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Editorial Review Product Description
Admired by T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, Graham Greene, and Dylan Thomas, Djuna Barnes was the most influential and prolific female writer in Paris during the 1920s and 1930s. The Modern Library is proud to include--for the first time--her most critically acclaimed novel, Nightwood, which was praised by The Washington Post Book World as "a masterpiece of modernism." Dorothy Allison, author of the National Book Award-nominated novel Bastard Out of Carolina, has written an Introduction especially for this edition, in which she defends Nightwood as a lesbian classic.
First published in the United States in 1937, Nightwood is a novel of bold imagining and passionate, lyrical prose. Described by the author as the soliloquy of "a soul talking to itself in the heart of the night," the novel creates a dreamlike world in which time ceases to exist and in which human beings transform into animals. At Nightwood's center are the love affairs of Robin Vote--a character based on Barnes's lover, Thelma Wood. Robin marries Felix Volkbein, an eccentric aristocrat, whom she meets in Paris, and whom she abandons years later for the American Nora Flood. But Nora cannot contain Robin, either, and Robin in turn deserts her for the larcenous Jenny Petherbridge. Rich in irony and symbolism, Nightwood brilliantly depicts the all-consuming power of erotic obsession in language that twists and turns, drawing the reader into a labyrinth of meaning and revelation. This edition also includes T. S. Eliot's Introduction to the 1937 American edition.
Elizabeth Hardwick wrote, "Djuna Barnes is a writer of wild and original gifts. . . .To her name there is always to be attached the splendor of Nightwood, a lasting achievement of her great gifts and eccentricities---her passionate prose and, in this case, a genuineness of human passions."
Amazon.com Review
Nightwood is not only a classic of lesbian literature,but was also acknowledged by no less than T. S. Eliot asone of the great novels of the 20th century. Eliot admired DjunaBarnes' rich, evocative language. Lesbian readers will admire theexquisite craftsmanship and Barnes' penetrating insights intoobsessive passion. Barnes told a friend that Nightwood waswritten with her own blood "while it was still running." That flowingwound was the breakup of an eight-year relationship with the lesbianlove of her life. ... Read more Customer Reviews (27) 
Read it twice (please) and then discuss it in book group
At the March 2008 meeting of the NYC LGBT Center Book Discussion group, we discussed "Nightwood" by Djuna Barnes.
We had a very small group that was surprised at the difficultly and rewards and incomprehensibility and pleasure of the novel. One reader brought his notes about Barnes' biography, which were very helpful. By discussing several aspects of the novel, we learned more about what was going on and made sense of much of it, including the "what just happened?!" ending.
We all agreed that it is much more understandable on its second reading. This may be a great novel (#11 on The Publishing Triangle's list of 100 Best Lesbian and Gay Novels), but it seems very odd and difficult to approach without knowing Barnes' life and having some additional tools to handle the text.
Why did I give this four stars? This is a three-star review for the book itself and a FIVE-STAR REVIEW for book groups considering reading it.
I do not get it
I have tried to read this book several times over the past twenty years and never made it past page 25. I found the book to be stupefyingly dull. I find this vey puzzling because the list of Barnes admirers are legion. Everyone from T.S. Eliot to Samuel R. Delany to Herbert Read have proclaimed the book's greatness.Moreover, I have read and admired many abstrct and abstruse books. I don't get it. It must be some fault of mine that prevents me from appreciating this novel.
Maybe someone can leave me a comment that will put it together for me.
Breathtakingly Bad: as Art/Life-Affirming as a Steven Seagal film.
This book is so embarassingly, jaw-droppingly, crosseyed-inducingly bad, I wonder what T.S. Possum was ever smoking when he agreed to write the preface for it (which is also badly written, go figure!).
My only explanation for how this book/writer ever became published/famous, is, most feminist readers simply do not read very much other than feminist writers, and so, alas, become woefully deluded as to even basic literary values (vide, gibbering eulogist reviews re Barnes romancière).
Perhaps the only justification a sane grown-up human being has in reading this turbid swill, is it is really, really (I mean, you-can't-make-this-stuff-up!) funny, to make fun of. If, in fact, you are like me -- somebody what feels like they have "read everything" and are moving on with jaded appetite to 4th and 5th tier litterati -- I actually heartily recommend "NightBoner" as a bracing cordial of pure giddy hilariousness. The blunders come so bewilderingly turgid and apace (literally every line would, if found singly, make you wince) that altogether they constitute a sort of big fun symphonic Blooper, like a gushing "Tour de Force, majeure" that not only absolves the reader of that once sacred trust -- in the basic daring, decency, and humanity of the writer -- but invites, even taunts, us to rubberneck along in a dazed and stupefying trance while this weird pretense-puffed creature self-implodes... leaving behind the lonely and incomprehensible void whence she came.
Perhaps people just shouldn't named their kid "Djuna" to begin with. Maybe it isn't an auspicious start for the orotund-prone.
