Bright Young Things discussion
This topic is about
Bloomsbury Pie
Group Reads Archive
>
June 2012 - Bloomsbury Pie by Regina Marler
date
newest »
newest »
I loved this....kind of a curio. I've read so much about the group and admire their work...and then there are all the films about them....this just fascinated me. I'll be very interested to hear what everyone else thinks.
Mod
It started off ok - I was interested in how Leonard Woolf was quite unconventional in the way he managed Virginia Woolf's literary estate after her death. The media and public opinion of the 'bloomsberries' was also fairly interesting. After that it went quite deeply into Vanessa Bell and her family, who doesn't really interest me much. Also, my view of Bloomsbury includes T.S. Eliot, James Joyce, E.M. Forster & co., which this book didn't really touch on (...unless I gave up too soon!). The way it was written was a little dry, when I found my self skim reading and skipping pages I knew it was time to give up.
Unfortunately, I was the same way...skim read. This is partly my fault as I am not curious about how the group became revitalized. I was hoping for more of a biography about the original group during their time and not just focussed on Virginia and Vanessa.
This book is an excellent addition to my collection of 'Bloomsbury' books, and the first I've read that takes a wide view of the whole concept of Bloomsbury. In an intellectual, but very readable way, as she traces the history of the Group and the concept, Marler searches for answers to the questions: What exactly is Bloomsbury? Why is it compelling? What has contributed to its rising and falling in popularity? Who were the real Bloomsberries? (Love that word, and I've never seen it before this book.) Of course she also talks about the types of people who are attracted, so I looked for and found myself among her examples.I learned a great deal, and found it particularly interesting to see how differently the British and the Americans have reacted to, and treated Bloomsbury as an idea, and 'The Bloomsberries' themselves over the years. (less) [edit]
Enjoy!