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Neighboring Lives
Carlyle, Swinburne, John Stuart Mill... Rossetti, Whistler, Lewis Carroll... these and other characters come vividly to life in this extraordinary novel. Set within a few square blocks along the Thames, in Chelsea, Neighboring Lives is a glorious re-creation, based on historical fact, of the private and working lives of many of the nineteenth century's greatest writers and artists.
- GenresHistorical Fiction
368 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1981
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
September 29, 2021
A re-read for notes.
I read this to makes notes so I did not plan to review but here are my scattered thoughts. It's a difficult read, using historical and real people as characters and showing them in their community, which was Victorian Chelsea. It covers a lot of time. Starts in 1846 in Chelsea and ends in 1866. People mentioned: The Carlyles, of course, Leigh Hunt after Shelley's death, Whistler, some Lewis Carroll, some Rossettis, even some Swinburne. At times it reads like nonfiction and is nonfiction and at times it's not. But it's intelligent and thoughtful and I really enjoyed it. Enough to read page by page and take notes like I would be doing from a history book. These two authors obviously know their subjects, and all these chapters are sorts of recreations of real life events. John Stuart Mills shows up. Chopin does, too. One gets a good sense of these people's daily lives and their struggles to create art while just living day to day. I really enjoyed it very much. It was hard work taking notes and deciding what I wanted to remember and what I didn't. It was kind of like a college class, a semester's time of work because I started reading it the last week of March 2021. And since I had so much going on, I had to do marginalia and make notes from thoughts I'd written in the book. One of the best thing was details about the landscape. Chelsea was its own little town. And I do love Chelsea. It's where I would love to live today. And historically, it's my golden place, too. I made a map, too. I have a map of London, England with some of these details written down on it. Laughing. Ah, to be so obsessive. HIGH RECOMMENDED.
I read this to makes notes so I did not plan to review but here are my scattered thoughts. It's a difficult read, using historical and real people as characters and showing them in their community, which was Victorian Chelsea. It covers a lot of time. Starts in 1846 in Chelsea and ends in 1866. People mentioned: The Carlyles, of course, Leigh Hunt after Shelley's death, Whistler, some Lewis Carroll, some Rossettis, even some Swinburne. At times it reads like nonfiction and is nonfiction and at times it's not. But it's intelligent and thoughtful and I really enjoyed it. Enough to read page by page and take notes like I would be doing from a history book. These two authors obviously know their subjects, and all these chapters are sorts of recreations of real life events. John Stuart Mills shows up. Chopin does, too. One gets a good sense of these people's daily lives and their struggles to create art while just living day to day. I really enjoyed it very much. It was hard work taking notes and deciding what I wanted to remember and what I didn't. It was kind of like a college class, a semester's time of work because I started reading it the last week of March 2021. And since I had so much going on, I had to do marginalia and make notes from thoughts I'd written in the book. One of the best thing was details about the landscape. Chelsea was its own little town. And I do love Chelsea. It's where I would love to live today. And historically, it's my golden place, too. I made a map, too. I have a map of London, England with some of these details written down on it. Laughing. Ah, to be so obsessive. HIGH RECOMMENDED.
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November 3, 2022DNF
July 10, 2015
from 2005.
Another big thick historical novel, I particularly enjoyed reading Neighboring Lives, by Thomas M. Disch and Charles Naylor so soon after reading David Lodge's new book (scroll down) as it similarly details historical fact with fictional embellishments - those hidden conversations, assignations, and meetings we wish we'd been a fly on the wall for. Where Lodge imagined Henry James, Naylor and Disch focus on the pre-Raphaelites: Rossetti, Morris, Carlyle, Holman-Hunt, among others. Greatly enjoyed it. Extremely well-written. Man, did it take me back to grad school. Got to pull some pre-Raph poetry off the shelves and walk my academic memory lane.
This Thomas Disch guy - he's some kind of crazy Renaissance man. The first book I read for him was pure sci fi - and spooky spooky sci fi at that. Now this very intensely literary, academic, imagining. Is there anything he can't write?
Another big thick historical novel, I particularly enjoyed reading Neighboring Lives, by Thomas M. Disch and Charles Naylor so soon after reading David Lodge's new book (scroll down) as it similarly details historical fact with fictional embellishments - those hidden conversations, assignations, and meetings we wish we'd been a fly on the wall for. Where Lodge imagined Henry James, Naylor and Disch focus on the pre-Raphaelites: Rossetti, Morris, Carlyle, Holman-Hunt, among others. Greatly enjoyed it. Extremely well-written. Man, did it take me back to grad school. Got to pull some pre-Raph poetry off the shelves and walk my academic memory lane.
This Thomas Disch guy - he's some kind of crazy Renaissance man. The first book I read for him was pure sci fi - and spooky spooky sci fi at that. Now this very intensely literary, academic, imagining. Is there anything he can't write?
December 16, 2014
Here's historical fiction centered on Chelsea in the 1830-60's, detailed and daily in its delights, Thomas Carlyle and his Jenny, the Rossettis and their crowd, Swinburne and Whistler with a glimpse of Turner. Domestic, quiet, the most extravagant events of a destroyed manuscript, mistresses and scandal embedded in the inexorable movement of days. The texture is soft and muted, with a whiff of the reeking Thames. You enter lives that have a great deal of persuasive ordinariness about them however notable the names. I wonder if Spall in his extensive research for the movie Mr. Turner happened upon this book? For atmosphere, for the time and place, I think the novel hard to match--a key to a past world.
October 6, 2014
A very interesting book, filled with Carlyle, Rossetti, and many denizens of 1860's Chelsea in London. Alice, inspiration for the "Adventures in Wonderland" even makes a brief appearance. English Majors will love it!
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews