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42nd out of 58 books
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12 voters
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Dalva
by
Jim Harrison
From her home on the California coast, Dalva hears the broad silence of the Nebraska prairie where she was born and longs for the son she gave up for adoption years before. Beautiful, fearless, tormented, at forty-five she has lived a life of lovers and adventures. Now, Dalva begins a journey that will take her back to the bosom of her family, to the half-Sioux lover ...more
Paperback, 336 pages
Published
January 1st 1991
by Washington Square Press
(first published 1988)
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Jeanette
rated it
Three point five stars.
There are several male authors who are generally regarded as having a great ability to write from the perspective of a female character. When I read these authors I disagree with the assessment, most notably because they fail to capture the true complexity that is the essence of being a woman. Jim Harrison is an exception. With the character of Dalva, he explores all the layers of conflict and identity that are part of growing up female in a patriarchal society...more
Dalva is probably my favorite novel by the man who is most certainly my favorite living novelist, Jim Harrison. I've probably read it five times and just read it again because of a death in my family, and because Harrison in general always grounds me in life, and gives me a renewed appreciation for being alive.
It's very hard to describe how he brings that about; I'm not sure I understand, something about the way he writes the sentences, the things he notices. I've read everything h...more
It's very hard to describe how he brings that about; I'm not sure I understand, something about the way he writes the sentences, the things he notices. I've read everything h...more
It is unbelievable how much I love this book. I drool when thinking of it. I love Harrison's smooth, delicious writing and the language and feeling of the West comes out in every page. I love Dalva's character and her remembrances. This is totally the book for me and I have gone on to read tons more of Jim Harrison except his food book which is...boring.
Broken up into three books, the first book is Dalva's in which she explains her current life while delving into her past explaining her history and her family which is the thing most important to her. The second book is Micheal, a broken man who has surprisingly won the task of reading Dalva's great grandfather's journals. This intersplices the journals with Micheal's day to day activities which are mightily entertaining as he explores the wonders of Nebraska and its people. The third book is Da...more
This is an engaging novel. The story is broken into three different narratives. The first section would make fine novella on its own. This novel, like his best work is deeply felt. Dalva has elements of historical fiction. If you are interested in the spiritual consequences of the Fort Laramie Treaty, Little Bighorn or Wounded Knee, these book offers an interesting narrative. This book also provides meaningful commentary on the loss of local Prairie economy and culture. All of the work o...more
This book really excites me because Harrison is able to do so many things at once: imaginative storytelling/philosophy/history. His writing reads like a list of aphorisms (that aren't tiring) while plot sneaks in and unfolds.
Maybe it just fits my mood, but I'll call Dalva one of the top 10 American novels ever written. Stark landscapes, warm people and cold selfish motivation. Most accurate depiction of the plains I've ever read.
Great story. Amazing, articulate prose. I learned I could love a writer who loves hunting, fishing and Michigan. Who knew?
I wish I was this woman.
Wow, what a great book. I'm hesitant to broadly label books written by Americans, or even those written about America, as containers of American culture, but there are certain, rare works of literature which seem to contain the essence of what I feel is my American heritage. Steinbeck's East of Eden is one of these books, and so is Dalva. Harrison brings a landscape and its people so vividly to life, that they come to inhabit the reader; they become real people and places that are added to ou...more
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Nearly indescribable. Gnarly and despicable. Just kidding. I'm not sure Harrison isn't the best writer out there. Just like, the absolute best writer-of-words alive. The guy could write anything he wants, and in Dalva it sort of seems like he does. There's hardly the faintest whiff of narrative here (which makes the book difficult at times, though still beautiful), but then at the same time there are a number of huge and overarching/overlapping narratives woven throughout. At any given moment, n...more
Dalva is really good, but I'm starting to wonder about the recurring themes Mr. Harrison wraps into many of his books.
I get it now: substance abuse, family dynasties and inherited trouble, gourmet food, human footprints upon the landscape, the healing powers of nature.
On a macro-level, the author returns to these themes to explore the fragility of human life in contrast with the resounding impacts of our activities on earth. Particularly important to this exposition is ...more
I get it now: substance abuse, family dynasties and inherited trouble, gourmet food, human footprints upon the landscape, the healing powers of nature.
On a macro-level, the author returns to these themes to explore the fragility of human life in contrast with the resounding impacts of our activities on earth. Particularly important to this exposition is ...more
I loved the first part of the book. Dalva is such a fascinating character, I wish I were more like her.
However, I hated the second part of the book and the Michael character. It was really hard to read through his narration and I also though the journal entries were really boring and I ended up skimming through a lot of it.
The third part was okay. So I'm overall ambivalent. I really wish the entire book was mostly the first part, but I know a lot of people love this book and...more
However, I hated the second part of the book and the Michael character. It was really hard to read through his narration and I also though the journal entries were really boring and I ended up skimming through a lot of it.
The third part was okay. So I'm overall ambivalent. I really wish the entire book was mostly the first part, but I know a lot of people love this book and...more
Very few authors move me the way he does--his stories (alot take place in Northern Michigan)seem to be about small places but the telling is so big--he is so many things--literate, lusty, philosophical, funny, and deeply moving--his interests are sometimes so typically masculine, but he loves women, I don't care what some critics say (that he's misogynistic--bah!)... This book, and the sequel, are among my very favorites of his--he's one of the very few writers I buy anymore--in hardback too.
