steriella99's review against another edition
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
3.25
sparksinthevoid's review against another edition
huh????? this book made me feel stupid.
book 7 for my moderns module
book 7 for my moderns module
mrsy09's review against another edition
challenging
dark
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
cuqjids's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
informative
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
5.0
mmlemonade's review against another edition
1.0
Peut-être ce livre fut révolutionnaire en termes de littérature surréaliste, d’écriture automatique, mais il est d’un ennui mortel. L’auteur utilise des phrases beaucoup trop compliquées (probablement pour se donner un air supérieur) pour ne pas dire grand chose, pour décrire son quotidien et ses réflexions. Je me suis même longtemps interrogée à savoir s’il s’agissait véritablement d’un roman et non pas d’un essai, de Breton qui donne ses impressions sur ses collègues artistes et sur les pièces de théâtre auxquelles il assiste.
C’est peut-être plus intelligible quand Nadja arrive en scène vers la moitié du livre mais il reste que leur relation est assez banale et l'écriture redevient abstraite au moment où elle quitte la scène.
Le surréalisme, bien qu'intéressant en peinture, ne convient pas à la littérature. Celle-ci a besoin d'une structure afin de raconter une histoire.
C’est peut-être plus intelligible quand Nadja arrive en scène vers la moitié du livre mais il reste que leur relation est assez banale et l'écriture redevient abstraite au moment où elle quitte la scène.
Le surréalisme, bien qu'intéressant en peinture, ne convient pas à la littérature. Celle-ci a besoin d'une structure afin de raconter une histoire.
sarahhahmad's review against another edition
5.0
4.5 stars— nadja walked so all the other manic pixie dream girls could run
casparb's review against another edition
4.0
This roams into the strong 3.5 territory it is a difficulty it is wonderful and Breton-y in the way I adored when I read the Manifestoes of Surrealism which are still exquisite and explosive and deserving a reread but Nadja is overlapping hauntings and painful therein. André can be earnestly beautiful. His prose is certainly among the best of the era.
I think Nadja the person tears holes in this text. What happens to her is heartbreaking, but because it is a true story and Nadja was indeed Nadja and Breton had this relationship with her. It doesn't cast him in the best light. Compelled the imagination for many days.
I think Nadja the person tears holes in this text. What happens to her is heartbreaking, but because it is a true story and Nadja was indeed Nadja and Breton had this relationship with her. It doesn't cast him in the best light. Compelled the imagination for many days.
kjackso's review against another edition
4.0
“…It would be hateful to refuse whatever she asks of me, one way or another, for she is so pure, so free of any earthly tie, and cares so little, but so marvelously, for life.”
Noooobody does manic pixie dream girl like a French surrealist. Intellectual man meets (psychotic?) woman (ghost?), becomes obsessed to the point that you get the idea he's carrying around a little notebook and writing down quotes of what she says (he lists his favorites towards the end) and then bails at the first sign that her life isn't all poetic coincidences and good eyeliner. Literally:
"A story of a blow in the face that had drawn blood, one day, in Brasserie Zimmer, a blow from a man whom she gave herself the sly pleasure of refusing simply because he was low.... almost managed to alienate me from her forever. I don't know what sense of absolute irremediability her rather bantering account of this horrible incident inspired in me, but I wept a long time after hearing it..."
Also the climax of this love story manages to include: an extensive review of drawings that (if Nadja is considered as a *real person*) really lend evidence to that fact that she's probably been institutionalized, a pretty good rant on prison abolition, and somehow, the author making the entire story about him. Truly genre-making, four stars purely out of respect for the start of all the most annoying tropes. Also some really good offerings on the surreal:
“I am concerned with facts of quite unverifiable intrinsic value, but which, by their absolutely unexpected violently fortuitous character, and the kind of associations of suspect ideas they provoke.”
“I do not admire Flaubert, yet when I am told that by his own admission all he hoped to accomplish in in Salammbo was to 'give the impression of the color yellow' and in Madame Bovary 'to do something that would have the color of those mouldy cornices that harbor wood lice' and that he cared for nothing else, such generally extra-literary preoccupations leave me anything but indifferent.”
Noooobody does manic pixie dream girl like a French surrealist. Intellectual man meets (psychotic?) woman (ghost?), becomes obsessed to the point that you get the idea he's carrying around a little notebook and writing down quotes of what she says (he lists his favorites towards the end) and then bails at the first sign that her life isn't all poetic coincidences and good eyeliner. Literally:
"A story of a blow in the face that had drawn blood, one day, in Brasserie Zimmer, a blow from a man whom she gave herself the sly pleasure of refusing simply because he was low.... almost managed to alienate me from her forever. I don't know what sense of absolute irremediability her rather bantering account of this horrible incident inspired in me, but I wept a long time after hearing it..."
Also the climax of this love story manages to include: an extensive review of drawings that (if Nadja is considered as a *real person*) really lend evidence to that fact that she's probably been institutionalized, a pretty good rant on prison abolition, and somehow, the author making the entire story about him. Truly genre-making, four stars purely out of respect for the start of all the most annoying tropes. Also some really good offerings on the surreal:
“I am concerned with facts of quite unverifiable intrinsic value, but which, by their absolutely unexpected violently fortuitous character, and the kind of associations of suspect ideas they provoke.”
“I do not admire Flaubert, yet when I am told that by his own admission all he hoped to accomplish in in Salammbo was to 'give the impression of the color yellow' and in Madame Bovary 'to do something that would have the color of those mouldy cornices that harbor wood lice' and that he cared for nothing else, such generally extra-literary preoccupations leave me anything but indifferent.”