Djuna Barnes
Paperback | Pages: 182 pages Rating: 3.66 | 8803 Users | 885 Reviews
Mention Of Books Nightwood
| Title | : | Nightwood |
| Author | : | Djuna Barnes |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | First Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 182 pages |
| Published | : | September 26th 2006 by New Directions (first published 1936) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Classics. LGBT. GLBT. Queer. Novels |
Commentary Conducive To Books Nightwood
Nightwood, Djuna Barnes' strange and sinuous tour de force, "belongs to that small class of books that somehow reflect a time or an epoch" (TLS). That time is the period between the two World Wars, and Barnes' novel unfolds in the decadent shadows of Europe's great cities, Paris, Berlin, and Vienna—a world in which the boundaries of class, religion, and sexuality are bold but surprisingly porous. The outsized characters who inhabit this world are some of the most memorable in all of fiction—there is Guido Volkbein, the Wandering Jew and son of a self-proclaimed baron; Robin Vote, the American expatriate who marries him and then engages in a series of affairs, first with Nora Flood and then with Jenny Petherbridge, driving all of her lovers to distraction with her passion for wandering alone in the night; and there is Dr. Matthew-Mighty-Grain-of-Salt-Dante-O'Connor, a transvestite and ostensible gynecologist, whose digressive speeches brim with fury, keen insights, and surprising allusions. Barnes' depiction of these characters and their relationships (Nora says, "A man is another person—a woman is yourself, caught as you turn in panic; on her mouth you kiss your own") has made the novel a landmark of feminist and lesbian literature. Most striking of all is Barnes' unparalleled stylistic innovation, which led T. S. Eliot to proclaim the book "so good a novel that only sensibilities trained on poetry can wholly appreciate it." Now with a new preface by Jeanette Winterson, Nightwood still crackles with the same electric charge it had on its first publication in 1936.Specify Books Supposing Nightwood
| Original Title: | Nightwood |
| ISBN: | 0811216713 (ISBN13: 9780811216715) |
| Edition Language: | English |
Rating Of Books Nightwood
Ratings: 3.66 From 8803 Users | 885 ReviewsNotice Of Books Nightwood
"I have been loved," she said, "By something strange, and it has forgotten me!"Here is something strange, a 1936 landmark of modernist gay poetry disguised as a novella. It's written with unstoppable confidence and verve and the dangerous knowledge that all people are possible, and any of them may be geniuses. It follows a love triangle of three women as they pursue each other hopelessly around the world. A gender-fluid doctor provides commentary and impenetrable advice. "I have a narrative," heMany of the reviews of Nightwood on this website seem to reflect the same sentiment, 'how do I even review this?' I often think this is a bit of a cop-out review but in the case of Djuna Barnes' Modernist novel from 1936, utter disorientation seems to be the most fitting response.A novel generally follows a basic plot with some semblance of a structure and often has one main character. Nightwood begins the birth of Baron Felix. We learn about his false patronage and we follow him in his attempt
I enjoyed the style and originality of Nightwood, but didn't love it, for two reasons. The first is that it is very much of its time. The novel feels like a push-back, a response to the status-quo, an attempt to embody some form of modernity. I felt I lacked context; I found it difficult to meaningfully relate to this narrow, obsolete zeitgeist. The second reason, is that I could not connect deeply enough to the characters - especially to the three women - to feel involved in their minds and the
My second reading of this, but my first of the Dalkey edition. Reading it along with other of her work this year I have no doubt of her place amongst the great literary geniuses of the inter-war era. She is unafraid of complexity, subtlety and nuance. She is unabashedly, proudly, queer (and the un-censored Dalkey edition does much to bring the transgressive power of this text back to life). She has the intelligence, ambition and courage to produce truly great art.This is one of the great books
Night people do not bury their dead, but on the neck of you, their beloved and waking, sling the creature, husked of its gestures. And where you go, it goes, the two of you, your living and her dead, that will not die; to daylight, to life, to grief, until both are carrion.Nightwood is such a strange book and this isn't so much a ramrod- straight person's reaction to gay-lesbian literature as the feverish, dream-like quality of the text like you've stumbled into someone's nightmare & can't
T.S. Elliot said of Nightwood, that it was "so good a novel that only sensibilities trained on poetry can wholly appreciate it". It's really more like a poetic dream than it is a novel. This isn't really because there is no narrative to be found, there is, and what's more, there is a clearly defined romantic conflict between the two main female characters, Nora Flood and Robin Vote. What makes it poetic is probably the flowery digressions that follow the brief explanations of what is happening
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