Walter Pater: Lover of Strange Souls

by Denis Donoghue

Traces the life of the influential British writer who paved the way for modernism, and discusses his ideas and their reception by his contemporaries.

Genres: Biography, Art, Nonfiction, British Literature, Literary Criticism, Philosophy

372 pages, Hardcover

First published May 23, 1995

Reviews

[C. B. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is lovely and has, somehow, made me even more fond of Pater than I already was. I liked it best for chapters one to nine; these examine Pater’s life through his works and through the people he knew. It is concise, interesting, and enriches one's reading of Pater. As others, I was less keen on the middle portion of the book which looks through Pater’s works chronologically. I found plenty of interest in the chapters about works I’ve read — like The Renaissance and Marius the Epicurean — but it felt a bit off to read those chapters which dealt with ones I haven't; these are in-depth analyses which essentially assume prior knowledge of the given work. The final four chapters, however, are a return to form. Donoghue gives a wonderfully forceful argument that Pater was the first literary modernist, as well as an almost comically accurate breakdown of Pater’s style — both on the macro and micro scale. In essence, Pater’s prose is always trying to avoid essence; it’s about deferring any assuredness in anything, plodding along methodically, savouring the flashes of thought aroused by whatever is under examination (a story; an artist; a poem).

I hope to return to those middle portions of the book after I have read more Pater.

[Davis · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not exactly sure three stars is the rating this work deserves, but it seemed the only way of expressing the combination of inspiration and disappointment with which I finished the book. On the one hand, there are some really great essays in here: the last essay especially made me glad I had stuck with it to the end. But the middle section of the book, where Donoghue goes through Pater's work in detail, was a bit of a test. At times eye-opening, some of the essays pointing out Pater's supposed failure to answer all possible questions a literary critic could lob at his work didn't leave me sympathetic to Donoghue. Pater, like all of us, is incapable of answering for all of his sentences and works. Donoghue's frustration at this didn't make me a better reader of Pater - but the essays where he was able to appreciate and describe Pater's style and antinomian attitude did.

If this were a dissertation, I would have thought it great, and would have looked forward to a revised book form. As a book, it's brilliant points seem to suffer from the company they keep. Recommended for people interested in Pater and willing to deal with some head-scratching, but not for those who, as the book-flap says, are "concerned with the changing character of latter-day Western culture." Surely there must be better avenues into that prickly subject than this.

On a side note: If any of my fellow readers have recommendations for other studies of Pater that they enjoyed, I'd love to hear them.

[Clem Paulsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Widely influential, his work spawned many schools, forms, and points of view. It's the style, a strict recounting of subjective phenomena, which drew me in at first. Much of it, it's heretical to say, is the story of an early and very impressive taste for bitchiness.

An extraordinary life. You might want to take a peek at The Renaissance id you haven't before you plunge in.

[James Henderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating biography highlights the significant details of a literary life.