Ascexis's review
Mistress Masham's Repose
by T.H. White
Gosh, I didn't know you could still get a copy of this. I read it when I was about twelve. I was intrigued and baffled -- it certainly wasn't like anything else I'd ever read. I had to go read Gulliver's Travels when I was done. It actually has a similar odd tone --didactic, sarcastic, and entertaining, all in one. I particularly liked Maria's giant house. My favorite part was the illustrations-- my long out of print edition has lots of terrific illustrations by Fritz Eichenberg.
Ascexis's review
Mistress Masham's Repose by T.H. White
Ascexis's review
rating:
I liked this, don't get me wrong. But it's a flawed story, and while I enjoyed it, I found myself skipping or rolling my eyes at chunks.
It reads like an elderly professor telling a story to a favoured niece/nephew, and for all I know it was. It doesn't read like something intended for publication, it's bitty, weirdly paced, very episodic, has sporadic digressions into fairly dry subjects and asides, and then finishes up with a rush of an action adventure ending, as though the author suddenly noticed said niece/nephew falling asleep.
The pace is slow, the people mostly cariacatures outside the two protagonists. It's a dry sort of book, and the disparity between Maria and the Professor's styles as the story switches between their povs is a little disconcerting, particularly when neither of them really listens to or understands the other.
After Gulliver let the story slip, a ship's captain returned to Lilliput and kidnapped a chest full of Lilliputians to display in public. Th...more
It reads like an elderly professor telling a story to a favoured niece/nephew, and for all I know it was. It doesn't read like something intended for publication, it's bitty, weirdly paced, very episodic, has sporadic digressions into fairly dry subjects and asides, and then finishes up with a rush of an action adventure ending, as though the author suddenly noticed said niece/nephew falling asleep.
The pace is slow, the people mostly cariacatures outside the two protagonists. It's a dry sort of book, and the disparity between Maria and the Professor's styles as the story switches between their povs is a little disconcerting, particularly when neither of them really listens to or understands the other.
After Gulliver let the story slip, a ship's captain returned to Lilliput and kidnapped a chest full of Lilliputians to display in public. Th...more
Gosh, I didn't know you could still get a copy of this. I read it when I was about twelve. I was intrigued and baffled -- it certainly wasn't like anything else I'd ever read. I had to go read Gulliver's Travels when I was done. It actually has a similar odd tone --didactic, sarcastic, and entertaining, all in one. I particularly liked Maria's giant house. My favorite part was the illustrations-- my long out of print edition has lots of terrific illustrations by Fritz Eichenberg.