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Title: The Farewell Symphony by Edmund White ISBN: 0-679-75476-8 Publisher: Random House Pub. Date: 01 September, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.93 (15 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Brilliantly written book about a man's place in time.
Comment: I'm always intrugued by White's work and his singular ability to capture not only his stories but mine and those of many other gay men. As a raconteur of the dawning and tarnishing of gaylife, he is peerless. He leaves me breathless, having to re-read the last paragraph over & over.
Rating: 4
Summary: Flawed masterpiece
Comment: White's The Unfinished Symphony masterfully completes the trilogy begun with A Boy's Own Story. White's novels speak for a generation of gay men who witnessed the burgeoning of gay liberation and despaired at the devestation of AIDS on the community. It must be read in sequence with A Boy's Own Story and The Beautiful Room is Empty to fully feel the impact of the narrative.
The Unfinished Symphony sees a change in style from the other two novels. With clearer prose and less imagery than the previous two it at times loses some of the beauty of its predeccesors. Having said that this novel is more raw and grittier, more physical and forceful and as a result invokes a whole different range of sensory images than the first instalments.
In certain sections of the novel, the descriptive narrative tends to border on the mundane and dull but when White taps into the emotions of family and death the novel soars and speaks to you both as a human being and as a gay man. The recounting of the relationship with his sister and the illness of his mother is written from the heart and speaks a universal language. The emotional desolation wrought by the deaths of many friends to AIDS leaves the reader drained but feeling extremely human. The emotive passages as the novel nears completion make up for any over descriptive and dull passages earlier on.
I have referred to this book as a flawed masterpiece. Flawed, in my opinion, as a result of the decreased use of the imagery and senses used in the prior books. A masterpiece due to its rawness, its honesty and its ability to hurt, to make us ache and to make us feel human.
Rating: 5
Summary: One Violinist Remains...
Comment: White chose the title to this novel from Haydn's The Farewell Symphony, in which, as the musical piece nears conclusion, the musicians leave the stage, one by one, until there is a sole violinist remaining, who finishes the work that so many others began.
In White's novel, we are taken on a tour of the protagonist's (White himself) 30's, 40's, and 50's as he climbs from unknown author to celebrated chronicler of gay life. Along the way, White bares his soul through his no-holds-barred sexual confessions, as we see him interract with friends, lovers, and back-alley liaisons.
Beginning post-Stonewall, and culminating in the AIDS crisis we witness White in many scenarios: best friend, object of desire, live-in lover, and even surrogate parent. White envelops each role with his particularly magical brand of prose, sentiment, and bravado, that is sometimes shocking, sometimes sad, but always entertaining.
As the novel carries on, and reaches the now 20 year old beginning of the AIDS epidemic, we see the significance and poignancy of the title, as the disease ravages the ranks of White's friends, and leaves him the one violinist remaining to chronicle their lives, as they intertwined with his own.
From backrooms to bedrooms, from parking lots to Paris, with stops in New York, Venice, and Morrocco along the way, White delivers another triumph in chronicling his life, and what began as A Boy's Own Story becomes the life of a man.
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Title: The Beautiful Room Is Empty : A Novel by Edmund White ISBN: 0679755403 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 04 October, 1994 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: A Boy's Own Story by Edmund White ISBN: 0375707409 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 30 May, 2000 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: Nocturnes for the King of Naples by Edmund White ISBN: 0312022638 Publisher: St. Martin's Press Pub. Date: 15 July, 1988 List Price(USD): $7.95 |
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Title: Caracole by EDMUND WHITE ISBN: 067976416X Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 28 May, 1996 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: Swimming Pool Library by Alan Hollinghurst ISBN: 0679722564 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 19 September, 1989 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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