This was my first Jim Harrison book inspired by an interview I read with him. I loved it, at least most of it. Dalva is a wonderful character and as one blurb reviewer put it someone you would love to know. I am anxious to read more Harrison and have picked up his autobiography on sale at the library so we'll see. The second main character in the book, Michael, I couldn't get much sympathy or like for but I suspect he is in someways a portrait of Harrison himself. Finally, a "western" ...more
A true American epic, in the best sense of the word, intimate, powerful, nostalgic. A great heroine. If only for this novel, Harrison deserves to be ranked among the greatest writers of his generation. And as deeply American as this book is (especially since it talks of the Native American tragedy), it's so intensely emotional and human that it really transcends all geographical frontiers. I know of many French people who love this book a great deal because it evokes for them what fascinates the...more
This book and The Road Home are my favorites.
I became so invested in this story. I loved the way Harrison interwove a native family history with a white-western family and highlighted the complexities and challenges of it. His intimate knowledge with the Nebraska landscape was enchanting. I fell in love with this family and I wanted everything to work out for them.
I became so invested in this story. I loved the way Harrison interwove a native family history with a white-western family and highlighted the complexities and challenges of it. His intimate knowledge with the Nebraska landscape was enchanting. I fell in love with this family and I wanted everything to work out for them.
Harrison has some gems tucked in this book. I love how he creates complex characters who may or may not be central to the story. Old man Lundquist, Freida, Ted, Paul, He Dog, Charlene... are all unique and rich. I was prepared to hate the second part narrated by Michael, the idiot, but was delighted to get his perspective. I look forward to reading the next one.
A novel about a woman's search for her son. Harrison certainly takes a risk in writing two-thirds of "Dalva" from a woman's perspective. Where he fell short was in the middle of the book where he switches voice from Dalva to Michael. It felt like Dalva was getting too difficult for Harrison to delve into and so he depended on a male voice to get through the novel's tough spots. Though the book as a whole is a great read, I was disappointed in the unnecessary jolt in perspective.
Fantastically good book. When I moved from the east back to the west coast this book made me drive three days out of my way to see the Sand Hills of Nebraska. I first read this in high school and have reread every couple of years. B/c I love this book so much I can't actually give it a review without getting into minutiae which would then ruin the book.
This was one of those mea-culpa-by-association books, like Poisonwood Bible, where I was glad to have read it so I could feel outraged by my predecessors. I knew in the far reaches of my mind that our ancestors had slaughtered the majority of North American Indians and screwed them royally, but “Dalva” brought it home to my heart. “We minimize these people now so we don’t have to feel bad about what we did to them” (p.53)
I’m sometimes critical of a male author speaking through a femal...more
I’m sometimes critical of a male author speaking through a femal...more
Jim Harrison admittedly has been long a favorite of mine. He is earthy and elegant and tells complicated stories simply like he does here as Dalva tries to reconcile her adventurous life with her new middle age at the same time sorting out her family's remarkable history in Nebraska.
Un roman passionnant. La vie d'une femme, d'un peuple. Des rencontres. Une plongée dans le passé. Une nature décrite avec tellement d'amour et de précision que nous arrivons presque à sentir ses parfums. Bref, une histoire riche qui fait voyager et qui émeut. A lire absolument !
A personalized epic of the US treatment of Native Americans and their land from a modern point of view.
Great combination of characterization, plot, Ideas, forms. Sometimes could give the impression
of bragging about knowledge of nature, but that's consistent with the book's intentions.
Great combination of characterization, plot, Ideas, forms. Sometimes could give the impression
of bragging about knowledge of nature, but that's consistent with the book's intentions.
One of my top 5 favorite writers. One of the few men who can write from a woman's perspective and mostly get it right. I would love to have the opportunity to go on a fishing trip with Harrison & Hemingway; both sensual, bawdy, rowdy sexist pigs this woman can help but adore.
I have always loved Jim Harrison and thought I would love this book. I found it so tasteful because Dalva, the title character, was a man in a woman's body, Harrison typically writes gripping and masculine tales and I think this was a difficult feat for him.
Dalva is the first of a two part examination of a well to do but vaguely dysfunctional multi-generational family living in rural Nebraska during the early twentieth century. By weaving the same story multiple times from the viewpoint of different family member narrators he paints an interesting picture of the effects of a benevolent tyrant on successive generations. Harrison's love and understanding of Native Americans, especially the plains Indians, is an essential strand in the multiple stra...more
I loved this book. One of the best reads I have had in a long time. I felt compelled to read this book with a pencil in hand, to underline passages containing Harrison's and his characters' philosophical meanderings and observations. They are little vignettes that stand on their own, inviting one to open the book at random at some future time to take a peek back and reconnect with the experience of this reading, or to gain inspiration for one's own creative endeavors. Harrison has published w...more
Emma
is currently reading it
i might be in love with dalva. reproductive freedom, lots of fucking, smart women with conversations about colonialism? yes, please. not sure how i feel about jim harrison's maifest destiny obsession yet.
There are some beautiful and impressive insights into life and human nature here, and some very entertaining moments but, man, too many words. Could have been a masterpiece with half as many words.
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Jim Harrison was born in Grayling, Michigan, to Winfield Sprague Harrison, a county agricultural agent, and Norma Olivia (Wahlgren) Harrison, both avid readers. He married Linda King in 1959 with whom he has two daughters.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
His awards include Nation...more
More about Jim Harrison...
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
His awards include Nation...more
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