Hol's review

Hol's review

The Bostonians (Modern Library Classics) The Bostonians (Modern Library Classics)
by Henry James

979843 Hol's review

I loved the descriptions of place--the unfilled Back Bay in Boston, ramshackle tenements in German Manhattan, grass growing in disused shipyards on the Cape. But the main characters are hard to enjoy. Boston feminist Olive is all angry propaganda, her conservative Southern cousin Basil is all sentimental claptrap. My copy bills the book as addressing "the woman question," but social reform is only a backdrop to Olive and Basil's rivalry. I was also struck by the rootlessness of the characters--Olive without close familial ties, Basil a displaced Southerner, and both out of step with the cultural mainstream. I wondered if the author was uninterested in public life (except when it affects private life) and felt unmoored in his historical moment.

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message 1: by Amy
04/14/2008 09:01AM

719788 bostonians -- that's a toughie.
hope you'll review it here !

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message 2: by Frankiewright
04/14/2008 09:44AM

Nophoto-u-25x33 Love James but not that book. Thought Portrait of a Lady and Golden Bowl wonders. Interested to hear what you think.
Big smile to you on a pretty-sky day.

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message 3: by Amy
04/14/2008 10:16AM

719788 The Aspern Papers is another good bit of Jamesian suspense. It's great that James is still read, beyond The Turn of the Screw

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message 4: by Hol
04/14/2008 01:57PM

979843 So far it's intellectually interesting but not emotionally satisfying. I'm only about a third of the way through, though--work called as it was getting more absorbing. Or maybe the demands of work make any book suddenly more absorbing...

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