I wonder if she was even aware that while she was indulging her florid, flailing, 10th-grade best on paper, writers like Céline or Isak Denison or other 1930's leviathans were laboring, humbly and maturely and painstakingly, at the real Thing?
I am indeed somehow reminded of the local ping-ping champion who, in all his pride and innocence, had never heard of the chinese olympic team. But I suppose, at a certain point, it is just awkward to juxtapose, when it's not already obvious, nicht wahr?(oh yeah, attaching itty unneccesary bits of foreign lingua franca to mortar her crumbling Queen's English is one of Barne's favorite literary resorts. This troubles the real multi-linguist; she also likes words like juxtapose.)
Anyway, a person who actually is literate will perhaps find a similar fascination in another obscenely overrated, ex-pat, paname writer's romp: James Baldwin's "Giovanni's Room". It too is a They're-So-Bad-They're-Good, 5th-tier-book-club monstrosity.
I am serious though this type of fake writing is so depressing and pathetic and transparent, in its tinseled pomp and grotesque bungling and simpering aesthete foppery, that I am truly dumbfounded it has a following -- however PHD-thesis evolved and sustained she be.
The Edge of Attention
There is no question that Djuna Barnes' book is engaging. To begin to read it is to fall into a mania; descending word after word into the pathetic world of the four main characters - especially Dr. O'Conner, whose errant monologues expose the other characters while covering his own descent.
Is it well-written? No doubt; the descriptions are moving, the scenes (when there are scenes) are gripping, and the characters are alive. But it's easy to fall into the question: does all of the book matter? During some of Dr. O'Conner rambling tangents, for example, I could've flipped through another book or made myself some tea, coming back (as after a commercial break) to engage with the truly consequential passages. Of course it's difficult to know what matters in one reading, which makes "Nightwood," in its way, a bit of a trick.
It's short enough, at 180 pages, to speed through and see in hindsight almost before it's finished. This saves the book; the rush one feels reading it is both modern, and a signature of a paradoxical writer, reckless, but in complete control of the reader's attention - having O'Conner become interesting right before he closes the book.
Aside from my reading experience, "Nightwood" is a classic of lesbian literature, a modern marvel, and recommended by T.S. Eliot (so?).
So, decision time. Buy it? Check it out from the library? That depends. For the lover of conservative styles and plots, probably not. But for the edgy reader, into a little risk - "Nightwood" is it.
A prose poem...
... is T. S. Eliot's description of Djuana Barnes novel. It is that, and much more. I first read this novel almost 40 years ago; felt I understood very little of it.In the intervening time I have walked past, and patronized the Café de la Mairie, a backdrop for much of the action, on the north side of the square in front of St. Sulpice numerous times. Unquestionable a radically different café in the `30's, certainly not surrounded by the very chic shops of today.The Café "nagged" me into giving it a second try.
I am truly grateful that it was not a school assignment. I imagined a Professor expecting effusive praise, and that my report on the book would have to be filled with ramblings on "transgender identification," "anomie," "angst," "symbolism," "codependence," "transcendent wisdom" and of course, "stream of consciousness."And with a bit of luck, I might get a B -.
But when your main motivation is a pleasant café, and a "does-your-perspective-improve-with-age" attitude, then what? No question the prose is rich and dense, with wonderful insights, coupled with sheer and utter nonsense. Consider some of the wonderful passages: "Love is the first lie; wisdom the last." or "We give death to a child when we give it a doll--it's the effigy and the shroud; when a woman gives it to a woman, it is the life they cannot have, it is their child, sacred and profane:..." There is a wonderful analogy for love in the ducks in Golden Gate park so heavy on overfeeding that they cannot fly.But regrettably these oscillate with the utter nonsense of: "He had a turban cocked over his eye and a moaning in his left ventricle which was meant to be the whine of Tophet, and a loin-cloth as big as a tent and protecting about as much."And that is why so many readers, including myself, find the book such a difficult read. Brilliance, alternating with the drug-induced ramblings worthy of William Burroughs, NOT, James Joyce.
"Baron" Felix seems the best drawn, and most understandable of the characters. His child, Guido, likewise, for a minor character. The four central characters: Robin Vote, Nora Flood, Jenny Petherbridge and Dr. Matthew O'Connor all seemed far too opaque, motivation is clearly lacking for so many of their actions. True, a central theme is lesbian love, and its betrayals, with bit parts for transvestitism. All of which I am constitutional incapable of having deep insights into... but still, if reading is too illuminate, there was only a small candle glowing on these issues.
I was struck by the quality of the other reviews on this book, the best, by far, of any other book on Amazon. Many of their insights do not need to be duplicated in this one - one commenter in fact said there was no need to write one after reading Eric Anderson's.Yes, it is an excellent review.
Overall I settled on a 3-star rating.It is a provocative, radical book, particularly for the `30's, with some wonderful insights into the human condition.But it is so hard to stay focused when these are combined with the William Burroughs nonsense. (Sorry, "Professor.")It was with a sense of profound relief that I finished the book, realizing in the unlikely event I have another 40 years to go, there will not be a third try.
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