It centres on the group of writers surrounding Henry Wadsworth Longfellow as he translated Dante’s Commedia. Before reading the novel I knew next to nothing about these guys and now feel at least on nodding acquaintance – certainly more than ready to sample more of their work than heretofore. So that in itself is a sign of Pearl’s success at bringing them to life. And I did feel some degree of authenticity in the portraiture, unlike the Rubenfeld novel. Of course, I’m working on trust here, but there was enough that rang clear and true to be ready to lend that trust. I remember a lot of the publicity for the novel praising its ‘cleverness’, as if there were something extraordinarily demanding about dealing with this historical background, but I felt Pearl succeeded in rendering his characters believable for not-so-clever readers by not overdoing the cleverness himself.
He’s particularly good on the Civil War itself and plugs into a sense of what this meant emotionally to at least two generations of Americans. I feel this is where the heart of the novel lies. Oddly, I don’t think there’s much real power in the material dealing directly with Dante. I found all that a bit trite (maybe the result of knowing a bit too much myself, spoiling the didactic flavour of that part of the proceedings.)
Anyway I read it fast, basically in a day, putting all on-going reading aside, and that’s always a good sign.
3 comments:
You're right about The Name of the Rose being in a class of one. I'm envying your reading list while reading Huck Finn. Nothing bad about Huck Finn though -- I've come to recognise it as a very spirited and thoroughly enjoyable book indeed. Unfortunately most of my peers don't share my views.
Good to hear you being positive about Huck Finn. Actually I'm puzzled by the bad press it seems to get in school. Other than the falling away for the final fifth - which is in itself interesting to reflect upon - it seems to me obviously wonderful stuff. Maybe we should just read the best bits aloud and let its magic do the work for us?
Ah, the infamous Phelps's farm sequence. I think it does Huck a disservice but tells us much about Twain. I think it's a problem of reading: some students don't like having to work out what Jim is saying. That's the reason why the people who dislike Huck Finn dislike King Lear as well. For people like us who read The Canterbury Tales in the original Middle English (with glossary, of course), however, these are trifles. I think that was arrogant.
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