, led by our extraordinary professor who is a Victorian scholar par excellance. Byatt is obviously an excellent Victorian scholar herself, as she pulls off a novel that passes for one written by a Victorian during that era. It's actually two "novellas", the first focusing on a Darwinian insect (mostly ants) metaphorical comparison with human society; and the second focusing on the Victorian preoccupation with seances and the "spirit world". What...more

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Jul 29, 2012 Cynthia rated it 3 of 5 stars

Beautifully written, rich and multi-faceted as I have come to expect from Byatt. Dare I say, however, that due to these very strengths, the novella format does not really do her characters nor her writing style justice. I do love short fiction, but because Byatt's storytelling often incorporates both breadth and depth, the full effect isn't acheived within its limitations.

I will also admit here that I know very little about poetry, even less about Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and virtually nothing ab...more

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Dec 23, 2012 Teresa Esteban rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 19th-century, brit-lit, historical-fiction

3.90/5
Another great book by Byatt on the Victorian era. Talking to other people about the author, I've come to think that whether you hate her books or you love them. And I love them. Even if this one wasn't as awesome as The Children's Book or Possession, I still enjoyed it a lot. Byatt's books are so rich –that's why, sometimes, they can be a bit "dense"–, so full of information and descriptions but also with poems, or extracts of books or fairy stories. So that, at least for me, it is very ea...more

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May 20, 2012 Murray rated it 4 of 5 stars

The only reason I withdraw a star on such a wonderful read is the very nature of the book which is comprised of two novellas. Not that there is anything wrong with the novella form but it does limit one's involvement as the ending arrives before flow of contentment has subsided. It's like having someone torn away from you life just as you found your comfort. Fortunately for me, A.S. Byatt has many more reads unread and waiting for commitment. After first reading Possession a few years back, I kn...more

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May 14, 2012 Mariano Hortal rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: british-literature, genre-contemporary

"Ángeles e insectos" de A.S Byatt. Mi puerta de entrada a la gran escritora británica se trata más de dos historias largas pero con un poderoso nexo de unión que las hace complementarias que una sola historia. En "Morpho Eugenia", la escritora nos cuenta la historia de William Adamson un naturalista que sufre un naufragio y que irá a parar a una familia aristocrática donde encontrará el amor y creará una familia. El estudio de los insectos (en especial de las hormigas y abejas), le ayudará a des...more

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May 14, 2011 Beth rated it 4 of 5 stars

It might be unfair to rate this book yet because it is in fact 2 novellas and I have only finished the first one so far. But I really enjoyed the first one so I figured I might as well review it.
If anyone had told me I would be willing to read a book (however short) where a good portion of it is about ants, I would have scoffed. And okay, yes, I did skim parts of the more intense ant paragraphs. But I really enjoyed this book.
I loved the language. I loved the intelligent questioning about relig...more

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Sep 03, 2011 Jonathan rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: britain, seen-the-film

I'd seen the film, 'Angels & Insects' a few years ago and really liked it and so when I saw the book in a secondhand bookshop a little while ago I picked it up and thought I'd read it instead of watching the film again.

The first thing is that the book is actually two novellas, the insects novella is first, 'Morpho Eugenia' and the angels novella is next, 'The Conjugial Angel'. The film is based on the first novella.

I would've given the film 4/5 but 'Morpho Eugenia' only 3/5. A.S. Byatt seems...more

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About A.S. Byatt

A.S. Byatt (Antonia Susan Byatt) is internationally known for her novels and short stories. Her novels include the Booker Prize-winning Possession, The Biographer’s Tale and the quartet, The Virgin in the Garden, Still Life, Babel Tower and A Whistling Woman, and her highly acclaimed collections of short stories include Sugar and Other Stories, The Matisse Stories, The Djinn in the Nightingale’s E...more

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“She sat beside him on the bench, and her presence troubled him. He was inside the atmosphere, or light, or scent she spread, as a boat is inside the drag of a whirlpool, as a bee is caught in the lasso of perfume from the throat of a flower.” — 4 people liked it

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BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/298381.Angels_and_Insects?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347519320l/298381.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/298381.Angels_and_Insects?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Angels and Insects by A.S. Byatt[/url]

Angels and Insects

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